So, now that you’re getting a better idea of what social media is, the question becomes “How do I actually apply it?  Where do I start?  How do I not screw it up and blast away all my customers?”  Start here… the 5 P’s of Social Media:  Profiles, Propagate, Produce, Participate, and Progress

1.  Profiles: There are basically two types of user Profiles, your personal one or your company one and a group profile.  Personal/business profiles can be: Jane Doe in LinkedIn, Facebook, MySpace, Flickr, Twitter, YouTube.  A group profile can be:  Social Media Marketers, Investment Bankers Online, or Innovative Thinking.

You should immediately secure your names before someone else gets them.  Already, cyber-squatters are piling in to Twitter.  With the last Friday (06/12/2009) night opening up of personalized Facebook URLs, over 1/2 million people secured their names in the first 15 minutes.  Don’t be behind.

2.  Propagate: After you’ve created your accounts and filled in your profiles, you need to begin to propogate those accounts with content.  Photos, company pdfs, product slicks, video, audio files, etc.  Get out there and get all your digital files collected and uploaded to these web sites so that when your customers and prospects are looking for you and/or information on you, it’s easy to find.

3.  Produce: If you don’t have a lot of content, or if you want to add new content, get to creating!  Your computer, more than likely, has a built in microphone and free sound editing software (if not, get Audacity, a free audio recording and editing software). The best part of all is there is no cost but your time.  However, you must always keep in mind to send a strong “What’s in it for me?” message to your listeners.  Give them a reason to keep watching, listening, or reading your content.

4.  Participate: Yes, you have to have conversations with other people’s content and in their blogs and profiles.  Begin by commenting, but LISTEN first… don’t just jump in.  This medium really is a cocktail party… use the same skills.  You don’t just walk over to a group across the room and start pontificating.  You listen in on the fringes first; you look interested; you nod your head; then, once one of the group glances at you expectantly, you ask a relevant question or give an interesting statement.  That’s manners.

5.  Progress: Said it before… say it again, “What gets measured, gets managed.”  So, be sure you’re measuring your progress.  I.E. how many views has your video received on YouTube?  How many people have “liked” or commented on your Facebook status?  How many people request to be linked to you on LinkedIn?  How often do people follow you back on Twitter?  I recommend Google alerts for seeing when your name/ your company name is mentioned on the web.  Also, I cannot recommend Woopra highly enough!!!  John Pozadzides is the CEO and he and his team have created an amazing product.  I track both Wendistry and CityCrush with Woopra.

Some portions excerpted from FastCompany.com and Lon Safko