With people being more focused on the relationships that they are making with others and businesses, this is where public relations professionals need to invest in. Relationships take time and resources to develop, but they are well worth the effort in the long term. However, how can you establish a good relationships via social media? Well, there are certainly many ways to do this, but the core concept of it comes down to respecting others online and paying it forward. Meaning, we as public relations professionals have to take the first step in being part of the conversation and actively listening to what is being communicated and shared among others in the online community. Whether it is a tweet, update on Facebook, or sharing information via mobile applications like Foursquare and Gowalla. Here are three things to keep in mind when you are on social media and want to pay it forward:
Be generous with knowledge and acknowledgments: Paying it forward by sharing knowledge is absolutely key – that is why the social media influencers that are out there presently are so successful and influential – they are absolutely generous with their knowledge and are transparent to talk about it with others. By doing this, the online community benefits and everything evolves accordingly. If people did not share their best practices, new research discoveries, or anything like that – how can we evolve as a profession or society? Not easily – so it is very important to share stories, research articles, and other documents that might be useful for others to be aware of and expand their own personal knowledge. In addition, you want to make sure that you acknowledge and thank those that helped you along the way as well – this is not only good manners, but it is the right thing to do as well. Whether you update on Facebook with the link to this individual’s name or tag them in your tweet, these are just some ways to publicly acknowledge these individuals that helped you in a positive way. You never know where some of these fellow community members, professionals, and researchers may be down the road. 🙂
Be an active listener: Individuals on social media want to share their stories and experiences with others, and do not want to be talking to a robot or a brick wall. We have to be open and engaging with those online to see what are their main concerns and issues, and proactively address them to the best of our ability. You can do this by using web analytics (Tweetmeme, Cision, etc) to monitor what are some of the issues that people are talking about and going directly to the social media site to address them accordingly.
Go the extra effort to help or communicate: People sometimes are afraid to start the conversation, and this causes the discussion online to halt to a standstill. What we can do is go the extra effort to make sure that we as the public relations professional to provide a positive and friendly environment for really insightful dialogue. This means being active on all of the sites – Twitter, Foursquare, Gowalla, Facebook, YouTube, and even your own personal blog. It is important to have a consistent presence on all of these sites since there are people that might use one and not the other.
These are just some of the ways that public relations professionals can pay it forward using social media, and at the same time be able to build these long lasting relationships. Hope you all are having a great day!
Best Wishes,
Karen
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