The 5 Biggest Social Media Blunders by Fortune 500 Companies

There’s a lot we can learn from other people’s mistakes.If you run a small to medium sized business, there’s a lot you can learn from the mistakes of larger companies. Big companies tend to be run by committees and boards, meetings and managers. As a result, they can’t be as nimble or as fast as smaller businesses.

Where they’re weak is often where you have the advantage. You can avoid these kinds of mistakes if you’re careful, because it’s much easier for you to change course if you see red flags.

Here are five of the biggest social media blunders made by Fortune 500 companies, analyzed so you can learn from them.

Mistake #1: Unclear Communication

Whenever you put a message out to your market, you should make sure it’s crystal clear and that there are no conflicting messages.

Google made a big blunder with this when they released Gmail on April Fools Day.

Traditionally, Google had done an April Fools joke every year prior. For example, one year they announced Google PigeonRank, where websites were ranked by pigeons instead of technology.

When Google announced Gmail, most of the world took it as a joke. At the time, Yahoo! Mail and Hotmail were both offering only 10 MBs in storage and Gmail comes out with 1 GB.

It took several days before the announcement was actually taken seriously and by that time they lost a lot of the initial momentum. According to a CNN article, Google’s VP of product did say that they did a bit caught up in the April Fools spirit even while launching a real product.

Mistake #2: Telling the User They’re Wrong

When Apple released the iPhone 4, there was a small bug with the antennae system. If you held the phone without a case in a specific way where you were touching one of the corners with your finger, you would completely kill the reception.

Steve Jobs’ response? “Don’t hold your phone that way.”

While Jobs was right that the bug really wasn’t that big a deal, his response was posted all over social media and was interpreted as them not caring about what the customer thought.

The whole ordeal almost killed the launch; until Jobs changed course and announced free cases for all iPhone 4 purchases.

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9 Tips & Tricks for Better Google+ Brand Pages

This article is a follow-up to our earlier post How to Use Google+ to Promote Your Product or Service.

In social media, Google+ brand pages are the way of the future. Using Google+ brand pages, you can create an informative, interactive profile for your fans on Google+ to connect with you. Few companies today are taking full advantage of what Google+ brand pages have to offer.

The easiest way to access your brand page is to go to your own Google+ page. Just click the drop down menu under your username to switch to your brand page’s view. Here you can edit the page, add people to circles and post status messages.

Here are top 9 tips & tricks for using Google+ brand pages to their full potential.

#1 – Creating an Easy to Reach URL

By default, Google+ gives you a custom URL that’s fairly difficult to read or remember. For example, your URL might be something like “plus.google.com/8723570370197390157.”

To make this easier for people, create a redirect on your own website to your Google+ brand page. For example, people should be able to reach this page by going to www.yourwebsite.com/googleplus/

You can also use Google+’s URL shortener to create a better URL on Google’s domain.

#2 – Add Buttons to Your Site

Want to make it easy for people to find your Google+ page on your site? Want to put live feeds of your status updates on your sites? Want to make it so people can re-post whatever you said with one click of a button?

It’s easy. Just add the respective Google+ buttons or widgets to your site. Access these under the “Get Started” menu in your brand page.

#3 – Don’t Share Your Visitor Count for the First Few Months

If you see that a page only has a handful of visitors, chances are you’re not going to want to visit that page. In other types of social media, like Facebook or Twitter for example, there’s not a whole lot that you can do about this.

However, with Google+, you can choose to hide your follower count. While this isn’t a good long term strategy, it can be very useful in the short term.

#4 – Give Great Resources

Google+ gives you the ability to add as many links as you want to your profile. The links can point back to content on your own website or to other people’s sites.

Make liberal use of this feature to point your users to the best possible resources for their problems.

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7 Creative & Effective Ways to Engage your Facebook Fans

How engaging is your Facebook page? When people land on your page, do they feel inspired to engage with you, or do they simply “like” your page and never return?

Getting someone to “like” your page is simply the first step in a long two-way relationship. It’s not the end goal. Once someone has identified themselves as a fan of your organization, that’s when the real work begins.

Here’s how to engage your Facebook fans.

Aim to be Interactive

The idea is to pull your users into engaging with you. The dialogue should be a two way street. Engaging users isn’t just about putting out great content, it’s also about pulling the user into interacting with you in meaningful ways.

A lot of brands make the mistake of just sending content at their user in a one-way street. Instead, aim to be interactive. Get your user base involved.

Ask Questions

One easy way to get your user base involved is to ask questions. Multiple choice questions as well as open ended questions both end well.

The questions can be related to your market or current events, they could be personal or they could just be random and off the cuff. Experiment with different kinds of questions to see what your user base responds best to.

Create Polls and Quizzes

There are many, many tools you can use online to create interesting polls and quizzes.

Polls and quizzes are a fast and easy way for people to interact with you and with one another. The quiz should ideally be very short, only about 10 to 15 questions long. It should feel like a fun and entertaining thing to do, rather than a survey. Read more

How to Use Google+ to Promote Your Product or Service

Google+ is the newest social network in town and the fastest growing social network in history. As more and more people come onto Google+, it’ll become more and more important for businesses to be well versed in Google+ marketing strategies.

By learning about Google+ today, you’ll put yourself ahead of the curve. Not only will you be seen as progressive, but you’ll be able to establish your brand long before others have even realized the importance of Google+.

Here’s how to use Google+ to promote your product or service.

Create Meaningful Circle Segments
Perhaps the most valuable thing Google+ offers that Facebook doesn’t is the ability to sort your market by different segments. Using Google+’s circles, you’ll be able to choose exactly who gets to see what messages.

So how should you segment your customers?

Ideally, you should create a different circle and therefore a different segment for each different kind of “mindset” of customer that you have.

For example, you might have one circle for people who’ve bought your product, one circle for people who haven’t bought yet, one circle for people who’re affiliates of your product and one circle for people who’ve entered into a contest but didn’t win.

Each of these people might respond to different messages. For example, offering customer-only discounts to your past buyers could be a stellar strategy to get repeat buys. On the other hand, with people who haven’t bought yet, you might want to provide primarily trust building content.

Take Advantage of Google+’s Posting Features

One thing that’s inherently different about Google+ than Facebook is the length and style of your posts.

On Facebook, you can only post 420 characters in a status update. That really puts a limit on what you can post. Essentially, you can only post short thoughts, short content and links.

On Google+ however, the limit is well over 2,000 characters. (There’s no set limit yet.) In addition, you can link to several videos, links and pictures within your post.

That means that unlike Facebook, on Google+ you can post entire pieces of content for your network to see. You can use Google+ as a direct way to publish useful information to your circles without having to refer people to an outside link.

Use this feature liberally. If you want to build a brand as an expert, Google+ offers a much more suited style than Facebook does.

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iOS 5 Update – The “O Where Art Thou” Reactions!

At the time of this writing, the iOS 5 has not launched as yet but it’s been fun following the various reactions over Twitter of people waiting keenly in anticipation for the new update. The launch time is rumoured to be either midnight PDT ( that didn’t happen ) or 10 am PDT (The update’s available now! It became available shortly past 10 am PDT).  Will also do a follow up post about reactions post the update, that should also be interesting! (UPDATE: Follow up post is ready – Survey of Reactions to the new iOS 5)

Here are some of the better ones that I found, if you have any suggest them in the comments section below:

Zachari123 Zachari Miller

Frustrated because I want to download #iOS5 but I need to sleep. If only I could wirelessly download it. Too bad I need #iOS5 for that!   Retweet this!

kaspershow Kasper

The “check for update” button has got to be sick of me by now. Retweet this!

RafAvila Raf Avila

#thatawkwardmoment when every iPhone user worldwide goes into seizure mode pressing the ‘check for update’ button on their iTunes.  Retweet this!

amyflandreau Amy Flandreau

I’m so pissed that I’m such an idiot who stayed up waiting for #iOS5 when it’s not midnight in the entire country yet Retweet this!

MrsNastashia ??Me ??

Apple is gonna make me carry my laptop to work tomorrow..cause I need this update ASAP!! Retweet this!

GeorgiaTiPb Georgia

OMG…Not wanting to update to #iOS5 has pissed some people off like I ate their first born child. What’s up w/ that? http://www.tipb.com/2011/10/11/updating-ios-5/
Retweet this!

bandpyro Jessie

Stay up till iOS5 comes out, or go to sleep and not be a dead tired teacher tomorrow? CHOICES CHOICES?!?!? Retweet this!

elzombo Jeffrey

I want to stay up for iOS 5. But then again I want sleep. Retweet this!

ammo_kills Cody

Ok I’m looking for #iOS5 and can’t find anything.. thought I would come to twitter, cause theres always an answer here. lol  Retweet this!

AlexHutchins1 Alex Hutchins

#ironic that bbm has crapped out the night before #ios5 Retweet this!

moldyminttea Miguel P.

i bet #iOS5 is gonna be infected with Steve Job’s ghost. Retweet this!

j_cic John C

Current version go away! Retweet this!

RichardHuckvale

Come on America catch up with the UK we are on the 12/10/2011 but can’t have iOS 5 till you catch up!!! #iOS5 Retweet this!

So these were some of the ones I found interesting enough to highlight. It’s wonderful to see so much interest and passion about the Apple brand and credit has to be given to the visionary Steve Jobs to have done everything he did to generate this level of excitment and enthusiasm about all his creations.

Find below a twitter stream keeping track of more mentions regarding iOS 5, you might catch a few more interesting ones there.

Other Posts you might like:

• iOS 5 Update – A Survey of the Reactions! Cast your Vote!
• 10 Bizarre Facts you ought to know about Facebook
• 7 Awesomely Amazing Examples of Success through Youtube
• 14 Powerful Tips for Marketing on Facebook
  

What to Include In Your Social Media Marketing Strategy

A well planned and executed social media marketing (SMM) strategy takes you where your users and buyers are. It lets you share the voice of your organization, get real time feedback for your products, create an instant buzz for your new product offerings, build customer loyalty, and reach an informed target audience. The great thing about a well carried out SMM strategy is that it requires very little financial investment from your side.

I)     What to Include In Your Social Media Marketing Strategy

An effective SMM strategy will leverage all quality online social hubs where users and customers meet and converse. A good SMM portfolio includes a presence on diverse and multimedia social sites. Let’s take a look at the key elements of a good SMM strategy.

• Social Networking Sites

There are various social networking sites where you can create profiles to connect with your target audience directly. Create a Facebook fan page. Create tweets and retweets on Twitter. Create your organization’s profile on Linkedin. According to statistics released by Facebook, the social networking website has around 500 million active users, of which around 50% log in every day for commenting or browsing. A Facebook fan page thus makes a lot of sense to reach an active online audience. On the other hand, Twitter has real time updates and news-worthy tweets that even search engines show in their search results. The tweets about your products are quickly read and responded to by other users. A Twitter account to respond to and create a buzz about your product is therefore essential. Linkedin is accessed by a variety of professionals and businesses looking to connect and research for work and business. Hence, a Linkedin account for your organization is great for networking within the industry or with vendors.

• Blogs, Microblogging

Blogs give you a wide platform to talk about key issues. Blogs are also a great way of bringing traffic to your main website. For an effective blog, you need to post fresh and relevant content frequently, monitor and respond to comments, create internal links, and build a community of loyal readers. Microblogging through sites like Twitter also lets you send short, crisp updates.
Some famous company blogs are www.engadget.com, googleblog.blogspot.com, blog.facebook.com & en.community.dell.com/dell-blogs/default.aspx. If you want blogs related to SEO, you can check out searchengineland.com, www.seomoz.org/blog or www.searchenginejournal.com.

• Online Videos

Websites like Youtube have created a whole new arena for multimedia interaction. Sharing and viewing videos is now, not just an activity enjoyed by individuals for their own pleasure, but also a great way for an organization to share information about its products. Organizations have found sharing interesting and related videos on Youtube to be a great way of ensuring continual, sustained interest of the target audience. You can upload interviews of your top management, share presentations, or even share videos of social or business events in your organization. When Intel uploaded fun and digitally enhanced videos of its Consumer Electronics Show exhibit, it not only created a buzz but also ensured users got to know about its new Core Duo processor.

• Photosharing, Slide Sharing

Sharing relevant and interesting images with your user base also helps in creating pleasant, long-term associations. The images can be about widely anticipated events like a product launch, celebrity associations, or the organization’s internal events. Websites like Flickr have an active user base and can be leveraged for this purpose.

Slide sharing, on the other hand, directly appeals to the user’s needs by sharing information that they need and would use in their business. If your organization has conducted any good-to-know research, you can share the findings online. You can also share your presentations, slides, and reports through websites like Slideshare and Scribd.

Read more

The (Cool) New Kids On The (Social Media) Block

To imagine a time before Facebook is not only difficult, but honestly is a little depressing too. And I speak for everyone when I say, Tweeting has become an activity as natural as breathing. Thanks to Facebook and Twitter, the social media space will never be the same again. Though, they by no means invented social media, they have played a big role in reinventing it.

Inspired by the success these two have enjoyed, many have gone to town creating versions of their own, unfortunately not all have been met with the same amount of enthusiasm or success.

Today, we take a look at a few promising social sites, that will possibly help us answer the question a few of us have already been asking, ‘After Facebook and Twitter, what?’

1.    Foursquare – Since its launch in 2009, this location-based mobile game doing double duty as a social networking platform has found ready and easy resonance with social media enthusiasts and other early adopters. In almost a year’s time, Foursquare has managed to convince more than seven hundred thousand people to give it a try. No mean task that, especially in the first year, for a service that targets a niche market of mobile users. Little surprise then that it is being hailed as the Twitter of 2010. With over 20 million ‘check-ins’ happening everyday, even pathological naysayers will find it difficult to dismiss it as a fad.

2.    Gowalla – The fact that the next on the list is also a location-based social networking mobile game will readily attest to the importance of mobility and location in the social space. Though Gowalla originally got a head start on Foursquare, until the breakout success of its chief competitor, it was hardly able to mobilize that advantage. But a year on, things are certainly looking up for Gowalla, having tasted sweet victory by trumping Foursquare at SXSW to take home the best mobile app award for 2010. In comparison with Foursquare’s user stats, Gowalla’s 150,000 odd users may not look like anything worth writing home about, but over the last few months it has enjoyed a steady growth that is substantively impressive, as revealed by the recent deal with the Travel Channel, which echoes the Foursquare – Bravo Network deal, to integrate proprietary Travel Channel content (Food Wars to be precise) with the game.

3.    Chatroulette – I almost didn’t believe it when I first read that the most talked about social app on the web, Chatroulette, is the brainchild of a 17 year old. Andrey Ternovskiy of Russia developed Chatroulette ‘for fun’ with no monetization plans, so that he and his friends could ‘randomly connect’ with people on the web. A good way to describe Chatroulette is as an online ‘speed dating’ game aided by webcams, but a better way will be as a game of chance meetings online. When you play a game of Chatroulette, you are automatically paired with a random player, with whom you can chat (text or video) and if at any point you wish to terminate the connection, you simply ‘next’ that person to initiate another connection. There is an inherent creep factor to Chatroulette (anything that involves video chatting strangers is bound to have one) that could prove to be a dissuasive factor, but the kind of response it has garnered has been extraordinary and indicates a strong user preference for video-based interactivity on the web. From the looks of it, Chatroulette could very well hold the key to the limitless possibilities of interactive communication on the web.

4.    Yelp – Think the yellow pages, a local search engine and a social networking site all rolled into one – that’s Yelp for you. Though it is a little long in the tooth when compared with the other sites on this list (having been launched in 2004), Yelp’s true social powers were felt only post Facebook, and by that virtue, it merits a place on this list. Yelp has incorporated into it two of the hottest aspects of the web – social and location. You can search for local business, read user reviews of the same and build a network all at one place. That’s social networking with a purpose – really, what’s not to love about Yelp?

A few of these social services have already been made famous for their marketing compatibility, the others are in too nascent a stage for me to speculate on such abilities.
In the coming years, we may see them grow to give Facebook and Twitter competition, both as substantive social apps and as effective marketing platforms. What do you think? Will they lose momentum halfway through or will they succeed in sustaining the hype?

4 Indispensable Tips On Viral Marketing That Cannot Be Ignored

If your goal is to promote your business, whether it is online or offline, you cannot do better than to rely on viral marketing. Viral marketing, in case you were worried, doesn’t involve viruses; the term alludes to the super-fast rate at which viruses spread. Viral marketing involves relying on techniques that will help spread your (promotional) message through a ‘viral process’ and reach a web-wide audience within a short amount of time.

The success of your viral marketing efforts depends on how expertly you play your social graph to use as a medium though with to push your message. However, if your message finds no takers, it can hardly go viral, which counts on people indulging in some furious sharing, and no one shares bad content. So, it would be a good idea to remember that a successful round of viral marketing needs both good content and some decent social networking skills.

Here are some handy dandy tips that you can fallback on in your hour of viral marketing need. (I love puns, can you tell?)

1. Giveaways. Everyone loves free things. Free makes everyone happy. I could delve into the exhaustive scientific studies that attest to these statements, but really, there is no need for it. The giveaway model always works, it works off the Internet, it works equally well on it too. You can offer ebooks or Internet tools, or even sample mp3s if your music is what you wish to promote, and set the ball rolling. Just ensure what you give away is not sub-standard junk that you won’t use yourself. If people like the stuff, they’ll share, talk about it and generate interest in your business. Read more

6 Ways To Make Your Blog A Success

The whole point of having a blog is to get traffic to it, and as difficult as this may seem, your best option is to work at it. The World Wide Web can be likened to a bottomless pit of information, with an endless flurry of users trawling it, day in and day out.  To get these users to consider your corner of the web, by which I mean to drive more traffic to your blog, there are a number of things that need to be done, things that cannot be avoided and have to be done with a generous dose of passion.

It is heartbreaking to see the number of blogs out there that have excellent content but can’t seem to succeed. They have rotten rankings and fail miserably. Don’t let same fate plague your blog, kick back and crack the Technorati 1000 by getting your house in order.

1. Make Your Blog Successful Or Die Trying: First thing to remember is to never give up, to keep on trucking, or rather writing, and remember that if the content is crap, no marketing effort will make it a success. No one starts a blog just for the hell of it, ensue that you have something to say. More publicity, promotion and, consequently, traffic will come your way, but only if the content is truly great. If you cannot write, get a writer to do it for you. There are loads for freelance sites online, where a blogger will write for you at a small cost. Read more

11 Simple Tips That Guarantee More Comments For Your Blogs

I am sure I am not the only one who burns with envy when the neighboring blog receives more comments than mine does, or even worse, the neighboring blog receives a glut of comments, while my blog can’t even muster one. Apart from making me feel that my blog and I should be living under a rock, it almost makes my persistent fear that my blog has no actual readers fairly real, which is no good for a blog or a blog writer’s self-confidence. It’s every blog writer’s worst, confidence-sucking fear – a post not receiving enough or any comments. So, how can any self-respecting blogger persuade his or her readers to leave [more] comments? To issue a confirmatory sign that all the efforts that go into the running of a blog aren’t in vain? To engage daily in a spot of virtual hand-holding so that the said blogger can grow strong enough to withstand future, commentless days without turning near-suicidal?
My dear fellow bloggers, today, I’d like to let you in on a few trade secrets that can help you garner more comments and increase your sense of blog-worth considerably… You are welcome!

1. Invite Comments - Yes, as simple as that. Let your readers know that you are keen to hear from them. Most blog readers are expert lurkers, spending hours on end at a blog, but seldom letting their presence known with, you know, a comment. Regulars (especially) are usually a little in awe of the writer and hence a trifle embarrassed to comment. Think getting tongue-tied when meeting a celebrity, it’s a similar emotion. So, you the blogger should try your utmost to put your readers at ease, and let them know unequivocally that you’d like to hear from them.

2. Compel Them To Comment – Making your posts conversational, and peppering them with questions that invite your readers to share their opinions on whatever that you’ve written about is a stellar idea. While you are at it, ensure that the topic you’ve chosen is interesting enough; current, popular, even slightly controversial ones will give your readers an impetus to comment. For example, write a post about your take on the Tiger Woods ‘incident(s)’ and all the brouhaha over it, a topic that is current as well as suitably controversial, your readers will be more than eager to offer their two cents worth.

3. Reward Your Readers – You may think that the posts you write are rewards enough, but if you continue in that perception, you might as well bid all hopes of comments goodbye. Setting up fun virtual prizes and awards can help acknowledge your readers’ presence and at the same time express your continued gratitude for it, and hence, can prove to be a surefire way to elicit more comments and evoke more loyalty from them. For example, you could set up Reader Of The Month or Best Comment of the Day awards and have the winners’ name displayed on your blog; it won’t cost you anything, but sure will make your readers feel cherished.

4. Guest Posts From Your Readers - Stir things up on your blog with a little reader interaction. Invite a reader, preferably a regular, to write a post for your blog. That’ll give the other readers something to talk about, you can be sure. In addition to providing more ‘flavor’ to your blog, such a move will help the readers feel more connected to you.

5. Reveal Your Soft Underbelly – Well not literally, of course. Adopting a slightly self-deprecating approach or talking about things you are spectacularly bad at, or even revealing the most irrational of your fears will make it easier for your readers to relate to you, and tell them that you are just like them, with your anxieties and silly fears and everyday problems. Having said that, you’ll have to strike a balance between being relatable and whiney; too whiney, and you run the risk of losing whatever few readers you have (and you don’t want that, no sirree, no).

6. Comment on Others’ Blogs - Do unto others what you wish they did to you; that is the first commandment in The Big Book Of Blog Commenting. Linking opportunity aside, commenting regularly on blogs you enjoy can result in acts of reciprocation. Though not necessarily a quid pro quo deed, you can be assured that if you leave meaningful comments on other blogs, those bloggers will take note of it, and quite possibly repay you in comments.
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