In a recent interview, online marketing consultant Brent Csutoras gave some advice that all social media marketers should take to heart, don’t rush your social media link bait. Of course, like most things, this is easier said than done. Many of you have been in a situation where you felt you had a great offer or article and set your bait only to face disappointing returns. Even great content can be a let down if you rush to get it in front of the wrong set of eyes.

So how do you ensure that your bait will work? Research. Lots of research. Research should be at the core of every marketing campaign. If you begin your communications efforts by researching your market, you can avoid making mistakes and rushing your social media bait.

To begin you should pick the right community to use. Many social media networking websites provide descriptions of their purpose. These should tell you if the site reaches the type of people you want to reach. If the site does not have a description, explore the site to better understand the common interests of its users.

Once you’ve identified the sites that are most useful to you, spend a good deal of time on each site (or hire someone to do it) conducting your own research. Become familiar with the community. Figure out what appeals to them and how they communicate with each other. Make friends and be social with them. Get a network going and tend to that network. By taking the time to become part of their social networking community, you will be better prepared to create effective social media bait.

During your initial research and experience with the social network website, determine the type of bait that has been successful in the past. What type of message appealed to this particular community? What didn’t work? Make a list of ideas that can be accessed later to help you brainstorm.

Once you have a list of potentially effective ideas, pick the one that seems most valuable to that particular social media network and keep the others for future use. When developing this particular link bait, make sure it’s valuable, that it meets an interest or need. You want to make sure you become a source for quality information, not screaming hype, that way you can build trust and users will respond to your bait in the future. Plus, if you provide quality information, people will link to you. Here are some tips for developing successful content:

• Don’t clutter your site with advertisements. Have a few selected advertisements, but let your content shine.
• Have links to related posts on your site.
• If you’d like them to comment make the RSS features prominent.
• Make sure your article has a title that focuses on the viral point.
• Have a clean description that follows up on the title, but provides more information.

After you develop your link bait, get your friends involved. That’s the benefit of establishing relationships prior to laying link bait. Once people get to know you, they are more likely to be interested in helping you or learning more about you.

Social media websites are not your typical website. Traditional websites have static content that is only updated to meet a particular organizational need. Social media networks are more like living, breathing organisms. They are constantly changing, growing and adapting to users’ interests and concerns. While you may be familiar with social media websites in general, it is important to get experience with a particular social media site before marketing to its community.As I said before, social media networking sites are constantly changing and evolving. That’s because these sites are more like online communities than portals for information. Before you attempt to market your products in one of these social media websites, it’s important that you know as much as you can about who visits each particular site and what their interests are.

To begin, you should brainstorm a list of social media websites that may be good platforms to market your product or service. After you develop this list, make a point to visit and join the social media networking communities that have the potential to help you meet your goals. Once you join these communities, you should collect as much information as you can about the members of these social media networking sites and their interests.

Since research is crucial to an effective targeted marketing campaign, it is imperative that you know as much about the members of each social media networking site as possible before you begin to market your services. Consider the first few weeks that you join a site as time dedicated to research. Below are some questions that may be helpful to ask of each community:

• What are some common characteristics of the members of this social media website?

Are the members all women, small business owners, teens, doctors? Knowing who you are dealing with is critical to developing a targeted marketing message. Small business owners may respond best to a marketing message about a service that promises to improve their bottom line whereas teens may respond best to a message that promises a product will impress their peers.

• What are some common concerns, desires or themes discussed on this social media website?

By closely monitoring a site, you will begin to see patterns in the topics discussed. For example, a group of small business owners may talk about how they wish they knew more about selling their products online. You may notice that in these discussions eBay is frequently mentioned. This could point to a potential opportunity for you to offer customized eBay coaching courses. If you didn’t closely monitor the discussions on the site, you may have missed this common concern and the opportunity it provides.

• How do the members of this social media website communicate with each other?

Do the members use formal or informal language? Is there any jargon or inside terms they use that you should master? Once you get a sense for the tone and content of member communications, you should use the same tone for your communications with them. In other words, if you are on a social networking site for teens and they speak to each other in slang and abbreviations, you should sprinkle in some slang and abbreviations in your messages too.

At first, the recent advice to, “promote yourself, not your product,” when utilizing social media networks seems to go against common sense at first. It seems like you would want to tell everyone about your amazing product or revolutionary service. But, much like those loud salesmen you often find at kiosks in the mall, you too can scare off potential customers by sounding too pushy.

Social media networking sites are not your typical websites. They are more like a busy coffee shop or lounge where friends and acquaintances talk about common interests. No one wants a salesman to interrupt a pleasant conversation. Just like you wouldn’t try to sell your product at a dinner party, you shouldn’t try to sell it on a social media networking site - at least not overtly.

Sure you can talk about your company or organization, but don’t make it the focus of your conversations. Instead, engage others on the network in discussions about their interests. That way you’ll learn more about your potential customers’ interests. Plus, you can make great contacts that can later refer new business to you.

The key to truly engaging in productive conversations with others on social media networks is honesty. Be honest about who you are and who you represent. Make sure the other members of the social media network know that you are there because you have a genuine interest in the group and the topics they discuss. If you sense any measure of distrust, it may help to further explain that you are there to learn and because you yourself find the network personally interesting.

As you begin to make contacts and acquaintances look out for ways you can appeal to them. But, as I said before, be honest. Treat your online relationships as you would your personal face-to-face relationships. As trust builds, those who are interested in your products will come to you, honestly interested.

So, before you engage in “promoting yourself, not your product,” you should consider these tips:

•    Never be too pushy or vocal about your products or services
•    Engage other members in genuine conversations
•    Take note of common concerns and patterns that appear
•    Figure out the things network users find appealing
•    Use insight gained from participation in social media networks to improve your targeted marketing messages
•    Treat online relationships as you would face-to-face relationships
•    Provide a unique product or service to generate buzz, but only for those who express interest
•    Remain aware of the rules for joining social media networks

Just remember, word travels fast on the Internet. Good manners will get you far and help you build a positive reputation. And, a positive reputation is always helpful in boosting sales.

Understanding how to target your most important audience is the key to effective marketing. As many of you have already figured out, marketing messages are not one size fits all. One major rule of thumb is that marketing messages should be specifically tailored to meet the needs of each community you seek to reach. That’s why the advice to “fish where the fish are” is particularly helpful. The idea behind the catch phrase is to target your marketing initiatives to specific network communities that cater to a niche population who may be interested in your services. These niche network communities are referred to by many as “micro-communities.” These micro-communities, such as, WebMD, Wikihow, and Deviantart, provide social networking features for a smaller audience with particular interests. By focusing marketing initiatives on micro-communities, you can create customized messages that will appeal to each community on their own terms. In other words, targeting micro-communities with personalized marketing messages can lead to higher sales, more traffic and greater buzz.

Of course, social media is not new. It is part of the movement commonly known as Web 2.0. Micro-communities are just another offshoot of Web 2.0, providing relevant information and networking opportunities for a particular audience. But, how do you reach these niche audiences? How do you actually “fish where the fish are?” Here are some tips that can help you get started:

1)  Figure out which micro-communities to target. Who do you want to reach? What are the characteristics of the audience you think could use your services? Brainstorm a list of the various audiences you think you’d like to reach. Then, conduct a comprehensive Web search to find out what micro-communities are out there. Make a list of the most active micro-communities, the ones with lively message boards and a steady flow of traffic.

2)  Do your research. Effective communication starts with research. Before you begin creating your targeted messages, you should find out as much information about your key audiences as you can. Who are the people who visit these micro-communities? What interests them most? You should read as many blogs and comments as possible. Take note of any common patterns or concerns you see in their posts. Also, try to identify particular opinion leaders, those who post more frequently than others. What are their major issues? These patterns and posts can serve as inspiration for you when you begin to construct your targeted messages.

3) Brainstorm and test your marketing messages. After conducting thorough research you should have plenty of ideas for messages that can reach each micro-community. Make a list of key terms and ideas each micro-community may find interesting. Generate your targeted marketing messages around these key terms and ideas. Once you have a list of messages, select a few to test. However, before you post anything, make sure you are clear about who you are and what you represent. By being honest from the start, you can generate a sense of trust within these micro-communities. If you aren’t upfront at the beginning, you will certainly be discovered and the word will spread like wildfire. These micro-communities can be a great resource, but remember that their members are communicating with each other frequently. This can be great for business or doom your campaign from the start.

I have always been a long time advocate for process maps. I like to keep my day to day tasks organized so that when I wake up in the morning to start my work day, I know exactly where I left off and exactly what needs to be done.

One of the big problems with social marketing is organization and structure. How can you be sure that you are not wasting time? With the mass confusion going on trying to figure out a “graspable” (is that a word?) system for working the social networks it is no wonder that most people simply give up the effort all together.

You can and will get traffic to your website or blog using social networks. The only problem you need to tackle is to make sense of all the madness to produce a single clear blueprint that you (or an employee) can follow from start to finish.

That is the goal of The Social Marketing Blueprint Formula…

The formula allows you to systematize and categorize thousands of social networks so that you can focus on the ones that matter to you and what you are attempting to accomplish for your business. The clearer you are at the beginning on what you want from the social networks, the easier your job will be.

The Social Marketing Blueprint Formula (if worked) will produce an asset for your business. The asset is a process map, a blueprint that you or an employee can follow in order to effectively syndicate your website content and/or blog posts across hundreds or even thousands of channels (social networks) where your target audience is active.

I will be syndicating this blog post using a blueprint that we developed using The Social Marketing Blueprint Formula. Following is a video that I produced which will show you a sample of the actual blueprint that we are now using.

As you can see from the video, we have an exact, step-by-step process map for syndicating our content to reach out to the social networks in an exact and planned way. The end result is traffic and sign-ups for the free report.Be sure to grab your free copy of The Social Marketing Blueprint Formula and get up to speed on this breakthrough now.

This blog is being used as a case study in social marketing. We will drive traffic to this blog for the purpose of gaining sign-ups to the free report. That’s the goal… I’ll keep you posted.

- Charles Heflin