While it may seem impossible to compete with the corporate conglomerates, there’s one thing the small fish has over the big fish in the business pond today:

Small business owners have the ability to make powerful connections with customers individually.

While the larger companies try to connect through the various social media networks, programs, and events, it’s simply not the same. Consumers know and value the difference between a faceless corporation and an honest business owner. Though the larger companies will have events, giveaways, and contests designed to entice action from consumers, they never really connect one-on-one in the social scene, which is what the social scene is all about.

While social media has enabled the entire world to connect on a personal level, the power of the connection has been somewhat deluded by those who abuse the opportunity – those who want to increase their friend count for marketing purposes alone. Because of them, it’s become acceptable for “connections” to consist of friend requests and acceptances.

While the popularity of social media is stronger than ever, the connections made are weaker than ever. Because of this, we’ve come up with a few tips that might help you increase the power of the connections you make with customers in the social media scene.

Let your customers come to you – This is one of the most important things you can do when searching for connections with high conversion rates – that is, connections most likely to turn into your customers. Consider the return on investment – your investment being time: does it make more sense to spend time building a lot of low conversion rate connections or building content, such as interviews and tutorials, to attract high conversion rate connections? Growing your friend list is easy and instant – don’t be fooled into thinking you’re making progress by the amount of friends you have in the social networks. For more on letting your customers come to you, read How Business Owners Can take Advantage of Social Media.

If you do seek connections, always send a message – Avoid deluding the connection you seek by sending a personalized message along with your request to connect. Introduce yourself and state why you’d like to be connected.

Accept connection requests with a message and question – Again, don’t reduce the power of your connection with the silence treatment; show them you care about the connection and pose a general question. For example, if you are a remodeling contractor you might say …

“Hey John, it’s nice to meet you here on Facebook. Are you working on any projects at the moment?”

By sending a question along with your message, you’re encouraging your connection to continue the conversation – the more conversation, the more likely the connection will convert to a customer. Often times, a connection will reply with …

“Nice to meet you too, Adam. I enjoy your blog, so I thought I’d connect with you here! I’m just about ready to remodel my kitchen and I was wondering what your rate was.”

Engage your connections just as you would engage a customer in a store. Just remember to keep it pretty casual though when in the social media scene – you’re interacting with people one-on-one not as a business person but as a person who does business.

Finding the balance between connecting with customers as a person and connecting with customers as a business is the key to a healthy business / customer relationship, so you should also consider submitting your information to local, national, and international business listings.

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