In my last article, I wrote on the importance of building a social capital. I said, “Social capital is the number of people that you have direct relationship and access with via any of the social media platforms, including your e-mail and mobile phone contacts”.
I mentioned some of the ways in which an individual could build his/her social capital and I said any system that could bring people together had the potential to create wealth.
Once you have been able to build your social capital via a very functional website, social media etc, the next logical step is to derive some form of profit from all your labour. To many people, making profit is synonymous with making money. So we would refer to profit-making in terms of financial reward.
Turning your online presence to money is not as scary as one may think. We know that ‘time is money’ and if you have decided to spend some of your time online, it should be convertible to money, shouldn’t it?
Literally, billions of dollars exchange hands on the internet daily. Therefore there should not be anything wrong with LEGITIMATELY earning some of this money. Making money online involves time, dedication, a strategy and some business-savvy. The internet provides various opportunities to make fresh income but, that is not our focus in this piece.
Our focus is on how you can make your current business more profitable using various tools available online. Before we hit the ground running, it is important that I appreciate those that sent me feedbacks via email especially on the piece about building a social capital, that said, let’s convert time to money.
Leverage on your social capital
The most reliable type of social capital refers to those people with whom you have been able to build a relationship and who have come to trust you. So how do you turn this trust to profit?
Let us imagine that you are a real estate consultant, a doctor, a motivational speaker, a car sales person, et cetera. You have been able to build your social capital and you have over one thousand friends on Facebook, over 500 followers on twitter and hundreds on clicks on your website daily. You must try to ensure that members of your social network can trust you well enough. How do you gain their trust?
As a motivational speaker, consistently tweet motivational words in a manner acceptable by members of your network, your profile picture should be representative of the personality you hope to portray. This step pre-supposes that you understand what your audience wants, how they want it, and when they want it. If you get this right, when you come forward to announce an event, members of your social network will be interested in being a part of it.
During my study of consumer behaviour, I learnt that price is not the only factor that majority of consumers look out for in making a purchase decision; nor is it the most important. Loyalty to a brand is a major motivating factor to a large number of consumers. If you can build loyalty among members of your social network, you can turn your social capital to profit easily.
Get sponsored
A couple of years ago, I stumbled on an interesting fact, which I verified while preparing this piece. I learnt that about 20 per cent of the incomes of certain cinemas come from the sales of popcorn. Have you ever wondered why popcorn is sold at cinemas? Now you know.
I am not going to ask you to sell popcorn online. No, far from it. The next way to turn your online presence to profit is through sponsorship. Generally, sponsors want exposure. They want to reach out to brands and companies that cater to your audience and start small. For instance, if you are a car salesman and you have been able to build a huge social capital, you could walk up to an automobile service centre and say that you would include a picture on their product as your display picture or on your website.
If you can prove to them that you can give their product the exposure they need, they will be willing to sponsor you. This is the same reason some companies sponsor seminars and shows, in exchange they ask that some of their publicity materials be placed at the venue of the event. Continue to cultivate your social capital, build trust, stay motivated, and note that getting sponsors is not so easy when you are just starting.
Use in-text adverts
If you are a frequent blogger, in-text adverts are a great method of monetisation. Advertisements are incorporated within a post contextually via keywords that are then underlined. For example, the word “mobilemonie” is underlined within a post, when readers hover over underlined text, a small pop-up with the advertisement appears.
You can also make a tweet about a certain product or post information about a service on facebook. In a very subtle manner, you could advertise a product by recommending it to members of your network. This effort usually would not go unrewarded.
Converting your time to money is one of the oldest ways of creating wealth and your online presence provides you with such an opportunity. Implement the strategies discussed here, kindly send me your feedbacks and above all, remember that every endeavor requires an amount of sweat before you can enjoy the sweet, so be ready to work !