Why is social media so important? More people are using social media through their mobile phones, computers, and tablets than talking, calling, emailing and texting. Do you find this surprising? I know I don’t. Some businesses have gone to the extent of allowing 30 minutes a day for their employees to use social media.

There’s a lot more to engaging in social media marketing than creating a few profiles and posting a few links. Without taking a measured approach to the situation, you’re not going to be able to make the most of what is a very powerful and influential strategy. There are thousands of other companies competing for social media users’ attention, so laying the right groundwork is crucial.

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There’s no doubt that social media is a valuable tool for marketing your business. By using Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and other sites to disseminate your message to the outside world, you can create more awareness of your brand and ultimately draw in more customers.

That last part can be a little tricky, though. It’s difficult for small business owners to determine how much bang they’re truly getting for their social media buck. Putting content out there that generates likes, retweets and other referrals is one thing, but generating actual revenue is another thing altogether. How much of your social media traffic is bringing about real return on investment (ROI)? And if the answer is “not much,” then what can be done about this problem?

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It is no secret that social media is turning into quite the process. It’s becoming more and more important, so many different tools and advice columns keep popping up to help businesses and individuals stay organized and successful when it comes to this newer marketing effort. This has caused many companies to create a full-time social media position for experts to help manage the many social accounts, follow analytics, get creative with engagement, etc. It takes a lot of time and effort, but the payoff is only increasing as social involvement increase, so it’s easy to ask yourself: Can I get away with making my social media strategy my primary marketing strategy?

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And in a way, they’re right. You can’t sell directly with social media. At least, not very effectively.

Because it’s like trying to pick up a date at a funeral. Wrong place, wrong time.

It will never convert like Google AdWords, where people show intent by typing in exactly what they’re looking for. And it will never be as effective as a triggered, event-based email campaign, which has been shown to provide a 600% lift over traditional outbound programs by Gartner (another market research firm).

But that doesn’t mean social media is worthless.

In fact, it can significantly drive revenue in an indirect, hard-to-measure kind of way.

Here are 3 effective ways social media can improve your bottom line.

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As a savvy inbound marketer, you’re already sold on the value of using social media. But good social media marketing is about more than engagement, lead generation, and wider reach … you gotta have some etiquette, man.

Etiquette? Really? Like pinkies-up-at-tea-time stuff?

While social media etiquette might sound like a stuffy practice, this is really just about having good social manners online. How you conduct yourself on your social channels, thinking about how your behavior affects your fans and followers, that kind of thing. Below are the top etiquette tips for you to keep in mind on your favorite social media marketing networks so you can stay proper while building your brand.

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Is your company’s social media as stale as last month’s bread?

Would you like to get more people-to-people interaction and begin a real conversation with your audience on social media?

No matter your company’s industry or size, you can encourage these deeper connections and improve your social media engagement.

Here are some tips to help you encourage people-to-people interaction, whether you are on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Foursquare or Instagram.

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It’s probably not a surprise to you that Facebook is the largest social network on the planet. With an estimated billion users, it has also become one of the most attractive social networks for companies to market their brands. In order to capitalize on this activity, Facebook has launched an advertising platform that helps brands build their digital assets on Facebook and drive traffic to their websites.

I have enjoyed success generating leads by posting Facebook ads that link to forms programmed on the Facebook domain. I program the forms on a Facebook tab to collect contact and other information from users. I found that I am able to generate more leads when I collect a user’s information on the Facebook domain as opposed to collecting it on an external website. On Facebook, brands target their advertising based on users’ interests, location, and the pages on which they click the Like button. Marketers target social media users who post this type of psychographic content, so they can find which users are most likely to become prospects and customers.

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Three out of five B2B respondents believe their online marketing mix doesn’t deliver and nurture the leads their sales pipeline needs according to a BtoB Magazine and Bizo survey.

Further exacerbating this problem is the slowdown of the sales process increasing the need for more effective marketing support to power lead generation.

B2B organizations need more high quality leads. The research revealed 60% of respondents thought generating more leads was their biggest marketing challenge. This is consistent with the 2013 Lead Generation Trends Report research.

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Before he started to dole out social media advice for entrepreneurs like you at Inc.‘s recent GrowCo conference in New Orleans, Dave Kerpen, chairman of Likeable Media and now founder of offshoot Likeable Local, had a few things he wanted to get out of the way.

First, he said, social media is not free. Second, it won’t bring you immediate results. And, third, it can’t make up for a bad product or service.

If you can cope with all that, you’re ready to learn how–and why–Kerpen still recommends you get involved:

1. Listen, Then Talk

A couple of years ago, when Kerpen went to Vegas, the check-in line at the Aria hotel where he was staying “took forever,” he said.

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Do you wake up every morning and say to yourself, “I must talk to five people today!”

I don’t either.

Anyone with basic social skills knows the best types of relationships occur naturally, not according to some predetermined number of relationships you “have to” maintain day in and day out. People engage in relationships because each person adds a certain amount of value that’s acceptable within their relationships.

Social media — the practice of developing (digital) relationships — isn’t any different.

Sure, you want to post consistently, but posting shouldn’t be determined by a quota. First of all, who determines this quota? Is there a Quota King that I missed the memo on?

And how can a quota be applied across the board? In other words, how can what’s good for a local company be equally good for a multinational one?

Instead, posting should be determined by the amount of content you’re able to generate. But not just any content.

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