WINDSOR—As a business owner, you can’t ignore social media anymore, or it may already be hurting you.

Damien Smith, director of marketing for Farmers Bank, stopped by Windsor High School this past Wednesday to talk about social media as a platform to boost your reach as a business and cultivate a community. Smith was asked to do a workshop on Social Media by the Isle of Wight Chamber of Commerce.

Smith spoke about the importance of blogging, vlogging, Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube and the 800-pound gorilla in the room, Facebook.

Blogging is one of the easiest ways to drive traffic to your website, as with the 2.5 billion Google searches going on each day, someone is probably searching about what you are writing about and may click. Vlogging is similar to blogging, except you set up a video camera and talk about whatever is on your mind.

“I like blogging,” Smith said. “It brings people to your site, and it keeps them there. And your blog can be whatever you want it to be.”

Search engines love Pinterest, Smith said, so it can help improve your visibility to set up a few boards and pins. On Instagram, adding hashtags with your photos can help with branding.

Internet users “waste” 6 million minutes each day on YouTube. Video also shows up high on Google searches, and video links stand out above the usual blue and black text boxes, which may help you get more exposure.

Getting started on Yelp can also be important as people look at reviews more and more. Smith said that some local business owners are probably getting their “butts” kicked on Yelp right now, and may not even know it. It’s important to get ahead of Yelp and set up one at biz.yelp.com, but don’t try to get your mom to write a positive review, as “Yelp is smarter than you are. Yelp will find those reviews and throw them in the toilet.”

Smith recommended that you ask clients who had successful experiences to sign up on Yelp and do a review. Also, he added, that Yelp and other review outlets show up high on Google searches.

Smith said that you have to be careful with Facebook. He goes with the 80/20 rule. Eighty percent of your posts are more about personal anecdotes, educating people, letting people know what’s happening and asking questions relating to things besides business. The other 20 percent of your posts involve the hard sale, directly selling your business.

Everyone, and their mom and perhaps their baby, has a Facebook page. The key to social media success is to practice being engaging.

Smith got into social media by accident in one of his first jobs out of the U.S. Navy.

“I was not good at the Internet, I just stumbled into it,” he said.

Then Smith became good at it, and after a period of helping people for free, he set up Guerrilla Social Media in Virginia Beach and got into marketing from there.

For more information on the Isle of Wight Chamber of Commerce, including events such as this, contact 357-3505 or email them at chamber@theisle.org.