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.
Digg, Tweet & Like Your Way to SERP Heaven
Social Media Marketing (SMM) a tool for getting across the right information to your target audience through social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, has truly arrived and is here to stay. Top search engines worldwide, like Google and Bing have already begun crawling for data from such social networking sites and are even using them for the final search ranking.
This was recently witnessed by the website SEOmoz.com, which not only got a huge surge in traffic after one of its posts “Beginner’s Guide to SEO” was tweeted by Smashing Magazine and then retweeted by followers, but it also reached among the top results (No. 2 in the 1st page as of today) in the Google search for the unusual term “beginner’s guide”. While the initial surge subsided after the first few days, the page nonetheless continues getting consistent traffic weeks after the initial tweet by a figure of authority such as Smashing Magazine.
The more number of times a particular page gets linked through the “Share” feature for various social websites, the higher the chances of a better search ranking. In fact, for the search engine Bing, the higher the number of “followers” or “friends” for a particular account or website on a social media site, the easier it is for the website to achieve a higher search ranking.
It is clear then that the importance of social media websites like Facebook and Twitter can no longer be ignored. SMO thus has to be a crucial component of your Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategy. Let’s take a look at how you can optimize your activities on websites like Facebook and Twitter to get the best search ranking.
• Stay Active
Having a presence on social media alone is not enough. You need to add meat to the bone of your online presence. This can only be done by staying active consistently, by posting or tweeting content, relevant images, and informative videos. You can also supplement this activity and stay active without too much effort by responding to comments, commenting on other relevant posts and pages, using the “Like” feature on Facebook, and retweeting. By investing a few minutes every day (as opposed to being online only once in a while) you can see really good, long-term results.
• Yes, Content Is Still the King
For an optimal search engine optimization strategy, content is still king. Ensure the content you publish is good quality content. While posting often is good, ensure you don’t lose grip on the type and relevance of your content. If the content is interesting and informative, the hits will appear. For example, the Travel Channel has managed to make the most of their Facebook profile by asking readers who enrol as “Fans” to share their Facebook-related travel stories. Needless to say, the content is interesting, unique, and highly relevant to the readers themselves.
You also need to ensure your content is free from plagiarism, is 100% original, and does not violate any copyright laws. In addition, your posts need to reflect an optimal density of keywords related to your business for search engines to take note of your website. Make sure your tweets or posts consistently talk about your business and do not lose focus, subject-wise. Examples of the type of content you post could be updates from your business, changes on your website, offers, deals etc. This will increase your brand value as well.
14 Powerful Tips for Marketing on Facebook
Finding a 
good place to showcase your products, services and websites for free in the online world is a dream for everyone – Facebook has made this a reality. With half a billion Facebook users and thousands of online communities to choose from, Facebook has brought potential customers much closer to you.
It’s no big secret that Facebook can help you in online marketing. However, I know there are many of you who believe that just registering on Facebook is enough… it’s not. Your Facebook success story ends before it even begins!
There is much more to marketing on Facebook than just creating a profile. Keeping your fans engaged is the key. Don’t be a brand, but be a community they love being a part of. In this article, I’m going to tell you how you can use the medium of Facebook to increase your customer base as well as retain the ones you have!
CREATE YOUR PRESENCE ON FACEBOOK
1. Facebook Profile: By creating a profile for yourself or your business, you are establishing your identity. This will take you a long way in developing relationships with fellow users and in positioning your business. You profile lets you interact with people on a personal note, more so if it’s a local business. Here are some aspects of a profile page:
o Profile Picture: Always put your best foot forward, which means us
e the most flattering picture as your profile picture. No matter what they say, a book is judged by its cover. I came across M.A.C makeup’s profile and thought it was really catchy with the colors used on the face. Hundreds of indifferent people with little time to spare are going to decide whether to add you based on your picture. So, make sure you get this one right!
o Add Friends: After creating a profile, don’t wait for things to 
happen. Add new friends every day and the word will spread that you’re on Facebook. Before you know it, you’ll be starting your day by accepting friend requests! However, make sure you don’t add more than 25 – 30 people a day as excessive adding can get your profile removed from Facebook.
o Wall: This is your main platform to interact with Facebook users. Post messages on your wall and also comment on members’ activities, though, only when relevant. A cafe once commented on my status when it was something about food. And there! A personal connection was built in a second! I knew that I was going to visit this place more often. However, make sure you don’t spam people every other day or they may remove you from their friend list.
o Photo Albums and Videos: Photos and videos are a great way to show
case the latest collection of your product. I know many people who love to see what goes on behind the scene during a photo shoot or while a baker does his magic in the kitchen. Moreover, the first thing most Facebook users check are photo updates. So take that camera and start shooting!
2. Fan Pages: Facebook Pages, known as Fan Pages, are designed for businesses, brands, companies, products and celebrities. It enables public figures, organizations and other entities to create an authentic and public presence on Facebook. You can encourage users to become fans of your page and share information with them by uploading pictures, videos, status updates, hosting discussions and displaying wall posts. Unlike Facebook Profiles, Pages are visible to everyone on the internet and are generally better for long-term relationships with your fans, readers or customers.
7 Awesomely Amazing Examples of Success through YouTube!
YouTube has become almost synonymous with online broadcasting. With millions of visitors per day, have you ever considered YouTube as a potential pool tool to build your brand and create customers?
Though a highly competitive medium, YouTube helps you reach your niche – whether you’re an aspiring film maker, makeup artist, politician or a comedian. Lately, we have seen many new ideas coming up in this medium and there is no limit to how creative or even eccentric you can get in grabbing attention.
Why It Works
When you see an interesting video on YouTube, you tend to post the link on Twitter, Facebook, or share it by emailing it to friends. They pass it on to their friends and the effect just multiplies and your message spreads rapidly, resulting in massive exposure. This approach, also known as viral marketing, doesn’t even have to be expensive. The reason we connect with these campaigns is because we understand the product better and the brand has a face. We identify the brand, making the whole experience personal.
Here, I have listed out some of the most innovative viral marketing hits on YouTube that you can learn from!
1. Will It Blend: The first campaign cost Blendtec, a company that produces blenders and mixers, less than $50. The team filmed a video featuring Blendtec’s co-founder Tom Dickson who said, “Will it blend? That is the question.” He made a smoothie of salsa, tortilla chips, Buffalo wings and Budweiser in the blender. Five days later, Blendtec’s marketing director excitedly told him that they hit 6 million views on YouTube. This was later followed by videos of blending golf balls, a crowbar, a video camera and iPod. My favorite is their latest, the iPad. Their online videos are still a rage and Blendtec’s online sales have grown by 500%.
2. America’s Got Talent: This is the latest one on the block. Their auditions are being done entirely on YouTube. You can record your performance even at home and upload it right away, giving an opportunity to many more. You can sit back at home while the judges and voters (viewers) decide whether you have it in you to take you to the next round. NBC and the producers of the show have partnered with YouTube to process the auditions online. Are we seeing the latest trend for reality shows here?
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?
Social Media Marketing In The World Of Online Gaming
I am not a gamer, not even a casual one. To state I find it difficult to identify with those people who practically have controllers growing out of their hands would be almost redundant. I am not beguiled by Bejeweled nor have I felt an impulse to help Flo out with her Diner. Until a few months ago, gaming jargons that are now so popular on the Internet made little sense to me (now, they make a little sense because I looked them up in Wikipedia. Seriously, pwnd is not a word, it’s gibberish!). And for months now I have been stoically resisting various (separate) attempts by my friends to make a farmer out of me (No, I don’t want to be your neighbor, and I certainly don’t want to grow pumpkins!). But even I can’t deny that social games are the hottest trend on the web, and have gained enough impetus to change the social picture, and that marketers are practically chomping at the bits to capitalize on the massive marketing opportunity they present
Be it the wildly popular (and weird) games on Facebook or the social network-cum-location-based mobile game
Foursquare, the interweb is finally alive to the as-yet-untapped promotional possibilities that social games offer. Evidently, games make social experiences ‘funner’; once accustomed to such a model, users will hardly be open to embracing a game-less one. (I can say this on authority, as I have had a similar experience with my 5-year-old niece and her broken Game Boy.) That and the fact that the social gaming market, in spite of being in its infancy, is worth a billion help me assume that this trend of social games will only grow bigger (but if that means more Farmville invitations, God help me!), and hence, I think fleshing out a marketing model based on it is, in fact, a great idea.
Clearly, more people are on to it. Foursquare must have foreseen this trend too, because four months ago, it launched its advertising platform, Foursquare for Businesses. And possibly taking note of the blitzkrieg growth-rate that it is enjoying, marketers are (already) lining up, hoping to cash in on it. Foursquare has already landed a deal with Bravo Media, the force behind Bravo TV – famous for its housewives and Padma Lakshmi. There are other early adopters, local businesses mostly, that are teaming up with Foursquare to promote their brand and fares. For example, when Foursquare player ‘checks-in’ at a local café that’s collaborating with Foursquare, he may end up landing some great discount deals, that are not available to the regular patrons. Read more
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
Social Media – Avatar in 2010
Last year saw Twitter and Facebook rise to dizzying heights of popularity and the web trying to wrap its collective head around the concept of real-time search and the resulting collaborations between Twitter and traditional search giants like Google and Bing. Yeah, social media really came of age in 2009. So, what changes will be wrought in social media this year? Social media gurus all over the Internet have been frantically making predictions, many have come out with extensive lists of just what changes it will undergo in 2010. Listed below are six likely social media forecasts for this year.
1. Social Media And Real Time Web – We already got a glimpse of the real-time web in 2009, with real-time search rolled out by major social media networks like Facebook and Twitter and the consequent deals with Bing and Google. 
This year we’ll see it come to its own, and social media will be the vehicle that will take it there. Besides being the agent of real-time search, which is already being incorporated into traditional search, social media will also prove to be a trend forecaster that will help spread as well as start trends and fads in matter of seconds.
2. Business of Social Media Marketing – Businesses were already turning hip to the powers of social media in the realm of marketing in 2009 (Dairy Queen, American fast-food chain and a local radio station WUKY are among the few who actively built their social media presence last year), and 2010 will reveal more and more businesses, including small businesses, resorting to the aid of social media marketing. According to industry experts, “Social media in 2010 will cease being the shiny new object and instead become part of the everyday lexicon of business.” And that it will no longer be considered a ‘fad’ used by youngsters and movie stars, but a marketing force to be reckoned with.
Will Social Media be the Death of SEO?
“Is the end of SEO nigh?”
To say that the question is at the forefront of the minds of several SEO mavens would be an understatement. The ever-rising popularity of various social media channels (read Facebook and Twitter) and the resultant flurry of activities (read real-time search) happening there have, evidently, been causes for concern for many in the search business (Google included). Many of them don’t just raise the question; they are convinced that there is no light at the end of the tunnel for SEO, and that the SEO-Armageddon is upon them!
SEO Vs. SMO: What They Say?
This undeclared war between search and social media has the grapevine rife with rumors – that Facebook is all set to vanquish Google, that Twitter is already beating the search engines at their own game, and here’s the whopper, real-time search on social media has all but replaced the traditional and ‘slow’ search engines!
Since I just don’t see the SEO-beast rolling over and playing dead (Google.com is the most visited site on the web), I am not holding my breath. A bunch of over-zealous early-adopters and a few million users thundering towards the latest social media sites may cause it to break out in sweat (by their own admission, Google had been a tad complacent, and hadn’t really anticipated the developments at Facebook and Twitter) but kill it? I don’t think so.
Yes, things may look a little worrisome, the as-yet-undisclosed search aspirations of Facebook, who is practically nipping at Google’s heels in the race for web domination (Facebook clocked 2.6 billion visitors in November, falling short of Google’s traffic volume by just 35 million) and the almost unanticipated success and as-yet-untapped potential of Twitter Search (which has seen a 477.25% increase in unique visitors in the last one year, as opposed to Google’s 11.77%) appear to paint a pretty bleak SEO-picture. But, can Facebook and Twitter push the behemoth Google out of the picture? Will they prove to be the fabled Google-killers? Let’s be real people, Google’s an old hand at search, no logic suggests that these search-wannabes can do what Microsoft and Yahoo together couldn’t achieve.
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