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Archive for the ‘Social Media’ Category

Since the era of social media has start internet marketing is being dominated by & still benefiting their business by associating their products with social media applications. Social Media Application is the great tool to connect social media applications. Many Companies or Marketers successfully implements many campaigns with your potential customer.

Not to long social media seem new & different but as a time passes social media change the situation from push to pull which makes a great impact on marketing strategies; companies seek their ways to connect & engage with potential & future potential customers because of its social media applications.

Now a day’s social media branding included as the key element in marketing campaigns and having a social media app attached to your brand gives your product worth. As social media use in marketing the value and importance of social media applications is increasing all the time. Thousands of applications are being developed so it is important for companies to make a full use of features offered by social media. Application provides an effective promotional platform to business which can be used to increase your product sales and increase your potential customers.

There are many social media with millions of users and they accommodate every type of businesses. So for establish a strong base of business in the market which can be easily achieved through social networking applications. The success of these Apps depends upon choosing the correct technologies and programming languages & 1 Social Media Agency is the leading social media agency which renders you services in social media application development according to your need & wants.

Our team was extremely encouraged by the pings and general feedback we got for our analysis of the top five telcos and their prowess (or lack of) in mastering the social media field. Thousands are following us even though we’ve just begun our series. Some of the feedback was from the telecos themselves. However, much of the feedback was from social media companies, SEO firms and consultants who are following our analysis with great gusto. They are right to be interested. I hope they can follow along as we have tried to make our synoposis as simple as possible.

Search Engine Placement Success or Failure

Most of the social media firms reviewed offer the sterling search engine placement promise. In simple English, the goal is to get your messages to show up on the search engine first pages. If done correctly, your messages can quickly attain the coveted first page placement on search engines by defined categories. This can be compared to having an ad on the front page of every newspaper in Canada. It’s the Holy Grail sought on your behalf by companies we review here. Unfortunately, they make their clients wait and wait to catch the prize, that is, if they capture it for them at all.

By contrast, our previous article about the top five telcos’ lack of success with social media showed up on the first pages of all selected search engines within a few hours of launch. We’re not telling you that to advertise our services. We don’t offer services, just free opinion. We use social media to share our views on social media, not for profit.

There’s no secret sauce to accomplish first page placement. Knowledge and experience of how search engines work are important. But other fundamentals must also be in place. We looked at a variety of social media firms to see how they did on the fundamentals. Here’s what we found.

Search Engine Verification

None of the so-called experts’ sites we reviewed were set up for verification by the big three search engines. These firms are claiming on their web sites that that they are the best of the best in the social media arena. Their sites are supposed to advertise their skills and experience. However, these sites are not even competently sprung to allow search engines to index their sites. This is a clear case of leaving the cheese out of your mousetrap. How are search engines finding these firms’ sites? The answer is, slowly and maybe eventually. So, if they can’t get it straight for themselves, what kind of advice are they giving their paying clients? Taking social media guidance from these kinds of “experts” is like taking health advice from a fat doctor who smokes. Consultant, heal thyself.

Bots and Crawlers

Establishing verification for your site also enables search engine bots and crawlers in finding your site. Which brings me to another mistake on the part of these firms. Bots and crawlers need instruction when they hit your web site’s front door code. Why haven’t these experts used the proper code? That’s what you should ask yourself before hiring them. In order to get your pages searchable the bots and crawlers need to be invited in. Simply put, they can’t ring a doorbell that isn’t there.

Web Sites

Most of the sites we reviewed closely resembled each other in appearance, layout and format. These firms almost all look like they are captives of cookie-cutter thinking. If that is their best presentation, what kind of sites do they advise their clients to establish? With surprising consistency, they relied on presenting the same series of terms, offers and site references. In fact, many use the same social media articles and reports that are easily found on the Web. You would think an expert would have an original opinion to share, based on social media expertise and creative outlook. I do not promote sites, however, there were some that stood out as interesting ones with fresh site presentation and original opinions. If you are looking at sites in search of potential social media expertise, I recommend looking for those with unique offerings and plain-English descriptions of how they solved problems and achieved success for their paying customers. Stay away from the ones that express themselves in high tech bamboozle lingo.

All the reviewed sites shout that their owners are the best in Canada or the world. Typically, there is a photo of the company principle(s) accompanied with promos for his or her next seminar, book they are reading and the like. Maybe their family and friends care, but why should you? And why would you pay to go to a seminar presented by someone who doesn’t understand social media basics and hasn’t applied them to their own web site. I found one site, a two-person shop, claiming to be the largest in Canada. Who are they subcontracting their massive amount of work to? No indication on their site. So, who are you really dealing with if you if you have a contract with this company? No indication on the site. If, as they claim, they are the best Canada has to offer, what does it say about the state of the industry in this country?

Why would I attend their seminar when it isn’t clear what they have accomplished for their clients? Do they, for example, tell you how long it took their clients to get social media traction or how much? No, they don’t. Showing a client list may demonstrate you have customers, but that’s about it. Flaunting a client list is bad business practice. In the first place, you are revealing your customer base to your competitors. Second, it shows you have so little content of interest to convey that you rely on filling space with these lists. Finally, you may have a niche of customers, which means other potential clients may assume you only handle specific silos of interest.

A Bird a Book a Link and a Blog

Recently, I read Canada is a few years behind comparable countries when it comes to social media implementation. I can see why. For example, the overwhelming applications chosen by these companies are a bird, (Twitter) a book (Facebook), a link and a blog. That means they lean heavily on a few shopworn applications to define their social media architecture. This is a very skimpy tool kit to say the least. These applications are powerful, but if used improperly or in a limited way, they can actually net social media marketing failure. The use of these applications to reach the intended goal, getting top-of-page status on search engines, can actually backfire.

These companies have set up these overused and abused applications aiming to drive traffic to their clients’ sites and gain followers. But their clients’ content was promotional and ad-like. This is a fatal combination.

Here’s why. If your content is all about product or service promotion and then set on the on the bird, book, link and blog track, your messages just swirl around in the Web ether, not gaining traffic or traction on the social media train. Why is that? Many enabling sites in the social media space, pure content sites in particular, do not like commercial promotion articles or other ad material. These are the sites that you really want on your side. These are the ones that have a mighty thrust when it comes to sending traffic from their site to others. The really useful ones won’t do that if your content is blatant advertising. They reject brand names in articles or links to commercial content sites. Simple as that.

Effectively, the social marketing companies are placing their clients’ content in the same crowded field as their customers’ direct and indirect competitors. What’s the result? Their clients’ messages sink like a stone in the social media marketing pond.

Social media and SEO good practice is not a one-size-fits-all concept. Building an effective social media network requires deployment of applications and sites that get Web users to share your content. The idea is to create a network of existing and potential consumers to absorb and pass on your content to others.

Limiting yourself to bird, book, link and blog with immediately rejectable content should obviously be avoided. You are marketing so think like a marketer.

For example, there are hundreds of social network sites that function like Facebook, but targeted to specific demographic segments and/or niched interests, everything from travel and sports to parenting and dating. The advantage of using these sites in a marketing strategy is clear. The social media consultants we reviewed, locked as they are to a four-item list of applications, do not seem to know about these sites. Otherwise, they wouldn’t keep hitting the Facebook gong and sending their clients’ messages into a general rather than niched stream. Go to this link to see a good list of sites that are much better marketing vehicles http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_social_networking_websites. You will find very interesting information about social media sites listed by interest and category. All of them are FREE of charge.

Again, think like a marketer. If you are selling tea cozies, seek the attention of tea drinkers and teapot connoisseurs. Don’t throw yourself into a giant space where people are hawking everything from salami to suds. If, for example, you are selling to a younger market, join a social media site that has a defined base of young adults. Many exist and are of surprising size. Interests tied to an age group can also be targeted through the proper social media applications. You can find lists of them by simply using a search engine. Maybe there are young people, age 15 to 24, who are mad about tea cozies. Find out before you launch your content or hand over your marketing dollars to the social media industry cabal.

Web 2.0

We all celebrate Web 2.0. This application refers to the second generation of the Web. It lets people with no specialized technical knowledge create their own web sites, self-publish, make and upload audio and video files, share photos and information and so on. They are meant to be accessible to non-technical users. That is their beauty. It’s also how social media pirates take advantage of their clients. They exploit these applications, which anyone can learn how to use, and present them as a their skills and know-how package. Worse, they apply them without first creating a social media marketing strategy. That’s how your tea cozy content winds up in the Web equivalent of Dry Gulch Nowhere.

Social Media Marketing Strategy Informs Content

Before setting out, you need a social media strategy, which is essentially an old fashion marketing strategy, set to exploit social media as a vehicle. Remember social media is ONLY the vehicle, not what dictates the message. At the core of your strategy is how to treat your messages, i.e., how to prepare content of compelling interest to your target audience. None of the sites reviewed talked about a marketing strategy as a starting point. I guess they don’t know about it.

So before seeking assistance from a social media company, I would head to a PR firm or traditional media strategy group. If I had a smaller company with a limited budget, I’d head to the nearest post-secondary journalism or public relations school. Here you will find talented and interested students, all wired to the Web and social media. They are social media savvy, creative and will work for a lot less than the high priced guys downtown.

Your strategy will inform your content, as well as how it’s written and where it’s placed. Remember when you enter the social media sphere you need to keep feeding interesting writing in a non-sales format to your audience. For example, consider writing a blog on the art of crocheting the perfect tea cozy like the one granny used to make. Don’t write a sales pitch on the merits of Acme Tea Cozies Inc. and pound away at the company brand. If only sales messages are delivered you will annoy and, in the worst case, repel your potential reader/customer. Like telemarketing or e-mail blasts, it will make your customer hate your brand. And, worst of all, you won’t develop the golden following who will pass on your content and drive traffic to your web site, blogs etc.

Conclusion

Overall, Canada’s prominent social media and SEO companies and consulting firms bombed out on social media basics. Their own web sites are startling examples of how they don’t understand their own craft. They are not upfront about what they accomplish for their clients. In fact, they really are simply selling vaporware. For those readers who did not come out of the Dot-com era, it’s “A term used to describe a piece of software that doesn’t exist, is suspected not to exist, or is incapable of performing as promised”. To put it another way, buyer beware.

For many businesses they think that the Internet is not going to harm them at all. However, that is when they should know that some of the healthcare communications that are present on the Internet about a company, could make a huge impact on the company. That is why it is so important that a company not disregard everything that they see on the Internet or totally ignore the Internet for the information about their company.

One way that a company can protect themselves will be to have some form of social media monitoring . When they have this in place they will be able to see what exactly is being said about their company. Then they can determine if they will be able to defend themselves and the company from any type of information that could be used against the company.

Another way that the company can fight the bad reputation that they may be getting will be by hiring a social media pr company. When they use these firms they will notice that they are going to rely on the firm to track what is said about them, but then they will also be able to use these companies to help them in the fight against the information that is being said about them.

Knowing about the importance of social media monitoring is going to be important for many companies. Once they know about the reasons that this is so important they can see that it is going to be important to monitor this even if they do not have a web site up.

SMM = Social Media Marketing

Social Media Marketing is strategically using the big social sites to spread your brand name or drive traffic back to your web presence.

SMO = Social Media Optimization

Social Media Optimization is adding key elements to your websites or content that make them easy to spread across the big social sites.

Rohit Bhargava Developed Social Media Optimization Rules 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5

1. Increase your linkability

Linkability is the willingness of other websites or articles to link back to your site. One way to increase your natural Google listing is to increase how many authority sites link to you, so to increase your linkability with social media optimization is to make your site more informative and useful to others. You can do this in many ways; blog, white papers, press releases, keyword targeted articles, RSS feeds, etc. This is the most important step in Social Media Optimization and should be your first priority.

2. Make tagging and bookmarking easy

The act of tagging is to bookmark the website to social bookmarking websites. For example, if you like the content or services provided at a website you tag it. This will show others that you approve of this site and they will check it out, making viral traffic. To include social media optimization tagging on your site, you can add tagging links such as Digg, Del.icio.us, Technorati, etc. Also, add the tagging links to other pages in your site (not just the homepage) and when visitors click the tag button make sure that there is a suggestion box to help your visitor list a relevant tag and notes.

3. Reward inbound links

As I mentioned before one way to increase your natural listing with Google using social media optimization is to get more back links. You can do this by rewarding people/websites that link to you (inbound links). Inbound links are links that send people to your site from somewhere else. One way to reward people for linking to your site is to have a “Recently Linked” that lists all of the websites that have linked to you.

4. Help your content travel

Social media optimization focuses on providing useful content to your market. When you publish content such as an article, video, or audio file you must help it reach as many people on the web as possible. You can do this by submitting to relevant high traffic websites. When the word gets out about your great content (no matter what format) you’ll receive backlinks to your site.

5. Encourage the mashup

To mash up is to use two websites content and mash them together. For example, Youtube makes it easy to mash their content (videos) onto your site. In addition, because it is so easy you have added a video to your site that has a Youtube logo on the video as well as a link back to you tube. So to encourage a mashup with social media optimization is to make it easy for other websites to use your content and reference it to drive traffic back to your site.

Jeremiah Owyang Developed Social Media Optimization Rules 6 and 7

6. Be a User Resource, even if it doesn’t help you.

One thing all visitors appreciate is honesty. With social media optimization you should include links to other websites that will help your visitor reach their goal or find the information they want. Do this, even when it doesn’t benefit you. By linking to competitors or information not created by you, you reap the benefits of having the all inclusive information on a particular topic. In the end, more people will link to you because you have lumped all information (or links) on a topic on one location.

7. Reward helpful and valuable users

Valuable users are your best friends. A valuable user can be determined in many ways; they may send traffic to your site, add valuable content to your site, or assist visitors at your site. No matter what their doing, if it benefits you, your site, or your service you need to reward them. This could be by sending a personal message thanking them for their dedication. Other ways to reward your valuable users is to create reward systems, advertise for them or promote their efforts on your homepage.

Cameron Olthuis Developed Social Media Optimization Rules 8, 9, 10, and 11

8. Participate

With Social Media Optimization you can participate by joining on the conversation about your topic (or targeted keyword). Simply posting articles and sharing content isn’t going to keep the buzz going. You should continue to share information on other websites. This participation will share your knowledge with more people. One way to do this is to find people that are blogging on your topic and to give input on the conversation. Also, participate in forums or other social groups that are discussing your topic. Read comments on your articles, videos, and audios and respond to them.

9. Know how to target your audience

Social media marketing is about sharing content/information. Not everyone is interested in your topic, so be sure to do your marketing research and post your information and knowledge where it will be understood and appreciated.

10. Create content

Content is considered to be any form on information that benefits a visitor. Content can be a white paper, article, video, audio, widget, the list goes on. Your job is to find a piece of content that will spark interest in visitors. No matter what market you enter there is always a form of content that they will share with others. Find out what it is and give it to them. This will in turn have them coming back for more useful content. If this happens, then you know that your social media optimization is successful.

11. Be real

Internet users are searching the web for specific content. If you are providing content that links back to a website, be sure that the website is relevant. You will not be rewarded for coaxing a visitor to a site that has nothing to do with the content they just read (or watched depending on the type of content you provided).

Loren Baker developed Social Media Optimization Rules 12 and 13

12. Don’t forget your roots, be humble

It’s easy to let popularity get to your head. When you become the shining star in your market be sure to recognize those that helped you get to the front of the pack. (this ties into #7 a little)

13. Don’t be afraid to try new things, stay fresh.

Any one on the internet knows how quickly things change. Keep up with new media content, new types of websites, and new interests in your market. By staying on top of new information you can maintain top rankings.

Lee Odden developed Social Media Optimization Rules 14, 15 and 16

14. Develop a Social Media Optimization strategy

Social Media serves multiple purposes. You need to identify what your purpose is and then publish content that will promote that purpose. Some purposes for Social Media Optimization include: branding, reputation, charity, increase traffic, build reputation, increase sales, credibility, etc. Make sure that as you develop content that you are publishing and creating with that purpose in mind.

15. Choose your SMO tactics wisely.

Of all the content available on the web only about 10% of people on the web are content creators. The other 90% are consumers and are willing to share your content. Make your content easy to consume and spread. Also be sure to create content that will have the most impact on your original purpose (which could be any of the following: branding, reputation, charity, increase traffic, build reputation, increase sales, credibility, etc).

16. Make Social Media Optimization SMO part of your process and best practices.

We all know that there are specific Search engine optimization tactics that every website should include. Just as you include keywords in your title tags and keywords in your H1 tag, you should find ways to includesocial media optimization aspects into the building of your website. This can be small details like including social bookmark tags on your site or encouraging incoming links with the “recently Linked” list I covered in #3.

17. Don’t be afraid to let go of a message or idea and let others own it.

Finally, when you create a movement, spark and idea, or develop a new topic don’t be afraid to let others run with it. Collaboration is key. Others can improve upon your original idea and give you credit for the start. Be sure to give credit where it’s due.

There is no substitute for healthcare communications to expand a medical related business. The business name should appear everywhere possible, so it will become a familiar word to the public. When the name becomes familiar, so will the services and products the business offers.

Social media pr is one of the most effective ways of promoting a business. The more often people come across a business name, the more likely they are to remember it when they are in need of health related services. Media pr should have a target audience in mind before launching a marketing campaign to be efficient.

An important factor when staring a promotion is to place the information in communities that are most likely to need the services and products that you supply. Healthcare information needs posted in locations that a senior normally frequents. Individuals searching for information on an illness should net some positive results for a health related industry.

In order to manage healthcare communications , it is important to do social media monitoring . Monitoring what is in the public eye, and how people react to the information presented, is the only way to know how successful your marketing strategy is.

Monitoring includes the public’s reaction to the information offered. It is also possible to monitor what people are saying about it, which will indicate whether your information is effective. Incoming and outgoing communications provides you with information if you pay attention to them. A business needs to know their consumers to be successful.