25 New Social Articles on Business 2 Community |
- SEO Speak – Thin Content
- Putting Twitter in Charge of the England Team [infographic]
- Take a Cue from Browns: How NOT to Respond to a Social Media Crisis
- Keep Blogging Well After You Think it’s Stupid and a Waste of Your Time
- What’s Worth More to You – The Cost of Your Reputation or the Cost to Monitor Your Reputation?
- Why Facebook Pages Should Be Deleted
- Crowd Sourced Summary of #CSMB2B in 42 tweets!
- 13 Strategies to Rank Higher in Google Search
- Pondering: How Does Your Social Media Garden Grow?
- Social Media & Seniors – The Rules Are Changing
- How To Control Who Sees Your Facebook Posts
- Scoring Klout: The Inside Scoop on the Web’s Hottest Measure of Social Influence [Infographic]
- Generate Business Leads with Social Media Savvy
- Is It Really All About Your Blog Content? – The Numbers Don’t Lie!
- A Brief Guide to Completing Your Google+ Profile
- Five Killer Strategies to Dominate Social Media’s Big 3: Facebook, Twitter and YouTube
- How to be Pinteresting
- 6 Steps You Can Take Today To Improve Your Social Media Marketing
- Social ROI Is Not A Myth, Just Ask TD Bank Group Or IBM
- 3 Reasons You Can’t Miss The Social Media Intensive Webinar Series
- How to Use Social Networking on Your Intranet
- Why Discovery Is So Important To Social Media
- #1 Myth about Facebook that you may Believe
- How to Build a Social Brand That’s a Sweet Orange in a World of Bitter Apples!
- Facebook Email – How To Reclaim The Address You Actually Use!
| Posted: 28 Jun 2012 03:00 PM PDT In the new world of Google there have been some changes to the sort of content which can help a website and one of the things which has been a result of this is an increase of the use of the term "thin content". So, I thought I'd cover this term as part of my SEO Speak series for the blog to help you understand what this is about when you hear people mentioning it. The term "thin content" became more heavily used following the launch of Panda last year. So, what is "thin content" and what does it mean for your website? Well in the context of the internet and how this is seen by Google thin content is the below:
Too Short What constitutes too short? Well it really depends on what the page is trying to do and what competitiveness levels your keywords have. Core pages which are aimed at delivering users useful information such as user guides, white papers and should be at least 300 words long, however the more competitive your industry or complicated your services the more you will need to say here! If your keywords have a lot of competing pages or are single phrase terms then it might be best to say more. However as you want to be offering value for users (see below) you need to make sure you don't say too much as pages which are thousands of words long are a turn off for visitors and search engines know that. News content which is aimed at updating your visitors about latest developments doesn't need to be quite as long as it's more about the latest development in your industry so around 250 words works for this. Designed for Search Engines/no value for users Having content which has been designed for search engines and not for users is the next no-no we're looking at. If you have a page dedicated to a specific keyword on your site, then you need to consider what this page is actually doing for your visitors. Does the page help them make a decision about a product (for example as a buying guide) or does it help with the use of a production (for example a how to guide) if so then this content is for the visitor primarily. However, if your content is a short piece just outlining a keyword and don't offer the kind of kelp people might expect to find on your site then it might be thin content. This kind of vague content won't offer any help to visitors coming to your site as it doesn't help them learn about a topic, make a decision about buying or become better at doing something. Yes, do consider having a page for each of your keywords, but these pages should be focussed on your business and your visitors needs. Remember, you want the rankings for your keywords because you are relevant to them and sell products or services related to each term, so it shouldn't be difficult to create a useful page for each term you are targeting anyway. As mentioned above there are some great types of value content for customers which won't fall foul of this including:
Low Quality Quality in this instance relates to a number of things including poor grammar and spelling. Making sure that your content is not littered with spelling mistakes doesn't just help with Google though it makes your site look better. The odd one or two is fine but make sure you check the spelling of new pages before they go up to ensure that this doesn't become a standard feature of your site. This also relates to the value of the content again and the concept of vague content not offering anything of value to the customer. If you are concerned about any of these things and/or you've already seen an impact from one of the recent algorithm updates from Google, then it's a good idea to look into performing a content audit on your website. Dave wrote a nice guide to content audits in January which you might find useful for this. If you find content which could be causing you issues you can remove it (making sure you redirect to a still live page) or rewrite it so that it offers values to visitors on your site. |
| Putting Twitter in Charge of the England Team [infographic] Posted: 28 Jun 2012 02:55 PM PDT In a characteristically scrappy and unglamorous style, England managed to make it through the group stages in Euro 2012. The game really got people ranting and raving on Twitter, so we used our social media monitoring tool to assess what people thought of the players. Steven Gerrard's triple-deflected cross to set-up Wayne Rooney's one-yard winner was enough to boost the England skipper's popularity, shooting it up to a 71% positive to negative tweet ratio. Below is an infographic that we've put together to accompany our interactive data visualisation, which shows the most popular England players according to Twitter.
While some players provoke a lot of discussion, the sentiment of those tweets hasn't been so splendid. James Milner, John Terry and Glen Johnson are all on the bad end of a huge number of negative tweets, while some players have struggled to get any discussion about them at all. Ashley Young, although playing all three games for England, is still the least popular midfielder with just 33,000 tweets. Wayne Rooney's triumphant return to England's scoresheet meant that almost 400,000 tweets have now been broadcast about the now-hairy striker. The tussle between Andy Carroll and Danny Welbeck for the second forward role has been in Welbeck's favour on the pitch, though calls for Andy Carroll on Twitter have been louder, earning the Liverpool player a place in our Twitter team. For more stats an info, you can check out the data-viz we've put together, and you can also offer your own opinions on the team by using the #betheref hashtag. |
| Take a Cue from Browns: How NOT to Respond to a Social Media Crisis Posted: 28 Jun 2012 02:35 PM PDT
With tweets coming in by the minute, 82,000+ Facebook group members boycotting the bar, and people showing distaste and utter bewilderment across the social media board, Browns Independent Bar, in Coventry, England, was sure wishing they hadn't turned away those grieving soldiers earlier this week… Yup, you heard me! Apparently this little bar in Coventry has a policy where they do not serve men and women in uniform. This bewildering policy came to light when soldiers in uniform, pall bearers at the funeral of their friend and brother, Corporal Michael Thacker, a soldier who died in Afghanistan on June 1st, entered the bar looking for a warm beverage before the funeral. Imagine their astonishment when they were denied entrance because the bar had this policy of not serving anyone in uniform. Imagine the world's astonishment when the news came out, or better yet, witness the world's astonishment and disgust on Twitter, where #BoycottBrowns has been trending for days; and Facebook, where 82,000+ people have joined the "Boycott Browns in Coventry" group. It's an emotional and irrational situation that immediately sprung to social media and formed a heavy and real-time crisis for this little, corner bar. Because it's an emotional and irrational issue (the 'irrational' is to the policy itself), I was interested to see how the owner of this bar, the one who put this policy in place in the first place, was responding to all of the negative press he's been receiving. Once I saw his response it was clear to me: this blog post needed to be titled "Take a Cue from Browns: How NOT to respond to a social media crisis"! Take a look for yourself: Click here to view official response made by Brown. How many failures can you count in this short 41 second response?First and foremost, where is the sincerity? Two grieving soldiers were basically shamed and turned away from receiving service. After having fought for their country and losing a brother and friend, they were turned away due to a policy that refuses to serve men and women in uniform. The first thing that we would have expected from Brown was a sincere apology, shame and remorse. He could have shown this by 1) memorizing his lines, and 2) looking straight into the camera with a little more than an air of "this is a total inconvenience for me". Attempting to justify the actions by stating a policy that the whole world does not understand in the first place, does little to help his case. As does stating that "had I known of the circumstances, I would have served them". He goes on to say that he is "now looking to review this policy", which is his attempt to state that he has learned the errors of his ways. Though with the lack of sincerity and conviction in his voice and actions, he might as well not have said it. As a general rule, if it's believed that you're making a change simply because you were caught and forced to, it's a null action – it will have little to no positive impact. This was Brown's one chance at potentially turning the situation around. Had he done the complete opposite within his response, he may have had a fighting chance. But with the lack of sincerity, 82,000+ people boycotting the bar on Facebook, and the sentiment on Twitter, I wouldn't be surprised if we saw this little bar close its doors sometime in the near future. This is yet another great example of one wrong action causing a viral social media crisis – and another perfect example of how NOT to respond to said crisis. What are your thoughts on the way Brown has chosen to handle this crisis, and what repercussions do you expect to see on account of his (non)actions? Share your thoughts with me below! More links: * Photo credit: ITV Central |
| Keep Blogging Well After You Think it’s Stupid and a Waste of Your Time Posted: 28 Jun 2012 02:30 PM PDT
To be honest, it really doesn't matter what you do to keep your blog running on a daily basis, but it's essential that you don't allow your blog to be categorized as "archived" by search engines, to say nothing of being forgotten by your readers. First, I will address why keeping your blog updated is essential to search engines and how fickle Google is. Google is worse than a Harvard Dean when it comes to judging you. "What have you done lately" is the name of the game and it is better for your career as a blogger to write filler during those times you're not in the blogging mood: you're having a crisis of faith, distracted by something else, or time-crushed by a well-paying job, for example. As I have said before, Google's judging your posts less on exactly what you write but how often you post. Since Google only has a finite number of nanoseconds in the universe, it prioritizes content based on several factors: quickness of your server, popularity of the content, links to your content from other well-regarded sites, as well as how often you post. If you post a couple of times a day, Google will be sure to allocate enough nanocycles to make certain that Google is the very first on the block to spider and index your content and offer it up almost immediately in its version of the real-time-web. If you post a couple of times a week, then you will only receive the commensurate resources; and if you never post, you will be relegated to archive, a static resource not needing more than a periodic diff ping to check to see if there have been any changes. This can happen very quickly, especially in these heydays of social sharing and the exponential growth of global web content. Google needs to conserve and preserve resources, so the moment you don't keep your platform populated, your reputation, your search-ranking, and your Whuffie — and you can see this reflected directly and in real-time if you spend any time looking at your income on AdSense or if you keep rigorous track of your Klout score: If you miss way too much school, you're going to have to repeat; if you miss a little too much school, you'll have to go to summer school. So, maybe it's a better idea to spend some time pulling C's for a while until you're back up-to-speed instead of dropping out or missing school. If you're too overwhelmed, maybe transfer from Harvard to 'Nova for a little while, but keep up the studies! So, keep on blogging, even if you're just calling the posts in. You probably will be surprised that you'll have more success with your gimme posts that' re basically popping out mindlessly just to get it done. Sometimes, just a quick morning post that's 80% excerpt and 20% your commentary is more than enough to keep your blog relevant and at the top of Google's search algorithm's resource allocation. For me, as you can see from my personal blog, Because the Medium is the Message, I have been worthless since my mother passed. Everything else has come before blogging, except this once-a-week obligation I have kept up for my friend and mentor, Mike Moran, the bloglord here, and so my personal blog has basically become a photo blog, documenting my recent life, which is easy and simple enough for me to do. And things are steady as she goes — the ad revenue from AdSense is pretty consistent now that I am keeping the blog moving forward, even if they're just snappies from my check-ins and time at the range or in church. It doesn't matter right now. The choice is not between writing good, vertical, passion-filled, and popular posts or posting my personal snappies, it's between posting snappies and abandoning my blog. Lots of folks are closer to abandoning their blogs every day — and most do — and I recommend against doing that. Keep that baby going, by hook or by crook. In fact, I bet you that my readers — what's left of them — are honestly getting to see I side of me that they never would have otherwise based only on my long-form, writerly blog essays. On the other hand, I have basically abandoned Marketing Conversation, which was stupid, since there was quite a lot of equity built up. I broke my own rule and MC has gone from being in the actual AdAge Power 150 to plummeting to 252nd — and it didn't take very long at all to happen. I squandered all of that equity and I daresay it'll take at least six-months to a year to bring it back to where it was. Don't let that happen to you. Better to get all your homework in even while you're suffering from your own private mononucleosis, even though you're tired all the time, don't feel like it, and basically hate blogging — because it won't always seem so stupid, so worthless, and so pointless — what's stupid is throwing away all the work you have put into your platform up until now just because you're having a temporary lack of faith. Your faithlessness is temporary — you're probably burnt out and just need some time. Until you're recovered and healed-up, do the daily minimum to keep that content churning. Learn from my mistake! Don't kill that favorite house plant you've been feeding and watering and sunning for a decade just because you're not in the mood for a while. If all else fails, give your blog away to someone else who can use it for a little while — allow your friend or associate to build up his or her reputation on your platform; or, if time is more important than money, you might consider to outsource your blog content while you're super-busy. It's probably worth it. |
| What’s Worth More to You – The Cost of Your Reputation or the Cost to Monitor Your Reputation? Posted: 28 Jun 2012 02:25 PM PDT
A few weeks ago, Heather Whaling shared the story of Nationwide and how they responded to what could have been a very difficult situation. While there was still come criticism about the response possibly being less "human" than it could have been from the various Nationwide accounts, it was still a great example of reacting quickly to douse potential flames. It was also a great reminder that social media needn't be scary for businesses worried about negative statements posted about them online (one of the biggest stumbling blocks for any business owner when it comes to social media). This is especially true, given the low-cost entry to monitoring your brand and effectively responding to both criticism as well as praise. And yet companies still have a fear factor around social media – so how can they overcome that? Cost of Involvement versus Cost of SilenceOne of the early phrases that came out of social media's ubiquity was "the conversation is happening whether you like it or not". This is probably one of the biggest reasons companies got scared to start with – talk about a statement to put the fear of God in you! The thing is, it should be the complete opposite – conversations about brands have always happened. In the supermarket shopping with friends; over a beer in the local bar; chatting on the telephone; picking the kids up from school and talking with other parents. These are the conversations brands should be afraid of, because they're the ones they don't get to see. Social media, on the other hand, is so open and searchable that smart businesses can create searches based around their brand or products, and see exactly what's being said; when it's being said; and what the impact on the brand might be. And it doesn't need to break the bank, either, but can save the reputation of the brand in return, which has to worth any investment, no? Consolidating to Keep Cost and Time Investment DownPerhaps one of the bigger reasons that many businesses are still staying away from social media is due to the investment costs. Not just financial, but time investment too. After all, while the tools – for the most part – may be free, it still costs money to set up a team (or monitor the platforms yourself). Add to that the fact you usually need to have multiple windows open to have all your networks covered, and it can become overpowering pretty quickly. Yet it doesn't need to be. The rise of social media dashboards in the last couple of years have helped to consolidate several accounts into one area, which helps with the time suck factor. Additionally, there have been great advances in the way online conversations are filtered, to ensure only the information you want is displayed, versus the blabber that may or may not be about you. With social media dashboards, you can:
Once you have all that information, you can begin to take control of your brand's perception again, and grab the advantage needed over your competitor to stay both competitive and effective. Throw in a social media dashboard that not only gives you all of the above, but lets you create Facebook promotions and marketing videos from within the admin area, and you couldn't ask for anything more. Just as well there's a dashboard that does that, eh? image: ohmlabmusic |
| Why Facebook Pages Should Be Deleted Posted: 28 Jun 2012 02:10 PM PDT
Corissa St. Laurent works for an email marketing company and has her own Facebook page to promote training events and ask her fans what they think about the evolution of social media. Christine Green offers web designing services to small business owners. She is self-employed and uses Facebook to share industry articles. Julia Campbell talks about the importance of social media marketing for nonprofits on her Facebook page. EJ Smooth plays saxophone and his Facebook page promotes his gigs. The list goes on and on. I have many friends who are sole proprietors, entrepreneurs, authors, musicians, and other personal brands who are creating and promoting Facebook pages. I can relate. I've been in their shoes. I've also created Facebook pages for my blog and self-employment. No more. Tamar Weinberg encourages individuals who are not large companies to install the Subscribe button and ask their otherwise fans to subscribe to their profiles instead. Citing her 9,500+ subscribers, Tamar elaborates: Hey Facebook friends, instead of creating fan pages for yourself and inviting your friends to Like you, just turn on subscriptions. If you were wondering where my fan page went, they're now my subscribers. It would be prudent to do the same, especially as maintaining two presences of your own is likely to be a pain. Within a day after reading her argument and participating in the ensuing Facebook comments — and subsequent tweeting with Geoff Livingston, Phil Gerbyshak, and Tamar — I deleted my business page but not before suggesting then-fans subscribe to me instead. (My city councilor page remains as public officials should be the only individuals with pages, really.) How it works is anyone who subscribes to me will read whatever content I share with the public. Keeping in mind how I use friend lists, if I don't want my subscribers to read certain content such as photos of my nephew then I restrict that Facebook audience to family and explicit friend lists.
Although consumers respond favorably about their likelihood to purchase from a brand they follow on Facebook, that's not overly evident from their Facebook timelines. Marketers should keep in mind that for consumers, Facebook remains primarily a place to interact with peers and share experiences. Although many consumers have opened up to brands that are present on Facebook, brand marketers should not expect they've earned consumer loyalty simply because a consumer has clicked the "like" button. I understand the desire for individuals with books or gigs or events or other materials to promote to have Facebook pages for people to like, comment, and share; but that liking, commenting, and sharing can equally occur on the profile. By allowing your fans to subscribe to you, you're increasing your Facebook productivity by allowing yourself to write updates to friends and subscribers in one place. Use friend lists, too, and you'll never experience a problem with who sees what when. Visit my profile now and click the Subscribe button. Any questions? |
| Crowd Sourced Summary of #CSMB2B in 42 tweets! Posted: 28 Jun 2012 01:47 PM PDT I have continued on with the social collaboration themed summary posts due to popularity of the last two ( #SBSS12 & #SBS2012) . Thanks to everyone who contributed to the conversation using the event hashtag #CMSB2B. The European Social Media Marketing Summit was held in London at the Regents Park Marriott Hotel on 25-26th June 2012. The event was organised by Useful Social Media and sponsored by Lithium. I was lucky enough to be asked to chair a panel discussion around "How to unlock the potential of your social media strategy" with Kerry Bridge from Dell and Conor McKechnie from General Electric Healthcare. I controversially started by declaring my position against the session title and said: "You dont need a social media strategy you need to align social to you business strategy"Luckily this view point was shared by my fellow panelists! The discussion followed. The event featured presentations from some of the worlds biggest brands. The line up included:-
For the benefit of anyone who couldn't attend or for anyone who would like a recap, I have compiled this article featuring what were, in my opinion, the key tweets and quotes from the day. It features a compilation of some of the things that were said on the day by the speakers and the opinions of those in the audience. I narrowed down the many hundred of tweets into just 42. Too much good stuff to get into a shorter list! Hopefully it should give you an idea of the summit and some of the ideas discussed. I have also added some photos of the event onto my Facebook page How do you get scale? Here are 101 Examples of Businesses that have proven ROI and scale from social dachisgroup.com/2012/01/social… #csmb2c #csmb2b — Key takeaway from last session. Get your #borndigital 20 something employees to help your #CEO play with social media #csmb2b #csmb2c — 6 key areas for separate social media strategies in your business #csmb2b http://t.co/VkAMTrxx — “It’s not a questions of having a social media strategy, it’s a question of how social media is aligned to your strategy” #csmb2b — Dell Social media toolkit – Guide to how small and medium businesses can make the most of social media slidesha.re/GUtt85 #csmb2b — @kerryatdell thinks B2B Social media is easier than B2C as you know the audience you are talking to. #csmb2b — “Your Subject Matter Experts & their relationships going to become an increasingly important part of your marketing” @KerryatDell #csmb2b — There isnt one way to use twitter for business #ibm #csmb2b twitpic.com/a0ds7e — “Don’t just track your company’s name in social media, track related conversations and add value.” #csmb2b — LinkedIn is basically a free leads database. Do an advanced search and you can find the people you need #csmb2b — 3M sums up social media #csmb2b http://t.co/Wdz5Q8IX — “You can’t control social media, you have to just guide people” @justineloua at #csmb2b — B2B brands are dull, B2B people aren’t. You’ll do more with personal accounts than company accounts #csmb2b — It’s not about doing social. It’s about being social. #csmb2b — Insight driven marketing activities: Tools used by Standard Life #csmb2b http://t.co/QnEYQIcF — Find employees who listen>give them something to talk about>give them a a place to do it. Bingo, you’re social #csmb2b — Nokia using private Facebook groups for internal collaboration employees already there & cheaper than Yammer – its Free! #csmb2b #csmb2c — .@jon_at_psion says Don’t just copy and paste your marketing message onto a social media network #csmb2b — Tell stories not messages #csmb2b — @jon_at_psion “Your brand no longer belongs to you” time to engage social audiences #csmb2b — There don’t need to be new positions to handle social media. You need people in your existing positions who get it #csmb2b — .@pricefloyd says these are the four principles of communication #csmb2b ow.ly/i/IVU9 — .@pricefloyd says social media is not pixie dust #csmb2b — .@prelini says we are living in the dawn of mobile, social and incredibly empowered consumer #csmb2b — .@prelini says customers are looking to scale their #customerservice without highering more staff #csmb2b @lithium — .@prelini says 85% of features of verizon software release was crowd sourced #csmb2b — .@prelini says switch off social media and see how service levels drop, @autodesk said NPS score dropped 10% #csmb2b — .@prelini says don’t just find fans, find your super fans! #csmb2b — .@prelini says it’s not the strongest of the species that survive its the ones which adapt the best #csmb2b — .@dailywebfacts says social is not a toolset its a mind set #csmb2b — In 5 years time CEOs will be chosen based on their social influence #csmb2b twitpic.com/a0q8h7 — .@dailywebfacts says social = culture + tools #csmb2b — .@dailywebfacts says use #google #adwords to target recruiters of where you want to work #csmb2b http://t.co/JrgmF8qc — .@SarahGoodall says 60-70% of sales cycle is done before a customer talks to a sales person #csmb2b — “host your own communities, orchestrate and participate to third parties presences” @SarahGodall #csmb2b — .@SarahGoodall says use social collaboration to save money in #R&D #csmb2b — RT @theotherhef: .@SarahGoodall is doing @SAP proud talking at #csmb2b #thoughtleadership — Tracking down key influencers in your sector is key to increasing social media reach #csmb2b — .@ygourven says social media is like dogs. 1 year is like 7 years #csmb2b #csmb2c — Web is still vital, but as soon as they ‘raise their hand’ (via community engagement) they’re in our CRM @SarahGoodall @cmacland #csmb2b — Avaya crowd sourced a video campaign and allowed viral to decide. Avaya vs. Cisco rap battle – fantastic! #csmb2b @cmacland — Best of show – RT @SarahGoodall: My #csmb2b slides are up on #slideshare – “Proving value of #socialmedia to your #cfo” ow.ly/bPMOk — |
| 13 Strategies to Rank Higher in Google Search Posted: 28 Jun 2012 01:00 PM PDT Question: What practicable/applicable things can I do to make my business rank higher in Google searches?Question by: Jodi C.
Create Evergreen Content“You’ll want your content to take the top slots for your name and various keywords and phrases, so you’ll want to have high-quality, authoritative content. The best way to make sure your content is seen this way to is create content that is forever useful, not trendy and disposable. Create content that people will be reading ten years from now, and you’ll be getting linkbacks for a decade.” - Colin Wright | CEO, Exile Lifestyle
Audit Your Online Profiles“Take a few minutes to log into each of your company’s online profiles. Is the biography updated? More importantly, is your website’s URL listed somewhere? The incoming links from these profiles may not weigh too much in Google’s mysterious algorithm, but you’ll be surprised what it can do if you have more than a handful of accounts online.” - Logan Lenz | Founder / President, Endagon
Think Like Your Customer Types“Think about what your ideal clients and customers might be typing into Google, and then find out if your hunch is right by looking keywords up in Google’s free Keyword Tool. Keep in mind that 25 percent of keywords have never been typed in before, but you’ll want to aim for popular keywords with low competition if you can. Then write content around these keywords and learn to optimize.” - Nathalie Lussier | Founder, CEO, Nathalie Lussier Media
Hire an SEO Expert“I suggest hiring a search engine optimization company or freelance specialist to develop an effective strategy to improve your rankings. The Google Panda update has made the SEO space even more challenging to produce results, so I suggest out-sourcing this task to the professionals. Look for individuals or companies with proven track records and monitor their biweekly reports closely.” - Anthony Saladino | Co-Founder & CEO, Kitchen Cabinet Kings
Go for Guest Posts“Start guest posting on tons of relevant blogs. Blogs love fresh content, and for you, it’s a great way to build links, which will boost your rankings on Google.” - Ben Lang | Founder, EpicLaunch
Content Is King, Links Are Queen“Yes, creating good content is very important to make your business rank higher in Google, but links are even more important. Google loves links, especially those from other relevant, authority websites. Join any and all industry associations, guest blog with a link back to your website and submit your site to any relevant directories to grow your backlink profile and your searches.” - Warren Jolly | President/CEO, Affiliate Media Inc.
Bust Out the Camera“Video is such a huge thing now for business owners. Not only does it give your company personality, but it can also be spread across networks while linking back to your site. Create great videos filled with information people can share and then repeat. Now, videos can be distributed across multiple platforms from one single platform, causing Google to love you.” - Ashley Bodi | co-founder, Business Beware
Colleges and Universities“The biggest SEO secret is that when .edu sites link to your website, it gives you a higher Google ranking. Contact colleges and universities and find a reason for them to link to your site, by running a special internship opportunity, for example.” - Nick Friedman | President, College Hunks Hauling Junk
Update Your Site Frequently“The more often you update your site, the more important Google thinks it is. If you can publish content to your blog every day, Google will start to recognize you as a great source of information for whatever your keywords are. With every blog post, you have another chance at ranking for new search terms, so each article increases the odds of your site being found.” - Matt Wilson | Co-founder, Under30CEO.com
Use the Right Keywords“Two effective ways of increasing your SEO rank are tagging articles and keyword analysis. You want to make sure your headlines are descriptive and are what somebody would actually search for. You should also choose keywords that people are going to look for — so imagine yourself as a searcher.” - Lauren Perkins | Founder and CEO, Perks Consulting
Move Away From Flash“Many small businesses, especially restaurants and bars, use Flash for their sites because it’s easy to launch, looks good and is fairly cheap. While the sites might look decent they rank really poorly in Google (without doing some tricks). Change your Flash-based site to WordPress or another platform and you’ll rocket up the search engine rankings.” - Nathan Lustig | cofounder, Entrustet
Take Advantage of Local Search“Are you a local business? Have you claimed your listing on Google, Yahoo! and Bing? If not, stop reading this article now and go claim your business listings immediately! I’ve seen a huge jump in traffic for businesses by simply claiming and filling out all the fields on these local profiles. The future of search is personalized, local results, and these valuable profiles are often overlooked.” - Andrew Saladino | Co-Founder & COO, Just Bath Vanities
How to Read Their Minds“The biggest mistake people make in trying to rank high in Google is having no clue what people are actually typing into search engines to find you. An easy way to find this out is to go to the Google homepage and slowly start typing in your phrases. You’ll notice Google suggested searches come up. Use those exact phrases in your titles. That’s what people want, give it to them.” - Trevor Mauch | CEO (Chief Entrepreneurial Officer), Automize, LLC The Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC) is an invite-only nonprofit organization comprised of the world's most promising young entrepreneurs. The YEC recently published #FixYoungAmerica: How to Rebuild Our Economy and Put Young Americans Back to Work (for Good), a book of 30+ proven solutions to help end youth unemployment. |
| Pondering: How Does Your Social Media Garden Grow? Posted: 28 Jun 2012 12:50 PM PDT How are you growing your social media garden? Equate your social media to a garden and work from the ground up to build something beautiful. Gardening can be approached by many different tactics as can social media, please take these as suggestions and use your own plan to create your unique experience. Just as there are many types of gardens, formal English, structured Japanese and butterfly gardens to name a few, each garden is unique and has it's charm. Your garden may not look like my garden and that is fine!
1. Plan your gardenDecide which social media platform that you want to use and learn how to use it. When I first started on Twitter, I used the regular Twitter platform and then switched to mostly Tweetdeck. Tweetdeck has a lot of features that help me use my time more efficiently. I set up columns to show mentions, lists I follow as well as hashtag streams. Customizing the Tweetdeck for whatever I am doing at the time is easy and efficient. HootSuite also has many great functions, my favorite being that it shows sent tweets. Power tip: Use a different platform for different accounts (ex. Tweetdeck for personal use and HootSuite for your business account). This way you know to respond appropriately as you are responding to tweets. Your personal responses to tweets might be slightly different from the response necessary from your corporate account. This is especially helpful when you are newer. Also, realize that it isn't possible to have a strong presence on every social media platform. Choose the ones you like best, be aware of new things and don't overload yourself. 2. Spread your seedsOnce you get started, spend a little time on each platform you choose. Maybe you already use Facebook and want to start on Google+, great! Just keep in mind that each platform has it's own language and strengths. Again, don't feel the pressure to be everywhere. Make choices that you are comfortable with and enjoy it! A great place to meet new people is chats on Twitter! I have made wonderful friends and learned a lot through these connections. Some chats that I support and attend are #PinChat, #BlogChat and #DadChat. I have also met amazing people in #CMChat, #GetRealChat and #LeadershipChat. I co-host#MyBookClub once a month on the 1st Monday of the month at 8 pm est. Meeting new people ROCKS!
3. Water your gardenOf course you need to be "social" to help your garden grow. Many people feel more comfortable just watching and not engaging in conversations with people, I encourage you to engage with people, say hello, thank you and keep in touch with those that you like to talk with and can learn from. Tiara tip to Brian Vickery for reminding me that being in a COMMUNITY is a great place to water your garden. I started in a group called #USGuys and learned the ropes with lots of fantastic people. Most of my original friends from Twitter are from this community. Now I spend most of my time in the 12 Most community with a foundation of supportive, fun writers who are my current online Tribe. We transcend Twitter and meet on Facebook, Google+, email, phone calls and tweetups. Sometimes your friends even water your garden for you. Power tip: If you meet an interesting person, follow them immediately. You may not remember their whole name or be able find them later. 4. Weed your gardenUse tools such as Manage Flitter to help weed out based on what you are comfortable with doing. I try to follow everyone who is following me and do unfollow people after a certain time if they don't follow me. Manage Flitter has a great whitelist feature that you can select people that you would never want to unfollow. I must admit, I am really bad at filtering out people on Facebook and don't typically unfriend people. There have only bee two instances that I have unfriended folks, prior to the ability to monitor the content that people were sharing. Constant whining and complaining on Facebook or anywhere is a total drag. 5. Ignore the trollsI discussed Trolls in the 'Hood in more depth in this previous post but the short version is don't feed the trolls! Ignore or block rude people. Why waste your time on them? Seeking attention, through negative behavior, is the typical troll fare. Everyone isn't going to like everyone else, that is life. Focus on the positive people and the great interaction that you have with them. 6. Do you want to be organic?Choosing how to build your followers is also a personal choice. I chose organic growth, slowly building my network of friends and colleagues based on similar likes and common values. Just like real life, we gravitate towards friends who are like us. Others choose a rapid growth plan, with #teamfollowback or purchasing followers, while this is a personal choice, I would argue that my followers are more inclined to be interested in my message, read what I write and be interested in what I share because they have engaged with me and hopefully chose to follow me and continue to do so because I provide some value to them whether it be content, friendship or entertainment.
7. Enjoy the flowersEventually, your garden will begin to flourish with the care and thought that you have given to it. Take time to smell the flowers and enjoy the network you are building. How do YOU grow your garden? Share with me what works for you, how you build your network and how you have grown. Featured image courtesy of ahp_ibanez via Creative Commons. |
| Social Media & Seniors – The Rules Are Changing Posted: 28 Jun 2012 12:34 PM PDT First off, let’s get one thing out of the way right now: I abhor the term “Senior” in the context of someone over the age of 65. I realize it is a tried, true and accepted term but that doesn’t mean I have to like it. A senior is someone in their last year of high school or college, or someone who has achieved a senior status i.e. Senior Copywriter, etc., but not someone who just happens to be of a certain age. Anyway, I wanted to share some interesting findings courtesy of the Pew Internet & American Life Project:
These are all very telling numbers for sure. If this age group, 65+ is in your target demo it may be time to revisit your strategy for if you’re not including an online/social/digital aspect to your overall strategy you could very well be missing a wealth of opportnities. Lower the “Boom” Now before you start running off at the mouth with “But Steve, unless you’re selling medicare health insurance, funeral plots or Efferdent, why would anyone have 65+ in their target demo?” I have two things to say. 1. You’re an idiot. 2. You’re a huge idiot. In case you haven’t noticed people are living a lot longer than they used to and while this doesn’t necessarily translate into more disposable income as someone gets older, it does mean you should at the very least consider the fact that more and more 65+ folks are online and using social media just like a lot of others who are younger. The other factor in all of this are the Baby Boomers. Last year the first of the Boomers turned 65 and given what we know about Boomers and how much net worth they have – they control 70% of the total net worth of American households – $7 trillion of wealth, it’s probably a good idea for marketers and advertisers to look at those in the 65, 66 demo a little different – let alone ALL those in the 65+ group. So, to recap… you have more and more 65+ people in general using social media and going online than ever before plus you have the initial influx of Baby Boomers who are surely going to be even more active online and socially then those slightly older. If you’re a marketer or advertiser, are you targeting 65+? Are you targeting Baby Boomers? Will any of the above info change the way you look at your marketing and advertising strategies? Named one of the Top 100 Influencers In Social Media (#41) by Social Technology Review, Steve Olenski is a freelance writer/blogger currently looking for full-time work. He has worked on some of the biggest brands in the world and has over 20 years experience in advertising and marketing. He lives in Philly and can be reached via email,Twitter, LinkedIn or his website. |
| How To Control Who Sees Your Facebook Posts Posted: 28 Jun 2012 12:15 PM PDT Our last two blog posts in the Shift Digital series focused on creating lists in Facebook, why you should create lists, and how to create lists and not spend hours on Facebook! This week I'll explain my favorite feature of lists – targeted status updates. Have you ever wanted to post something on Facebook and the immediately thought of someone that might not apreciate the post? Maybe it's your mom, or your boss, or your girlfriend. Well, lists make it easy to categorize the people in your life and share information that would only pertain to certain groups of people in your life. Once you create your custom Facebook lists, just go to the list you want to post to and type in the status box above.
Here are a few ideas for lists: Religion and PoliticsYou've heard the saying that you should never argue religion or politics. But sometimes, you just want to share your feelings or your opinions with people who are like minded. Especially with the election coming up, create a list of your friends who have the same political opinions as you do. Then, you can share your thoughts on the candidates and the race while keeping your friends. Mothers/ParentsIf you're a mother and you have parenting gripes or questions, make a list of fellow moms that you can post to and discuss. That way your sure to get constructive responses from other moms. Business ContactsIf you're friends with some people on Facebook who are more business contacts than personal friends, create a list for them and share your work with that list. You can then control how personal the information is that you share with them. Don't underestimate Facebook and it's value in networking. What other lists would you create? Or what other lists do you wish others would create and leave you off of?! |
| Scoring Klout: The Inside Scoop on the Web’s Hottest Measure of Social Influence [Infographic] Posted: 28 Jun 2012 11:40 AM PDT Facebook allows us to obsess over the mundane details of our friends' lives, and Google+ has made hanging out a legitimate activity even for people over the age of 17. So all the Web needed to finally become high school all over again was a way to tell who the popular kids were. Now it's here in the form of Klout, a company that assigns a numerical value to how influential you are online. Some critics have bashed Klout for a shaky score methodology, and The New Yorker called its social ranking premise downright evil. But the fact remains that if someone's claiming to measure your popularity, you're going to want to check it out – and try to increase it. Learn more about the krazy world of online Klout in the infographic below.
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| Generate Business Leads with Social Media Savvy Posted: 28 Jun 2012 11:35 AM PDT There are thousands of social media users who fit your demographic; fans and followers who would most likely be enamoured with your product or service, but just don't quite know of your existence…yet. We often discuss the organic evolution of potential fans to brand advocates, how your brand can enhance its online presence to attract consumers, or what type of campaign you can run to spark engagement – but sometimes you need to be the active pursuer, in a subtle way. Blatant self-promotion on social media is certainly a no-no, but we aren't talking hard selling, we're talking a friendly introduction and a wooing process. Here are three ways to use social media to generate new leads by playing the subtle pursuer. 1. Twitter Advanced Search, Your New Sales Assistant Twitter is exceptional for generating leads because of the way the platform is designed. Jump into the conversations taking place about your industry using Twitter's Advanced Search option. We've talked about the power of this tool before, but specifically when trying to reach a very distinct group of individuals, this tool is your new sales assistant. Take full advantage of it by refining your search all the way down to the mile radius of your target demographic or your store location. 2. Physically Monitor Your Interactions Don't let valuable interactions fall to the wayside. Physically keep track of promising engagements by creating some kind of record, like an excel spreadsheet or Google doc. Track the exact details of the conversation. What sparked the interaction? Which search terms did you use? Was there an incentive offered? When did the interaction take place? These details will help you with the follow-up process and also show your potential consumer that you cared and listened to their needs. 3. Always Follow-up The subtle purser will always follow-up, but you must be mindful that you are a brand on social media and you need to be careful in your approach. Give off the slightest vibe of self-promotion, and your brand will come off grossly salesy, diminishing your efforts. Create a Twitter list of potential followers you engaged in the past and give them a week or so to get the opportunity to check out your services or product. Take interest in something they are tweeting about to jump into the conversation, and if it feels right, you can ask them about their experience with your brand or product. If they respond that they have not yet visited your store front or website, offer something to give them a reason to come in or browse your site. Tag, you’re it! How will your brand incorporate these tactics to pursue social users? Visit /excelamktg for further customized social media marketing ideas, innovative campaigns, current social media trends, and insider tips for small business success. Join us! Every Friday at 1 p.m. Pacific Time we will be hosting a live Tweet Chat, where Account Manager, Elena Zanone, will be answering all your social media marketing questions. Use hashtag "#SMoaB" to jump into the conversation! |
| Is It Really All About Your Blog Content? – The Numbers Don’t Lie! Posted: 28 Jun 2012 11:05 AM PDT
Inbound Marketing is the newest business strategy which puts the customer in control and gives them the power to decide how they will receive their marketing materials. The way it works is simple:
The numbers do not lie.
Generating new leads and growing your customer base has never been easier. Qualified agencies like Go Time Marketing would love to show you how this cost-effective and measurably proven resource can get you more leads, more customers, and more business. Give them a call or just ask a question on their website. They would love to hear from you!
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| A Brief Guide to Completing Your Google+ Profile Posted: 28 Jun 2012 10:45 AM PDT We all know that Google+ is steadily gaining much popularity as it competes in the social media wars. With Facebook and Twitter as its main competitors, Google’s social media site is now becoming a giant of a social networking website as more and more people log-in to the website. What makes Google+ appealing to Internet users? Like other social media sites, Google+ has its own uniqueness that puts it to an advantage over other famous Internet pages like Facebook, Twitter, and even Reddit. The beauty of Google+ is that it lets you focus and interact with people with the same interests as you have. You may be asking yourself, "Doesn’t Facebook and Twitter offer the same kind of service?" In a similar fashion, yes it does. However, Google lets your posts to be seen by people with the same interests even if they aren’t in your followers group (or as what Google+ prefers to call it, your circles). When you post in Facebook, only the people within your friends list can see it. Twitter has kind of the same option as Google+ but what you see is all text and it passes by at an intensely fast pace. So now that you want to interact with people, the next step is completing your profile. Completing your Google+ profile not only gives you a "personality" within the social networking site, but it gives you other advantages as well. Here’s a few advantages to ponder on when you complete your profile:
Completing your profile allows you to let other people know who you are and what you like even without having to go through the first point of contact. Here’s what you need to do to complete your profile. Let’s start by completing the About tab:
If you’re a hobbyist, a professional, a business person, or just someone who wants a whole new social networking experience, then start completing your Google+ profile to get to know the world a whole lot better. |
| Five Killer Strategies to Dominate Social Media’s Big 3: Facebook, Twitter and YouTube Posted: 28 Jun 2012 10:21 AM PDT There is no doubt that the social media landscape is dominated by the Big 3 platforms – Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. Facebook alone boasts over 800 million users, 50 percent of whom log in daily. Over 250 million tweets are posted each day on Twitter, and YouTube is now touted as the second largest search engine, serving over 4 billion videos daily. You may think that social media marketing on each of the Big 3 platforms should be done differently, but in fact there are five ways you can approach social marketing across these platforms that will help you get the most out of your efforts. To be successful across the Big 3, consider the following five killer strategies: Strategy One: Increase your social reach Social reach is all about engaging with a growing number of fans and followers with the right presence in the right social channels. On Facebook, that means having a killer Timeline image. Follow what the pros do – for example, Jackson Kayak, the innovative maker of kayaks, asked fans to submit action photos as part of a Facebook contest and then encouraged fans to 'Like' their favorite photo submissions. The winning photo was used as their cover Timeline image. Strategy Two: Increase Fan Engagement with Content In social media, content is indeed the king. A recent McKinsey Quarterly study revealed that having the ability to engage customers and leverage those relationships is the top digital challenge marketers face today. Engage your fans and followers with funny, emotional, controversial, or empathetic posts– aim for striking a chord with your followers. Above all, be genuine – post that which is in line with your brand voice and relevant to your audience. Learn from those who do this best – for example, Orabrush used funny videos to connect with their fans. The company, who makes tongue cleaners, developed a series of short, highly entertaining videos including one that plays out like a suspenseful thriller preview and others that feature a spokesperson dressed as a tongue. Their YouTube channel boasts nearly 50 million views and is chock full of funny skits. Their success on YouTube helped them secure distribution in Walmarts nationwide. Strategy Three: Increase Lead Generation Lead generation on social channels is different from traditional lead generation – it's rarely appropriate to simply push a sales message. Successful lead generation on social media requires marketers to think more like a social customer and less like a marketer or salesperson. Keep leading social psychologist Robert Cialdini's Theory of Reciprocity in mind – be helpful – don't sell to prospects – help them solve a problem, even if it means recommending another solution. Show them you care about what your prospects care about. Monitor social media conversations, respond fairly to criticisms, answer questions and spread accolades. For instance, 8th Continent Soymilk monitored buzz about a competitor and offered coupons to dissatisfied customers. The online coupons, distributed via social channels including Twitter, earned a 39% redemption rate, compared to a 0.7% redemption rate of physical coupons.
Strategy Four: Identify and Engage Influencers Influence, both internal and external to a brand, can be leveraged to spread awareness of your brand and fuel word-of-mouth for brand advocacy and sales. Leverage internal influencers by segmenting customers by need, engaging them in targeted campaigns and rewarding them for performing desired actions. Reward your brand advocates for doing what they do best – create marketing campaigns that drive each segment to do more of what they already do for you. For connecting with influencers external to your brand, you can use a multitude of tools including Traackr, PeekYou, Klout, Kred by peoplebrowsr, mBlast and PeerIndex. Be sure to avoid the popularity pitfall – targeting an influencers based on their number of followers even though their focus is not relevant to your audience. Strategy Five: Apply Analytics to Know What Works Use analytics to measure success by social channel and content type. Analytics will help you understand the growth of followers, if your content is engaging, if external influencers and brand advocates are supporting you, and if you are driving leads and sales. It's important to measure each and every campaign to continuously optimize the return on your efforts. Want to know more about the five killer ways to engage with your fans and followers on the Big 3? Consult with our free e-book Five Killer Strategies to Dominate Social Media’s Big 3: Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Marketers, now onto you! Which companies do you try to emulate? Where have you seen great return on your social efforts? What are your top strategies for conquering the Big 3? Share your thoughts and best practices with our #AwarenessTips community on Twitter. |
| Posted: 28 Jun 2012 10:15 AM PDT As I previously wrote, any company or website incorporating Pinterest into its social media campaign needs to pin things that pop. These are a few things to keep in mind when trying to stand out on the digital-corkboard site: 1. A pin is worth a thousand words.Pinterest is a visual website; eye-catching and captivating images get people talking (or repinning, rather). This is a great example of a vibrant, bright pin:
This has been repinned over 9,000 times. Cute, colorful, delicious-looking food is Pinterest gold. More proof that beautiful images are highly repinnable:
If a company wants people to move from Pinterest to its website, it has to intrigue and interest them. The best way to do that is to grab their attention with a unique image or photograph. 2. Pinterest users love tips.Any pin that offers people useful and handy tips can become popular. Here is a great example:
Pinterest is a goldmine when it comes to these types of tips. Also, pins that teach often get repinned. I'm talking about pins in the DIY category or those that link to a tutorial or step-by-step instructions. Another example:
This pin links to an article entitled "52 Uses for Coconut Oil," which teaches people something new and useful that they can incorporate into their everyday lives. These two pins aren't as visually appealing as the Rice Krispies Cupcakes or the gorgeous (and extremely expensive-looking) bathroom, but they don't need to be because they offer information. Pinning beautiful photographs is one way to get repinned, and offering tips or how-tos is another. 3. Keep it light.Pinning is akin to a leisure activity, so light, entertaining, funny, and cute pins become popular. Looking at the "Popular" page, these are the kind of pins I see: pictures of food that link to recipes, photos of scenic landscapes and landmarks, pets, organizational tips, and wedding-related images (a cake, wedding invites). A few of these pins: |
| 6 Steps You Can Take Today To Improve Your Social Media Marketing Posted: 28 Jun 2012 10:14 AM PDT
All great information, and often times pretty technical. But success with your social media marketing goes well beyond the technical details. Success comes from continually building your audience – your social media reach – so that you are sharing your content with an ever-widening base of customers and prospects. If you are not growing your social reach, then you won’t have the traction you need to succeed in your social media marketing. So, how do you grow that reach? It takes a little time and dedication, but not all that complicated. In fact, there are 6 simple things you can do today that will help grow your reach and improve your social media marketing. Those steps include: 1. Completing your profile and using it regularlyMake sure you fill out all of the information in your profile and include a picture. Incomplete profiles or profiles without pictures signal a dead account or a spammer. If you only use your account sporadically, people will ignore it. 2. Including keywordsWhen you complete your profiles, you should include relevant keywords that you want to be known for where appropriate in both the profiles and your posts. Keywords make it easier for relevant prospects to find you when they conduct a search. 3. Promoting your social media accountsUse your non-social outlets to tell customers and prospects where you can be found on social media. Include social media icons and addresses in your e-mail signatures, on your web pages and even on printed materials your company may distribute. 4. Making it easy to shareAdd sharing buttons to all of your content and encourage your followers, customers and prospects to share your content across their networks. This further increases your reach and establishes you as a thought leader in your industry or niche. 5. Connecting and growingIdentify the key players in your industry and like, follow and share their content when its relevant to your message or brand. Connect with friends and colleagues. 6. Having a conversationThe whole point of social media is to engage and interact with others. When someone shares your content or comments on a post, thank them. See a post you like? Make a comment. Show there is a person behind the brand. The great things about these six steps is that they apply to any social media channel, from Facebook to Twitter to YouTube, and the smaller emerging networks dedicated to specific industries. Applying these tips and spending some dedicated time will help you grow your network and produce positive results, regardless of which social media channel you chose for your business. To learn more about social media, and how it can help your business attract relevent prospects, check out our e-Book How To Enhance Your Internet Presence With Social Media.
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| Social ROI Is Not A Myth, Just Ask TD Bank Group Or IBM Posted: 28 Jun 2012 10:10 AM PDT Sit down long enough, or better said, get Sandy Carter, vice president of social business sales at IBM, to stay in one place long enough and you'll start to hear story after story about how companies are realizing ROI from social business. Social media is defined by Andreas Kaplan and Michael Haenlein as "a group of Internet-based applications … that allow the creation and exchange of user-generated content." The technology gave everyone a 140-character megaphone and the ability to build a community around themselves or their causes. Innovation exploded as individuals, brands and organizations grappled with ways to compress time and distance. Social Media pushed the boundaries of possibilities and showed us the power that democratized information can wield and how much more we really needed to know (and innovate) to reap its potential. "Social media gave companies first mover advantage," states Carter. "Time became and still is the primary competitive advantage." But that was Social Media 1.0 and try as everyone might the ROI was elusive. Social media pioneers and early adopters learned that not all conversations are equal, relevant or valuable and engaging customers in a public dialog can backfire in costly ways if organizational processes and cultures are not appropriately aligned. But these pioneers also saw strong financial rewards from embracing social technologies: Cost reduction, operational efficiency, faster innovation through co-creation, and increased customer satisfaction. Lessons learned along the way brought the end of Social media and shaped the next era. Using Facebook for customer support or as a B2B sales channel was a great experiment that didn't really pay off. Yet it fundamentally changed the balance of power between the buyer and seller as well as redefined how work gets done. The next stage of social's B2B evolution focuses on ROI not because it is 'cool' but for the significant leverage it can have on achieving business objectives. The rise of enterprise social networking is becoming the next IT battleground. This shift of consumer to business networking, also known as "Social Business" has caused a ripple affect for organizations looking to adopt these skills into their businesses to better reach clients and suppliers, while swiftly gaining insight on the data being created in these networks. The winners in this challenge will be able to react more swiftly to customer trends, and out innovate competitors. "Realizing a meaningful ROI depends on how you deploy social," shares Carter. "The key to remember is that you will not see results out of the box."Companies that look for opportunities to replace and optimize their internal processes through social technologies are realizing a ROI. Carter cited some two examples from IBM clients:
Early social businesses will tell you that the place to start is NOT with your customers. Instead start by replacing inefficient internal processes with social-based practices supported by technology. TD Bank Group is a good example of how to drive ROI. TD Bank Group realized that to effectively compete it needed to evolve beyond social media. It had to become a social business and the place to start was inside its four walls. It needed to crack the collaboration nut. The 85,000 employees across TD needed to easily find internal experts, gets questions answered, recognize team accomplishments, share ideas, communicate and effectively collaborate across geographies. Along the way the bank realized it couldn't make the transition alone and partnered with IBM. What IBM brought to the table was not justcollaboration software but also the experience gained from unlocking its own social business benefits. Some of ROI that TD Bank Group is realizing includes: Time Saved: Senior district leaders need to continuously coach, motivate and lead their sales and customer service teams across each of their 10-15 branches. Impact: By eliminating layers of approvals and dissemination steps, they are now using Connections to recognize team successes and excellence in customer service via Status Updates, Board Posts and Community engagement saving each district leader and branch manager an hour a week. Doesn't sound like much but it adds up. Increased Productivity: Field Marketing Managers plan Community or Market specific events to drive business to TD branches/stores. Impact: By using IBM Connections to plan events like branch openings, successful programs can be easily replicated across different regions thereby saving time and money. Marketing managers can quickly and easily share their event plans, promotional materials and lessons learned in social communities. Streamlined Communication: Colleen Johnston, TD Bank Group's Chief Financial Officer, needs a direct line not only to her organization but also to the Women in Leadership initiative she leads. Impact: Through forums on IBM Connections, Colleen is able to expand leadership opportunities for women by coaching on networking, mentoring and career development. Through the social platform, Colleen answered 181 questions and comments during a one-hour live interactive conversation held on International Women's Day. With more than 4,500 blogs and 4,000 Communities created since TD Bank Group's November 2011 Canada launch and January 2012 roll-out in the USA, the company has started to see the business value of social business – fewer meetings and email, and improved internal coordination. All of which benefits TD's bottom line and employee experience.
Having been down the transition road itself, IBM and Carter have leveraged the lessons learned into a suite of services that help their global clients evolve into social businesses. The primary lesson that Carter shares is that social technology is just an enabler. Without changes to an organization's culture, leadership model and processes, the transformation will not bear fruit. For those who believe that social business ROI only comes in the form of new revenue or sales directly from social interactions – you're missing the message. This second era of social is all about transforming the nature of work and how organizations are structured. Like renovating a building, the real value comes from updating the inside rather than the exterior façade. Carter shares six pieces of advice:
Underlying this advice is a core message, success comes in increments. The proof points of real financial results along with best practices of how social business can architect change are there. IBM has, itself, made the transition with more than 400,000 IBM employees collaborating through IBM Connections. Their leaders are active daily users of social media to communicate more effectively and directly with all levels within the company. As a result, more than 67,000 communities have been developed, 475,000 files shared globally have generated more than 9 million downloads. Every day, IBM generates 35 million instant message chats. If IBM, a Fortune 19 company can reap real ROI from social business, what are you waiting for? |
| 3 Reasons You Can’t Miss The Social Media Intensive Webinar Series Posted: 28 Jun 2012 10:05 AM PDT
I was invited to share my strategies for how the Inbound Marketing process can help business owners and marketers tie all of their social media and internet marketing efforts together to drive measurable results including attracting more website visitors and generating more qualified leads online. I couldn't be more excited to part of the unique online event. I truly believe that if you are using social media for your business but struggling to see the results you desire or are thinking about getting started with social media for your business, you CAN'T miss this conference. Here are 3 reasons why: Reason #1 – 6 Awesome SpeakersI guess I could have counted this as 6 reasons by itself and called this article "8 Reason You Can't Miss SMIW", but that seemed a little fluffy. Each of the experts are specialists on their chosen network and will be providing specific strategies for using it for business. Below is a brief overview of who will be presenting and what their focus will be:
Reason #2 – Help a Child "Make A Wish"$10 for 6 hours of social media education is a HUGE value in its own right, but the fact that all proceeds go to the Make-A-Wish Foundation is icing on the cake. Make-A-Wish grants wishes for children with life-threatening illnesses and will be the recipient of 100% of SMIW's proceeds. All expenses are being paid out-of-pocket by the presenters. In addition, I will double your donation* if you register for the conference after reading this blog post AND then fill out this form letting me know you signed up through my website. *Limited to the first 20 registrations or $200 in donations. Reason #3 – You Will Get Recordings of All the SessionsAs much as we would like you to attend the sessions live, we realize that 6 hours of webinars in 2 days is a lot to fit into your busy schedule. That said, all sessions will be recorded and sent to anyone that pre-registers for Social Media Intensive and donates $10 to Make-A-Wish. You will receive links with the recorded webinars by email within a few days of the event so you can view them at your own pace (or watch them again if you attended). Register NowI have attended many online conferences and none of them have provided the value of Social Media Intensive. To learn more and register for Social Media Intensive, please visit the registration page. Seats are limited, so sign up today! |
| How to Use Social Networking on Your Intranet Posted: 28 Jun 2012 09:35 AM PDT I was recently on an online forum where someone commented: "We already have access to Facebook walls. Why have another wall on our intranet? Two message walls confuse people." I thought this was an interesting question and it's one that can be answered with examples of how leveraging a social intranet can facilitate conversations and help to gather information. Facebook-like message walls provide an internal networking space for collaboration and resource sharing between employees. Employee walls can be used to share intranet content and elicit feedback. Intranet Connections has a built-in "cc" (similar to email) where you can post on your wall and then cc other employees. Alerts are sent out about the shared content, and employees can respond via the wall in a conversation format.
A message wall can be a space where you network and is a great forum for managers and executives to communicate with the organization.
Human Resources can use the wall to share holiday schedules, policy changes and updated benefit forms.
Share information about your recent business trip or conference attendance.
Hopefully this gives you a few ideas on how you can engage through social networking on your intranet. Messages walls are a great way to encourage intranet participation from all employees and promote conversation. Messages are posted instantly decreasing back and forth emails. You can even favorite wall posts for future reference. |
| Why Discovery Is So Important To Social Media Posted: 28 Jun 2012 09:30 AM PDT Think you know your customers? Think you know what they are doing on social channels? Are you sure that you need a Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest profile to take full advantage of social media and see results? That's a lot of questions, but the reason I ask is because most businesses assume they know the answers to these questions. In reality, they have limited knowledge of how their customers use social media and the way to find the real answers is to take a step back from tactics and think discovery phase. You'd be surprised how many people skip this step and go right into creating profiles, editorial calendars and trying to engage. What the discovery phase gives businesses is the opportunity to truely look at customer's social habits and behaviors, such as things like what networks they use most, what content they engage with and why, and which types of campaigns generate the most buzz with the group. Here's how the discovery phase works.
Did you do a discovery phase for your social media strategy? What interesting results did you uncover? |
| #1 Myth about Facebook that you may Believe Posted: 28 Jun 2012 09:25 AM PDT
"Due to Facebook's new 'pay to promote posts' policy, only about 10% of people that 'like' a fan page will see the status updates. In order to see our posts and notifications just click/hover over the 'Liked' button (beneath the cover photo, to the right) and activate the 'show in news feed' option. This will allow you to see all of our posts. Please share this message wherever you can on Facebook!" The Good News: It's a myth. The Bad News: The 10% statistic isn't entirely untrue. I will tell you why. 1) Facebook determines what gets in front of you. The reality is that Facebook uses an algorithm called "EdgeRank" (which has been studied and analyzed and written to death about) to determine what gets into everyone's News Feed. Most people who clicked the Like button on your Page initially are not seeing all of your posts. They never were. Before Promoted Posts were even an option, only about 12% of your Facebook page fanswere even seeing your posts at all. Maybe they liked your page a few months ago but haven't interacted with it since. EdgeRank is not going to force your posts into their News Feeds if it does not think it is relevant. 2) The shelf life of a Facebook post is very short. HubSpot conducted a study and found that the overall shelf life of a social media post is only 3 hours. All your fans are not on Facebook at the exact time you are posting. And they may not be on it 3 hours from the time that you've posted. It's up to you to analyze your Page Insights to see what times of day and what days are the best for your particular audience and online community. It might be 2 AM on Thursdays; it might be 5 PM on Saturdays. Test, analyze, improve – that gets results. 3) Posts that get the most engagement win. EdgeRank assigns a "quality score" to all posts – updates, text, photos, videos, check-ins, links – and the subsequent interaction with it – comments and likes. So every time a fan of yours Likes a post or interacts with your page by leaving a comment, EdgeRank gives it an "edge". The formula is here:
There are hundreds of blogs and articles with tips on how to get more likes, comments and shares on your page. One of the best that I have found is John Haydon's 27 Ways to Increase Engagement on Your Facebook Page and Mari Smith's 7 Ways to Craft Your Facebook Posts for Maximum Shares. If you are repeatedly sharing posts that get a lot of interaction and engagement, if you adhere to Facebook best practices and if you are willing to get creative and think outside the box, your page has a real shot to be successful without giving Facebook a single cent. What are your thoughts on Promoted Posts? Have you used them? Why or why not? Please leave your thoughts in the Comments section. Thanks for reading! |
| How to Build a Social Brand That’s a Sweet Orange in a World of Bitter Apples! Posted: 28 Jun 2012 09:10 AM PDT
How do the brands that leave lasting imprints in your head do it? Why is that jingle you hear one time on the radio or TV in the morning stuck in your head all day? Why do you consistently buy one brand over another? Standing out in a crowd of noise, confusion, spammers and fakes online is not easy. It takes hard work, research, knowledge of people, knowledge of tools, knowledge of best practices and more. There are some days you may just want to throw in the towel and go back to your old spammy ways? Don't do it! There is a reason that the brands, jingles are stuck in your head. They are compelling, the words resonate with you, they are easy to understand and they probably spark an emotion inside of you. Good marketers know how to do these things with their eyes closed. Yet many business leaders and small or medium size business owners find themselves in an online world without a staff to help them or the knowledge themselves to guide their team in creating a compelling brand that people will remember and want to engage with. I like to stick things in a nutshell and make it as easy as possible for you to understand. There is a way you can build a compelling brand without a million dollar budget. However, there are some strategic and tactical things you are going to need to do and focus on to achieve success. Below are a 23 tips to help you build a brand that will be remembered, sung, tweeted, and virally shared. 23 Tips to Build a Brand that is a Sweet Orange in a World of Bitter Apples
2. Know your audience. You should know what your audience likes, wants, needs, desires and wants to be when they grow up. How are you going to help them do all of the above? If you don't know the answer to these questions, this better be your first and top priority (right after you write down your goals, objectives and build your plan!) 3. Know your value. What value do you offer your audience, partners, clients, employees? Why should anyone care you exist? Why should they talk to you, listen to you, tweet you, like your Facebook page, follow you or give a rip that your business exists on this planet? 4. A logo does not equal a brand. Many small business leaders think they are done with brand when they receive the logo and business card set from the local print shop designer. They think they've went all out if they have a website with two or three selected colors. Sorry folks, this is not brand. My first question to you will be why did you choose such colors? What do the colors say about you? What does your logo mean? Not just what does it look like. 5. Be your brand. Know your brand, share your brand, be your brand. Every employee in your organization is a representation of you and your brand. They better know the core brand attributes, brand promise, differentiators, value offered to your audiences. From the receptionist to the CEO to the tweet stream of your corporate Twitter account, each touch is a brand impression. Accept it, deal with it and make them count! 6. Brand development doesn't happen in a day. If any agency or consultant tells you they can develop your brand in a couple days and after a one hour session with you, run the other direction. A good brand consultant or agency will want to spend time with you to understand your business. They will want to know what it is you do and why. What markets do you serve? How are you different? Why are you different? Do your customers think you're different? How do you want to make anyone who comes into contact with your brand feel? 7. Align your social media and marketing efforts to your goals. Facebook should fit into your business. Do NOT spend the next year fitting your business into Facebook. You'd be surprised how many businesses are doing just this! Don't be one of them! 8. Consistency. Did you know it takes 6-7 brand impressions for someone to remember your brand at all? Yup, so that means every impression must count. The more consistent you can be the more easily each and every brand impression is going to leave a memorable imprint in their brain. Even if budgets are tight, find a way to build consistency across the various platforms. Focus on consistent avatars, logo placement, colors, value proposition messages, company and product descriptions, bios, titles, fonts. Basically anything that is seen or heard should be consistent.
10. Connect with your audience via emotions and feelings. Determine the feelings you want your audience to have when they come in contact with your brand. Write down the top 10 words that describe how you want them to feel as they come in contact with your brand. Do you want to be the family room, kitchen or sales floor? Choose colors, textures, words and engagement based on such. Then narrow it down to three words. Those three words should be the foundation for how your brand looks, smells and tastes to your audiences and community. 11. Be unique. Focus on compelling, relevant value and content that inspires, enriches their life and makes them better. Say good-bye to status quo and dare to be different! Don't build your brand and your content based upon your competition's website and social presence. You have no idea what their goals are, what audiences they are really targeting. Their strategy could be completely different than yours and you may find yourself in a year further behind than where you started! 12. Create a quick message house. The longer term goal is to obviously create a comprehensive message house in coordination with your broader brand and identity development. However, for now at minimum create a one to two page document which at minimum includes your vision, mission, elevator pitch, description, value proposition, benefits, features and unique differentiators. This document will also be very useful if you hire a consultant or agency. It will provide them with something to start with and a better understanding of where your heart and head is in regard to your brand and identity. 13. Share yourself. The more you share of yourself the better your audience will connect with you. 14. Be you. There is only one you so be that person. Be that brand. Be who you are, what you are, period! 15. Use a variety of mediums. Everyone learns differently. Some people like written word. Some like audio. Some like video. Some need all three before it sinks in. Don't be afraid to try something different you have never done before. 16. Engage your audience. Talk to them and inspire them after the Facebook like, not just before. Ask them questions. Speak in language they can understand to enable them to understand and connect with you. 17. Take your game up a level. Acknowledge you have competitors and simply doing what everyone else is doing is not going to be enough. 18. Humanize yourself and your brand. Treat your audience as humans. Let them know you are human too. Talk in words they understand and want to hear, not the corporate speak of your 1999 printed collateral. 19. Be relevant. If your audience doesn't care what you have to say or do, it's all for nothin'! Focus on developing content that enables you to have a conversation with your audience that they view as relevant and can resonate with their thinking and needs.
21. Stop the Random Acts of Marketing! If it's not in the plan, not in the budget or integrated, then chances are it is a Random Act of Marketing (RAM,) RAMs will eat your every last morsel of positive return on investment (ROI.) Don't get stuck in the RAM rut. Instead focus on the list of tactics and approaches in this post and they will help you stay away from those nasty RAMs! 22. Ask your audience what they think. Don't be afraid to ask your clients, partners, stakeholders, board members and employees what they think about you and your brand. Ask them to describe the three words they would use to describe you and your brand. You might be surprised to learn they are not the same as the three words you want them to think. The only way you can fix this is if you first know it's a problem. Communication with your audiences will inspire them to talk with you, share their same issues, and you will as a result be better able to help them solve their problems as well! 23. Don't give up! Even though this may seem like a lot of work (and it is), don't give up. Develop a plan that enables you to bite it off piece by piece. You can't build your brand or your business overnight. If you fall down, then just wipe off your knees, grab a friend and have them help you up. Learn from your mistakes and remember we all make them. Yesterday you probably worried about today. Today turned out alright. So why worry about tomorrow? Bonus Tip: Inspire – Connect – Achieve!Inspire your audience to connect with you. Help them achieve their goals. By focusing first on helping them achieve their goals, you will achieve yours. People want to laugh. They want to cry. They like when you pull an emotional string inside of them. That's what makes a jingle a jingle. It's more than a few words, notes or people dancing around your tv. Get in the heart of your customer, readers, partners and community and they may just see and hear you as a sweet orange they need to savor and remember! Are You the Sweet Orange or the Bitter Apple?Are you focusing more on selling your old, sour, worn out apples? Or are you inspiring your audiences to desire your sweet oranges? Are you giving them something to savor and cherish? Are you giving them something they like so much they sing all day or are compelled to share it with their friends? What tips can you offer others? What do you look for when looking for a business to help you with services? What is a sweet orange to you? Heartbeat of Social Media SeriesThis blog post is the first in a new series I am kicking off titled "The Heartbeat of Social Media". It will include a deep look at how communities work, what people are doing within them and how businesses can better understand how they can fit in, provide value and derive benefit as both a business as well as individual people. Subscribe to the series for updates and access to special videos, webinar training and more. Would love to hear your input and have you participate in discussions and debates as we challenge each other to be part of what makes the social network heartbeat healthy and alive in 2012! |
| Facebook Email – How To Reclaim The Address You Actually Use! Posted: 28 Jun 2012 09:02 AM PDT Quick update re. Personal Profiles on Facebook So in case you've not yet heard, Facebook has this week changed the featured email addresses of all of its users. Where you used to have your Hotmail or personal email address, or even nothing at all, your Facebook personal profile will now feature "{yourname}@facebook.com." Presumably this is just another step in their "all things to all people" world domination plan, but as is so often the case with Facebook, it was pretty poorly judged. You'd think that after the number of times they've aggravated their user base by amending personal information or settings in the past – the security setting change during Timeline upgrade being just the latest – they'd have learned to ask first. But no, and users were predictably furious. Anyway, if you want to check your settings and / or edit your Email details back to where they were, this is how to do it. First, go to your main Profile window, and look for the "About" link which is below your avatar photo, as below:
then, in the dialogue box which appears, you're looking for the "contact details" section like the one below. If you've not already amended it, you'll very likely have only the Facebook email address listed.
If you don't want to use Facebook email, just set the "@facebook.com" address to "hidden from Timeline" by hovering over the right-hand symbol as shown below, and then clicking to change the setting.
Click the blue "Save" button at the bottom of the dialogue box and that's it – you're done. NB: Facebook email is for individuals only at this point, so if you administer one or more Business pages, the email listed on those won't have changed. It might only be a matter of time though! |
Yesterday afternoon, an online friend of mine, 
There's no reason to ever let your blog go fallow. Unlike leaving farmland unsown for a period in order to restore its fertility as part of a crop rotation, there's no benefit in ignoring your blog.
Please keep in mind why someone clicks the Like button on your page. Loyalty is hardly why. The Chief Marketing Officer Council 
Whether you’re in the planning stages of building a new business or just trying to grow your company into its next phase, the last thing most business owners are thinking about is whether their websites and blogs are going to attract new customers. But they should.
Social Media Intensive
Have you seen this post on Facebook recently?
Clicking the "Edit" button will take you into another dialogue where you can fix a whole range of things related to your email – which address you want to show, if any, and who the address will be visible to.
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