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Things You May Have Missed
Posted in Online Marketing
2012 is now here, but check out some noteworthy happenings within the technology world in 2011 that you may have missed.
Twitter Revamped
In its attempt to become more user-friendly, Twitter has gotten a redesign. The most notable change is to the navigation. “Connect” and “Discover” sections have been added to the top of the page. The “Connect” section allows you to easily see what is being said about you on other tweets and adds more user- friendly searching for companies and people.
The “Discover” section allows for better hash tag searching and tailors information over time to be based on your personal interests.
“Who to follow” has been added to the sidebar and is a way to discover people who have similar interests and are close to your network.
For businesses, Twitter has rolled out branded pages to make Twitter more enticing to potential advertisers. Currently, there are only about 20 companies that are able to expand their profiles, but the feature will soon be available to all companies. Twitter also added the ability to have a customized banner beneath a company’s account information.
More information: http://mashable.com/2011/12/08/twitter-launches-major-redesign-video/
Google+, the new social networking platform, topped 10 million users in the first couple weeks and is still in the early stages of development. Google+ isn’t technically open to businesses, yet. Some have joined, but Google would like them to hold off during their initial trial period, as they’re preparing something special just for the business community. Businesses and organizations do need to get Google+ on their radar, because it’s going to change Search Engine Optimization (SEO).
The “+1” feature is something that Google rolled out on their search results a little while ago. It lets you rate the results of your search by clicking the “+1” logo beside the search result. This allows you to have some very real input in the search algorithm, but it’s more powerful if you’re logged in to Google.
I did a search for “how to replace a head gasket,” found a reasonable hit on page six, and I gave it a +1. I repeated the search and that site had moved up to page two! For the same search, it had also moved to page two for my Google+ friends, with the indication that I’d given it a +1. This makes my search results unique to me and I affect the search results of those within my network. (more…)
Every internet user is all too familiar with the concept of online advertising, be it in the form of a too-good-to-be-true offer, a survey, a pop-up window advertising myriad of services, and the text that runs along the bottom of streaming online video. As consumers have turned off their televisions and plugged in their PCs for home entertainment, the very nature of these advertisements has changed abruptly and in a noticeable way.
Taking the place of boilerplate, generalized advertisements like those that run on network television, we see customized and targeted information directly related to the content of our emails, our interests on Facebook, and our connections on LinkedIn. While this information is still used to sell products, a movement towards using this idea to address the social concerns of users has been quietly growing across the web.
This platform allows the users and vendors to truly engage in a dialogue, whereby one can select their own personalized ‘advertising experience.’ It is both refreshing and exciting to see the non-profit community benefiting from this new mentality towards user-driven advertising content. Major non-profits such as Kiva.org, the micro-loan marketplace endorsed by Presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter, have taken full advantage of this new movement, and websites such as YouTube and eBay have followed suit by partnering with various other charitable groups.
The benefits of addressing each user’s concerns through these means are clear, and with such major players as Hulu, Google, eBay and YouTube on board, the future of online advertising in the nonprofit realm looks promising. While these advertisements can still be irksome and easily ignored, this new trend serves both the interests of the user and the needs of the nonprofits.
Barack Obama raised $500 million from his online campaign, garnering a total of 5 million fans on social media sites. Dell used Twitter to sell $3 million worth of computers with over 600,000 followers. Clearly, these are some extreme examples of hard return on investment.
Social media ROI has been largely overlooked by businesses, as a study by Mzina and Babson Executive Education revealed. Eighty-four percent of professionals worldwide don’t measure the ROI of their social media programs, while 40 percent weren’t even sure if they could track ROI with their social media tools.
In spring of this year, Facebook started allowing Facebook pages to be customized more heavily with Facebook Markup language (FBML). This customization allows for greater control of messaging on a company or organization’s Facebook Page.
Toys R Us has provided an example of a particularly shrewd deployment of this functionality with a Black Friday-specific Facebook Page offering. The page gives a preview of the Black Friday promotions Toys R Us will be running, but only to fans of the page. Users can then click through to Toys R Us’ main site.
Social media, advertising and layups: Why you should advertise on social media
Posted in Articles, Online Marketing, social networking
As humanity continues to trend away from such oddities as spending time with each other, a new trend is emerging. No longer is television the undisputed king of making people sit idle. In fact, companies in Great Britain are actually spending more money online for advertising than they are for television. Yet, at least in America, online advertising is down.
So what does this mean for you? Online advertising isn’t even remotely trending toward being useless. You don’t even have to be smarter about it; a lot of that decrease is probably due to capacity cuts and huge expenditure decreases more generally. That said, more profit is good, and, with keywords costing more and more on Google, greater bang for your buck may be had in the social media realm. Nielsen reports that advertising on social media networks is up 119% from last year. The same study says people are spending 17% of their time online on social networks.
Think about that. When people are on a social network, what state of mind are they usually in? They might be using it for work, sure, but most of the time they’re bored and just killing time. Not exactly busy, you could say. Add to that, they put their demographic information in their profile. Does this get easier?
Bottom line: Strongly consider allocating more of your online advertising budget toward social media advertising. Depending on your demographic, this could be a no-brainer.
Managing Reality 2.0
Posted in Online Marketing
The internet is a second reality where users create persona’s and garner reputations separate from those earned in the physical, day-to-day world. In Reality 2.0 – Web Edition, online reputations and presences can have absolutely nothing to do with Reality 1.0 – Earth Edition, commonly considered “the real world.”
Founded in early 2009, Getlisted.org is a tool for tracking businesses online across the major local search engine platforms Google, Yahoo!, MSN Live Search and Best of the Web. This tool allows users to search and immediately find your business location and information in a local search listing, lending your business more credibility than one that isn’t listed anywhere.
Even if you don’t have a current website or you’re in the process of redesigning it, you can list your business online if you have an email address. This is a good way to gain visibility without committing to a particular brand identity.
Corporate blogs are common enough to be found on websites of Fortune 100 companies, and simple enough to be executed by small, family-owned businesses. The concept of a company directly communicating with its customers online and having a personal voice has taken off, and with good reason. But it’s not as intuitive as you may think, and there are tips that should be kept in mind when publishing your company’s blog.
Smile and have fun – Blogging is known for being more personable than other company communications, so show the fun and interesting side of your company. Take a cue from Kodak (1000words.kodak.com). Their chief blogger tries out new products and writes about her experiences, instead of just trying to market them. Which brings us to the next point…
Converse, don’t market- Don’t make the mistake of thinking this is the place for advertising slogans and generating testimonials. Let your customers tell their stories with your products, like Carhartt does – blogs.carhartt.com/blog/carhartt – by letting its fans post pictures of their kids in Carhartt, or tell stories about their tough jobs. Blogging is not always about what you have to tell your customers; that’s what traditional advertising is for.
Accept criticism - We know it’s a scary thing when you open up your blog for comments. There is the possibility that people might have a complaint. But don’t shy away, instead listen to what your customers have to say and let them know you’re listening.
We’ve all done it. You don’t have to feel ashamed to admit to that moment of intrigue while staring at that famous little search box. Recently, however, the act of “Googling” yourself or someone else has just gotten just a little bit more interesting. Let’s face it: curiosity has gotten the best of most of us at one time or another as we type our name into Google just to see how many results come back.
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