Social Media Marketing All-in-One For Dummies. Michelle Krasniak

for others.

The downside is that the true owner of shortened URLs may be a mystery, so it doesn’t do much for your branding unless you select the option to create a custom URL. Figure 1-1 shows a typical URL truncating service and the result.

      

As always, enter the name of your URL-snipping service on your Social Media Marketing Plan. To make it easier to track URLs and their snipped versions, select just one service.

TABLE 1-2 URL-Snipping Services

Service Name	URL	Notes
Bitly	https://bitly.com	Free and paid versions, with history, stats, and preferences
Ow.ly	http://ow.ly/url/shorten-url	Hootsuite’s URL shortener, free
Hootsuite blog	https://blog.hootsuite.com/what-are-url-shorteners	12 of the Best Link Shorteners That Aren’t the Google URL Shortener
TinyURL	http://tinyurl.com	One of the oldest and best-known truncators, free
Rebrandly	www.rebrandly.com	Free and paid versions to share and track custom domain name URLs
2 Create a Website	http://blog.2createawebsite.com/2012/01/09/popular-url-shorteners-for-redirecting-tracking-affiliate-links	Comparison review article

      FIGURE 1-1: Enter a long URL at Bitly and receive a shortened URL in return.

Using E-Commerce Tools for Social Sites

      If money makes the world go ’round, e-commerce takes the cybersocial world for a dizzying spin. Many options exist for promoting or linking to your online store from blogs and social networks, but several applications now let you sell directly (or indirectly) from social media pages.

Always check the terms of service on social media sites to be sure you aren’t violating their rules. Some services may prohibit selling directly from their site. Check out the possibilities on Facebook Marketplace, Etsy, Pinterest, or Instagram Shopping.

      Selling through links

      The easiest way to sell from social networks and blogs is simply to post a banner or a text link to your own website or to other sites that sell your products (Etsy, for example). Additionally, you can post images on a site such as Facebook with links to your website or other sites.

Marleylilly is an online boutique that accomplishes this in a sophisticated manner, as shown in Figure 1-2. For example, clicking a featured item on its Facebook timeline (www.facebook.com/marleylilly/?fref=ts) takes shoppers to Marleylilly’s website at https://marleylilly.com/product/monogrammed-layering-tunic to fill their carts and check out.

      Displaying products on social media channels

      If you’re looking for a more seamless experience, consider e-commerce tools that display items from your existing online store on your blog or social media pages, and then either link automatically back to your web store to complete the transaction or permit users to purchase directly from the social media page.

E-commerce badges are mini-displays of products; these changeable badges (which appear onscreen as a large button with multiple links) link to an existing web store. If you already have an online store, check your shopping cart or check stand provider (the section of your online store that totals orders and takes payments) to see whether it offers a badge for social media, like the one shown in Figure 1-3.

      

Many vendors of online stores offer apps with shopping or promotional functionality for use on specific social media services. For example, 2020AVE uses the Shop Now function to sell on Facebook (www.facebook.com/2020ave).

      Selling directly on social media

      As we all know, every extra click can cost sales. That’s why many businesses choose to sell directly from a social media channel in addition to or instead of linking people to their website, Etsy store, or Amazon store.

      Courtesy of Marleylilly

      FIGURE 1-2: Product offerings can begin on Facebook (top) and then link to a separate shopping website (bottom).

      Courtesy of the owner of The Little Dabbler

      FIGURE 1-3: The Etsy mini-badge on the right side of this blog drives traffic to the Etsy shop for The Little Dabbler.

This solution can be a very cost-effective one for some B2C micro-businesses with only a few products, at least until they grow large enough to make a dedicated storefront worth the investment. Selling through a social channel may also make sense for introducing new or trending products or generating interest that would drive prospects to a fully empowered storefront.

      Marketers for large companies and those with a B2B audience are a bit cautious. Social media channels are not yet flexible enough to handle large inventories or the long-sales cycle generally