Chapter 17
Marketing Sales with Social Media and the Community
IN THIS CHAPTER
Looking at announcements and other important messages
Visiting the eBay community
Filling out your eBay profile
Connecting on Facebook
Finding customers on Twitter
To be successful in selling it helps to include some marketing. Marketing is promoting your sales. In today’s world, this relies on social media and advertising. This doesn’t require you to spend money; you can promote your sales online through social media — the 21st century’s answer for free marketing. You can build your own community online to increase sales with only a little bit of effort. In this chapter you’ll get some beginner’s tips; if you’re interested in more advanced lessons, you might like my Social Media Commerce For Dummies book (also published by Wiley).
Note how I will always refer to a social media community, versus followers. From my experience having an inclusive community — where you follow back those who participate or comment — is the most effective (unless you’re a Kardashian). Following back goes far to build a community that’s invested in you as a human and your success. Too many approach social media as a place to “grow followers” and not follow back, versus to participate in a community. This isn’t a broadcast medium. It’s called “social” for a reason.
There is also a social community on eBay. On eBay, community is a long-standing tradition. Back in 1996 when eBay first began, the community was very strong, with thousands of eBay users; Customer Service representatives attended the boards (mostly to keep everyone in line), and they were a fun place to be. As in real-life communities, you participate as much as works for you. When it comes to the eBay community, you can get involved in all sorts of activities, or you can just sit back and concentrate on your sales. With the advent of social media, more eBay members participate in these open communities where they can also promote their businesses.
As you’ve probably heard by now, one of the main ways to participate in the eBay community is through transaction feedback (which I explain in detail in Chapters 4 and 6). In this chapter, I show you some other ways to build your community. You can socialize (making friends who live near you or who live across the planet). Also, whether on Facebook, Twitter, or eBay’s boards, you can gain knowledge from others, post messages, or just read what everybody’s talking about. I include tips here on how to use all these places to your benefit, and then give you a change of scenery by surfing through some off-site social media sites that can help you with your buying and selling.
I also wrote a book on online customer service; there’s a preview of it on my site:
http://theultimateonlinecustomerserviceguide.blogspot.com
Although spending time on social media and community chats are fun, they take away from time spent on your business. It isn’t “marketing” until you have a successful business to market. Those who are successful at eBay know that spending spare time listing and sourcing is the key. You need to work it, no way around that.
Joining the eBay Community
On the bottom of almost every eBay page is a group of links: Click Community to connect to other eBay members, or click the Announcements link to check proposed changes to the site on the Announcements page. Keep in mind, when you see the tips and suggestions on these pages, they may come right from corporate spokespersons in disguise. For example, I have seen catchy headlines about saving on shipping with free package pickup, electronic postage discounts, and free tracking — as if these offers were exclusive to eBay. You know, from reading this book, that these benefits are open to anyone. Take a little time to explore this area for yourself and separate the important messages from the PR spin.
News and chat, this and that
It’s not quite The New York Times, but you can find announcements, groups, and discussion board links from the Community Overview page. Figure 17-1 shows you the important links on the page. (eBay is continually making changes to the community, so note that this page will change with regularity.) Although thousands of people used to discuss everything (including events of the day) on eBay’s boards, the online buzz is now a shadow of its former self, as most people have moved to social media for discussions.
FIGURE 17-1: The main Community page features links to places to get information on eBay.
The tech editor for this book is Patti Louise Ruby (eBay ID aunt*patti — although she has another secret buyer ID). She’s been the tech editor for all my books on eBay. Why? Because she was one of two of the first eBay staff to man the original eBay chat rooms with Jim “Griff” Griffith. We also toured the country teaching eBay for “eBay University” in almost every state of the union. She knows eBay at its core. She goes over everything I write, and while I’m writing we text back and forth for reference. We both agree, the most important place for you to visit in the community are the Seller Updates. eBay sends out information on all the important changes for the site here. To save you time, just go directly to https://pages.ebay.com/seller-center/seller-updates/index.html.
Joining in the social media conversation
There are many places to connect with other eBay community members. Many are active on social media networks. You can find me on Twitter (@MarshaCollier), http://twitter.com/MarshaCollier, or through Facebook. If you have a quick question, ping me, and I will try to answer ASAP.
I also maintain a Twitter list of experienced eBay sellers who have a presence on Twitter. They are interested in helping others and are a valuable reference. More on them further on. Also further in this chapter, you’ll find tips on how to connect and market your items on Twitter.
Filling in your eBay profile
Did you know that if you click your User ID on any eBay page, you arrive at your very own profile page? (You also have a link on your Feedback profile page.) Unlike the old About Me page, which you had to choose to set up yourself, every eBay member has an automatically generated profile page. Yours is ready and waiting for you to embellish. Figure 17-2 shows you mine.
FIGURE 17-2: At a glance, my page shows you my feedback and that I’ve been on eBay since January 1997.
In Chapter 14, I show you the basics of how to set up your own. You can also add custom features to this page to share your other community moments.
Your profile page can reflect your many varied interests. From here, eBay gives you other ways to express yourself:
- Items for sale: A few of your items you are selling will appear on the page.
- Reviews: Wondering what other eBay members think of a particular product, book, or movie? Selected items on eBay are reviewed by users, and you can contribute one of your own. Reviews you have posted show up when someone lands on an item for which eBay users have posted reviews. Figure 17-3 shows the review page for the previous edition of this book, written by eBay members. To add your own review, click the Write a review button.
- Following: A sample of which sellers and searches (Interests) you follow. Also, when you save a seller to follow, it shows up on that person’s profile page.
FIGURE 17-3: eBay members review everything, including books. There are seven reviews for the book.
Hear ye, hear ye! eBay’s Announcements Board
If you were living in the 1700s, you’d see a strangely dressed guy in a funny hat ringing a bell and yelling, “Hear ye, hear ye!” every time you opened eBay’s Announcements Board. (Then again, if you were living in the 1700s, you’d have no electricity, Internet, fast food, or anything else you probably consider fun.) In any case, eBay’s Announcements Board is an important place to find out what’s going on (directly from the home office) on the website. And no one even needs to ring a bell.
The Announcements Board is where eBay lists any news that affects buyers and sellers, new features, and policy changes. Visiting this page is like reading a morning eBay newspaper because eBay adds comments to this page almost every week. You find out about upcoming changes in categories, new promotions, and eBay goings-on. eBay also uses it to help users become aware of critical changes in policies and procedures. Reach this page at http://announcements.ebay.com.
Figure 17-4 shows you eBay’s Announcements Board with information that could affect your sales.
Help! I need somebody
If you ever have specific eBay questions to which you need answers, click the Knowledge Base link in the Community.
These boards work differently from eBay’s old chat rooms. Chat rooms are full of people who are hanging out and talking to each other all at the same time, whereas users of discussion boards tend to go in, leave a message or ask a question, and pop out again. Also, in a discussion board, you need to start a thread by asking a question. Title your thread with your question, and you’ll hopefully get a swift reply to your query.
FIGURE 17-4: Keep up to date on what’s new at eBay by visiting the Announcements Board.
These boards cover almost any topic regarding selling and buying on eBay. Just post your question, and some kind eBay member will probably suggest an answer (but remember to double-check your answer, just as you would any advice from someone with unknown credentials). Keep in mind that the Knowledge Base is to answer questions; if someone tries to sell you something there, I’d say turn the other way.
One of the best solutions is to find one of the eBay Social Media sellers on Twitter (more about that later in this chapter); many are very active on the site, and you’ll probably get an answer tout suite. (I’m on there and Facebook — daily — and answer whatever questions I can.)
User-to-user discussion boards
eBay has some other boards that take a different tack on things. They’re discussion boards as opposed to chat boards, which basically means that the topics are deliberately open-ended — just as the topics of discussion in coffeehouses tend to vary depending on who happens to be in them at any given time. Check out these areas and read ongoing discussions about eBay’s latest buzz. Post your opinions to the category that suits you. You can find quite a few discussion boards on various topics relating to doing business on eBay.
There’s one cardinal rule for eBay boards: Conduct no business. No advertising items for sale! Not now. Not ever. eBay bans any repeat offenders who break this rule from participating on these boards.
Remember that you’re visiting eBay and that you’re a member. It’s not Speakers’ Corner — that spot in London’s Hyde Park where protesters are free to stand on a soapbox and scream about the rats in government. If you feel the need to viciously complain about eBay, take it outside, as the bar bouncers say.
Category-specific groups
Want to talk about Elvis, Louis XV, Justin Turner, or Mickey Mouse? Currently a bunch of category-specific discussion boards enable you to tell eBay members what’s on your mind about merchandise and auctions. You reach these boards going to the Community and then mousing over the word Groups. A drop-down menu appears where you can click Special Interest Groups.
Of course, you can buy and sell without ever going on a discussion board or group, but you can certainly benefit from one. Discussions mainly focus on merchandise and the nuts and bolts of transactions.
On eBay, you get all kinds of responses from all kinds of people. Take a portion of the help you get with a grain of salt; some of the folks who help you may be buyers, competitors, or have something to sell you down the line.
Don’t be shy. As your second-grade teacher said, “No questions are dumb.” Most eBay members love to share their experiences.
Learning and Selling through Social Media
Social media is no longer in its infancy; it’s long since made off with the car keys, so to speak. These days it has become the go-to destination for 69 percent of American adults. The burgeoning number of social media sites draws many eBay sellers and buyers because they are a tech-savvy group. All cultural changes began with words — as do many marketing campaigns — and the experts have decided that the dominant marketing tool today is social media. Social media is now the hub for “word of mouth” (WOM) recommendations and comments.
Social media sites have grown well beyond their initial role as tools of social contact. Following and friending like-minded people on social media networks (and connecting with them) not only builds a sense of community but also gives you a built-in support group.
When I say to connect, I mean to converse. You don’t have to sit on the sites regularly; you do need to drop by and respond to people who have commented to you. You also need to reach out and comment to others. Marketing can be a natural next step — if you handle it right. But keep this distinction in mind …
Social media discussion is not the same as advertising. You will see many online sellers promoting their goods, one after the other, as their sole “conversation.” That’s actually more broadcasting — like commercials on TV in the old days. Everyone skipped over commercials then — and they skip over them now. Ads-as-faux-conversation is old school and not very interesting to anyone who’s following you online.
Best practices on social media commerce require engagement with other community members. If you want to share the items you have listed on eBay on your social pages, use this strategy sparingly. Be sure shared listings are not the only (or last five) posts in your stream.
Many small businesses on social media try to get hundreds of followers for their social media pages. A multitude of friends and followers does not equate to producing massive sales. The quality of your conversation and the people you connect with is what draws people to you.
Finding friends and customers on Facebook
You have a Facebook page, right? You share fun thoughts and ideas with your family and friends, right? Well, when you set up an eBay business, you can have a page for your small business. I’m not suggesting that you’ll be directly selling from your Facebook page (although you can), but having a page is an efficient way to meet people online and interest them in what you’re selling.
Your initial base for building a business page comes from your friends. When you get over 25 people to “like” your business page, you can get a custom URL from Facebook for the page. Mine is www.facebook.com/MarshaCollierFanPage (because it was established a long time ago — when they were called “fan” pages). The page is different from my personal page at www.facebook.com/marsha.collier. I try to treat each page differently, encouraging more intimate contact on my personal page, and posting business information and conversation on my business page. Even my pictures are selected for a different style.
Unless your political and religious views reflect your core self and/or your business, it’s best to stay away from making public statements on these topics. Whatever you put on the Internet is indexed and recorded somewhere — and your prospective customers may be put off if they do not hold the same views as you.
As a subtle touch on my business page, I use an application (see Figure 17-5) called Auction Items (despite the name, the app also posts your fixed-price listings). Applications such as this can only be used on business pages. The application will be listed in the links on the left side of your business page. I find this app gives my items punch, and yet isn’t as “in-your-face” as other marketing programs. You can find it to put on your page (if Facebook qualifies your page) at www.facebook.com/AuctionItems.
FIGURE 17-5: The Auction Items application on my Facebook business page has clickable links that go directly to a page with my eBay listings.
The publishers of the app also offer other free tools. They enable eBay sellers to embed their listings into their websites by inserting a short HTML code into the website or via a WordPress plug-in. You can learn more about these by visiting http://esoftie.com and clicking Products.
Another example is my friend (and fellow eBay seller — dnasupplies) Anita Nelson. She has two Facebook pages as well: one personal and one for her business, ModelSupplies (see Figure 17-6). She is also @ModelSupplies on Twitter.
For a more detailed explanation of how to best use Twitter and Facebook, you might like my Facebook, Twitter & Instagram For Seniors For Dummies (even if you’re not a senior)!
FIGURE 17-6: The ModelSupplies Facebook page builds her eBay business on Facebook.
Connecting with other sellers on Twitter
At this writing, Twitter has 500 million total users (more than 330 million active users) and serves up over 500 million tweets a day. What’s a tweet? Not just a sound effect from a parakeet anymore. Now it’s a short online comment from one Twitter user to another; tweets often flit back and forth between users who follow each other. Tweets are not only comments but also other quick notes that can be quotes, links to news stories, and the occasional self-promotion.
If you like to chat, comment, and read news stories, I’ll bet you’ll like Twitter. You don’t have to be there all day, because when people “talk” to you there, you will see it in your “Notifications” column (you can see that on my Twitter page in Figure 17-7). To answer, you just click the Reply link.
FIGURE 17-7: When I talk to folks on Twitter, they appear as my “tweets & replies.”
You’ll find that your conversations on Twitter will engage you — but only if you engage with your followers. Those who are constantly broadcasting are just trying to build follower numbers — but it’s been proven that this practice will not increase sales.
So if you go to Twitter.com and sign up, you need to give your Twitter stream a name. I suggest that you use your real name — for several solid reasons:
- Friends will find you easier.
- If you change businesses down the line, you won’t have to start over with a new name.
- On the Internet, you are the face of your business — and everything you post is archived somewhere. Your tweets on Twitter are archived in the National Archive (no joke).
- If it’s good enough for @MichaelDell (founder of Dell), @SteveCase (founder of AOL), and @RichardBranson (founder of Virgin Group), I’d say it’s a good idea for you too.
After you sign in, you need to put up a picture and fill out a short bio. The first thing you need to do is put up a picture — preferably yours. People like to see what you look like when they find you on Twitter. Do everyone a favor and describe yourself clearly, as best you can, in the allotted 160 characters. Take a look at Figure 17-8 for a good example from the Twitter mobile app on my phone. Although Anita maintains a separate Twitter account personally, the account represents her @ModelSupplies brand.
FIGURE 17-8: eBay seller dnashopper (Anita Nelson) shows an informative bio.
After you fill out all the cyber-paperwork, you’ll see your very own Twitter page. It will be a very blank page. Don’t be sad and lonely — you can begin by following me, @MarshaCollier. Say Hi, and I’ll follow you back.
When you visit my Twitter page, you’ll see a tab that, when clicked, reveals Lists that I’ve made of people on Twitter. I’ve made one full of eBay Social Sellers that lists eBay sellers who participate in social media and are fun to follow. Just click on the link or go to http://twitter.com/MarshaCollier/ebay-social-sellers. On the list page, just click the link and you will automatically be following everyone on the list.
When you see their tweets in your stream, click the Reply link to say hello — or share something interesting. No doubt they will follow you back.
To find other people to follow, I suggest that you go to the search box on Twitter. Here you can type keywords that reflect your interests or the items you sell, and you will be presented with a list of accounts who have mentioned this word in their tweets. I put in a search for antiques, clicked the People tab in Results, and found a long list of people with similar interests, shown in Figure 17-9.
FIGURE 17-9: A built-in list of people who have a passion for antiques on Twitter.
Type in your hobbies and your interests. You’ll find a bunch of people to follow, and your Twitter home page will become far more interesting.