7 Ways To Transform Your Website Into A Social Media Hub

Should your website be social? Are you looking to turn that static website into something a bit more interactive for your visitors? Keep reading to discover how to become…

A Bit More “Sociable”…

There’s no doubt that social media is a powerful marketing and communication tool for businesses and non-profit organizations that have embraced it.

Yet, for most of us, our websites are still where the rubber meets the road. It’s where you turn visitors into leads, and prospects into clients and customers. It’s where you build your credibility and sell your wares.

But can you inject some of the “humanness” of social media into your website without compromising its ability to sell? Can you use social media to drive traffic to your website for conversion without alienating your current visitors?

More and more businesses are showing us that this is an achievable and worthwhile goal; that the two together can foster improved communication, build brand loyalty and create a better, more responsive, more profitable company.

Here are seven examples of how you can integrate your social media activity into your website for maximum results.

#1: Add Social Media Buttons To Your Home Page
A few years ago, the idea of sending people to another site from your home page after you had worked so hard
to get them there in the first place seemed boneheaded.

But the reality is that every one of your visitors is spending more time on social media sites like
Facebook than they ever will on your site. So why not talk to them there and from time to time give them a new reason to come back to your site?
So putting a button on your site that allows them to connect with you there makes sense, right?

Quick Tip: If you’re concerned about losing that prospect, consider having the social media site they
click on open in a new tab or window, keeping your own website available for later viewing.

Also, make sure you have a social media profile that will engage your audience. You can get ideas from looking at examples of top Facebook pages and read up on how to optimise your LinkedIn and Twitter profile.

#2: Connect Your Blog With Your Website
The line between blog and website has never been blurrier, with many businesses choosing to build their
entire site on platforms that were traditionally meant for blogging, such as WordPress.
Whether your blog shares a domain with your website or not, you can improve the interactivity of your website
by teasing your blog posts from your home page.

For example, a webmaster should be able to easily add a menu to your site as well as pull in the recent posts as links on to your home page

Quick Tip: Although free blog services like WordPress and Blogger are great and. they’re free, I prefer to have my blog under a domain I control. That way, you can move from one platform to another without hurting your search engine visibility, and you’re more insulated against a third-party blogging platform going out of business.

#3: Embed Videos On Your Website
There are few things as engaging as a well-put-together video. Imagine adding a how-to or explanatory video to your product or services page, never mind a welcome video to your home page!

How much more compelling would your site be? How much could you increase your conversion rates by showing examples of other customers finding success by using your products or services? Embed a video on your website to bring your offerings to life.

#4: Make Your Site Shareable
Twitter ‘Retweet’ buttons and Facebook ‘Like’ buttons aren’t just for blogs! When someone clicks these buttons, all of their connections see that they ‘Like’ your site or one of your site’s pages on Twitter and Facebook, with a link they can click on that will instantly bring their connections to the page they ‘Liked’.
So by encouraging people to ‘Like’ and ‘retweet’ your site’s content, you are giving yourself opportunities for your visitors to recommend and drive traffic to your site for FREE!!

#5: Add Your Presentations To Your Website
If you sell complex or high-priced services or products, you can maximise your results by putting your presentations on your site.
The best way to do this is to set up a free account at SlideShare (think YouTube for PowerPoint). Once you’ve uploaded your slides, SlideShare will allow you to embed that presentation back into your website or blog. This creates an interactive experience for visitors, who can now click through your slides.

Maximise the reach of your presentations by embedding SlideShare into your site as soon as you can.

#6: Socially Bookmark New Content

Social bookmarking is a unique method for internet users to store, organise, share and search the web pages they want to remember (bookmark). In this system, users save links to web pages that they want to remember and/or share.
Additionally, as people bookmark web pages on social bookmarking sites that they find useful, web pages that are of more use are bookmarked by more users.

So as you add new articles or archive your email newsletters to your site, make sure that you add them to appropriate social bookmarking sites like Reddit, StumbleUpon, and Delicious. These popular sites can drive huge amounts of traffic to your website in a short period of time.

This strategy works especially well for businesses that have consumer goods, especially if you’ve just launched something or you’ve got something eye-catching or newsworthy to share.

Quick Tip: It’s always best when someone else bookmarks your content. If people see that you have a vested interest in bookmarking the site, they are less likely to go look at what you’ve bookmarked.

So it might make sense to have a small “bookmarking club” with friends, where you promote each other’s work. This “seeding” will often encourage others to bookmark your content.

#7: Add A Facebook ‘Like’ Box To Your Website
This strategy is different to the first strategy I shared with you. With a Facebook ‘Like’ box, people
actually get to ‘’ your Facebook page directly from your website without having to find your page on Facebook first. But as in strategy number one, the principle is the same.

We’re all influenced by other people, a concept often referred to as ‘social proof”. When we see our friends or people we respect ‘Liking’, supporting or promoting something, we’re more open to ‘liking’ it ourselves.
Adding a Facebook ‘Like’ box to your site creates this social proof for the friends of the person that clicks on the Facebook ‘Like’ box.

Visitors can quickly see how many people have ‘Liked’ your business on Facebook, get a sense of your level of commitment to social media (by the posts you’ve added to your wall), and may even spy some of their friends and connections through the ‘Like’ box (it shows the photos of the latest people to ‘like’ your Facebook page).

Further, you make it easy for your site visitors to ‘like’ your business without having to leave your site.