Over the past decade, the Internet has become an increasingly connected environment through social websites such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, making it essential to learn how to incorporate social media into websites. In fact, according to Pew Research Internet Project, 73 percent of adult Internet users frequent social networking websites. Because of this, anyone who wants their website to have an impressive reach, fan-base, influence and profit needs to take advantage these new powerful technologies in order to stay relevant in the rapidly changing internet landscape. For those with little experience with social media, this process may seem intimidating; however, incorporating basic social media functionality is fairly simple and can bring powerful results.
Beginning Social Media Incorporation
The first step for anyone learning how to incorporate social media into websites is to create accounts for the website/brand on each of the major social networks. This will be the fundamental framework for any future social marketing and outreach campaigns for the website. An important step to effectively incorporate social media is to offer a variety of prominent social buttons on the website in order to generate traffic and interest. Some of these options are: likes/+1’s, shares, tweets and subscribe options. While it is essential to include these integrated social media buttons, it is a good idea not to overwhelm the user with choices. By using only a handful of the most popular and effective options, response rates and effectiveness will be higher.
Depending on the content management system the website is using, if using one at all, the “widget” options for embedded social media buttons will vary. Through experimenting and testing various designs and layouts, you can find a highly effective and aesthetically pleasing layout for the website over time. Learning how to incorporate social media into websites in a highly effective manner is not a skill that is learned overnight, it will take hard work, patience and time.
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Building Fans and Loyalty through Social Media Integration
In addition to social media buttons on a website, there are a variety of different ways to increase both loyalty and fan-base size. For an e-commerce website, an effective way to do this is to showcase a special offer available to subscribers, such as free shipping or a moderate discount, along with a well-placed subscribe button. This can bring large amounts of subscribers, further increasing your website’s influence and profit over time. Another subtle means of increasing web presence through social media is through embedded videos, pictures and other forms of media. Additionally, because nearly half of all time spent on social media sites is done through mobile devices, it is necessary to optimize your website for this traffic.
In order to monitor the effectiveness of any of these or related techniques, using a web analytic program, such as Google Analytics, will be very helpful and can provide valuable insights on how to best target any audience.
The Effects of Embedded Social Media
Through using integrated social media buttons on the website, the likelihood of viral content is much higher which can dramatically increase the website’s brand recognition and authority overnight. These buttons also play a more subtle role of spreading content, increasing traffic and increasing perceived credibility to any user who visits the page.
The vast amount of traffic on social media websites makes it paramount to the success of any website or business. Though learning how to incorporate social media on websites may at first seem like a simple endeavor, the real benefits come after large amounts of experimentation, experience and time.
