Do you Twitter? Are you on Facebook or LinkedIn? “Social media” is the latest buzz phrase for those looking for new avenues through which to market their businesses—and probably with good reason. According to Nielsen (K+BB’s parent company), two-thirds of the world’s Internet population visit social networking or blogging sites, accounting for 10 percent of all time spent on the web. Not surprisingly, such sites have experienced tremendous growth in the number of unique visitors in the past year. Facebook, for example, saw an increase of 198 percent from June of last year to June of this year, while Twitter’s unique visitors surged from 1 million to 21 million—an uptick of 1,928 percent.

With stats this impressive, that businesses have been honing in on social media as the new frontier for pushing their services and wares should come as no surprise. But what opportunities exist for kitchen and bath designers? And for those still on the sidelines who are interested in joining the ranks, how best to begin?


FIRST THINGS FIRST

If you ask Gail Doby, ASID, a Colorado-based designer turned chief vision officer of Design Success University, the options abound, but designers should first establish some form of online presence, be it a website or a blog. “People search on the internet to find almost any resource,” she said. “They’re going to research you before they ever pick up a phone. If that’s the case, how are designers without a web presence going to stay in business?” Surprisingly, she added, only 25 percent of all designers have a website.

If you’re not one of them, you’re in great company, but don’t fret. An easier alternative for setting up online, and one that Doby strongly recommends, is blogging. “Blogs are much more up to date,” she said, “which Google likes, because it tends to index the newest, freshest information. So people are more likely to find you.” Designer Jamie Goldberg, AKBD, CAPS, of JG Kitchens, understands this firsthand. Although she is active on several networking sites, her “biggest surprise and thrill” has been the impact of her blog, Gold Notes, on her search rankings. “Because I update it weekly, and because there are so many links to and from it—including my design site—it has kept my name high on page one for kitchen design web searches,” she noted. “This, in turn, has been great for online lead generation and new business development.”

Blog writing also tends to be more personal in tone and more personality-driven, allowing readers and potential clients to get a sense of you before making contact. This may help to distinguish you from your peers, which is always a plus given today’s increasingly congested cyberscape. If you already have a website, Doby suggests taking up blogging anyway, but attach your blog to your site and update it on a regular basis to improve your chances of being found.


QUICK & EASY

So let’s say you already have a website or you’ve started a blog, but would really like to get your feet wet with a social networking site and use it to attract business. But which one? According to Doby, Twitter may be the easiest for newbies. Originating from an idea by cofounder Jack Dorsey for staying abreast of what his friends were doing, Twitter is a microblogging platform that invites users to communicate their thoughts, feelings or the minutia of their daily lives in 140-word bites with the prompt, “What are you doing?” Signup is simple, requiring just a username, password and email account. Once you’re in, you can look for people you know (or know of) with similar interests and elect to follow them and their musings by clicking the “Follow” button on their profile. You can also search by keyword for groups that are discussing topics of interest to you. The results may be a little breathtaking. “I’m fascinated by the wealth of information and smart people that I come in contact with,” said designer Susan Serra, CKD, principal of Susan Serra Associates, Inc. “To be able to follow anyone via Twitter gives one great choices for insight, information and growth.”

Participating in discussions and following other users will help you to build your own base of followers, but some who are new to Twitter may find themselves at a loss for words. Designer Kelly Morisseau, CMKBD, CID, who authors the blog Kitchen Sync, at first resisted the site for that very reason. “I kept thinking, ‘Who cares what I had for lunch? Even I don’t care!’” she noted. “But then I joined and found a whole network of peers and professionals.” Doby suggests talking, or “tweeting,” about topics that are humorous or educational. Perhaps post a comment about a project and share photos via an application like TwitPic or Tweetphoto. “People love pictures and videos,” Doby said. “Designers can use them to get conversations going. Also ask questions. You want to tell a little about yourself that’s personal, but not too personal, so people can get to know you.”

Of course, you can also direct people to your blog or website, but only in moderation. “You don’t always want to be in selling mode,” said Doby. “You also want to be in a giving mode, or else people will ‘unfollow’ you, which is not a good thing.” Morisseau agrees. She suggests passing along a design-related tip or story. If it’s something interesting you’ve read from another user on Twitter, pass that along by “retweeting” it with a nod to the source. Doing so shows good will, said Doby, because it “helps that other person grow their list and they’re going to return the favor.” Once you’ve familiarized yourself with the site, you may want to try out some of the applications that are available to help you manage your Twitter experience and make it more convenient and accessible. Both Doby and Morisseau, for example, use Tweetdeck to sort through and organize the huge influx of information. Other products enable you to send updates remotely, say, via a cell phone and, of course, you can also add a Twitter feed to your blog to keep it fresh with your tweets.


FACE TIME

So now you’ve joined Twitter and maybe even tweeted some. You’re slowly accumulating a list of followers, but in the meantime, you’d like to try something else. How about Facebook? Founded in 2004 as a networking site for Harvard students, Facebook has expanded to embrace more than 250 million users of all age groups, with the fastest growing segment being those 50 years and older. Aside from keeping friends and family in touch with each other, the site has also attracted its share of businesses in search of new customers, or more specifically, fans.

Signing up for Facebook gives you a personal page that will ask you for a little more personal information than does Twitter and, once that’s been completed as you see fit, you can begin to befriend other users, message each other and post comments, photos and videos. According to Doby, your list of friends is capped at 5,000, which may or may not be a drag, depending on how sociable you are, but you can also set up a fan page for your business to expand your reach to an unlimited number of “fans,” who will, hopefully, engage in unlimited conversation about your services. “And they don’t even have to be a member of Facebook to be able to follow your page,” Doby noted. You can also elect to have your Twitter updates show up on your Facebook page, enabling you, in effect, to kill two birds with one stone.

But for many designers, Facebook seems to serve more of a vehicle for friendships both professional and personal. Although Goldberg does post links to her blog on her Facebook page, much of her time on the site is spent in conversation. And “if I’m traveling, I post photos and postings from my trip to my wall,” she added. “I had no idea that my cell phone could be an entertainment vehicle!” For Morisseau, “Facebook is more for personal amusement,” but she does receive updates from vendors and manufacturers that are also members.


GETTING LINKED

For those who prefer their social networking to be more occupationally focused, a third option that seems to be making the rounds in the kitchen and bath industry, and therefore might merit your attention, is LinkedIn. Launched in 2003, the professional networking site boasts more than 45 million members in more than 200 countries around the world. Its focus is clear when you first sign on. Profiles read like resumes, encompassing everything from educational background to work experience to recommendations, which you can elicit from contacts in your network. You can also forward your profile to a connection, direct-message others in LinkedIn and make use of a handful of applications that, for example, enable you to share presentations and link your blog to your profile. For Goldberg, a former journalist, the site has led to a number of design-related writing assignments and provided her with an easy platform for gathering recommendations, which she then adds to her website.

One of the more popular functions on LinkedIn, however, may be the ability to join a variety of groups and thus participate in industry- and/or interest-specific discussions. The discussions can prove to be rich ground for researching products, trade events, design ideas and even business solutions. Have a problem related to your practice? Join a group, post a question and chances are you’ll receive a flurry of helpful insight from other professionals who feel your pain.

Although the web offers several alternative sites for social networking, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn seem to enjoy a currency in the kitchen and bath world that others—at least for now—do not. Why not try one of them out tonight and see how it goes. If you find the going slow or you’re really looking for something more targeted, come back tomorrow to learn about a relative newcomer to social networking that is 100 percent focused on design, Ava Living.

Want to learn more about marketing your business on the web? Read Gail Doby’s handy tips.