People are talking about your brand online and there's nothing you can do to stop it. But you can join in. And we think you should.

People are talking about your brand online and there's nothing you can do to stop it. But you can join in. And we think you should.

Go ahead. Dive in. The water's warm. Go to Technorati.com (a blog search engine) and search your company’s name. What’s there? Are you surprised?

Don’t be. Conversations about your company and thousands of other brands, products, services, people, places and things are happening every day. According to a recent blogger study, about 21 percent of bloggers write about companies and their products once a week, and almost 2/3 of them trust other bloggers the most when looking for product information.

And there’s nothing you can do to stop it. But you can join in. And we think you should. Becoming part of the conversation is the best way to potentially influence it. And there are other benefits as well:

• Establishing your company as an industry thought leader
• Amplifying your SEO strategy
• Increasing traffic to your web site
• Generating real-time customer feedback about your products and services
• Giving you a direct voice to consumers during a crisis
• Boosting your reputation

1. Play. Find some blogs that interest you (there are millions of them). Let’s say you like fly-fishing. Subscribe to the RSS feeds of a few of these blogs. Follow them for the next couple of weeks. Leave comments on posts that interest you. Read other people’s comments.  Or find social networks and message boards about fly-fishing. Get used to the tone and style of social media. It’s different. It’s human.
2. Monitor. Assign someone on your team to look for conversations about your brand in the social media space. Use Google Alerts, Technorati Watchlists, Boardreader, and YouTube searches to start. Also, subscribe to bloggers who write about your category. Look at this information daily. What patterns are you noticing? Are there opportunities to engage?

• Make your conversations authentic. Don’t fake it. No spin. No marketing wak-wak.
• Be transparent. Tell people who you are. Don’t hide behind a fake profile or character. People want to connect with the people behind brands.
• Lastly, contribute to the community. Your value in the social media space is ultimately about what you bring to the party. Help others succeed. Share your expertise openly. Better the community, and people will reward you.