To summarize this series thus far, if you want to leverage the internet to grow your cash flow, you must have an internet marketing strategy to drive traffic to your site.  And if you want to benefit from the increase in traffic to your site, you absolutely must have a way to convert visitors to leads with which you can communicate and follow up.  (Compelling educational offers, forms and contact information.)  This means your website must be crafted to be something other than just another pretty online brochure.   Last week I wrote about a powerful automation technology, Infusionsoft, that enables you to collect, organize, manage and communicate with the people in your network.  Check our archives for earlier articles.

This week I want to address again the importance of social networking as an integral component of your internet marketing strategy.  Why revisit this topic?  Glad you asked.  The reason is we get tons of questions about social networking.  And the most important point I can share with you is that you should concentrate your efforts on at least one and not more than three social networking platforms.  By concentrating on one to three social networks you avoid the biggest reasons people don’t leverage social media.  People fear the unknown and use the excuse they don’t have enough time to do these activities.  So focusing your efforts on a few social networks and committing to being consistent will make a big difference over time.  No, as you will see with our networks, they don’t grow over night and you shouldn’t try to trick the system.

People tell us all the time they need to do a better job with social networking.  What we typically say in response to this is that we believe it’s essential to focus on at least one and not more than three or four social networks.  This enables you to be consistent and thorough.  We choose to concentrate on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook as our top three.  Other major social networks include Plaxo, MySpace, and Squidoo.  YouTube is big for video.  For a complete list of social networks click here for a Wikipedia recap.

The purpose of our (and possibly many others) social networking effort is to promote our brand and attract people to our websites and blogs so they can learn more about what we do and join our various communities.  We want to promote what we do and grow our business.  We want more traffic to our sites enabling us to earn permission to market.  This requires that we create and maintain online profiles and network with people who share similar interests.  Our primary interests are business related.  Specifically internet marketing strategy, website design, SEO, and a variety of consulting services related to business development.

You need to select the networks that fit you and your business the best.  We love LinkedIn because it is geared primarily to professionals and it is a huge social network.  Although I resisted at first, we now focus on Twitter because of its increasing popularity.  We also choose to invest our time and energy in Facebook because it is has huge reach and enables people in our networks to learn more about our personal interests.

So here’s a simple exercise for you.  Do more with your current LinkedIn profile or start right now to build your profile.  Commit right now to doing the following.

1. Start, complete or update your LinkedIn profile.  Make sure your profile is complete so your education and work history is detailed enough to allow the system to suggest new connections.  By completing your profile with past employers, schools, etc. the network technology will recommend people you may know.  Then you can decide if you want to connect.  Also, craft your profile to accurately describe your current positioning.  Help people know what you do professionally.  Take the time to reflect your brand well and be complete.

2. Invite people in your current network to connect with you on LinkedIn.  The system makes it easy to import various address books so you can send an invitation to others to connect with you.  You can also search for people by name and company.   Never stop growing your network on LinkedIn.

3. Start or participate in at least one group that is related to your interests or business.   If you visit the Group section of LinkedIn you can search by keywords related to your industry, business and interests.  Pose new questions and participate in the conversation.  Show up and participate regularly and add value to the communities instead of asking for something you want right away like, “more business.”

4. Add me to your network at LinkedIn.  You can find me doing a search for people, Clifford Jones.  Or find me here.

So what’s the bottom line?  Social networking doesn’t have to take a ton of your time.  Social networking can be fun if you choose to concentrate your efforts.  And social networking can be useful for growing a network that enables you to grow your business and cash flow.  Just don’t expect overnight results.

Clifford Jones, Founder
WealthNet Partners, LLC
“Discover The Art of Business Development”
Scottsdale, Arizona
Follow up on twitter http://twitter.com/WealthNetTeam
Get LinkedIn with us at http://linkedin.com/wealthnetpartners

Related posts:

1. How To Grow Your Cash Flow Leveraging the Internet: Part One Not every business needs to leverage the internet to be successful. But with millions of potential customers using search engines,...
2. How to Grow Your Cash Flow Leveraging The Internet-Part Two. Driving Traffic To Your Site. Last week I wrote about the importance of creating a website that will help you generate leads. This includes having...
3. How To Grow Your Cash Flow Leveraging the Internet, Part Six. Over the prior five weeks I’ve shared some insights as to how business owners can leverage the internet to generate...

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 21st, 2009 at 10:26 pm and is filed under Internet Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.