MSNBC -- Oct 29 -- I interviewed Dan Schawbel, a personal branding expert for Gen-Y
and the author of the upcoming book Me 2.0: Build a Powerful Brand to
Achieve Career Success. His Personal Branding Blog is ranked among the
top 50 marketing blogs in the world by AdAge. Dan is currently a social
media specialist for EMC Corp.
Q: Can you tell me about the trend that has employers hiring employees to take on SN duties?
A: It's a major trend that's been growing significantly. As companies grow
and SN continues to expand, the entrepreneurial boss simply cannot
devote all of the time needed for a successful effort. He or she needs
to hire someone else dedicated to assume this responsibility. This
person will be the internal community manager who will create, monitor
and transfer information about the company between and among employees.
Q: What's the benefit of hiring an employee who manages the
business's Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn and other SN
accounts?
A: This
network employee will reach out and interactively communicate with
various communities; the business owner simply will not have time to do
this successfully.
Q: Can you list what social networking a small business should be doing now?
A: They should at least be involved in the largest social
networks, belong to forums and have at least one blog.
Q: Do the different sites require one "community networking"
employee to manage? Or does it also work to spread out such duties
among many employees?
A: If you're Coca-Cola, then you
need a team. If you're a sole practitioner, you have to do it yourself.
However, whether you have five or 50 employees, delegate the
responsibilities.
Q: What "bare bones" networking should small-business owners
be doing on their own that will help them market their business?
A: They should get involved in social sites like
LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Friendfeed.
Q: Can you break down which SN are most popular?
A: MySpace has over 185m users, split evenly between
men and women14 to 34 years old. 25% of them are in the
U.S. FaceBook has over 110m readers, more women than men. The
majority of these users, 80%, are under 30 years old and half of
all Facebookers are located in the U.S., Great Britain and Canada. LinkedIn has over 26m readers, with the average age being
41. Men make up 64% of the audience. Their average household
income is $109,000. Twitter has 3m readers, two-thirds of whom
are men 18 to 34 years old.
FULL ARTICLE @ MSNBC