Is Social Media Worth Your Time as an Entrepreneur?

Very few business owners have the luxury of too much time. Instead, most are forced to make difficult decisions about spending limited resources of time, money and energy. As a result, small business owners may not be willing to invest time in social media sites like Facebook or Twitter until they are sure they will add to the bottom line.

Visibility

The simplest reason these sites help? Visibility. If your product is recognizable, customers are more likely to embrace the idea behind the product and buy it. People won't beat a path to your door if you don't tell them where you live -- especially on the internet.

“Both Twitter and Facebook are worth my time as an Entrepreneur. I’m sitting at the computer all day working my business and both applications can be running in the background as a reminder to update my status easily throughout the day. Both applications are where the “consumers” are. It’s a great way to reach a wide range of potential customers,” explains Sherri Morris, president of Digi Time Capsule, LLC

Branding

Social media sites like Facebook and Twitter provide an opportunity to showcase what it is about your product or service that makes you different. “Twitter is definitely worth my time. I use Twitter for 2 purposes: networking with other like-minded professionals and brand awareness. I'm branding ROI Coaching through the updates I post on Twitter and, in the process, building relationships with potential clients or customers.” Kassandra Vaughn, CEO ROI Coaching.

Customer Interaction

The biggest advantage of social media sites like Twitter and Facebook are that they allow entrepreneurs to get to know the consumers who are interested or who have purchased their product.

“They can speak to me in real time with any questions they may have about their purchase. It’s a great tool to provide excellent customer service. Normally, you don’t know the purchaser, but in the case of Twitter and Facebook, I actually get to correspond directly with them, get feedback after their purchase and have open-timeline conversations for others to see and read about how much people like my product, ” explains Sherri Morris, president of Digi Time Capsule, LLC (digitimecapsule.com).

Facebook or Twitter?

If you want to try one, but not both, consider your target audience. According to recent findings , “Twitter’s largest age demographic is 35-to-44-year-olds who make up 25.9% of its users.” Facebook users between ages 35-54 amount to only 3.5% of users.

Scott Scheper of scottdig.com suggests that Twitter might be a better use of time. Facebook’s main purpose centers on furthering and cultivating relationships with already established friends while Twitter’s main purpose centers on social networking (meeting people across the world with similar interests.

Vaughn agrees. “Facebook is still an un-in-the-air decision for me. I hear that so many people are on facebook when I'm out and about in public but I haven't found a system to leverage my time against the money earned through Facebook as of yet.”

Curb Your Expectations

One caveat – online social marketing sites like these require a different expectation of ROI, or return on investment. While they are free, the sites take time to do consistently. In the same way, building relationships (whether on or offline) doesn’t happen overnight. It may well take weeks or even months before they boost your profit margin.<