Prepare and Prevent.  Don’t Repair and Repent.

As your Social Media Marketing Agency, we're getting prepared for GDPR but need you to ensure you're prepared too; we would be remiss in not engaging with you to get you GDPR ready!  For example, did you know that you should be informing your customers we have access to your data?  Whilst the regulations are still being finalised, amongst other stipulations coming into force, there are at least three major questions you should be asking yourself and informing your clients of early in 2018:

• Where is the data held?
• Who has access to the data?
• Where else is the data stored, such as a hard copy printed list?

Whilst, we appreciate this may cause loss of client data and, within some businesses and industries, the regulations will differ, being prepared and preventing any issues will ensure you are not repairing and repenting later.

What Else Is New?

Your Business and Social Media is a fruit tree.  One that has should have strong and awesome roots and one that's healthy and adorned with fruit whatever the season!   You've got the website for on-line presence.  You've got some, if not all Social Media Platforms.  We're going to remind you of a few of and what's new.

Facebook: As the largest social media platform, Facebook is continually evolving and it's hard to keep on top of changes. 2017 has seen some fundamental developments, not least the various options now open to business pages such as publishing articles or show casing a video as part of your header image, or even an invisible in-box - do you know you have one of those? We're sure you're not utilising your Facebook to it's full advantage and would love to guide you more!

Twitter:  One of the most significant changes on Twitter in 2017 has been character limit.Twitter's character limit is its hallmark; a stubbornly frustrating feature at times and those who have invested in using the social network have come to accept it.  Recently however, this character limit has now changed to a whopping 280 characters and, alongside that, any user handle ie @allthingsscene, additional link, or image, no longer counts towards those 280 characters!  You've now got the opportunity to express yourself a whole lot more!

LinkedIn Pulse:  If Facebook is the social network for sharing memes, LinkedIn is the social network for businesses and a must have for professionals.  LinkedIn, amongst other uses is strictly for exchanging knowledge and ideas and, now has the advantage to allow professionals such as yourselves to keep your finger on the Pulse.  LinkedIn has always provided the ability to showcase your business and 'advertise' however, you can extend your writing and promotion via the mobile app Pulse.  In short, any business professional with this App interested in blogs or reading articles pertaining to specific subject matter, can now find you and your business 'on the go'; just don't forget the hashtag!

Instagram:  Advertising and marketing your business just got massive!  2017 was the year where Instagram became a more dynamic and engaging platform, with far more creative tools and marketing tools to benefit your business.  It was and still is the fastest growing social media platform to aid promotion of a product or service.  By September of 2017, the mobile photo sharing network reached 800 million active users, up from 600 million in December 2016 and still it grows!  Not only that, you can link your Facebook page to your Instagram audience with greater ease and functionality.  Did you know, making a paid promotion through Facebook with a connection via your Instagram, your audience and impression rate will triple.  'A picture is worth a thousand words'; choose wisely and that image or video will reach ten thousand eyes or more.

Google: And so, finally to Google.  Google consistently changes and amends its algorithms and, obviously, in favour of Google!  However, if you and your business is set up correctly, Google will favour YOU and recognise you as 'trustworthy'; 'it' will be more inclined to rate you higher than others.

Did you know for example that your website should hold SSL certificate as a security measure.  This demonstrates that you are a legitimate site and not one to be ignored! Your site should be responsive and where possible, connected to as many social media streams as possible and/or, YouTube as a great added bonus (and second largest search engine on the Internet), as well as utilising Google Plus for business.

All this and much more, can ensure your Internet Shop Window is transparent to them, recognised  and found with much greater ease by YOUR customers and on TOP!