SocialCPAs

Take the 2012 SocialCPAs survey today!

We just launched our third annual SocialCPAs Social Media Survey.  Our goal is to see how accounting professionals are adopting or avoiding social media. 

We hope you will participate in our survey and let us know what you think of social media.  You will be able to use the survey results to compare your social media efforts to peers in the accounting profession.

Click here to take our survey

We would greatly appreciate your help promoting this survey.  Please consider emailing this page to your coworkers or posting it to your favorite social media site.

Thanks for being part of our 2012 survey!

2012 Social Media Predictions from Alexandra DeFelice

Our first set of social media predictions is from Alexandra DeFelice. 

Alexandra DeFelice is Senior Manager-Communications & Program Development at Moore Stephens North America, Inc.  She is a former Senior Editor in charge of technology coverage at Journal of Accountancy  and also managed the journal’s social media presence.  Alexandra was one of the founders of the Accounting Tomorrow blog and is very active on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.

Here are Alexandra’s social media predictions for 2012:

LinkedIn will grow exponentially and people will increasingly use that channel instead of their outlook Inboxes.  QR codes will become mainstream by marketers but many consumers (at least those in the Boomer generation and beyond) won't know how to use them.

Facebook use will continue to grow as parents and grandparents want to stay in touch with their younger relatives. There likely will be several privacy breaches tied into this as the settings continue to change regularly.

Customers/clients will start to drive the way we do business more so than ever before, but businesses need to realize they can't put all their eggs in the social media basket. As more and more of these sites start to talk to one another, less and less will become private.

As a general rule of thumb, I would say that if you don’t want someone to know something, don’t put it on social media because there’s bound to be a hole in the system, somewhere. Work and life are no longer separate, so it will be difficult to act as though they are.

Having a Hard Time Getting Clients to Notice Your Firm?

It seems like a never-ending battle. You build a website, launch an e-mail newsletter and start a blog. Everything is working and then it happens! Your boss walks in and says, “Do we have a Google+ page?” As much as you like social media, there is an unending list of places that you need to list or register your firm. Hurray!

Let’s look at the ways that you can get your firm found using LinkedIn, Facebook and Google+.

LinkedIn Company Page

According to LinkedIn’s website, a company page is “a centralized location where millions of LinkedIn members can go to stay in the loop on company news, products and services, business opportunities and job openings.” This is a cool list but exactly how do I do all that?

Let’s start with some basics. Click on the Search Companies option from the Companiesmenu. Type in your company’s name and click search. Does your company appear on the list? If not, simply click the Add a Company link in the top right. This will allow you to add a LinkedIn Page for your company.

By default, any employee with a valid e-mail address at your company’s domain will be able to edit your company’s LinkedIn page. I recommend assigning designated administrative users. They will be able to enter and modify the following:

• Company overview
• Company type and size
• Website address
• Industry
• Operating status
• Year founded
• Location

Any company page administrator can share status updates with the company’s followers. These updates might include announcements, promotions, news and videos. Followers can then like, share or comment on these updates. This will expose your company to your follower’s entire network.

LinkedIn company pages can also be used to post job openings and broadcast information about your company’s products and services. Page administrators can view company page analytics that include page view, unique visitors, clicks on product and services, members following your company and visitors. These analytics can help you plan for future promotions and status updates.

Facebook Page

Facebook describes its pages as follows: “Pages are for organizations, businesses, celebrities and bands to broadcast great information in an official, public manner to people who choose to connect with them.” A company can use them to maintain a presence on Facebook. A person who has his or her own Facebook account can add and manage a Facebook Page.

The information posted on a Facebook Page is public and available to anyone on Facebook. People who “Like” your page will receive your updates in their news feed. Your Facebook Page can include the following information about your company:

• Category
• Year founded
• Address
• About
• Description
• Mission
• Awards
• Products
• Email
• Web Address

The Facebook Page administrator can use the Manage Permissions feature to control the visibility of your page, set country and age restrictions and control the information posted to the page. Facebook has a great feature that allows a page administrator to use Facebook as a Page. The administrator can use his or her page’s identity to view notifications, as you would with other pages, you can post status updates, share links and comment on status updates.

Facebook Pages include a comprehensive Insights module. Page administrators can use it to see the page’s total Likes, the number of people talking about the page and the total number of people who have seen content from the page. Analytics also allows you to see detailed demographic information about the people who Like and are talking about your Facebook page.

Google+ Pages

Google+ Pages launched in November. The social media site’s blog describes the pages as follows: “Google+ pages help you connect with the customers and fans who love you. Not only can they recommend you with a +1 or add you to a circle to listen long term, [but] they can [also] actually spend time with your team, face-to-face-to-face.”

Your Google+ page can include posts, pictures, videos and basic information about your company. Much like Facebook, you can use Google+ as your page so that your posts and comments appear from your page. For example, I have an account/identity on Google+ as Barry MacQuarrie. When I post a status update on Google+, people in my Circles will see an update from Barry MacQuarrie. I also have a Company page for SocialCPAs. There is no user called SocialCPAs. I can login to Google+ as myself and switch my identity to SocialCPAs. Once I do this, all of my status updates, comments etc. will appear as if SocialCPAs posted them and notBarry MacQuarrie.

Google+ and Google+ Pages are just getting started. There are a lot of people trying to figure out how useful they will be and how they fit into business corporate marketing plans. If you haven’t done so already, try following a few pages and see what you think.

Final Thoughts

Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+ can help businesses with their marketing and customer service efforts. They allow businesses to broadcast their message, share product news, receive feedback and connect to customers in innovative ways. They are also a great resource for individuals. They allow us to learn a lot about our clients, vendors, prospective clients, referral sources and competitors.

Are you and your company taking advantage of these opportunities?

 

This article was originally published in the AICPA's CPA Insider newsletter.