I discovered the Jacobs Media blog when they recently re-posted my article 10 Marketing Lessons I Learned from Working with KISS. Jacobs Media is a radio consultancy, providing assistance to radio stations. Today they posted a really great article discussing what you should be doing to engage with your followers, what you can do to make your brand extraordinary.

What really caught my attention was the line, “…even folks who work in social media, who say “engagement” every tenth word, don’t always interact…”, SO TRUE! I am amazed when I attend a seminar or read a article and the speaker or author is a “expert” on networking or promotion and you visit their Twitter account and they have 70 followers and the last post was three weeks ago. There are many so called experts out there, but if you do your research about what they are doing online, ie are they following their own advice, you learn they don’t follow their own advice. The point, do a little research. Google them, search for them on Twitter, on Facebook. See if they have experience doing what they preach.

The last part of the article also provides three great tips for interacting with your fans.

Validate – When you make people feel welcome, important, and “validated” on your social channels, they feel free to participate and return. This also gives cue that you care, which will generate more interaction.

Inspire – People look for inspiration and ideas that connect to their passions. Many times people get their sense of self-worth from brands. Your connection to the community, your music, and the things they care about can provide that inspiration.

Inform – Creating reliable rhythm with your interaction builds up recall for people to know you’re there online with them, and that they can trust the information they get from you.

Too often you see celebrities and sometimes radio stations and personalities brushing off fans as if they’re some sort of nuisance. In fact prior to social networking, it was essentially word of mouth that validated celebrities and the consumer’s excitement to meet them. A bad “brush with fame” can totally deflate the magic of meeting someone who is inspirational. But as the biblical saying goes, “What’s done in the dark shall come to light.” Social networking is here to shine the spotlight on just how some celebrities (and some radio stations) treat its fans.

Just cruise through Facebook Like/Fan pages, Twitter accounts, and blogs and you’ll see threads of neglect, unresponsive tweets, and blog comments that go unacknowledged. What is funny is that even folks who work in social media, who say “engagement” every tenth word, don’t always interact with or follow the majority of their fans.

We have a great opportunity to go beyond the ordinary with social networking and create meaningful fan experiences. You may have read where Lady Gaga fed her fans pizza as they camped out on the streets awaiting her performance on SNL last weekend.

We’re not talking about racking your brain each day for that “next big thing” that will take your brand to an ultra-viral level. Oftentimes, it’s about the little things, as the Lady Gaga story displays. Those little things can be extraordinary moments that lifts a fan – or lots of them. Perhaps it’s a blog that resonates and inspires. Or it’s a Facebook update that might cause someone to consider that “I never thought of it that way.” Or it’s a funny tweet that just happens to make someone’s day. Those experiences can have a major impact.

So how can you make your brand extraordinary? Extraordinary brands do the following:

Validate – When you make people feel welcome, important, and “validated” on your social channels, they feel free to participate and return. This also gives cue that you care, which will generate more interaction.

Inspire – People look for inspiration and ideas that connect to their passions. Many times people get their sense of self-worth from brands. Your connection to the community, your music, and the things they care about can provide that inspiration.

Inform – Creating reliable rhythm with your interaction builds up recall for people to know you’re there online with them, and that they can trust the information they get from you.

Understand what it takes to build and sustain relationships. People are starving for attention because in today’s world, everyone gets to be mini-stars with YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, and of course, Reality TV. Raise the bar to what matters by tapping into unmet consumer needs. You can kick start the passion of your audience as well as broaden your reach and increase your cume by building stronger relationships.

via Jacobs Media – jacoBLOG.