Music Teacher's Helper Blog

I am completely fascinated with online networking.  It’s such a fun way to interact

Are you a social media expert?

with people you know and meet people you don’t.  In fact, social media is all the buzz in advertising in today’s market. It’s free, it’s fast, and you can hit a large market.  Big companies are even hiring social media experts whose full time job is to tweet you, text you, and message you about hot deals and cool stuff.  It’s the next big thing in marketing.  But should you use it for your private music teaching studio?  I do.

Facebook.  I love Facebook, mostly for its ability to quickly and easily connect with a ton of people, specifically my friends, family, high school classmates, and even my piano students. You can quickly and easily get messages to all or some of the people you know, advertise your studio, and share tips and tricks for practice times.   But Facebook is rife with privacy issues.  If you’re going to post personal items on Facebook, you must be vigilant about using discretion and privacy settings.  After all, some, if not all, of your posts may end up in Google searches.  You also need to watch that some distant relative doesn’t tag you in an unflattering photo from your third cousin’s wedding.  It might reflect poorly on the image you are hoping to portray to your private lesson students.  Avoid posting anything that you don’t want the entire world to know or see.  Don’t post rants about people or places, instead, keep your posts positive, fun, and inspiring.  Better yet, create a separate page based on your studio website.  You can invite all your students to visit, as well as post events, ads, or information that you want your students to see.  It’s a great place to offer an incentive for referrals.  You can also join Facebook groups such as your local high school band page or church page.  From there, you can meet new poeple and make new connections.  Don’t forget to ask people to ‘like’ your page so they can find you later or share you with their friends.

www.facebook.com

LinkedIn.  LinkedIn is a more professional venue, and a great way to network with other private teachers, businessman, and other professionals.  It’s a great way to get your resume and credentials out there, as well as advertise your studio website.  You’re not likely to find young students on LinkedIn, but you will be able to network with people who can lead you to new students (such as their professionally employed parents).  Be wary of attaching your Twitter and Facebook accounts to LinkedIn.  It’s much safer to keep this account strictly professional with no personal references.  Include a great looking head shot so people remember you as a person, not just a name on the computer screen.  You can also join various discussion groups through LinkedIn, so you can find job openings or people looking to find a private music teacher.  Don’t forget to link your profile to your free Music Teacher’s Helper website.

www.linkedin.com.

Twitter.    The key to Twitter is in being succinct.  You only have 140 characters to get your message out there, so the more concise you can be, the better.  You can invite your friends and family to follow you on Twitter, and you can gain followers by following people you like.  Whenever you tweet, you should add a hashtag that compliments your tweet.  So if you tweet about piano practice, you may want to end your tweet with #piano or #musicpractice.  A hashtag is like  a keyword.  Other Twitter users can search for keywords, and hopefully, your tweet will come up.  Again, make sure to link your account with your Music Teacher’s Website.  Be careful of privacy issues, and keep an eye on your followers.  It is polite and expected to follow back appropriate followers on Twitter.

www.twitter.com

Google+.  Google plus is like Facebook without all the fancy bells and whistles (and with less privacy problems, too).  It’s a great networking tool, and I’m sure it will be gaining popularity as time goes on.  Invite your friends and family to join, and create ‘circles’ to categorize them in.  You can then associate with people that are in their circles, and thereby expand your own.  Being so concise will inspire your creative writing, too. www.google.com.

There are a few tricks to good, social networking.  First, post often, but don’t spam.  I love hearing what local business men and women are doing, but I get annoyed by the people that post every half hour.  I just don’t have time for that!  If your are networking to advertise, post things that are relevant to your studio, such as practice tips, composer tidbits, and available lesson spots.  It’s also a great place to offer incentives or advertise specials, if you have them.   Routinely look for new people to connect with by checking your family and friend’s pages and searching for groups and individuals.  Avoid ranting and raving or gossipping in your posts.  Keep your comments positive and helpful.  If you are going to post about your students, make sure you have their parents permission.  People love to see photographs, but be very careful what you post and who you tag.  If you want to post photos of your students, you should probably get written permission first.  Lastly, always be aware of privacy concerns.  If you don’t want the entire world to know, play it safe and just don’t post it.  Link your accounts to your free Music Teacher’s Helper Website so people know where to find you.