Ok, so by now we have all heard about Social Media how it works, how much time it takes and what’s involved, but maximising time for such web Marketing remains a challenge.
We were brain storming the other day during a meeting on how we could increase our productivity within the company’s networking activity. How we could still be active on our twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and blog accounts while:

• It doesn’t consume all of our time
• We get a ROI on the time we do commit

Here are some of the suggestions that we came up with and thought we would share them:

• Be firm with either yourself or your staff’s time. Allocate an amount of time that you are going to participate in networking/social media and stick to it, there comes a point where ‘you can do no more’ to increase effectiveness so don’t waste valuable time.
• Don’t be shy at offering links, interaction buttons or even invitations wherever possible.
• Send out an E Newsletter to promote, publish and round up the months networking activities.
• Link your networking together with apps like http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/twitter-tools/
• Don’t *over do it*. Blogging, tweeting and profile updates that are done too often, seem to lose credibility quickly. Post often (@ least once a week), and post quality.
• Give things away. Don’t worry we’re not suggesting you give away a secret formula just give away enough to make your followers a) keep following and b) recommend you as a valuable/credible source.
• Measure! See our previous article. The above will all be totally pointless if you don’t.

Networking -part 1 of 3

Facebook

Founded in February 2004, and currently has over 400 million active users.
Facebook claims to “facilitate the sharing of information through the social graph” and I wouldn’t necessary disagree. Facebook offers photo and video upload, chat, email, a forum (or wall), marketplace (to display items for sale), Event and Groups and additional Pages to mention just a few of its offer’s (full list on the websites fact sheet).
Adding an additional pages or creating groups within your Facebook account is where the term “Become a Fan” is relevant. Creating your own Business Page/Pages is an excellent way to promote you business and keep your “fans” up to date on Events, promotions and marketing info. By creating this community of loyal fans and by making your offerings of interest and benefit you can soon turn a static promotion into a viral one.
* For the few techies reading, Facebook is one of the most-trafficked PHP websites in the world, and utilizes one of the largest MySQL installations anywhere in the world, running thousands of databases.
Want to find out more about Facebook? It’s all here

Twitter

Twitter is the leading micro-blogging site; this instant messaging social tool allows users to blog 140 characters in any single string. Messages can be uploading via a variety of means. Web, mobile app, desktop app, via SMS txt … they really have thought of pretty much everything.
The basic starting point being, you set up an account (which is free by the way), search on areas of interest and follow them or perhaps follow users you may already know that have a twitter account and start micro-blogging about stuff you either find interesting or more importantly others find of interest.
Though all my reading, there seems to be an option that twitter and tweeting your events, announcements and points of interest is the future of PR.
Despite being based on a relatively simple structure (in techie terms that is), twitter allows us to follow others (even our competitors), interact and influence our followers, create lists and interact with the world instantly.
News travels fast, but faster via twitter.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn has 60 million members in over 200 countries and with that in mind you can see that this is no small fry as far as social networking is concerned
According to the official LinkedIn press room, a new member joins the networking site, on average every second, with somewhere in the region of 50% of its uses outside the US.
LinkedIn is very much a business social networking tool. Like with the Facebook you are able to link with contacts/friends (LinkedIn call these connections) which can have second-degree connections and then third-degree connections. Within this web of connections you can build an interconnected network of experienced professionals from around the world. Sharing skills, knowledge, information, and business opportunities amongst your connections and even offering and accepting recommendations that the entire network can see.
With executives from all Fortune 500 companies being LinkedIn members

MySpace

MySpace was launched in 2003 by eUniverse (an internet Marketing Company based in LA). In 2005 eUniverse (and with it MySpace) was bought by Robert Murdoch’s News Corporation.
In April 2008, based on monthly unique visitors, MySpace was beaten by its main competitor Facebook.
In terms of users, the 100 millionth MySpace account was created on August 9, 2006 and on that basis I would guess they are doing pretty well.
As you would expect, MySpace has the standard blubs, a profile page, about me, who you would like to meet etc. What makes MySpace a little bit different to the others is the extent in how much you can change the visuals of your page. With significant editable sections of the site (both by “Profile Customizer” and html/CSS editing), users are able to brand pages making then total unique.

What makes MySpace stand out from the crowd is the ability to add music files to your pages – the music is added to a player which can then be embedded directly into your profile page.
So, it is no surprise that MySpace is the popular choice amongst the music industry.

Watch this space for Part 2 (Blogging) & Part 3 (Photo Sharing +)

When is a website not a website? When the website is ‘Coming soon’ If ‘Under Construction’ Pages will kill off your business the dreaded ‘Coming Soon’ web page will stop you before you even got started. This is usually (but not always) when a new company wants a website, registers their domain and then asks someone to put up a single page with ‘Coming Soon’ on it.

No One Does Business Soon

So who wants to do business soon? Who wants to do business with someone who is not actually here yet (but will be soon?). If your not actually trading yet then you are ‘coming soon’ but this is rarely the case. What is the message that you’re actually giving out with this? Are you saying ‘We can’t get our act together and sort out our website’, or is it more like ‘We’ve neglected our site, but we’ll try not to neglect our customers’? Feel free to add your own theme on this one.

So if this is what we’re saying to our customers and it is as negative as I claim, why don’t people get this sorted out? It must come down to the time and money see-saw. If you don’t have the time you have to use money, but getting it sorted out costs an unknown amount of money (and it is probably too much money, you assume). But you can get this sorted on a budget and can be cost effective.

It Doesn’t Have to be This Way

Getting one page up should be well within your time and budget constraints. Any web design company worth its salt will be able to get to get you a fresh design with images up and live on the web for a couple of hundred pounds (at the most). You’ll have to compromise on design. It won’t be all singing and dancing and it may not be exactly what you want, but it will be better and more effective than your old coming soon page.

You may struggle to get the words out and down on paper and if this is the case you should think about hiring a copywriter to write the copy (the words on the page) for you. Most web design companies will have a copywriter they can recommend if they don’t have one on staff and copy for a page might only cost you £80, which compared to the sales and reputation you’re loosing isn’t too bad.

Helpful Hints

1. Don’t use the words ‘Under Construction’
   The web is a fluid and in constant change. Your site will always be changing and is therefore always under construction.
2. Don’t use the words ‘Coming Soon’
   If you have a page on the web, you’re not coming soon, you’re here! If your website is one page, then that is your site. Better to have one great web page than loads of nothing pages.
3. Make it Keyword Rich
   Google loves text. Customers love information. The two go together. Get one interesting, information packed, keyword rich page with a few interesting images to let visitors know they have hit the right page. Have a clear first paragraph that tells visitors they are in the right place, then add a benefit proposition that is the way it is, but …
4. Include a Call to Action
   Once your visitor has read what you offer, tell then what you want them to do next. ‘We can arrange your free, no obligation demonstration by calling 01799 111 222′, or ‘Visit us on market days for a great deal’. Use something that isn’t too ‘hard sell’ but encourages your visitor to continue the dialogue you have started
5. List your Contact Details and / or Form
   Now your customers know what you want them to do, make sure that they can. A contact form that emails you the requested details is always good. If your mega tight budget doesn’t allow the emailing form then just make sure your address, phone number and email are on there.

So Get On With It

So stop procrastinating and get going. Find a web company you feel like you can trust, will take a bit of time to chat to you and help you out and get one great page up on the web. The rest can come later.

Rake Mark can obviously help you with getting one great page up there ( or as many as you might need), just give us a call on 01785 256 222. We’re here and happy to help.

According to Nielsen, worldwide usage of Social Media Networking, such as Facebook, twitter, blogs etc is up 82% on the same period last year and with many companies adopting and enhancing their existing marketing strategies this is set to rise even further.

According to a study by BrianSolis.com in 2009  over 80% of professional usage of Social Media goes un-measured. Although Social Media Usage in the Business Sector has been around for some time, the requirement for consistent and continued ROI (Return on Investment) figures form such marketing methods means that anything you invest time into needs to prove its worth and have its performance measured.

Monitoring Software such as Google Analytics is free to use and is key to providing the data you need to build an accurate picture of your Social Media foothold in the marketplace. Date such as:

• Traffic Sources
• Network
• Interaction

 … Can be the difference between a tumble weed blog and a credible source that users come back to time and time again.

The most important thing to remember is to measure your Social Media Activity for your company. Monitoring Software will provide a mountain of data, but is only useful if you are collecting relevant data that you can turn into useful information and fits with your SMMS (Social Media Marketing Strategy).

Monitoring Area Ideas to help you get started

• Track your referrals – this will give you an indication of tandem or child feeds that are working well and those that you either need to allocate more recourses or drop from your SMMS.
• SMID (Social Media Interaction Duration) – It may be prudent to analysis the amount of time that your visitors and lingering on your site. This might help you build a picture of your visitors interests.
• Bounce Rate – are your visitors leaving within a couple of seconds? Perhaps your page isn’t clear; your copy may need changing or may need more interest adding.
• Interaction – are your articles getting comments? What are the comments and are you responding to them?
• Membership – are your followers, subscribers or members increasing? If not why not?

If your effects aren’t working then change them! For more Tips on maximizing your web social Media or online marketing efforts subscribe to our newsletter.

During my regular trawl through the business forums last week I came across a post from someone who is selling fashion accessories at their local markets and the giving the profits to local charities. They had a really low budget and so they were looking for sources of cheap advertising.

Unfortunately, advertising will often fail to give value for money, especially if it is used in isolation, small quantities or with a limited budget. I wanted to help, so I offered some tips on other marketing and promotion ideas that can yield dividends without costing very much money. An abridged version of my reply is below.

Hi

I think you should consider this from a rounded marketing approach. Don’t just think about advertising, which is probably going to be too expensive for you, think about other methods of promotion that will require time without costing too much.

1. Press Releases.

 There are a few free press release websites that you can load press releases to. Also, contact your local paper with interesting things you are doing, new lines of jewellery, other activities. When you have been going 1 year, tell them. You are a charitable organisation, so they are going to be happier to print it than if you were just a new small business. You are clearly a big hearted person who cares for others, doing something other than moaning about your situation, a real can do person. The press will love writing about you. 

2. Blogging

Your on the web so set up a free account at blogger.com and start writing about the things you do. Make it personal and interesting. The people you met at the various markets, the new lines of products, how sales are going, are you nearing a target, etc. Once or twice per week if you can. Put the blog address on any offline marketing you do (leaflets, cards, press releases, etc)

3. Twitter

So if you are blogging then try micro blogging. Set up a free account. Follow a few people who are interested in jewellery (search twitter for those users) and then try to write a few tweets of your own. Be upbeat and amusing. Tweet a few times per day if you can. People will start to follow you.

4. Facebook

Again, its free. Set up an account and start a fan page. You can upload photos of your designs and get feedback on them. Also you can profile the charities that you are helping. Every time an amount of money goes to a charity, find out what it does, then let people know.

5. Recognition

There may be awards in your area and nationally that you could win. Business people pat themselves on the back all the time. There may be something like the Pride of Britain awards in your area. I am sure that someone knows about the great job you do and if you were nominated for a local hero award then you could raise your profile and sell more jewellery and do even more good.

 6. Personal Representation

Try to put yourself in front of as many people as possible. On days that there is no market you might want to try contacting local organisations either on the phone or in person. You could try to sell directly to the people you talk to or ask if you could have a small table with samples that you could sell during lunch time or at home time. Again, make a point of letting them know that this is charitable work, they are more likely to allow it. Maybe business centres with a lobby area or larger organisations with plenty of staff could be good locations.

 All my ideas are designed to be cheap or free and generate buzz around your business. The more people talk about your business and how great your products are and what a great job you do for charity the orders will start to come in. 

I really do wish you all the best of luck with this. Let me know if I can be of any further help. 

Phil

You can read the full post thread at the UK Business Forums,  http://www.ukbusinessforums.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?p=1142952#post1142952

If Aileen gets in touch to say how things are going then I add it to my blog.

In the year 2010 most of us have come to the same conclusion that marketing has changed and success only really comes to those that position themselves apart from the rest move with the time and stay on top of their game.

Some companies are quiet happy sticking to the traditional methods of marketing that they have always used, and that’s fine, but now is the time to give you that competitive edge and really stride out ahead.

By using current and flexible marketing technology practices, such as e-mail marketing, social media and mobile marketing to drive traffic to your SEO (Search Engine Optimised) website you will soon see the ROI when an increase in website visits turn from “never visited website before” to “Just looking” and finally onto “ready to buy.”

Don’t make your users work too hard to find you

Very simple but often overlooked. Your website should be working for you constantly and if it’s not you need to consider why not? Think about the content of your website, think about how you can generate buzz about products and services displayed on your pages. Put into place your search engine strategy and don’t lose sight of your end goal … engage your visitors, generate interest and convert that interest into revenue.

Today’s web market place is made up of a variety of tools (categorized into Social marketing) e.g. email Marketing, twitter, facebook, alone press releases etc and are in the main free to use and in part your path to a successful online presence.

In simple terms the link between you, your customers and potential customers is the search engines and you need to shine big and bright.

Generate a website that is clear to navigate, full of factual and easy to find information about your services and products and then shout about it from the roof tops.

Striving to get to the top of Google isn’t a bad goal but get the basics put in place first and remember that measuring progress is one of the most important parts of your search engine strategy.

Four Tips to get you Started

• Know your market place and where you are going to position yourself in it.
• Follow best SEO and SEF practices  
• Create your search engine strategy
• Measure, Measure, Measure with something like Google Analytics

Subscribe to our online marketing newsletter and we’ll send you the very latest tips and tricks to help you with more exposure on the web with less exposure of your wallet.

Social Media networking such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn etc have over the last year grown massively and are very much the ‘In thing’ to be part of and as a business using this method of new age communication (Social Media) can be the loud speaker you never thought you had.

According to the Internet World Stats website the latest figures show that 1,733,993,741 of us use the internet and while not all of these users will be regularly active either in networking or a potential client it does give us a huge platform to sell our wares.

Armed with the information that we have a huge audience, it is not unreasonable to assume that a percentage of that audience is interested in what we have to offer, or perhaps not just interested but actually looking for what we have to offer and for whatever reason just didn’t know about us. Enter your business stage left!

The camera is rolling, your centre stage and the world is listening.

By creating this online arena, you are not just providing information to the world but gaining information, feedback and comments (good & bad) back that help you to grow, improve and promote your business and services. Creating a community of like minded people that interact, explore and collaborate could set you up nicely within your community and deem you a noteworthy source.

Creating these accounts and communities is free, total free and budget wise is an ideal solution for those on limited marketing recourses however, be careful, the downside to this type of marketing and exposure does require constant attention to reap any real benefit. 

Don’t underestimate the time commitment that this will consume. Allocating specific time each week (or more often if you can) to update and interact with your community is a must if trust is to be built.

Social media really does come under the category of ‘You must put in, to get out’.

Join us on Facebook and Become a fan of our business Pages and you can follow more of our Social Media blog articles. 

The term itself “Social Media” often causes confusion and misunderstanding and I, myself have heard it explained in seminars and workshops with at least three different slants, so let’s start with the basics.

‘Media’ is not a new term that businesses are not used to using; however the term media now applies to many different areas, the main two being, Industrial Media and Social Media

Industrial Media is commonly referred to as “traditional”, “broadcast” or “mass” media, and basically uses the good old pen and paper, newspaper, TV and radio. The content of which is delivered to you, not by mail (well sometimes but) by the author. The content is written, read or broadcast in full and although offers feedback ability, that feedback does not form part of the content. Interaction starts and stops with the delivery method and the person that is consuming the media.

Social Media (also under the banner of Web 2.0) is radically different to that. Social Media uses the internet and web technologies to deliver and transform content with the start of the content being OTM (One to Many) generating the MTM (Many to Many) viral structure. Businesses will often refer to this as UGC (User Generated Content)

Social Media is designed to be highly scalable, highly interactive and most of all very informative.

Examples of Social Media are Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Flickr, blogs …  the list goes on for some time but the idea being multiple inputs providing greater, deeper information – like the snowball effect.

How Do I Benefit from Social Media?

Other than the really obvious one of access to an array of information, you can also provide and array of information that others find interesting and repeat/ forward all over the word!

Google LOVES content, it’s not human, and it does care if your pictures are really pretty, it’s a computer and computers read information and the information on the web is HTML code – simple.

Every blog article, forum post, tweet that generates traffic, buzz and interest in your web pages is gold dust. If it’s on the web it’s HTML and Google is reading it.

Businesses worldwide are slowing coming round and understanding the full potential power of Social Media, online communications and the intense exposure and website marketing benefits that can be created by engaging in greater online ventures.

Over the last year a large percentage of social networking sites such as Face Book and Twitter, have published a continued increase in use, with facebook making no secret of it’s predicted success. In the real world this has turned social networking and what some would call idol chit chat into big money and therefore big business.

With more than 300 million active Face Book users reported and at least 50% of those users logging on everyday, that gives you 150 million lines of potential communication open everyday. Among those users it is reported that more than 2 billion pieces of content (web links, news stories, blog posts, notes, photos, etc.) are shared each week. That could be your information, your news stories and your blog posts reaching users worldwide.

To get the same exposure using traditional marketing and PR methods would have taken 30 times as long and thousands if not millions more of are hard earned pounds and dollars to achieve.

Social Media and Web 2.0 as a whole (not just face book) offers each and every one of us a platform to a mass audience. Use it poorly and as you would expect to receive poor results. Use with energy, vigor and a purpose to impress and you will be rewarded for your efforts.

Social Media is Big Business and it is not going to disappear any time soon, so release some of the rains and encourage communication and participation within your company and don’t allow your competitors to gain a strong advantage because you resisted change.