Small businesses (like the big ones) have a crucial concern- how to win and keep customers. While it is easier for the big enterprise- what with the resources and money muscle at their disposal, the typical small business and start up does not have access to fancy and expensive tools and resources. However, in the digital age, this issue can be mitigated by effectively utilizing the Internet and what is now called ‘social media’. The only hindrance today is knowledge, and how much do you attempt to gain it. The best part is that it is free to use, has virtually unlimited resources and can go a long way in transforming the way you do business.

Now you definitely know many things happening in the Internet world around you, and maybe you’ve tried one or two of these- have a Facebook/Friednster/QQ/Orkut account, tinkled with twitter, played with Plurk and linked to many on linkedin. You used them for a while, but well, they did not exactly result in business the way you thought they would. You even thought of blogging and then decided it is less effort to ‘pitch’ to bloggers (or was it your PR agency?) but that fell flat as well. Déjà vu?

I am starting a series on how to use these social media tools- for business. No big articles here (unless some of you really want a separate post on it)- just the top 10 or 15 points that will make the difference for you. I will assume that you know the basics of what the tool is all about, so as to not waste time in the gory details, and get started immediately.

And again, while the best intentions are always there to discuss the essential hygiene factors, it is always advisable that you do get expert opinion by hiring the right talent or the right agencies (you can try Pulsopinion-Freelance experts with a disclosure that we get some work done through them). These companies understand your business and the media space. Really every business is different from the other. It needs consistent time, effort, expertise and love to develop into something that starts showing results over a period of time.

In the first part- we start with, well, perhaps the trickiest of them all. Twitter.

• First Post : Using Twitter for business Part 1
• Second Post: Using twitter for business Part 2
• Third Post: Are Businesses in Asia using microblogging to their advantage?