Peter Shankman, founder of The Geek Factory Inc., and Help A Reporter Out, a company dedicated to connecting journalists with sources across the country, recently visited Milwaukee to talk about communicating in an era of new and social media and how those tools and strategies can be utilized to ultimately translate into revenue for a company.
“Social Media is nothing more than a new tool in your quiver of arrows that you need to use,” Shankman said. “It just allows a company to listen to its audience a little better.”
According to Shankman, the customer controls the direction of a company and social media is an effective way to reach them and find out what they are looking for.
Shankman founded the Help A Reporter Out platform online in March of 2008 after launching on Facebook a few months before that. It has grown entirely off advertising sales and was acquired by Vocus, a PR Software as a Service company based in Beltsville, M.D.
“We never spent a dime on marketing or advertising we just used channels that were available to us,” Shankman said.
Shankman presented on four basic principles to abide by in a social media strategy. That is to be transparent, to be relevant, to focus on brevity and keeping the message short and too the point and to stay top of mind.
Not all social media tools are useful for every company, Shankman said. “What’s important is where your audience is and what they want from you.”
To see more highlights from Shankman’s presentation click on the video link below and visit www.shankman.com.
