All businesses can harness the power of social media to help find new customers and enter new markets – but the key is to have good content.
The message was highlighted by experts at a seminar staged by Barclays which looked at how to use some of social media’s more effective tools. 
Called Leading in the Digital Age – the use of Intelligent Social Media, the event at UWE heard from keynote speaker is Kate Doodson, executive director of Cosmic Ethical IT, one of the region’s leading social enterprises.
Kate said many new social media users made the mistake of not thinking strategically and posting information that was of no use to their business or prospective customers.
“You should apply normal business principles,” she told the gathering of small business owners. “There is lots of noise going on but you don’t have to join the conversation. “Listening is the best thing to with social media at first.”
Once business owners had established how they wanted to use social media they needed to plan their content.
“It shouldn’t be a knee jerk reaction to something,” she said.
The best use of social media was to manage reputation – both as a business and an individual – and to become a though leader through the use of blogs.
“Thought leadership is the pinnacle of content and has the impact on buyers,” she said.
Kate then joined a panel debate with Bristol entrepreneurs Dan Martin, editor of Businesszone.co.uk and founder of The Pitch business competition, James Lott, co-founder and managing director of social enterprise Working Knowledge, which creates chances for young people to open doors into employment, and Catrin MacDonnell, co-director of deli and catering firm Papadeli, along with Lewis Hunt, Barclays Digital Eagle, YouTube specialist.
