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Continuing EducationWhere Do Your Customers Gather Online?Guest Instructor: Lori Stanley RoeleveldAn open door to building relationships with your customers is to ask them about their social media use.Social media is an ever-changing landscape so survey your customers regularly about what they use. It’s likely most productive to do this through in-store interviews the first few times so you can glean key information:a) What are their favorite forms of social media? Current options would be Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, Google+, Pinterest, LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram, GoodReads, Blogger, email, or Wordpress but the options expand all the time so ask about others they may use besides the ones on your list.b) How do they access their social media? Desk top? Lap top? Smart Phone? Tablet? This is important to know so you’re aware of how your information appears on these devices. You’ll want a website that is designed on a “responsive” template so that it adjusts to fill a desktop screen but still appear usable and readable on a Smart Phone.c) WHEN do they access their social media? Ask them what time of day they are most likely on their social media. This will give you your optimal times for reaching them. For instance, my mom (in her seventies) only checks her email once a day and her Facebook page only twice a week and always first thing in the morning. She’s not likely to see something that appears in her Facebook newsfeed only in the late afternoon or evening. But, mom carefully reads everything she is sent via email and Facebook. My daughter (in her twenties) receives updates from her social media sources throughout the day and night via her Smart Phone or her tablet. However, she doesn’t read it all and decides in a flash if she’s going to click an item or disregard. Both of them are avid readers and prefer paper books to e-books but reaching each one with information is a clearly a varied challenge.Smart businesses these days form a social media advisory board or team. This isn’t a group that needs to meet monthly and have meetings but these are go-to people with knowledge of and/or expertise in a particular form of social media or a specific demographic of people who use social media. If you’re aiming to reach your twenty-somethings, you’ll want to understand Tumblr and Instagram. If you’re engaging with the over-fifty crowd, know the power of Facebook. Having a team of customers to both, a) advise you, and b) agree to support you through their favorite social media, is a powerful way to build relationships and reach a wider audience.The key to using social media is to remember that it is primarily social in nature. That means that even though people access it through technology, they’re generally seeking more than information. They are using technology to connect with other humans. It’s easy to fall into the trap of using social media as if it’s a giant billboard “Buy this book!” “Visit our store!” but content like that is quickly overlooked, especially when immediately following it is an engaging YouTube clip where a sheep dog corrals a group of baby chicks.Social media that gets attention is personal, clever, humorous, inspirational, and inventive. Just as it’s important to know your customer’s habits, it’s vital to know the strengths of the people driving your social media. Do you have a staff person who is great at inspirational or witty one-liners? Maybe he’s your source of Twitter content? Is one of your staff engaging on camera? She could be your YouTube or Instagram driver. Are you savvy with a fresh angle on current news or cultural trends? Get yourself on Facebook. Is your spouse amazing with creating beauty and visual appeal wherever he or she goes? Develop a Pinterest board just for them.So, your assignment is to survey or interview your customers to determine what social media they already use, how and when they access it, and to identify a handful of social media advisers/supporters. Don’t discount your older users in the social media game. I have an aunt in her seventies who spends hours on Facebook, commenting, sharing, and creating fascinating status updates. If she’s your customer, you want her spreading the word about happenings at your store.Keep in mind that local churches are also trying to learn how to maximize the power of social media. As you develop a team of advisors, consider hosting a workshop or discussion panel and inviting local church leaders to learn beside you about this powerful communication tool. One way to increase the power of social media is to coordinate efforts with others and agree to share one another’s tweets, updates, and photos. Bring the local churches and ministries you serve along with you on this adventure.Our purpose is to make an impact on the world around us for Jesus. Social media is one place where people gather. Understanding and utilizing it to its highest capacity to spread God’s Word and engage people in conversation about the things of Christ should be part of all our mission moving forward.Next, we’ll cover specific ideas for engaging customers through the various avenues available to you through social media. Author Bio:Lori Stanley Roeleveld is a disturber of hobbits who enjoys making comfortable Christians late for dinner. She’s authored an unsettling blog since 2009; a pursuit that eventually resulted in her first book, Running from a Crazy Man (and other adventures traveling with Jesus). Lori’s blog has a modest but faithful daily readership and yet, in 2014, one post was viewed over 1.2 million times and another was shared over 275,000 times on Facebook. Lori’s blog was named one of the Top 100 Christian Blogs of 2015 and has been quoted by Ann VosKamp “A Parable of Haiti.” Lori teaches a popular workshop at Christian writing conferences on the theme of blogging beyond platform. ................
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