Social media is all about engaging customers in the digital age.

Customers are no longer limited to their local stores; the entire Internet is at their fingertips. It’s extremely important to help customers find you, keep their attention when they do find you, and give them reasons to come back.

Google Doodle

This weekend, I spent almost 10 minutes playing with the new Google doodle! At first I couldn’t figure it out, so I used Google to actually figure out how to “play” with it! I was hooked, and unconsciously I am already waiting for their next one. Google has engaged me, and has given me a reason to come back.

Social platforms such as Facebook, Google+, Twitter and Foursquare – they all make it easier for customers to find you and get to your landing pages.

Keeping their attention and giving them reasons to come back – now, that’s the hard part. That’s our job.

My suggestion – Embrace new technology but don’t forget the basics. Figure out how to use the ever-changing set of social tools available to engage your customers. Facebook gets this; let’s take the new Facebook interface as an example…

Facebook has developed a new feature called Timeline (to be released in about two weeks). This new feature allows users to interact with their entire Facebook history as if it were an interactive scrapbook. Timeline divides Facebook pages into two columns where photos, comments, and updates display one’s own unique life story. In other words, Timeline allows users to scroll through each other’s entire lives on Facebook.

“It’s like a scrapbook, but it’s more comprehensive, it’s more organized, and you don’t have to spill out photos all over your living room floor,” said Chris Cox, VP of product management at Facebook.

This is a huge opportunity to tell the world your story especially for small businesses. This could help build a unique history with the customers and brand your organization with your fans as an important part of it.

It will give your customers the ability to see what has happened, not just what is happening.

Facebook pages are currently such a moving target – content posted one week is lost tomorrow… this almost forces you to generate new campaigns and new engagement techniques continuously.

“The way your profile works today, 99% of the stories you share vanish. The only way to find the posts that matter is to click “Older Posts” at the bottom of the page. Again. And again”, said Samuel W. Lessin, Product manager at Facebook.

Marketing teams can now spend time generating quality campaigns, which will engage your social customers for months not weeks or days. This will surely transform how companies engage digital marketing companies and increase expectations. Bring it on – we have been waiting for this! :)