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w w w . i n s i g h t o n b u s i n e s s . c o m F e b r u a r y 2 0 1 6 • I NSIGH T | 23 A rigorous, on-campus program offering three distinct emphases: Apply now! www.snc.edu/go/newmba S E T Y O U R S E L F A P A R T W I T H A S C H N E I D E R M B A The MBA for Business The MBA for Supply Chain & Manufacturing Professionals The MBA for Health Care & Medical Professionals company you want to network with, as well as many of their connections. Finco says this is a great tool to use when introducing yourself to a hub of professionals. "When you reach out to someone who might not know who you are directly, you should mention a person who the both of you might know," Finco says. "It's all about taking that personal connection you would make with an in-person networking event, and carrying it over to the virtual and social side of networking." A way to promote a business through social networking is making it visible to the Google eye. e more a company posts relevant content, the more Google will pick up on this. However, Amanda Betts with Stellar Blue Technologies says that if you post frequently every day, you are competing with your own content. Some platforms, like Twitter, are more lenient, however. "ere is definitely a science to timing when it comes to social media," says Amanda Betts, marketing director for Stellar Blue Technologies. "e two biggest mistakes we always see are a company or person who never posts anything, or the other end of the spectrum when someone posts too much." Another key component of making a company more visible to prospective networkers comes from the personal side of social media. When a business makes a post, the best thing that can happen is if followers and people with their personal accounts, share and promote that post. While some promotion of your company or brand is important, Betts says 70 percent of content shouldn't be about you. It should instead be something that is fun and engaging like tips or tricks or "did you know" posts to create brand loyalty. Linnemanstons says Google algorithms look at social media behavior and activity and they also look at how many real live human participants in social media are pointing to a particular piece of content and to a website that owns that content. If employees with the company share posts and updates made through their company's social media platforms, this will in turn, get the company on Google's radar. "Basically, when a question comes across, Google is going to point to a certain website because lots of people have been sharing information about that site, which tells Google there is good content there," Linnemanstons says. "For Weidert Group, social media becomes the way we can make sure Google can see what we are doing and it's a way to promote good content directly to a live audience." Experts say the bottom line to strengthening a social media presence is to always keep your mobile strategy in mind before posting on social media. "You need to understand your mobile strategy and that social activity and mobile activity go hand in hand," Betts says. "Engagement with your audience is always going to be top dog and you need to incorporate those kinds of strategies into how you promote yourself or your company through social media."