Tweet Boldly – Langford, South Dakota

Perusing through the twitterverse a while back I came across an interesting tweet from the little town of Langford, South Dakota. Actually, it was a Facebook post shared to their Twitter page, that actually originated from the South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks page. (No we’re not playing Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon). Regardless, of the path in the social media world, the message caught my eye.

At first blush, the tweet is relatively simple, especially for a small common-sense community. It takes a post from South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks and utilizes it to promote the community to hunters.

Be Efficient, Be Effective

First of all, let’s look at the efficiency and effectiveness of the post. Langford utilized video content from another source for the post. Video content is one of the most effective ways to catch attention. But the production costs of quality video content is costly, especially for a small community. Utilizing video content from other sources is a great way to achieve the goals efficiently and effectively.

Promote or Not to Promote

Next, there’s the promotion of presumably all the businesses in the community. Many communities stay away from the promotion of businesses. It’s safer to leave it to their chamber of commerce or upon the businesses themselves. For cities to promote local businesses is often a sticky subject. But Langford is so small, this post likely promoted every business in the community. This likely eases many of the concerns of doing such promotion.

Sure, the tweet/post promotes a number of businesses beyond what a typical hunter would be interested in during their visit to the area. Stopping by a lumber yard, a hair salon, or a seed company is not typically in the mindset of visiting hunters. But leaving businesses out, even if they’re not relatable can cause more headaches than benefits. Especially for a municipality, rather than a chamber of commerce. Also, you never know, a hunter may need lumber to repair/expand a deer stand or duck blind. Depending on the length of their stay, they may need a haircut.

You never know, a few more dollars could be spent locally. A simple tweet or Facebook post could help businesses and your sales tax base.

Your Decision

Overall, this type of social media post may not be in the realm of the direction your community wishes to head in marketing the community. But it has its advantages nonetheless. Just remember that 77% of Americans have social media profiles. That number continues to climb as well. Social media has already become an efficient and effective marketing tool. But be bold with it. Make sure it stands out in the wild wild west that is the twitterverse.

(By the way, be sure to follow Rural Resurrection on Twitter and Facebook! 😉 )