Social Media is a great way to engage with your audience. To get feedback about products and services, business leads and even generate sales.

But to do so requires you to have a following and not just any followers either. You need those that may be interested in what you have to offer.

They are out there somewhere, but how to find them?

There are a number of applications that can make reaching out to your target audience in Social Media that bit easier.

Hootsuite

Probably my favourite Social Media management tool, Hootsuite allows multi-account management and multi-user collaboration. Giving the account manager ultimate control. Aside from being a great management platform it is also fantastic for monitoring the social space.

Within Hootsuite you can set up something called “streams”. These are defined channels of updates based on preferences you set.

For example if you want to monitor Twitter for mentions of a phrase related to your market sector you can easily do so in Hootsuite. In the screenshot below I have set up a stream to monitor for the phrase “car insurance”.

From this stream you will see plenty of opportunities to reach out to your target audience. Many other filters could be employed to define location or even sentiment.

Twilert

This handy tool allows you to monitor Twitter for a specific phrase, @ mention or hashtag. Twilert will then email you at the interval you define when it finds anything.

This means you can monitor Twitter remotely and react as quickly as possible to any mentions of your keyword or phrase.

Whos’s Following Who

Twitter is such a great prospecting tool as all the information is open for you to see. Unlike other social platforms where you need permission to follow someone, with Twitter you can do so without question.

Taking advantage of this openness allows you to see who’s following your competition and following them ourselves. It’s likely if someone follows your competitor they may well be interested in you too.

One idea may be to collate a private Twitter List, and add these people to it. Monitor their interaction with our competitor looking for opportunities engage. You don’t even need to follow them if you don’t want to.

Facebook Ads

Facebook can prove very popular for some brands, whilst others struggle to make it work for them. The one thing that makes Facebook so appealing is the ability to run highly targeted Ads.

Every parameter you could think of is available allowing you to display adverts to very specific audiences. Some of the criteria your are able to leverage is:

• Age
• Location
• Marital Status
• Hobbies
• Place of Work
• Education
• Upcoming birthdays
• That Like your Facebook page
• Even the friends of people that Like your page

In fact with the right combination of filters it is almost possible to target individuals. At the very least you can target highly specific groups driving them to your page or website.

LinkedIn for Business

If you prefer to target business people rather than individual consumers then LinkedIn may be the platform of choice.

With a premium LinkedIn account you can search for business leads based on the following filters:

• Seniority
• Company Size
• Interests
• Function
• Interests
• Years of Experience
• Fortune 1000
• Your Groups
• New to LinkedIn

Even without a premium account you can search for specific companies and look for key contacts. Find out how you are connected to these individuals and ask for an introduction from your network.

Who’s Asking

Looking for people asking questions related to your market sector can be another great way to reach your target audience. There are several popular Q&A services that you can monitor or event take part in.

LinkedIn and Quora are probably the more sophisticated platforms that make it easier to connect with those asking questions.

Here you may need to be more proactive by providing a suitable answer to gain trust before trying to build a relationship with the users.

Providing Value

Wherever you look for your target audience on Social Media there is one thing you need to ensure you provide, and that’s value. Whether it be in the form of content or a solution to their problem.

Without either of these your target audience is unlikely to engage, and without engagement your unlikely to generate business.