Everyone kind of expected the internet to change how we market to potential hosting customers. The use of SEO methods that once helped bring a hosting website to the top of the SERPs look archaic compared to the use of social marketing now. What’s more is that Google and the other search engines are taking into account your social profiles while ranking your site for certain search terms. With all of the social marketing out there, knowledge of what and when to advertise is as important as knowing the best social media platforms to choose. Instead of following the social marketing trends, a web host should be at the forefront of the trends, especially since old methods of marketing are becoming obsolete.nThere’s a ton of marketing advice out there on the web, but much of that feel-good advice just hasn’t been proven to work. Yet, the general advice you get when you’re growing up, like “make friends” and “be yourself” doesn’t really work with social marketing either. (Okay, obviously when you’re setting up a great business Facebook page, you’ll want to have ‘friends’ of your page.)nWhen you set up a Facebook page for your business, you can add tabs to personalize your page. Make sure you fill out everything you can and make sure that you’re not going to offend anybody. Once you create your business page on Facebook, you can engage your customers in discussions on your page. Having your customers participate in your discussions shows up on their news feeds and those of their friends. You can run specials for those who ‘like’ your business’s Facebook page, maybe offering a discount on their first – or next – months’ hosting. You can set the special offers so that only those who ‘like’ your page will get full information on the offer.nA great business Facebook page helps you show that there are real people behind your web hosting business. It can help potential customers to get to know you and your employees so they feel more comfortable with choosing your business. Transparency is a huge part of online marketing these days so don’t be afraid to post behind the scenes pictures and news that you’re interested in. You can use Facebook to show that you’re responsive to your clients’ needs and also to show them that you’re not all that different. Add traditional marketing suggestions such as testimonials to your Facebook page. You might even show your uptime statistics or job openings on your page as well. Above all, keep the content fresh on your business’ Facebook page to keep your business fresh in your customers minds.nThough the Flickr terms of service don’t allow you to market through Flickr, you can advertise your business through Flickr if you walk a fine line. You need to avoid hard sales tactics and ‘sales-y’ copy when you tag your pictures, or your Flickr account may be suspended. Instead, the pictures you upload should showcase your business’s culture and employees. If you or your employees volunteer in a community event, upload a video about your participation in the event.nFlickr’s best practices page gives a snapshot of what a business’ Flickr should look like, including a suggestion to use your business name as your identity name on Flickr and setting up a personalized URL. Yahoo! also suggests fully filling out the profile, ensuring transparency and helping your customers identify your web hosting business. You’re allowed a thumbnail gallery, so show thumbnails of your customers’ websites. Find a group for your city or other interests and join that group on Flickr to spread the word about your business, actively participating in the discussions going on in those groups.nThough you might not want to use FourSquare because you won’t have people checking into your offices, you can do more social marketing on Twitter. If you’re already on Twitter, you’ll want two separate Twitter accounts. You should have a personal account and a business account. On the business account, you’ll want to send informational links to your blog and other specials. Yet, to get the most out of marketing on Twitter, you should do more than simply send out links. Many professionals who spend time on Twitter stop following an account that only sends links unless it’s an account linked to a blog. A good rule to go by is to send out no more than one link for every 15 Tweets.nMuch research has been done on the best way to use social marketing to promote a business. As stated above, some of the feel-good advice given by traditional marketing professionals seems great in theory, but there’s no proof it really works in marketing – social or otherwise. Normally, business emails are sent out during the work week, but studies show when a business email is sent out on the weekend, customers are more likely to take the time to read and respond that email because they have fewer business emails to read. Similar research shows that people are more likely to re-tweet a tweet sent around 4 in the afternoon than one sent earlier in the day because that’s when their Twitter feeds slow down enough for them to be able to focus on individual tweets. Finding the best timing for your social marketing plan is as important as knowing which social media platform to use because you can get more results for less effort.

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