I was recently doing some research on Google and typed in the search box “simple steps to social media”. The results made me chuckle when the top 15 results contained the following descriptions:

• 10 Simple Steps to Social Media
• 9 Simple Steps to Social Media
• 8 Simple Steps to Social Media
• 7 Simple Steps to Social Media
• 5 Simple Steps to Social Media
• 4 Simple Steps to Social Media
• 3 Simple Steps to Social Media

I’m curious what happened with the 2-step and 6-step process. Well, if you search for 6 simple steps, it’s out there too! But I was surprised that no one seems to have the brilliance to devise a 2-step process. So I began to ponder to notion of how many steps does it take? Is there a answer to this question? Perhaps the magic 8-ball will know the answer? I know, Mr. Owl will know! He figured out how many licks it took to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop. A one, a two, a three.

So, how many licks does it take to get to the center of social media?

Truth be told, there is no correct answer. Social media campaigns need to be tailored for each clients specific objectives. Below are some basic components that should be understood and addressed prior to launch.

Understand Your Target Audience
The most important and first step in any social media campaign is understanding your target audience. One misconception/strategy is the idea of targeting the general public. You need to understand your audience and how to effectively communicate, precisely as possible, about your service or product. As a social marketer, you must create an two-way open forum allowing a constant stream of exchanged information with your target audience.

Figure Out Your Objectives
So now that you’ve determined your target audience, the next step is identifying your objectives. Objectives are often driven by marketing or sales. Many companies today use at social media as a tool for improving Search Engine Optimization (SEO), as it has long been directly accountable to improvements in web sales. A simple question to ask yourself, “What’s the goal or point of this program?” The answer is usually a combination of the following:

• Increase brand or product awareness
• Increase sales
• Lead generation
• Loyalty program
• Create a community
• SEO

Connect With Your Audience
You’ve now determined your audience and objectives, but how do you connect with the audience? A well planned social media marketing effort starts with research. Finding out where your desired audience spends its time interacting and sharing content is critical in any strategy. Social media marketing is an investment in time and relationships. Understanding and building upon those relationships allows for community building – leading to increased awareness.

With the plethora of social media websites available, choosing a right ones depend on your audience and objectives. Creating profiles on several websites will improve awareness and begin the first steps in building your community. A good start would be to focus on some of the most popular sites such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Digg and Flickr.

Choose A Strategy
While creating profiles is a start, understanding how to use these social media websites is paramount. Creating a channel on YouTube for you monthly video seminars, generating potential B to B clients through LinkedIn, building a fan base on Facebook, driving traffic with your followers on Twitter, or building a great community on your company blog all sound great, but it takes a sound strategy for implementation. There are different approaches to each website, fortunately there are hundreds of articles available on the internet. Some basic research will yield great results for strategies on the larger networking sites.

Software is also available and beneficial for monitoring and interacting with multiple social media websites simultaneously (Seesmic). Use tools for Twitter to allow multiple people to use and manage one account (CoTweet). With Twitter software such as SocialOomph or Hootsuite, you can schedule your tweets and have them deploy over a week. Other software available will help with Facebook and LinkedIn status updates. Posting and commenting on social media websites with a constant frequency and posting weekly posts to you blog (Wordpress or Blogger) will help build community and awareness.

SEO also plays a key role in strategy. Much of the content creation and promotion for a social media marketing happens within the mix of sites chosen. Building off the information gleaned on these websites leads to opportunities for optimizing content and keywords (Google Keyword Tool).

Measure Your Goals
There are lots of ways to measure social media success, so make sure you determine your key metrics before you get started. Leveraging social media monitoring services like Radian6 and web analytics such as Google Analytics you can provide marketers with the insight to improve results. Use tools like YouTube’s Insight to track videos posted on your YouTube Channel. The bottom line is that you need to measure your goals. Choose your objectives and goals, define them ahead of time, and create a plan to track your progress. This will allow you to not only gauge overall campaign, but allow for refinements on the fly while you’re still running the program.

Join The Conversation
Now that your social media campaign is running, it’s time to join the social media world. Go get social. Search for your name and your company. See where people are talking about you and join in on the conversation. Post comments on other sites and blogs leaving contact information or website address if permitted. Learn the lingo and jargon so you understand the way people talk. Learn how tool use tools like the “Hashtag” (#) or “Retweet” (RT) features in Twitter. Participate in ways that follow the accepted norms of each site. Become a community leader or topic expert by answering questions, starting discussions, and stay actively involved. You must stay current and relevant to continually build awareness of your person, company or product in the social world.

So, how many licks does it take to get to the center of social media?

It takes 6… 6 licks to get to the center of social media! It appears that I have successfully created the “6 Simple Steps to Social Media” methodology. Social media marketing can have very beneficial results once the planning and set-up have been completed. It is important to realize nothing happens overnight and it will take time, but you can accomplish you goals and much more in only a few hours each week. Good luck.

So, how many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop?

Well, a student study at the University of Cambridge concluded that it takes 3481 licks to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop. Just thought you may want to know!