[mykenniswade]

I have an idea to start an marketing/consulting company that will help small businesses increase their web exposure on social networking sites. I am looking to market to those small business owners who don't have the time and the skills to create social networking profiles and find advertising with these sites as well. This will free up time for the business owner to focus on their day to day business operations, become a part of today’s web culture, and increase their presence on the web directly with potential customers. So please let me know what you guys thinks.

Does this seem like a good idea? Does anyone have experience in this market and can you give me so good advice? Does this idea sound profitable? Is there a market for my idea? Please anyone give me some good advice.

[ethansmith]

Essentially, you are talking about becoming a social media consultant. This idea has the potential to be very profitable, as many people and marketing firms are making bank in this arena already. It is a good thing you decided to focus on small business. Most large businesses have either hired a full-time social media marketer or have outsourced their operation to a large internet marketing firm.

When you are pitching a local small business on your service, be prepared to offer them practical solutions on the spot, letting them know scenarios of things you can do, successful promotions that can be run via the social media outlets. Also do your research and have concrete numbers of gross impressions/prospects that can be reached via the medium. One thing that will also help you greatly, is having previous success. If you can show a business that you were able to drive hundreds or thousands of new visitors to a business with x% conversion rate then you will be almost guaranteed the account at the business your are pitching.

If you are relatively new to the whole social media game, and think that just because you know how to set up a cool looking myspace, or a nice looking twitter page you may want to back off, do a little reading, and a lot of testing/hands on work with the social media platforms so that you can know and understand user habits and what constitutes a successful social media marketing campaign.

[mykenniswade]

Thanks that is the best advice I have ever received on young entrepreneur. I am definitely still doing my research and learning more html coding. I am using social networking for my company and my friends company to help him more web exposure and so he can focus on his business and not have to shelve out thousands of unnecessary advertising income.

[tytorelli]

Hello, Ty Torelli here,

Looks like you are wanting to get in the game that I have been doing for years. Let me tell you one thing and PLEASE do NOT take offence to it,..

("Does this seem like a good idea? Does anyone have experience in this market and can you give me so good advice? Does this idea sound profitable? Is there a market for my idea? Please anyone give me some good advice")

Advice #1)Base upon the above quote: If you are going to come on here and ask people how YOU should market this idea of yours, DO NOT even attempt to go to a company and say you are going to help market them!!

Advice #2) If you truly want to market to companies - Pick One market / niche, study it to its fullest, Do MARKET RESEARCH on that niche. After all, that is a main part of Social Media Marketing right, research?

If you want to know how to market yourself to any company and ask them for your business, PLEASE have a success story like EthanSmith said. You need to be able to prove to your customer that you are capable of "SUCCESSFULLY" marketing with Social Media.

What credit do I have to give this advice? A little about me - I made my start as an Affiliate Marketer 9 years ago, promoting other companies products online, using several Social Media Outlets. For the past 3 years I have been a "Social Media Consultant" for major companies and I am not talking about Mom / Pop shops.

In February of this year, I created: "Social Media Traffic Exposed", this is my coaching program designed to help people like yourself or anyone trying to use Social Media as a way to promote or market themselves, business or product using Social Media. This class teaches you the "correct" way to use Social Media as your tool.

If you would, take a moment to view the site. Based upon your question, I would encourage you to signup for my FREE LIVE Webinar. You can do so on the site.

I have a total of 30,000 spots on the LIVE feed and only 2,6XX left (as of this morning). It only takes a moment to set it up. I hope this helps you and I look forward to knowing you have one of the seats!! Social Media Traffic Exposed

Ty Torelli

[bennihan]

Ty,

I think that I will definitely give your show a chance.

As far as the post goes I am also looking into becoming a social media consultant but first I am establishing myself as a blogger online and gaining some credibility. Then I will be moving towards a niche of clients aimed particularly at the restaurant business.

[benmaxime]

I don know if this is revolutionary, but try!

[andrivistamedina]

While entrepreneurs in the business sector identify untapped commercial markets, and gather together the resources to break into those markets for profit, social entrepreneurs use the same skills to different effect. For social entrepreneurs, untapped markets are people or communities in need, who haven't been reached by other initiatives. But while they may read from a different (triple) bottom line, social and business entrepreneurs have a lot in common. They build something out of nothing. They are ambitious to achieve. They marshal resources to meet their needs. They are constantly creative. And they are not afraid to make mistakes. by. Andri Vista Medina

[Mr Money Maker]

My first impression is you asking us if this is a good idea. If you're a consultant you should know already if this is a good idea...if you don;t know then why get into the business?....also.....My real impression is your advertising on this forum by posting the message. It's done all the time in forums ..people ask if the idea's a good one, just to get people interested in doing business by checking out there website.
If you want the truth get ranked on google,yahoo,MSN,Webcrawler and you'll get enough business traffic.
Anyways I am not trying to be harsh....it just as the feel of promoting your business.

[mykenniswade]

Originally Posted by Mr Money Maker

My first impression is you asking us if this is a good idea. If you're a consultant you should know already if this is a good idea...if you don;t know then why get into the business?....also.....My real impression is your advertising on this forum by posting the message. It's done all the time in forums ..people ask if the idea's a good one, just to get people interested in doing business by checking out there website.
If you want the truth get ranked on google,yahoo,MSN,Webcrawler and you'll get enough business traffic.
Anyways I am not trying to be harsh....it just as the feel of promoting your business.

Im not a consultant and I was just asking a general business question. Trying to get some information and find out if this was actually a business model. My question was geared to starting a advertising company from my previous experience in internet advertising and PPC sites. Thanks for the comment though!

[VBN11]

I think your business idea has a lot of potential. As others have commented, you will need a more solid business plan, great testimonials, and more concrete examples of what you are able to do for them using various social media outlets (i.e. Facebook vs MySpace vs Twitter). I recommend you take some more time familiarizing yourself with the numerous social networking sites that are out there. Familiarize yourself with the nature of each site in terms of average user age, geographic reach (some have majority of users in the U.S., others don't), special/unique features, etc.

You also say that you're doing some work for your friend. Why not use that as an opportunity to keep record of your success and failures. Start a portfolio of your work, because you will need something to show potential clients in the long run. Look up other social media consultant websites and see how/what they are marketing, and how you fit in and differ from them. What will your business offer that theirs don't.

And last but not least, I think your decision to focus on small business is great, but you should narrow it down even further. What kind of small businesses? Think of a particular niche you want to specialize in. Afterall, you're more likely to be successful doing something you love, but don't try and take on too much and burn yourself out early on in the process.

Good luck!

[Mr Money Maker]

I think as the Internet grows social backlink marketing is going to vanish.....lets face facts Google is making changes, they run a business....sooner or later only the top paying customers will be ranked on Google.....I mean no one gets free ads in the phone book right?.............it will stop on Google........so cash in now make as much as you can, but I wouldn't bank my future on the SERP page ranking system.
The future is coming !!