Day 3: Experts Talk Social Media Strategy in ‘Mobilizing You’ Session

AT&T hosted Black Enterprise’s Women of Power Session 13, dedicated to teaching attendees how to use social media to advance one’s brand. The panel, “Mobilizing You,” featured tech-savvy ladies who are at the top of their game when it comes to using everything from Facebook and Twitter to Instagram and Linked In.

Sharing advice were L.C. Johnson, Founding Editor of Colored Girl Confidential; Angela Pitter, principal and founder of LiveWire Collaborative; and L. Michelle Smith, head of Global Diversity for AT&T’s Corporate Communications. Moderated by Our World with Black Enterprise co-host, Patricia Césaire, founder of the Césaire Groupe LLC, the discussion began with social media trends and details about the best practices for engaging on social media and creating a community around your expertise.

“The rules have changed in some way where it’s very noisy and cluttered. It’s very important to leverage influencers who will get your brand across,” said Smith, who reminded people of the lack of social media privacy and adjusting permission on Facebook to control what people see.

[Related: WATCH LIVE: Women of Power Summit]

Sharing how she differentiates between her personal and professional social media accounts, Smith­ gave tips on content

creation. “The first is community; It’s all about individuals who gather around a brand or topic. You need to have people who care about your content or message. And you have to have some really compelling content, good information, and conversation. You need to engage people and get them to talk.”

Pitter shared info on various social media sites and resources to organize content, such as Feedly, along with automation and scheduling tools like BufferApp and Hootsuite. “You can’t tweet once a week or once a day, but that’s where these scheduling tools come in handy,” said Potter, who talked about aggregating Women of Power speakers in a list on her Twitter page. “You have to engage. It’s ok to retweet content.”

When discussing how to create a content strategy that’s intriguing and authentic, Johnson suggested thinking about what you’re tweeting and using what’s posted as a strategy.

“I tell women to ask themselves, ‘What do you want to be best in the world at?’ If you can choose one thing you want to be known for, one place you want to be best in the world, then you can ask yourself, ‘How do I get there?’ Once you get there, you need to know your audience. The secret is knowing that people don’t care about you; They care about how you can help them.”

She continued, “For example if you’re a marketing executive, the people you can help are others who are marketing executives. And once you find out who your audience is ask yourself, ‘How you can make their life better?’ You can entertain them, you can educate them, you can teach them, and you can inspire them. You can help them feel like, ‘I can do this.’”