For companies that invest in inbound marketing expertise, the internet can be a godsend if used effectively. With a huge potential customer base inhabiting cyberspace, you might be tempted to go for the biggest inbound marketing catch you can, but there are more subtle ways of driving visitors to your social media channels and website.
In the one-click era, the internet audience can be remarkably fickle. Their online behaviour in terms of brand attention often comes down to ‘what have you done for me lately?’ Question and answer sessions using your social media platforms can be a canny way of offering your audience valued, tangible benefits while giving them a reason to check out your offering.
Whether your main focus is B2B or B2C campaigns, you can showcase your products and services by answering the questions of your fans and followers. On Twitter, this could take a simple question and answer format, in which you set aside a time each week or month to field questions sent via users’ tweets. You should make sure the session is well publicised, and by and large relevant media outlets will be happy to tell its audience the Q&A is taking place, as it is a free service that is likely to be appreciated by readers.
If you are running the Q&A through Facebook, you might want to post a status update on your timeline which invites users to send in their questions via the comments section below. You can then take the pick of the bunch and provide a more detailed response in subsequent posts.
Offering a prize for the best question can often be a clever way of attracting more questions from social media users and increasing engagement. You might also wish to make the Q&A more personal by inviting a different expert or company figure to conduct the session each week.
There are few better ways of positioning yourselves as experts in your particular field, while making a gesture of goodwill in delivering a useful service to your potential customer base than social media Q&As. They serve to meet your inbound marketing objective of creating more interest in your social media activity and subsequently your website and brand.