What you need to know about becoming an industry brand advocate on social media

Brand advocates — another buzz term making the rounds online. You’ll find plenty of articles, blog posts, white papers and ebooks explaining that social media is all about the soft sell approach and that you should focus on engagement with your target audience.

Most of the content about this will explain that if you want to see real success with social media, you need to become part of the conversation online and invest quite a chunk of time and effort to see results.

Even though this is true to a certain extent, what I have seen over the last few years is that you should become a brand advocate to see awesome results with social media.

Many believe social media is a numbers game and only focus on vanity metrics, but in fact it’s all about connecting with real people and supporting them.

The online world is noisy

There are way too many people adding to the noise online by liking, sharing and retweeting with absolutely no intent and purpose. Many are also getting way too engaging and personal with their social media campaign, which can exhaust all of their time and produce little to no results. The online world is noisy and separating all the junk to the stuff that really matters to you can be a challenging task.

This is what I do when someone leaves a comment on one of my blog posts or engages with me on the social media channels that I am using:

• Find out who they are by looking at their profiles online. I usually start by doing a search for their name online.
• If they have a website I look at how they present themselves and if it really fits their online persona.
• Mention them by either replying on the comment or mention.

Go the extra mile with your connections

By being an advocate by setting an example yourself genuinely shows that you really care and willing to take the extra mile in getting to know the people you are connecting with. Another great way to make the connection stronger is by mentioning them or commenting on one of their blog posts or social media updates.

If your network of connections is truly supportive of your brand and yourself, they can really be of great help and support to spread the message about your brand and what you do. They might not purchase your service or products all the time, but they are advocates and respected by their own network. Because of this, you might see a huge return.

Be different with your social media strategy and be the advocate in your industry that stands out. Always provide value to your network and become active with your campaign. Review the people in your network and determine which of those people can be labeled as your own advocates. Engage with them and show them that you value their connection. Focus on becoming the advocate with your social media campaign instead of chasing numbers.