What?

I offer social media consulting, PR, social media marketing, and social media optimization services to various companies seeking to achieve higher visibility online and target new audiences with the tools I recommend and show how to use properly in order to build an active and loyal community of people passionate about these companies’ brands or products.

Why?

I have two things about my personality and my experience that make me think that I have something unique to offer you:

• I have been on both sides of the startups launch and promotion process: as a blogger I know exactly what I want the startups to do (both in terms of their products and in terms of their approach to promotion) to get the coverage they want while as a marketing person with two startups I have relevant experience of doing exactly these things to ensure the product launched is noticed by the blogosphere and traditional media and gains momentum.

• My location in Russia and my knowledge of the local market, mentality, and lifestyle fundamentals along with my extensive experience in the internet business both in Russian and internationally make me believe I may be just the right person to help any company thinking about entering this already huge and rapidly growing market with their product.

Who?

My extensive social media and PR experience allows me to provide efficient social media consulting and PR and marketing services to the companies pursuing different goals and falling into these main categories as they will benefit the most from working with me:

• new internet startups launching their products and looking for pre-launch consulting and help with launch strategy

• existing internet startups and established companies looking to increase coverage in traditional media and in the blogosphere and build a loyal community that will help their product grow

• traditional businesses looking for new tools to promote their products or services online to the new target they don’t reach with existing tools

• companies entering (or planning to enter) Russian market with their internet products or services

Companies entering Russian market

The fact that I am based in Russia and know the internet industry both here and internationally as well as understand the Russian mentality make my services mostly valuable to both established internet companies and startups willing to launch their products in Russia. So if you think that you are ready to target the market with the fastest growing internet population in Europe and plenty of money people are willing to spend, I will be here to make sure your product will be noticed in Russia and Russia will become an important market that will generate revenue for you. It is important that Russian users and potential customers will feel actually welcomed and cared about by your company – even without you learning a single word in Russian or visiting Russia yourself (well, unless you don’t want to yourself). Here are the services I provide to the foreign companies contemplating entering the Russian market:

• Evaluating the potential of the Russian market for your particular product or service

• Analyzing competition in your field of business and making sure you product is prepared to compete with the existing players in the market (or honestly suggesting that you will be better off not wasting your money on expanding to the Russian market if it is already saturated enough)

• Suggest modifications to the product or service you are planning to launch in Russia that will make the product a better fit for the local market and Russian mentality

• Smooth and flawless localization of your product/service/website/application (my 10 years of experience as a freelance translator will help me ensure that your product localized into Russian will be as comprehensive and as understandable as it is in its native English)

• Ensuring the launch coverage by the relevant blogs and by traditional media outlets (my startups have been covered in the largest local magazines)

• Building the community of Russian users with all the tools you use in the English-speaking market (your corporate blog, pages and groups on social networks, a dedicated Twitter account, participation in relevant conversations in the Russian-speaking blogosphere)

Internet startups

I am available to consult you throughout the life of your startup as it is never too early to begin thinking seriously about how you will market your product and rarely too late to correct the mistakes you’ve already made (if ever). Here are the recommended services:

• Advising on product development

• Competitive intelligence

• Launch planning

• Marketing and PR services

• Social media consulting and training for startups to embrace the tools required to promote the products

• Social media services and community building

The startups I consulted and helped with PR got coverage in the most desirable traditional and new media outlets which can be very helpful at the launch date. But eventually the most important thing for any company doing business online is to grow and maintain a passionate community of fans around your company that you could rely on helping you with the famous word-of-mouth marketing.

And while building such a community usually means nothing but giving people proper tools and places to communicate (as well as informing them that such places are available), many companies have not embraced the power of such tools and need help in setting them up and showing them how such tools should be used to result in the highest value both for the company and its customers. And here is exactly where my services are intended to help your company.

Traditional businesses

If you run a traditional business various social media tools can help you expand your outreach to an enormous online audience and will enable you to interact with your visitors through engaging rich media and online conversation tools on a level that will significantly enhance involvement of your customers and will put you in control over your company’s online brand and community. I can help you prepare and implement the social media marketing plan that will make all of this possible, I will train your dedicated specialist or I can optionally represent your company on social media sites and manage your community for you if you don’t have the required time and resources but realize you do need to embrace these new media tools. At that I will make sure that your social media strategy will be completely in line with your overall business goals. Below are the services I usually provide to a traditional business venturing into the new media world:

• Setting up a corporate blog and training you on its use. A blog can be an efficient tool to engage your customers in a dialogue with your company and staff and keep them interested and involved, ensuring brand loyalty for a long time. I can help you set up the corporate blog and advice you on updating the content and communicating with the customers’ community in a manner that will make blogging truly efficient for your company.

• Training you the basics of managing online reputation and helping you to understand how to track what people tell about your brand online (be it in blogs, on social media sites or on social networks). But the most important part is learning how to react to the customers’ feedback and interacting with your potential customers – and here is the knowledge I will provide you with as well.

• Advising and helping you build efficient presence for your company within social media sites (Twitter, FriendFeed) and social networks (Facebook, LinkedIn), training your staff on using these tools properly to gain the highest effect.

• Advising and helping you on seeking coverage with the blogs that cover your particular industry and reach your target customers with their opinions and with the traditional media outlets as well.

As traditional business often do not have the time or resources required to work on their social media strategy on their own, I can also provide services of social media marketing (SMM) and social media optimization (SMO) to you so that you have everything done absolutely right – without even going through all the hassle of learning how to do it right. This will ensure that you will have a passionate community around your business or product and people will feel your company is willing to particulate in a conversation with them, which is a very valuable quality for many internet users now.

If you feel that we could work together and I am the person who can help your business grow, feel free to contact me for details by email (s.gladkova@profy.com) or by phone at 415 830 6309. I will help your product get noticed!

Svetlana Gladkova