25 New Social Articles on Business 2 Community |
- Blog Tip – Create a Blog Identity
- Social Media Trends to Watch in 2013: Convenience, Personalization & Transparency Rule
- Social TV Strategies: Magnet Minute [Video]
- 7 Easy Steps to Implementing a DIY Social Plan for Yourself and Your Firm
- What Is Wrong With Your Social Media Lead Generation Strategy?
- Spotlight on Men’s Health [Infographic]
- Socl: Microsoft’s New Social Network
- Step by Step Guide: How to Write Simple Blog Articles for Your Audience
- Showrooming – Embracing The Change
- New MySpace Steps Onto The Field
- 2012 Social Media Report: Mobile, Social Care & What This Means For Marketers
- How To Build Your Brand Online
- The 9 Circles of Social Media Hell: When it All Goes Horribly Wrong (p1)
- Non-Profits Investing More Time, Money in Social Media [Infographic]
- Business Blogging: Why You Need To Climb To The Top Of The Marketing Mountain
- Should Your Business Be on Groupon-esque Sites?
- What You Should Know With Social Video Marketing
- SEO: What Is Google AuthorRank & Why You Should Plan For It Right Now
- Instagram Unfriends Twitter
- Making the Most Out of a Social Media Crisis
- Dove Gets Real Women To Share Their Stories On Social Media
- Seven of the Best Guides to Marketing with Pinterest of 2012
- Measuring and Monitoring with Sprout Social [Review]
- 7 Reasons Why It’s Better To Hire a PPC Management Company for Your Campaigns
- How to Search Twitter With Eagle-Like Vision
| Blog Tip – Create a Blog Identity Posted: 06 Dec 2012 02:35 PM PST Before blogging and launching your blog site on the web, it is important that you determine your blog's identity. Simply put, it is your blog's identity that will distinguish yourself from your competitors and the one that will help create a lasting impression among your B2B leads. Although creating a blog identity has become a buzzword among marketers these days, many people still have difficulty performing it. So, here's a list of tips that will help you in branding: Make a brand promise and make sure it's reflected in every single post. What did you promise your reader the first time you meet? Is it entertainment? Cooking tips? Whether you commit to always making your B2B leads laugh or provide recipe that they and their family will like, your promise is one thing that your readers will always expect. Don't compromise on your identity just because you want to discuss everything. Make sure to deliver a specific and expected content every time. Focus on your expertise. Admit it, you don't know everything. There are a lot of things that you don't have the knowledge and skills yet. So instead of trying to do everything yourself, start investing your time on the things you are good at. Focus on your expertise. Pick one area that you are capable of discussing and start there. When you are able to make yourself clear to your readers, and show what your business is all about, creating loyal followers will be easy. Have a wise choice of color. Color can be an effective factor in making your blog stands out. Take a few minutes to choose an appropriate color scheme for your blog. Be creative and brave. You can choose a color that you want for your business and use it consistently across all your activities on the web including social media, videos and product launches. Now, these are some quick tips. There's a lot more. But the key message here is that you need to invest your time, money and effort to build a strong identity for your blog and to make B2B lead generation easy. So, how's your blog looking? Let us know in the comments below. This post originally appeared at CallBoxInc.   |
| Social Media Trends to Watch in 2013: Convenience, Personalization & Transparency Rule Posted: 06 Dec 2012 02:30 PM PST
Bhargava is a marketing expert whose recently released second book LIKEONOMICS is a #1 Global Marketing Best Seller. He was a founding member of the world's largest team of social media strategists at Ogilvy, where he advised leading global brands including Intel, American Express, Novartis, Unilever and dozens of others on marketing strategy. He is frequently interviewed in media globally as an expert on business trends, marketing and social media and has recently appeared in The New York Times, NPR, The Guardian (UK), Fox News and CNBC. So what are the growing social media trends to keep an eye on? Here are seven to watch with the other eight revealed on Bhargava's blog on December 5th: 1. Shoptimization: A growing number of companies are using technology and apps to optimize the shopping process, making it faster, localized and more convenient. Watch this trend to catapult in 2013. Current examples are Key Ring; Dashlane which makes providing online checkout information easier and more secure, Macy's in-store GPS which helps shoppers find their way in the massive NYC location. 2. Partnership Publishing: Reading between the lines of do-it-yourself and traditional publishing, partnership publishing encourages a do-it-together approach, pairing aspiring authors with publishing experts on an independent or boutique basis. Examples are Paper Lantern Lit, Net Minds, The Domino Project and LayerGloss. 3. Increased Humanity from Financial and other Institutions: With the consumer becoming more publicly vocal via social media and mobile, even the biggest institutions such as banks and government are taking steps to become more transparent and more, well, "human." From focusing on conversations and content in straightforward language, to networking and social media incorporations, to making processes simpler, it's a trend we'll all be hoping is successful. Early leaders include Ally Bank and Mint.com. 4. MeFunding: Consumers are less fearful about putting their personal information out there for the world to see. Emotional connections and personal stories bring out the humanity in us all and it works for the "mefunding" trend – like crowdfunding, but far more personal. Check out GoFundMe, indiegogo and GiveForward as examples of "mefunding" in action. 5. Hyper-Local Commerce: Get in on the ground floor of real estate and construction projects of your area; have your online shopping experience localized or personalized to mirror your little corner of the world and your own wants and needs. Visit Goodzer, Sears Local, Popularise, Fundrise, and Shopify for examples of this growing trend. 6. Friend-Sourced Travel: Who knows you better than your best friends? So why not let them plan and participate in your next getaway? Sites like Vayable let your friends help you curate your travel experience; DinewiththeDutch.com creates a new global family over dinner. Trippy.com presents the Pinterest for shared travel), whereas airbnb.com helps you find some of the most unique places to stay around the globe, all with the help of friends and even friends you haven't met yet. Most of these sites use Facebook as a base to find and involve your friends, and then, choose your own adventure. 7. Degree-Free Learning: Who says you have to pay tens of thousands of dollars for an education? Following in the footsteps of edX.org and Coursera.com is a new generation of online learning including creativeLIVE, Inc. Advisor, Jack Welch eMBA, UnCollege, E[nstitute] and Soundslice. Learn a trade, take up a hobby or master a new skill. The sky's the limit online. The trends above can be applied in some way to almost any industry. Which do you find most interesting or see the most potential for? Is there a trend not on this list that you are watching? We'd love to hear from you. Leave a comment below.   |
| Social TV Strategies: Magnet Minute [Video] Posted: 06 Dec 2012 01:40 PM PST This week on the Magnet Minute, Amy shows some strategies to further the conversation of traditional television shows online. This has been a rapidly increasing trend in TV, and networks are implementing many tactics to stay involved in the conversation and further engage their audience. One thing you see most frequently is a watermark on the TV screen with a designated Twitter hashtag. There are already so many people tweeting while they watch their favorite TV shows, so it makes sense for networks to suggest a hashtag to consolidate the conversation in one place. This helps viewers meet each other and drive engagement even further. The more they talk to each other, the more they connect with the show, and the show gets talked about more online. Another fun idea is having the talent create behind-the-scenes video blogs on either YouTube or a mobile network. One show that does a great job of this is The View because their hosts give a glimpse of what happens backstage with a video-messaging app called Tout. It's a great strategy to drive personal connections with an audience that is already loyal to their programming. Instagram is the leader when it comes to sharing photos, and TV shows are using it as well. If you follow the Today Show you will notice this is a huge part of their digital strategy as they share tons of pictures with their audience. If a viewer sees someone they love on Today's Instagram feed, they may tune in for the interview. Another great strategy is to actually take the digital conversation and display it for all to see on television. Talk about building brand ambassadors for life! Displaying tweets and status updates, or submitting them as questions for guests, is a great way to engage an audience. They are already talking about you, but now they talk WITH you. How do you engage with social media while you watch TV? Let us know in the comments and connect with us on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, and LinkedIn. Register for our FREE Resource Center and Newsletter to access our growing library of valuable Guide Books, Tip Sheets, and more!   |
| 7 Easy Steps to Implementing a DIY Social Plan for Yourself and Your Firm Posted: 06 Dec 2012 01:20 PM PST
Perhaps you sell HR and recruiting services. Or you're an architect, an engineer or a designer. Maybe you're in the financial services space – an investment advisor, insurance advisor or a planning specialist. If you consult anyone about anything, chances are that your success is significantly driven through your business relationships and networks. You already invest significant amounts of your time and money in these networks and relationships. They are, in many ways, the lifeblood of your business. Social networks such as LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and Google+ enable you to extend – through digital and mobile technology – the relationship building and nurturing activities that lie at the heart of your enterprise. Virtually every professional services business has some clients and prospects that are active in the social space and each of these individuals is a gateway to another network. Any business without a social strategy for engaging these socially active clients is taking a risk. You're taking for granted the loyalty of these clients and forfeiting opportunities in the online space to translate that loyalty into engagement and referrals. In what follows, I outline 3 key strategic principles and 7 tactical elements of an effective do-it-yourself social strategy for virtually any professional services firm. First, aim to grow your social capital in the influence economy.Social networks have given rise to an influence economy within which people create value and accumulate social capital. Your social strategy should be built around actions that steadily grow the social capital of your firm and the individuals with it. Second, build personal brand and networks within a corporate setting.The key building blocks of the influence economy are personal networks built around personal brands. By supporting and guiding the personal branding activities of your key employees, you will also grow the social capital of your firm's brand. Third, attract clients and prospects by adding value, giving and helping.Outbound push marketing has been replaced with inbound attraction marketing. Instead of pushing out mass media messages, concentrate on stimulating conversations by adding value to discussions and helping target audiences understand issues better. Being generous and giving knowledge freely triggers a powerful desire to reciprocate. Seven steps to implementing a DIY social media planSmall and medium-sized professional service firms have a unique opportunity to integrate their corporate social media initiatives with personal branding and content micro-marketing strategies. Here are 7 key elements of a DIY social strategy for your firm. 1. Define your target audience.The first priority is to sit down as a team and decide: who do we want to reach? Then, dig into those personas in great detail and specify what concerns and interests those audiences have. The foundation of your social strategy should be a clear understanding of who you want to reach and what matters to them. And don't worry if you don't get it perfect right out of the gate. Social strategy should be iterative, so you can (and should) tune up and expand your target audience definition periodically. 2. Understand your brand identities, both corporate and personal.Notice, I didn't start by saying: sit down with your team and decide what is your message? That's because in social media spaces it's more effective to be your brand values than it is to tell people about them. Thus, it is critically important to understand the relationship between your corporate brand that defines the collective values for your team and the individual personal brands that express these values through sharing content and interacting online. 3. Curate content that meets the needs of your target audience.Formalize a content curation process within your organization. Start by appointing a suitable person to lead and coordinate finding and sharing great content that your target audiences want. Some skills that make for a suitable curator include: avid reader, creative thinker, unbridled curiosity, subject matter knowledge and/or being a quick study on any topic. Once content starts flowing within your team, other individuals will also emerge as lead curators from whose finds the team can benefit. 4. Distribute curated content through social networks.
Note: While corporate accounts can be used as part of this distribution plan, personal feeds and sharing by individuals within their networks is key to activating each person's social network. 5. Establish a blog and use it to create content that adds value to discussions your target audience is already having.Blog publishing is a great complement to curation because it gives you a platform to express your unique view, while adding value to a discussion. A collective corporate blog may be the best way to go in many situations because you can plan your editorial calendar around multiple writers within your organization and more easily maintain a steady stream of content. 6. Continuously improve the social media skills and knowledge of your team members.Social media is a constantly evolving space. Strategies and techniques should be constantly reviewed with an eye toward focussing in on what's working and what's not. The personal branding skills of your team members and how they are being applied in online settings is also a key factor in the success of your corporate social strategy. Regular collective skill-sharing sessions and even individual coaching and mentoring within the team can significantly improve your results. 7. Track success in terms of key performance indicators.Determining the success of any online strategy is a product of defining success meaningfully and then measuring appropriately. When building relationships and brand, you need to set benchmarks and have appropriate time frames. Building trust and social capital, whether online or offline, doesn't happen overnight. But beware of defining your success solely in terms of online metrics. Make sure you are defining and tracking key performance indicators that have a real impact on your business.   |
| What Is Wrong With Your Social Media Lead Generation Strategy? Posted: 06 Dec 2012 01:16 PM PST
Dan Zarrella, Hubspot's Social Media Scientist and author of "Zarrella's Heirarchy of Contagiousness: The Science, Design, and Engineering of Contagious Ideas", identified common myths that affect marketers' ability to generate qualified sales leads and B2B appointments from their social media campaigns: Myth #1: Engaging in social conversations is the most important part of every social media campaign. The truth is that, with so many voices in the social community, people will not talk to you unless you have something worth talking about. In other words, before you can join in the conversation, you have to have some good ideas and expose people to them. Zarrella pointed out that engaging in conversations does not build reach and generate sales leads; instead, marketers should link prospects to valuable information. In short, get a large social media following and regularly tweet links to quality content. Myth #2: Friday, Saturday, and Sunday are bad days to post messages. Actually, this one may be true. The problem now is that everyone avoids the "bad" days. And with large volumes of content being published from Monday to Thursday, your message will likely drown out if you follow the crowd. Studies found that messages posted on Facebook and Twitter during the weekends get more attention and have significantly higher 'retweet' and 'share' volumes than the ones published between Monday and Thursday. So, if you want a message shared on social media, post it during the weekend where there are fewer stories to compete for your readers' attention. Social media marketing is hot nowadays, and while other business lead generation methods like SEO and B2B telemarketing are still widely used, it has clearly become an important aspect of modern sales lead generation and B2B appointment setting campaigns. This post originally appeared at CallBoxInc.   |
| Spotlight on Men’s Health [Infographic] Posted: 06 Dec 2012 12:45 PM PST Each year during November, men around the world take part in "Movember," observing a month-long hiatus from shaving their facial hair to raise funds and bring awareness to issues concerning men's health. In 2011, the effort raised more than $126 million. Increasing awareness of preventable health problems and encouraging early detection and treatment of disease among men and boys is an important topic year-round. Statistics show that while males outnumber females at birth (105 to 100), by the ages of 65 to 74, the male-to-female ratio is 80 to 100. Even more staggering: Seven million American men have not attended a physician’s appointment in more than 10 years. Two-thirds of men would not seek a health care professional if they were experiencing chest pain or shortness of breath, two early warning signs of a heart attack. To help further education about the current state of men's health and the proper ways to address these issues, including when and how often they should be tested, take a look at the infographic below. Share it widely with all of the men in your life — moustachioed or not! Via Nurse Practitioner Programs and Nursing License Map   |
| Socl: Microsoft’s New Social Network Posted: 06 Dec 2012 12:40 PM PST You might think that by the end of 2012, the internet is maxed out with social platforms. With Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Tumblr, and StumbleUpon (the list goes on and on), it's easy to see how introducing a new social media platform may be suicide. But it's not! Yes, Microsoft finally rolled out their social media platform called "Socl." It's a great concept which takes the idea of Pinterest to the next level. Socl allows users to create actual collages of images. Using a Bing search on the site, you can create any type of collage within minutes of searching. You can even type in your own URL and choose media from that particular site. In addition, Socl has its own bookmarklet to bring things you see on the web into your Socl account. Of the big social media platforms, Socl takes the good pieces of each one and combines them into one site. You can create posts, like interests, and follow people much like you can with Facebook and G+. You can also click the smiley under any post (a la Facebook) to let the creator know, "This makes me smile." The notifications are simple and easy to manager like G+, while the visual experience is similar to, and in my opinion, better, than Pinterest. Best of all, you get real time updates of all posts the way Twitter offers.
After being on the beta-test of Socl for 24 hours, I'm really digging it. It's international, so individuals around the world can create posts for you to see without having to friend them or follow them. If you choose, you have the ability to search specific topics and follow that topic, or users who post about that topic. Since you can create a post about anything (and I mean anything), you do have the ability to report posts and/or users as inappropriate or as spam. If Microsoft can play this well, they could easily get users from Facebook, Google +, and Pinterest to make a switch. Socl is incredibly visual and I think users will either love it or hate it. I also think Socl could be a great marketing tool for businesses to showcase their products and reach many users who may not know about their products. I don't think you can sign up as a business yet (I tried, and failed), but any user can feature the products of any business with a website. I think we are about to see a new way of marketing come to life.   |
| Step by Step Guide: How to Write Simple Blog Articles for Your Audience Posted: 06 Dec 2012 12:35 PM PST There are hundreds of blogs created every day (if not every second), which is a very good thing but, how many blogs are able to stay long? How many blogs last 6 months? The key to running a successful blog online lies in your ability to create engaging and heart compelling content. Time has gone when Google ranks keyword stuffed sites. In fact, if you ever make the mistake of stuffing up your contents, with keywords, your ranking might go under overnight. The very successful blog owners today, are people of vision. Right from day one, all they post on their blog is quality content. In case you do not know, only quality content can resurrect your blog from the dead. If you have been spending pennies to get contents written by blog ghostwriters, then it is time to set aside a smart budget and hire a professional blog ghostwriter. As a blog ghostwriter, I have worked for several online business owners and one question most of them seem to ask me the most, is, ''How to create a simple blog post readers will love''? My answer: By writing, what they want. Throughout my years as a guest blogger and blog ghost-writer, I have mastered the art of writing quality blog posts that will engage the reader and attract the search engine. Writing a blog post is not as hard as some people think. In fact, it is as simple as ABC. All you need is focus and determination. In this article, I will be sharing with you, how to write a simple but effective blog post. 1. Let research come first Do you think you will pass if you don’ read for an examination? Definitely not It is the same way when writing blog articles. You need to do your homework first. Do your research. Never lift a finger on your keyboard without researching first. As for me, I find it easy to write a perfect blog post within 25 minutes. How am I able to achieve this? Because, I make sure that I research every ”nitty gritty'' before writing. If you are ever going to attract the search engines, you need to research. The search engines are humans. In fact, they walk eat and drink just as we do as humans (just kidding). They are very sensitive. The only way to get their attention is by researching and creating a well-detailed and informative blog post. 2. Write for a fourth grader. Your readers do not care if you have a master’s degree in English or you passed out from college with a first class. They do not want to read a science book. They do not understand ‘those’ big words you are using. All they want from you is to write in the language they understand–Simple English! Make it easy for anyone to read your blog posts. Use simple words people will understand. If you leave out any words that are hard to understand, you will make your readers upset (They'll never come back again). Pro Tip: Keep your contents simple and informative. 3. ”Spice” your blog articles with images Writing a blog post with only text can sometimes be boring. If you really want to attract more people to read your contents, add images, videos and maybe, discussion plug-ins. Add some fun. 4. Know the state of your flock It is not wise to give your audience what they dislike. Give them what they want and earn their reward. You may ask, ''But how”? Write a blog post that addresses their challenges. If you are short of blog post Ideas, talk to them and ask about the topics that interests them the most. Convince them to tell you their questions, problems, and goals in life. You can then align the information you get to create a perfect blog post that addresses their needs.
Make your post readable. Make your paragraphs short. People don’t read much. They scan. Two to three sentences per paragraph will do! Your turn The question is, do you have enough time to manage the contents of your blog? If you do not have the time, hire a Ghostwriter to write your contents. Ghostwriters have the ability to write heart compelling and remarkable blog posts from scratch. What do you think? Do you have any more blog writing tips to the ones above? Let me know what you think in the comment section.   |
| Showrooming – Embracing The Change Posted: 06 Dec 2012 11:53 AM PST There are close to 110 million smartphone users in the United States alone. And, according to a recent Price Grabber study, many of them plan to use their devices for holiday shopping. The study polled 2,500 smartphone users across the country. Of them, 32% said they planned to use shopping apps to use for the holidays; 42% said they planned to buy small- and big-ticket items through smartphones. 75% agreed they would do some form of shopping online. The 2012 Holiday season means a new opportunity of growth for the consumer phenomenon known as 'showrooming' - the act of consumers browsing for items in-store before using their smart phones to find a lower price online. We've all been there, standing in our favourite flagship store, collecting information on our item of choice while simultaneously popping our mobile browser open to see what the internet has to offer. Showroomers have quickly become the bête noire of big box stores. Brick and Mortars are starting to become painfully aware of the effect that this has on their business in regards to lost sales. A whopping 80% of retailers will be affected by showrooming this holiday season – with the electronic and appliance segment taking the biggest hit. While major retailers like Target and Walmart are looking to thwart this behaviour by pushing exclusive products and emphasizing in-store pickups for online purchases – there must be a high level understanding that while they're trying to combat showrooming – it simply cannot be beat. Embracing Change: Though many will not be able to compete with Amazon's exceptional model (better margins at lower prices), retailers need to recognize that showroomers are more likely to participate in loyalty programs, willing to trade personal details for rewards, and are much more interested in mobile commerce. Simply put, there is an apparent opportunity for improvement across all platforms, including the in-store experience for consumers. Key Factors In Play: price, experience, location, and perceived value. Retailers should be trying to take advantage of these behaviours and looking to harness the consumer's willingness to trade personal details for rewards. Also finding new ways to engage with their consumer, both online and off – offering customized service to build personal relationships, investing in technology to engage with their customer base, and create a genuine dialogue in customer care. Research has found that showroomers are:
The question is, if retailers start acting now, can they have a fair shot at winning over consumers and closing the gap between their online competitors and lost sales? How will other major brands choose to innovate their systems and try to gain the loyalty of consumers? It's an incredibly interesting time for retail and technology – this is certainly a long lasting trend that we'll be keeping our eye on and sharing more information about. This article was originally posted on the Konrad Group blog. For more information about the company and their services, please visit www.konradgroup.com.   |
| New MySpace Steps Onto The Field Posted: 06 Dec 2012 11:45 AM PST Like a Phoenix rising from the ashes, MySpace has been reborn, and I have taken a plunge into the new world. Under the ownership of a seemingly endlessly talented Justin Timbmerlake, this is a whole new beast. The first thing you notice about the new MySpace, especially if you had an account on the old MySpace, is that it’s beautiful. It’s very visual, with lots of context-based menuing. Although it was disorienting at first, the side scrolling has quickly grown on me.  The New MySpace It is also very apparent that the site is now focused solely on music. Every piece of the site appears to be wrapped around the idea of listening, sharing, and exploring music. With access to what seems to be a massive collection, you can quickly immerse yourself. MySpace is not without its issues though. The icon showing who you’re connected to, although simple, looks like a master card logo, and it is not instantly clear how to use it. Also, what do the different states of the icon mean? It’s not always obvious how certain layers of the site are opened and closed. There is also a stark lack of intuitive linking; I find myself trying to click on things that don’t have links, especially in the “Discovery” area. From a competition standpoint, I wonder what Facebook thinks of MySpace’s re-entry into the social scene. After spending some time with the site, I realized that it isn’t so much Facebook that should be paying attention to this brand resurrection as Spotify, Pandora, and potentially iTunes. I can easily see teens and 20-somethings taking to a platform like this, especially those who really enjoy exploring and sharing music. The big question, since currently there are no ads or subscription fees, is, “Where will the money come from?” Once MySpace starts generating income, how will that translate into compensation for the artists? And without any obvious features to best the dominant music players in the industry, how will MySpace compete? Getting to play with the new MySpace has really created more questions for me than have been answered. At the same time, it’s fun to see a great player come out of retirement, and it will be fun to watch MySpace step out onto the field again. Whether or not the company hits it out of the park this time around is another question entirely.   |
| 2012 Social Media Report: Mobile, Social Care & What This Means For Marketers Posted: 06 Dec 2012 11:15 AM PST Nielsen's just-released "Social Media Report" for 2012 drills deep on mobile, illustrating the inexorable relationship between social and mobile devices. "Time spent on mobile apps and the mobile web account for 63% of the year-over-year growth in overall time spent using social media" the report said. Specifically, mobile apps, which dominate over mobile web in time spent. As you may have seen from Nielsen's cross-platform report, second-screen interaction is becoming routine behavior: 41% of tablet owners and 38% of smartphone owners use their device daily in front of the TV screen. Call it our 'Global living room' — The skyrocketing adoption and use of social media among consumers is transforming TV watching into a more immediate shared experience. What's also very interesting, is the social care brands are taking into consideration as they work on engaging fans and retaining customers. Social media has emerged as one of the most important channels of customer service, with nearly half of US consumers reaching out directly to brands and service providers to voice their satisfaction or complaints, or simply to ask questions — More notably, one in three social media users say they prefer to use social media rather than the phone for customer service issues. What does this mean for marketers? Social Word-Of-Mouth: Social Media enables consumers to tap into the opinions of an exponentially larger universe. While traditionally word-of-mouth has been essential for brands, it's scope was previously limited to the people you knew and interacted with on a daily basis. Hyper Informed Consumers: Social media is transforming the way consumers across the globe make purchase decisions. We're all learning about other customer experiences, reading reviews, and gathering useful information on brands, products — and particularly interested in finding deals/purchase incentives before pulling the plug on coveted items. Opportunity For Engagement: Consumer attitudes towards advertising on social media are still evolving. Though roughly one-third of social media users find ads on platforms more annoying than other types on online advertisements, research suggests that there are opportunities for marketers to engage with consumers over social media. More than 25% percent of social media users confess that they are more likely to pay attention to an ad shared by one of their social connections. This article was originally posted on the Konrad Group blog. For more information about the company and their services, please visit www.konradgroup.com.   |
| How To Build Your Brand Online Posted: 06 Dec 2012 10:25 AM PST Build Your Brand Online? How do you go about doing that? For many, that is the sixty-four million dollar question to answer. It's sometimes overwhelming…just the thought. Google+, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, LinkedIn, Instagram, Pinterest, to blog or not to blog, etc, etc… Even for the "experienced" person and/or business online, building a brand socially STILL can be a time-suck and a waste of resources if not planned out. And it doesn't happen overnight. Building a brand takes a serious level of commitment and consistency. Becoming a small business success is hard enough, much less in a world filled with the limitless options of the internet. Here is a great primer on how to build and refine yourself as an online brand. How To Build Your Brand OnlineDo you have other tips on how how to build your brand online?   |
| The 9 Circles of Social Media Hell: When it All Goes Horribly Wrong (p1) Posted: 06 Dec 2012 10:10 AM PST Every brand and social media manager has nightmares about making an embarrassing, damaging or potentially career-wrecking mistake or something going horribly wrong one day. There have been enough instances of social media 'fails' over the last few years for us all to be aware of what could go wrong – and to learn that once those incidents happen, there's no going back. One rogue tweet, bad post or angry conversation will be screenshotted before you can even think about deleting it, and brought up again in countless articles just like this one. But, mistakes happen, and some situations are out of your control, but hopefully we can all learn from these mistakes and experiences of others … and how to deal with them. Here is the first half of our list that details the 9 things you really don't want to happen to your brand in social, but also takes the care to list the remedies you'll need to cure them. Catch part two tomorrow. 1. Getting trolled Most people these days are aware of trolls and will have some idea of how to deal with them. If you blog, you should expect to get trolled. Most of us will experience it at some point to varying degrees. Ironically, our own article about trolls has been trolled. We like to leave those comments there for our own amusement, but of course trolling can be much more damaging than this. What to do: Ever heard the phrase 'Don't feed the trolls'? Well, that's the main advice – trolls want a reaction, so don't satisfy them by giving them one. We wrote a guest post earlier this year with more detail about how to deal with trolls – read it here. 2. Your social media manager losing their rag You may or may not be aware of the incident involving a Dublin restaurant, Cinnamon, last month, but this was a prime example of how not to do customer service on social media. When a customer complained about a 40 minute wait, the Cinnamon account replied defending the restaurant, saying it was a busy day. The conversation continued and the restaurant took things from bad to worse, when it told the customer that they would be happy to have 'one less person in the Q'. And then called them an arsehole. The story was reported on several news sites, and the restaurant eventually apologised on Twitter and posted a statement on their Facebook page. They also offered a €1 coffee to customers mentioning 'twittergate'. They blamed the tweet on a 'moment of madness' by a member of their staff, but one wonders if this is just an excuse, given the fact that the tweets certainly sounded as if they were from management, the apology tried to claim "there's two sides to every story" (yep, and we've read both sides) and the manager clearly is not well-versed in social media, as when asked why the offending tweet had not been deleted, the manager said that she 'didn't think tweets could be deleted'. What to do: There's really no excuse for being rude to your customers online, but if this does happen, then an apology – both to the customer personally and to everyone else, and some sort of goodwill gesture is the best you can do. Disciplining/speaking to the responsible staff member, if applicable, would also be a wise move. 3. Your hashtag campaign gets hijacked We all know about the many examples of this happening - #waitrosereasons, #mcdstories and #qantasluxury being perhaps the most well-known. The last thing you want when you've spent time (and possibly lots of money) on crafting a hashtag campaign is for it to be taken over by disgruntled customers or people just looking for an opportunity for an easy joke. What to do: Make sure that your hashtag cannot be twisted against you, especially if your brand has a 'variable' reputation. Take time to consider the possible uses of the hashtag, and also to consider what you will do if it does get hijacked. Are you going to ignore the tweets? Acknowledge them? Respond to them? Make sure that you have decided this before you kick off your campaign, in case the worst does happen. 4. You get hacked or impersonated Jetstar will know all about this. Recently, the budget airline suffered the misfortune of being impersonated on Facebook. Another user set up an account name 'Jetstar Australia' and started to respond to comments on the official Facebook page in a, er, less than polite manner. Fortunately, Jeststar seem to have their heads screwed on and responded promptly, posting a statement on their own page stating that they were working with Facebook to stop the account. What to do: It's advisable to act quickly if you are hacked or impersonated, in order to secure your account, distance yourself from the fake posts and also to stop rumours being spread online about the messages before your reputation suffers. For Jetstar, although the incident brought out a few comments about their own customer service, the result was merely some (moderately amusing but insulting) posts due to their speed at dealing with the incident. And remember, we'll be back with the final five tomorrow, so come back then!   |
| Non-Profits Investing More Time, Money in Social Media [Infographic] Posted: 06 Dec 2012 09:50 AM PST We recently announced the results of our latest small business social media survey – complete with a snazzy infographic – about how much time and money our small business customers spend on social media. Then we thought, what about non-profits? At VerticalResponse, we have thousands of happy 501(c)3 customers (we offer a pretty sweet discount for non-profits, including 10,000 free email credits each month, 50% off social media marketing and more). Non-profits depend on donations for funding, so they need to be super efficient with their time and budgets. So how much do non-profits invest in social media, and is it growing? We surveyed more than 100 of our non-profit customers to find out. Turns out that much of what they're doing is pretty consistent with the small businesses we surveyed, with a few interesting exceptions:
Here are more statistics in a visual infographic: Are you a non-profit? Do you agree with the data? Let us know in the comments!   |
| Business Blogging: Why You Need To Climb To The Top Of The Marketing Mountain Posted: 06 Dec 2012 09:30 AM PST I am just back from a short Fall vacation in Phoenix, Arizona where I climbed a mountain, Piestewa Peak, for the first time! Well, at least part of the mountain. But once I was a high as I was going to get on this mountain (now, now, this was NOT a Colorado mountain) I "got" why people love climbing AND that training is key to excel. The view above the city and surroundings is amazing! Once you understand the "why", the "how" is easier to activate. And once you are good at it and it becomes a positive part of your life, good things happen! There is a great analogy with mountain climbing and business blogging. First, many marketers don't try it because it is hard. When they do try it, it is sometimes with the wrong blogging resources, kind of like trying to hike in flip flops, and never try it again. And you have to get back on that mountain time and time again to conquer it. Just like blogging, you need to work at it to get into a groove and find your angle. However, once you do conquer it, you can guide others. Again, like business blogging, when you create great blogs you can guide your customers along their journey. Why is this blogging activity important for you? There are three key reasons
Competitive Advantage. Many businesses and thought leaders do not integrate blogging into their marketing mix and this is a gap opportunity. For instance, when I was planning for our Phoenix vacation I did several Google searches on "What to do in Phoenix in November" and "what to do in Phoenix if I only have 2 days". All that I found was several old posts! Whether you are part of a B2B or B2C company, blogging can drive more visits to your web or social media site than your competition, giving you an edge. Native Buying Behavior. People are changing how they buy, relying partly on online search. A recent Fleishman-Hillard report notes that 89% of all customers turn to a search engine to find information on products, services or businesses prior to making purchases. Another report by the DAC Group indicates that 71% of enterprise purchase decisions in the United States begin with research conducted on a search engine. Blogs are a key content destination that these search results can point to! Always On Connection. Since there is downtime time to do buyimg research a blog is a critical way to be always on. Hubspot states that more people in 2011 found blogging to be a critical part of their marketing tool kit than in 2010. Blogging enables you to to have an always on connection with your customers and prospect, proving them focused and customer centric content in stead of salesy information. I propose there are five ways to leverage blogging for your business: 1. Rise above the clutter. With the percentage of businesses using blogging diminishing (due to scaling and resources) it's a great way rise above the bombarding emails that have a decreasing clicks-through rate, non-relevant promotional tweets and unsearchable Facebook posts that do not break through your customers news feeds. 2. Become a trusted resource. By focusing single customer-focused issues with each blog post and avoiding overt selling, you can build yourself up as a trusted resource. For instance, my opportunities for two of my favorite new finds in Phoenix, Papagos Brewing Company and Chelsea's Kitchen would be to write a series of So You Are New To Phoenix blogs that give people like me a some great advice always grounded in a last stop of the day at their restaurant or brew pup.This would would have been a great find while I was vacationing in Phoenix! 3. Articulate your differentiation or relevance. Blogs are a critical tool if your business needs to articulate a key point, since it allows you to lay out your ideas in very simple, graphically appealing ways (perhaps like this blog post?) Articulation does not mean spelling out why YOU are better than THEM. Rather it allows you to point out the key differences of big considerations that indirectly point to your business as a solution. For instance, while in Phoenix I stopped at DeluxBurger, a great burger and craft beer joint, where they served phenomenal organic beef burgers! What a great opportunity for them to blog about the key benefits of organic beef without flashing the blinking red light …. Eat At Delux Burgers! 4. Access to online reviews or tribal input. Yelp! And Foursquare are the big brand and small business competion equalizers. However, it appears that very few businesses encourage posting, hoping that it just happens! Of all places during my trip, it was going home when the TSA wants to,know how hey are doing. Businesses like Angels Trumpet Alehouse should be encouraging checking in, Yelping! and using blog posts to get the tribe to share. Even if its bad sharing, it lets you authentically engage. 5. Invite conversation. The commenting component of blogging is the key to enabling g customer conversation. When you keep your blogs simple and informative and inviting, you can seed the conversation. For example a blog by the Arizona Biltmore, where I stayed while in Phoenix could cover a range of topics of corporate meeting planning and romantic getaway ideas to how to get your exercise workout in while staying on property. I can imagine many questions being asked and the answers are … Conversation! And, this is a great source of ongoing sustainable content!  Tequila Sunrise over Camelback Mountain in Phoenix, AZ I am happy to answer your questions and start a conversation with you about how to leverage a blog for your business. Please contact me directly or comment below. I am always tweet able too at @GerryMoran So, don't get discouraged about blogging. It's an interesting climb up that mountain that will take some time to master. Once there, you will break through te clutter at the peak, provide a relevant focal point for your customers and always be there as a resource. And when you succeed, you can sit back and enjoy a Tequila sunrise from the mountain top. (No, the view! But we did enjoy an awesome Tequila Sunrise at the Arizona Biltmore, the originating home of the drink in the 1930s.   |
| Should Your Business Be on Groupon-esque Sites? Posted: 06 Dec 2012 08:50 AM PST It's pretty obvious why Groupon was chosen as the lead-in for this topic. Living Social nips at its heels, but Groupon is still the leader when it comes to digital, deal-based marketing. It's spawned a number of other sites such as Sweet Jack and Sharing Spree, which means there's an outlet available for nearly every business. However, is it worth it? You need to consider carefully if it's financially responsible to give half-off (or better) deals to a large number of consumers. Don't forget these deal companies also take a cut, albeit a relatively small one. You can cap how many people can snag the deal, but this is a number that should be carefully considered. A company that sells custom wire baskets might cap their number differently than a restaurant or parts dipping baskets company. The Pros You're guaranteed to drum up new business, and people will be visiting your company who have never heard of you before. There will also likely be people who purchase your deal that never use it. You're paid immediately from the company, which means a big influx of cash when you might need it most. Ideally, you'll create a few recurring customers from the deal. Depending on your business, half off might still be profitable for you. However, there are some businesses that will be taking a loss. This is still worth it for some businesses that are in dire need of tapping into a new market. Consult with your accountant and marketing department carefully before making a decision. The Cons Of course, even if you need the marketing efforts, it's a con if you're not making a profit on the deal. It's also important to remember that even though you get the money up front, you still need to step up to the plate. It can take some customers months to redeem their deal. If you're not used to this much business, you won't be on your A-game. You might have been the victim of poor customer service via a deal. It's critical to treat every single customer well, regardless of if they have a deal or not. Otherwise, you're nixing potential long-term customers. Make sure you're prepared for a rush post-deal. Get Prepared You'll be able to see just how many people are purchasing your deal. You might get phone calls for appointments well before your deal closes. This will give you an idea of how much business to expect. However, as soon as a company accepts your offer, you need to start preparing. Make sure you have enough inventory and/or staff to handle the rush. Hire part-time, temporary staff if necessary. Nothing is more frustrating than not being able to redeem a deal you just purchased. Plan ahead, expect a bum rush and especially remember to treat deal customers like royalty.   |
| What You Should Know With Social Video Marketing Posted: 06 Dec 2012 08:00 AM PST In the world of internet video marketing, most companies see “going viral” as the holy grail and Well, if you want a viral video hit, you have to do it through social video marketing. Viral videos don’t simply create themselves; you have to put them out there where people can find them and be interested in them. Now, it needs to be said: Sad to say, you probably won’t have a video mega-hit like the recent Gangnam Style. The odds are stacked against you. However, even if you don’t become a worldwide hit, social video can mean big things for your online marketing efforts. However, there’s more to it than just creating a video and putting it online. So, let’s take a look at some of the elements that go into a successful online video marketing venture! Key Tips For Improving Your Social Video Marketing
Good social video marketing is the key to a successful video-based campaign. If you do nothing else, focus on making entertaining videos that clearly present a message. That’s the ground-floor basis for success.   |
| SEO: What Is Google AuthorRank & Why You Should Plan For It Right Now Posted: 06 Dec 2012 07:03 AM PST
What is Google AuthorRank?Remember PageRank? That Google algorithm determines page authority based on how many times a page is linked to by other websites and by the authority of the website linking to it. So if the HubSpot homepage (PageRank 7/10) links to this blog post, big PageRank boost for us, meaning a higher ranking is search. With the rise of the social Internet and its effect on search, individuals now have the ability to both be an authority and have other people confirm that. Google AuthorRank works like a reputation engine that will determine which individuals are creating high-quality content. How Do SEOs Expect AuthorRank to Work?General consensus is that Google AuthorRank will be used along with Google PageRank. As AJ Kohn puts it, Google wants to see web content with both high Google AuthorRank and PageRank. This isn’t terribly new considering how important social signals have become for all search engines. What’s new, and even outside of some people’s comfort zones, is that authorship is integrated with Google+, so that your profile shows up next to posts you’ve written. Like this: Google AuthorRank, When and Why?Why is easy. Google’s continuing quest to provide only the best results (killing content farms and content spammers) means it needs to start determining authority of both the page and its author. A real person with real social influence will have that reputation applied to the content that real person creates. When is a little fuzzier. To some extent the concept behind AuthorRank is already in place for those of us who are adding Google+ users to Circles and have activated "Search, plus Your World" results. And a public social profile’s Page Rank is already applied to links that you share on Twitter. Now that Google has a way to determine authorship based on the information in your Google+ profile, it’s only a matter of time before AuthorRank becomes a full-scale factor in search ranking. What Does This Mean for Company Blogs?It’s still common for corporate and company blogs to eliminate bylines or have a post authored by the company. Well, corporations aren’t people. Google Authorship means that companies are going to have to loosen the reins a bit and allow employees (or even specialized freelancers) to be more public facing than they were before. At Kuno, all of our team members are set up as public facing representatives of the company. A level of trust is necessary when it comes to that. But the benefit is that these authors will add a human face to the brand. The key for companies is to let these individuals be human. They have likes and dislikes. They have friends and family. The personal and professional are collapsing into each other more and more everyday. And people aren’t going to give your authors much authority if all they do is talk about your company. If you need to show employees how to do this right, have them look at Scott Monty, the global head of social media for Ford. It’s cars, marketing and Sherlock Holmes that make his social profiles tick. For me, it’s marketing, movies and random singing. The more interesting you allow employees to be, the more people will be interested in them… and the higher their AuthorRank. What Does It Mean for Individual Authors?Get on Google+ now if you’re not there. Use it if you’re on it but not active. Socialize with more people if you’re already using it. And remember to connect the sites you contribute to with Google+ (see the helpful links below). Just remember to focus your efforts. You can’t be an expert in everything. The content you produce should be high-quality because you have a passion for that topic. Again, for me it’s marketing and movies (and a little TV). Outside of that, I’m not producing much content associated with my authorship status. As you develop this content, make sure you’re connecting with others on Google+ who are interested in those topics and interacting with them. And because this is just the tip of the iceberg, individuals should check out this SEOMoz blog post by Mike Arnesen for more preparation information. BottomlineThese are Google’s new rules, and if you want to rank, you need to play by them. While we don’t know when AuthorRank will become a serious factor, you need to get serious about it now… or risk being penalized later. More Helpful Links: photo credit: rachaelvoorhees   |
| Posted: 06 Dec 2012 06:51 AM PST Facebook snapped up Instagram, the photo-sharing app, in April. They paid $1 billion in cash and stock, which was very, very friendly of them, but also very prescient. Facebook + Instagram = a nice app/brand synergy of the experience of sharing photos and interests. At the time, Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg, said that the company would be building on Instagram’s strengths and features and growing the app independently rather than "just trying to integrate everything into Facebook." Facebook indicated that they intended on keeping features within the app that allowed photos to be published on other social networks, and the ability to have followers and to follow people who are not necessarily Facebook friends. But what a difference nearly a year makes. Since Instagram got their new Facebook friend, the photo-sharing service has slowly distanced itself from Twitter. Today they unfriended them with news that Instagram integration had been disabled with Twitter Cards. Users can still share Instagram images there, but they look too large for the space provided and end up looking cropped. Competition has forced the situation, and there are now links that direct Twitter users to Instagram.com, which forces users to visit the Instagram website if they want to view images in their entirety. The reason for this move? If you guessed it made things easier for users, you'd be wrong. If you thought it had anything to do with making money, you'd probably be right. Instagram has never really monetized the social network, but in the digital world, that philanthropic approach doesn't last forever. These are businesses, after all, not hobbies – no matter how much money Mr. Zuckerberg has. And if you don't control the app, you can't control the look and feel of advertising, and with more and more stuff going mobile. . .   |
| Making the Most Out of a Social Media Crisis Posted: 06 Dec 2012 06:45 AM PST If you are experiencing a social media crisis with your business, it can either devastate you or you can turn it around and deal with it in a way that doesn't ruin all of the effort made so far. If you approach it correctly, you have the potential to get closer to your clients and to your market as a result of dealing with a crisis that you could not prevent from happening. It is up to you to deal with it in a way that will turn the tables and allow you to achieve extremely positive results rather than negative ones. There are many ways in which you can make lemonade from lemons.
ConclusionAlthough "when life gives you lemons, make lemonade" is a cliché, there is a great deal of wisdom in the concept. If you are dealing with a crisis in your business, it doesn't mean that you have to accept it and close up shop. You can consider it a learning experience and turn the negative into positive. Everyone has to deal with crises as some point in their career. It isn't a matter of the crisis existing. It is a matter of how you react when you are in the middle of it. If you deal with it constructively and gracefully, your business connections will respect you and will want to continue to be associated with you and your business. Remember to listen to what other people are saying and glean ways to improve your approach whenever possible. That is one of the important ways in which you will grow your business. We are pleased to provide you with the insightful comments contained herein. For a free assessment of your online presence, let’s have coffee.   |
| Dove Gets Real Women To Share Their Stories On Social Media Posted: 06 Dec 2012 06:35 AM PST Unilever owned FMCG brand, Dove launched its new hair fall treatment product via real women sharing their experiences with the product through videos and blog posts, in the Dove Hair Fall Rescue Diary. Beauty brand Dove, known for its promotional campaigns around every day women, has launched a brand new product for hair fall – 'the Dove hair fall rescue treatment' that claims to strengthen and nourish from the roots, giving you freedom from hair fall in just two weeks. Now hair fall is a common hair issue plaguing all women yet they are reluctant to share it. With this in mind, the brand has built an extensive campaign with real women sharing their hair fall stories and how the new product rescued them. I stumbled upon the campaign through a banner ad on YouTube yesterday, which also featured one of the story videos along with real life women who have found a cure to hair fall and now want to share it with you. Impressed by the pitch, I clicked on the 'Discover' button and was taken to the brand's YouTube channel. The home page, designed as a diary talks about the product and encourages you to hear the personal experience from the Dove bloggers themselves. Adjacent to this are featured videos of women from varied backgrounds yet who are social savvy bloggers. There is bridal make-up artist- Akriti Sachdev, fashion bloggers – Jasleen and Sonu, travel blogger – Shivya Nath, author Kiran Manral among others.
Viewers are encouraged to share the secret via a cool contest called 'Share the secret' with product hampers to be won. When you click on the green button, you are led to the Facebook 'Dove secret diary' app which resembles the YouTube diary in design, but only this diary is a closed one. In addition, there is a link displayed at the bottom to shop online. About 'Share the secret' contestYou click on 'enter' to open the diary. The home page or 'Secret Diaries' welcomes you similar to the YouTube page with product information, contest link and story videos. Click on any of the photos to get her complete story right from her every day schedule and hair fall problems to how Dove's hair fall rescue treatment helped her.
The app has 4 more tabs: 1) 'The Dove hair fall rescue range' that gives complete information about the product and how to go about using the entire range with illustrated steps, 2) 'About hair fall' which explains about hair fall and answers FAQs to bust myths regarding hair fall, 3) 'Featured articles', as the name suggests gives you additional detailed information about hair fall and the Dove product, 4) 'Contest' is the quiz that can win you the product either in beauty kits or exclusive Dove bags. The contest is a simple multi-choice quiz with questions centred around the stories and the product. The app has an option to share and also encourages you to share any of the story videos to increase your chances of winning! How good is 'Dove secret diaries'?I'd say 'Dove Secret Diaries' is a cool campaign for a product launch. It manages to build ample curiosity and moreover offers the product as the prize, thus completing the cycle. Dove has always campaigned around real women and their stories. But, this one seems as real as real women can be by featuring a few women I already knew. For instance, I follow author Kiran Manral on Twitter and was quite taken aback to see her endorsing Dove, while sharing her story. I'm convinced other women will be able to relate to the fashion bloggers, travel bloggers, writers, etc. featured in the video. To add to this, the Facebook app scores a perfect 10! Beautiful and pleasing design, smooth navigation, clarity of information and despite having too much in the app it did not appear crowded. Moreover, it enables sharing on Facebook, further amplifying campaign visibility. The link to shop online on the YouTube page is also a well thought essential addition. In between of all this, the Consumer Complaints Council on ASCI has upheld the complaint made on the Dove Hair Fall Rescue Treatment TVC, saying that the product claims are not adequately substantiated. However, this has not affected the online promotions whatsoever. From the YouTube ad to the YouTube channel, ultimately leading the target viewer to the Facebook page, I find a single brand voice speaking to me about a secret that I would like to know – a solution to my hair fall problem from other women just like me. All in all, it's a good campaign that brings home the point and convincingly too, although it has to pass the real acid test from the consumers. But, I'd like to know Dove's idea behind having a global Facebook page and not having a dedicated one for India? Even earlier in the year, Dove had been reaching out to women who are active on social media, especially women bloggers. By giving product hampers at blogger meetups to hosting a blogging contest around 'My beautiful hair story' on one of the largest platform of Indian bloggers, Dove has been on a continuous journey of building a community of women interested in hair care. What are your thoughts on the campaign? Is Dove weaving in memorable stories?   |
| Seven of the Best Guides to Marketing with Pinterest of 2012 Posted: 06 Dec 2012 06:30 AM PST While consumer brand marketers are embracing Pinterest enthusiastically, many B2B marketers are still in a quandary about the visual sharing site. On one hand, it's highly engaging, rapidly growing, and has more than 11 million users. On the other hand, 80% of users are women and the most popular topics continue to be fashion, cooking, home decor, crafts, weddings and kids.
The seven experts below contend that the site is indeed worthwhile for business, that it's sort of helpful for SEO, and that their tips can lead to business success there. While some B2B marketers will likely remain skeptical, there's no sign of Pinterest's growth slowing anytime soon and the demographics are shifting, making the site at least worth keeping an eye on for now. How To Get The Most Out Of Pinterest by Search Engine People Advising "If you're an entrepreneur, marketer or small business owner, do yourself a favor and join the site now," Matt Beswick provides a concise but helpful guide to using the visual social network, from getting started and building a following to generating more traffic and properly categorizing your graphics. Why Pinterest Is NOT Your SEO Miracle Worker by Search Engine Land Jordan Kasteler notes that while SEO practitioners initially flocked to Pinterest for its do-follow links, the site changed course and switched to the insidious no-follow links in March 2012. Nevertheless, he does suggest seven ways for SEO pros to constructively use Pinterest as a social network rather than a source of easy backlinks. B2B Marketing & Pinterest: 5 Tips for Becoming the Ultimate Pinner by Marketo B2B Marketing and Sales Blog Chris Russell offers five tips for using Pinterest for B2B marketing, such as "Pinterest's search is all about keywords…simply adding a description (adjectives help!) will immediately get eyes on your pin…They're basically the same rules as Yahoo search circa 1996. Load up relevant, popular keywords in the description of your pins and boards and you are guaranteed to get more views/likes/follows." 10 *Useful* Rules for Using Pinterest for Business [Infographic] by Unbounce Oli Gardner provides the "10 commandments" of using Pinterest for business, in both text and infographic form, among them: "honor thy source," "remember to be social" and perhaps most helpfully, "Research and measure your pins — A key here is to check Google Analytics to see the value of the Pinterest traffic you are getting…also don't be afraid NOT to use Pinterest if you can't make it successful." 7 Surprising Pinterest Insights Every Marketer Needs by Heidi Cohen Heidi Cohen contends that if you are skipping Pinterest because you've heard it's "a female dominated, crafting ghetto" then you are "missing out on an important social media marketing opportunity regardless of whether your business is B2C, B2B, not-for-profit or solopreneur oriented." And she backs it up with research showing that Pinterest's user base is increasing male, 80% prime working age (between 25 and 54 years old), highly engaged and mobile-savvy. Pin to Win: The Ultimate Short Guide to Pinterest for Business by Social Media Today Brett Relander puts forth nine "no-fail guidelines" to business success on Twitter, such as "Keep your boards in order. A common mistake is to dump all your content onto one board. Instead, use different boards to break down content in a way that makes sense," and "Take care with your links…Make sure that your Pinterest links take the viewer directly to the exact right content. Another important point is to check links for images that you are re-pinning. When you re-pin, you are implicitly delivering a recommendation, so make sure the link works and is not spam." 25 Tips to More Effective Marketing on Pinterest by Brent Price Carnduff Brent Carnduff suggests setting up a business page, verifying your account, tagging other Pinterest users, adding "follow me on Pinterest" and "Pin it" buttons to your website or blog, and creating boards with tutorials or product instructions among the more than two dozen helpful Pinterest tips here.   |
| Measuring and Monitoring with Sprout Social [Review] Posted: 06 Dec 2012 06:20 AM PST Among enterprise social media CRMs, there's no shortage of choices. Argyle, Spredfast and Radian6 (now Salesforce) all offer a host of robust features for companies who execute and monitor social media campaigns. Sprout Social stands among the best solutions with an elegant interface and an impressive client roster. We recently had the opportunity to tinker with the software thanks to a free 30-day trial. Here are is a rundown of its features and benefits:
It also boasts the to ability add multiple admins – perfect for large social media teams. The Sprout Social interface is divided into six core components: the Dashboard, Messages, Feeds, Scheduler, Discovery and Reports. Dashboard The dashboard greets users with at-a-glance, high-level analytics, as well as quick access to other features of the CRM. From the dashboard, you can access your inbox, review tasks and view reports. You can also quickly connect additional profiles and grant admin access to new team members. Messages The Messages tabs syndicates all of your social media mentions – tweets, DMs, posts, comments and private messages – into one feed. You can customize the feed to show what kind of messages you want, as well as monitor "Brand Keywords." You can also assign tasks to team members, view your sent tweets and Facebook updates, and monitor "Web Alerts" – similar to Google Alerts. Feeds The Feeds tab displays your connected Twitter and LinkedIn feeds, as well as a Google Reader account. Through the Twitter feed, you can respond directly to tweets, effectively eliminating the need for the Twitter web client. For a business account, it's difficult to connect a LinkedIn business page. However, personal users can easily make use of the LinkedIn feed. Scheduler Scheduler allows you to create and schedule Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn status updates in an editorial calendar layout. You can even connect an RSS feed to automatically send social media updates. Sprout Queue functions similarly to Buffer, allowing you to browse the web and add blogs and other webpages to your scheduling queue. Discovery Discovery allows you to curate your followers – making suggestions on who to follow based on past interactions or who to follow based on dormant activity. Smart Search lets you search for keywords or phrases that your customers would be talking about. This section appears to be limited to Twitter only. Reports The biggest strength of the Sprout Social software is the reporting functionality. Users can easily generate custom, attractive infographic-style reports based on follower stats, engagement and traffic. You can even run a competitive Twitter analysis, comparing your account to those of competing companies. The "Website Vs. Social" report pulls in your Google Analytics data and compares it to Twitter activity. All in all, Sprout Social should be considered for enterprise-level companies who create and monitor a high-volume of social media – particularly in teams of 3 or more who focus primarily on Twitter. The integration of many different tools – content curation/scheduling, listening/monitoring and limiting – eliminate the need for multiple, disparate tools in favor of a turn-key solution. What it lacks in functionality, it makes up for in usability. Grade: 8/10 Pros: Beautiful interface, multiple team-member access, in-depth reporting Cons: Lack of Google+ integration, does not suggest content/engagement improvements, difficult to connect a business LinkedIn page vs. a personal profile. A free 30-day trial of Sprout Social is available here. For more information about social media optimization, download our Increasing Conversions with Social Media guide.   |
| 7 Reasons Why It’s Better To Hire a PPC Management Company for Your Campaigns Posted: 06 Dec 2012 06:15 AM PST
Do you keep using your in-house PPC expert to manage your campaigns, do it yourself or hire a pro team to take care of it? At the end of the day there is no clear-cut answer as it all depends on the nature of your company. But to help you answer this question, here are some key points to understand before you make a decision… 1. Change A large part of what a dedicated and reputable PPC management company does is stay abreast of the latest changes in the industry so they can not only keep up, but maintain profitable campaigns too. Google Adwords and Microsoft Adcenter are constantly changing and it takes daily research to make sure you are complying with these changes. All of this takes a lot of time which most small businesses simply don’t have. 2. Security Let’s pretend that you hire the best, most talented PPC expert for your team and she does wonders for your campaigns, delivering more ROI than you ever thought possible. Then she gets an offer from another company at a higher salary with better benefits and she leaves you, then what? The fact is you will be left with nobody to keep your campaigns profitable and within just a few days they will start to plummet into the black. Not a good feeling! With a dedicated company this problem simply cannot happen. 3. Time Maybe you’re one of the lucky entrepreneurs out there that has plenty time on their hands and just loves the idea of learning Google Adwords. If that’s the case then by all means dive into it and manage it all yourself. Just be aware that it’s extremely time-consuming to learn it, and then to keep it running as well. Expect your first 6 months to be a loss. However, a PPC agency can have a profitable campaign up and running within just a few weeks depending on your industry. 4. Resources There is a lot more to a successful PPC campaign than just keywords and bidding. You need to be great at copywriting, making landing pages, managing bids, using the various tools for spying, keyword analysis and tracking. Not only are these tools expensive, they also have a very steep learning curve. Some agencies even have their own tools custom made to deal with certain issues or get better performance. 5. Scale If you’re only spending a few hundred dollars each month on Adwords then it makes sense to just do it yourself. Hiring an agency only makes sense if there is some scale to the campaign because of the fees they will charge you. This way you can advertise for a few months, maybe even a year before you would have spent as much as an agency’s set up fees. That’s a lot of leeway to learn and potentially set up a very profitable campaign on your own. If however, you have a medium budget, say above $500 a month to spend but less than $5000, you should definitely hire a professional PPC consultant to come in, take a look at your campaigns and optimize them for maximum ROI. Just one session with a seasoned Adwords veteran can save you years of trial and error and without the costs associated with a full-blown agency. 6. Cost To hire an in-house PPC expert will cost you around $45 000 per year for their salary and another $15 000 in benefits. So you’re looking at around $60 000 per year and that’s without further training, pay raises, bonuses etc. Using an outsourced company will cost you far less since most charge around $3000 per month totaling $36 000 per year – and with this you get an entire team of experts on your side, not just one person. 7. Fees While these are all important factors, by far the most critical are the fees. Obviously it only makes sense to hire a company to manage your PPC accounts if it makes financial sense to do so. You see, many PPC management companies charge a substantial fee for the privilege of optimizing your campaign and squeezing every last drop of ROI out of it. A common pricing structure is $3000 per month plus a percentage of advertising expenditure. This means you have to make a pretty big return on your campaign to afford these fees, and naturally, this would require a decent budget. Hopefully that makes your decision a lot easier and you’re much more informed about which route to take for your business. Image courtesy of renjith Krishnan/FreeDigitalPhotos.net   |
| How to Search Twitter With Eagle-Like Vision Posted: 06 Dec 2012 06:09 AM PST As you may or may not know, there are a number of Twitter search operators that can greatly enhance the value of your Twitter search results. If you haven't used them, or didn't know about the full range of search operators, you may be surprised at how powerful a Twitter search can be. You can review the full list of operators here, but following are a list of operators that I've found to be particularly helpful: ""Placing quotation marks around your search returns results containing the exact phrase within. For example, "social media marketing" will yield results containing the exact term 'social media marketing'. I've found quotation marks to be incredibly helpful with increasing the relevance of searches for any phrase, name, brand, consumer anecdote, or anything that is longer than a single word. Search forsocial media and you'll get results about grade 8 social dances as well as acrylic paint. Search for "social media" and your search results will be much more in line with what you're really looking for. ORUsing the word OR between search terms produces results containing your first search term, or your second search term, or both. For example, social OR media, will yield results containing the words social OR media OR social media. There are a couple of cases where I find the OR operator to be particularly helpful. The first is when I'm searching for highly related search terms and I predict that one term versus the other will not deteriorate the relevance of my results. Also, there are times that I'll predict that people might describe a single thing I'm searching for in different ways and I'd like the results to show both. -Precede a search term with a dash that you do not want to show up in your results. For example, social –media, will yield results for the word 'social', but not 'media'. The dash is an incredibly useful search operator. I frequently use this to eliminate commonly associated words from my searches to really focus my results. Frequently, I'll conduct searches for chatter about a given organization, but don't want results that would be associated with one of their business units. To minimize results about unrelated business units, I'll simply eliminate keywords that I anticipate will cloud my search. near:"location"Use this search operator following your desired keywords to limit results to those generated by people in the specified location. For example, social media near:"toronto", will yield results for social media from users in Toronto. As you know, Twitter is a pretty massive social media network, which means people are tweeting about all sorts of different things, from all sorts of different places. While this is amazing for a multitude of reasons, when you're looking to find the most relevant information, connect with people who are geographically close to you, or monitor conversations on a business in a localized area, the 'near' operator is amazing for filtering your search results. You can narrow your results by country, city or town. ?A question mark following your search term will show tweets that ask a question. For example, social media marketing ?, will yield questions that contain the search term 'social media marketing'. I'm frequently asked how to go about engaging with people on Twitter. Given the sheer number of people on the platform, and the fact that we frequently follow, and are followed by people we don't necessarily know from the real world, connecting with others can be overwhelming and intimidating. An easy way to engage with people on Twitter is to conduct a search for questions people have that fall within your area of expertise and – you guessed it – answer them. BONUS TIPSCombine Search Operators As powerful as Twitter's search operators can be for refining your search results, try combining them for even better, more focused results. Save Searches If you find yourself repeatedly searching the same terms, Twitter allows you to save up to 6 searches for quick access. Saved searches can be unsaved to accommodate a new saved search. Search Streams Popular Twitter clients, HootSuite and TweetDeck, allow you to setup dedicated streams with search results. This can be an incredibly effective way to stay in tune with the pulse of your audience, what is important to them, and what they are saying about your brand, to list a few common uses. When setting up your search streams, remember that all of the Twitter search operators will also work here. Do you have any Twitter search tips you'd like to share? What search operators do you find to be particularly useful? As always, it would be great to hear from you in the comments, or on Twitter @RGBSocial   |
What does the near future of social media hold? Influential marketing expert Rohit Bhargava recently gave a sneak peek of seven of his annual 15 Social Media Trends to Watch at Potomac TechWire's Social Media Outlook 2013.
You are a professional working independently or within a small or medium sized firm.
Once your organization is consistently sourcing great content that your target audience wants, there are a variety of ways to distribute this content including:
Are you flushing money down the drain with your current social media lead generation strategy? A recent study conducted by IBM Corporation found that while almost 50% of the 1,161 companies surveyed put more money into 
the prize they need to strive for. It’s like the advertising equivalent of winning the lottery: crafting a marketing message that’s so well-loved that people voluntarily share it with each other by the millions.
social video marketing. There are arguments to be made for super short (~1 minute) videos as well as longer ones in the 3-4 minute range, but unless you know for a fact your audience has an extremely long attention span, try to keep it under five minutes.
By now, it’s commonly accepted that blogging is one of the most important ways to generate traffic on your website. Google algorithm changes have made it necessary to create quality content frequently and consistently in order to compete in the new world of SEO. But as happens often these days, things are changing once again. This time, it’s not just the content that matters, though. With Google’s AuthorRank, you matter, too.
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So, is Pinterest worthwhile for business marketing? Does it really help with SEO? And if Pinterest is worth the effort of getting to know the ins and outs of yet another social network, what are the best practices for using it?
Sprout Social allows you to connect one corporate Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Google Analytics acccount, as well as one of each for a human user – with an easy option to toggle between the two.
At some point you will have to make a tough decision.
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