Tag: Marketing

What companies need to ask when hiring a social-media consultant

Letting an outsider influence your brand’s social-media presence can be a scary thing. You’re giving a consultant or an agency an enormous amount of power over your brand — and probably paying them a pretty penny. You know you need help to make your social-media efforts bear fruit. But how can you be sure you’re bringing in the right person?

At the 2010 BlogWorld Expo, panelists shared their takes on the social-media hiring process. As the panelists — each of whom is no stranger to the process — talked, they returned again and again to three fundamental questions that companies need to have answers to before confidently bringing a consultant or an agency on board.

via smartblogs.com

You can follow the ‘via’ link above to go to the source and read the rest of the article…

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Social Media Marketing Bootcamp – Green Bay, December 3

I’m really excited that Dana VanDen Heuvel of MarketingSavant has asked me to join him in team teaching this Social Media Marketing Bootcamp in December. Dana’s brilliant when it comes to social media strategy and I’m not so bad at practical, tactical social media tools…

Nearly every local business can benefit from social media in their marketing, but most courses and books only tell you why and don’t show you “how to.” The Social Media Boot Camp for Local Business will teach you the why, the how-to and the practical, tactical things you can do to make social media work for your business. You’ll complete the course with complete command of the latest social media marketing tools and know how to deploy them in your business.

Folks who attend will get alot in a very condensed timeframe and if I weren’t presenting, I’d be the first to sign up…

via gbsmbootcamp.eventbrite.com
You can follow the via link to sign up via EventBrite. Here’s the outline for the course…

Social Media Bootcamp – Workshop Agenda http://d1.scribdassets.com/ScribdViewer.swf

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6 Easy Ways to Get More Visitors to Your Blog

Image representing HubSpot as depicted in Crun...
Image via CrunchBase

A blog is an important asset to any business. It allows you to gain visibility as a thought leader, engages your audience in conversation, and acts as link bait. But you can only reap these benefits if you can actually get visitors to your blog. By now, we all know that content is king and that creating remarkable content on a regular basis will pay off sooner or later. But here are some simple strategies you can apply to each of your blog posts that will make your blog traffic soar quickly.

Click here to go to the source of the quote: blog.hubspot.com

Good stuff from HubSpot — one of my favorite internet marketing resources. Go the source if you’re interested in discovering the ‘6 ways’…

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6 Ways to Optimize Your Blog for Search Engines

a chart to describe the search engine market
Image via Wikipedia

In an earlier article, I talked about the importance of blogging and search engine rankings. However, once you’ve got the blog up and running, the next thing to do is to start optimizing your posts for the search engines. Although search engine optimization (SEO) can be overwhelming to the newcomer, once you understand a few basic concepts, you’ll soon find it’s really not that difficult.

Good SEO copy and a search engine–optimized website accomplish three things:

  1. They’re easy for the search engines to read
  2. They’re easy for the target audience to find
  3. They’re easy for people to read

Everything you do to optimize a post is based around those three basic concepts.

So with that in mind, here are six things you can do to optimize your website or blog posts for the search engines…

via socialmediaexaminer.com
You can follow the ‘via’ link above to go directly to the source to get the whole story if you’d like to get the 6 ways…
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49% of Small Business Owners use a Smartphone

“Over the past few years, it seems that a few mobile devices — laptops, Bluetooth headsets, and increasingly, smartphones — have become ubiquitous among business people. The days of the pager are gone. Small business owners seem to be outpacing the rest of America in smartphone adoption, according to a recent survey of nearly 10,000 small business owners. While only 17% of Americans own smartphones, according to a recent Forrester study, a whopping 49% of small business owners are reported to own smartphones. Of those smartphone owners, 35% own BlackBerrys, 33% own iPhones, 25% own Androids and 7% own Windows Mobile devices. While the study didn’t include a comprehensive look at how small business owners are using their smartphones, we suspect that merchants are turning to mobile devices to stay on top of everyday business needs through e-mail, scheduling and calls. We’ve heard success stories from business owners who also tweet on the go, see the importance of location-based services, and are investing in mobile advertising.

If you’re a small business owner looking for a smartphone, don’t fall victim to the hype — know why you’re doing what you’re doing and make a smart decision. Here’s my perspective on selecting a smartphone…

#1. In many ways, the cellular provider you pick is more important than the phone you use in many cases. If you live in a large metropolitan area, this is kind of a non-issue but most Americans live in non-metropolitan or rural areas. An iPhone is worthless where I live because AT&T is worthless where I live. Before you select a smartphone, review the coverage areas of the network you intend to use and make sure coverage is good in all the areas where you do business and live…

#2. Having selected a network, the services you use should dictate the phone operating system you select. imho, all small business owners should select Google Apps for their business. Period. The Android phone operating system is developed by Google and optimized for Google Apps. BlackBerrys, iPhones, and Windows Mobile devices can all benefit from Google Apps but Android works best. My advice is that small business owners use Google Apps with the most powerful Android phone available from their carrier. Get the best phone you can afford…

#3. Having selected a carrier and a phone, find a rep at your cellular provider who has a clue. You may laugh, but finding a good rep can be a bit like Diogenes searching for an honest man. For me, my carrier is Sprint, my phone is an HTC Evo, and my rep is Cindy Otley at the Oneida Street store in Green Bay. For me, Cindy IS Sprint and she is a primary factor in my decision to stay with that carrier. She’s smart; she knows her company, their policies and the options they offer and she’ll work hard to help you select the plan and phone that will work best for you. I don’t make a move with Sprint these days without talking with Cindy. YOU need a rep like her, especially if you’re not sure about #1 and #2…

There was one more juicy tidbit in the post…

While only 12% of respondents said that they currently market their businesses through mobile — via mobile ads and apps, for example — other reports point towards an upward trend in mobile advertising budgets. In fact, spending on mobile advertising is set to grow nearly 50% to top $1 billion in 2011, according to eMarketer.” Source: 49% of Small Business Owners Use Smartphones [STATS]

More about that later…

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Answered: 10 Questions About Website Redesign

Image representing Mike Volpe as depicted in C...
Image by mikevolpe.com via CrunchBase

Website redesign can be lethal or liberating for your business. Know what you are getting into before you sign the contract.

Most recently, we covered the website redesign topic in a webinar with HubSpot’s VP of Marketing, Mike Volpe. We received nearly 400 questions during the live session and wanted to address the most frequent ones here, offering a platform for discussion.

via blog.hubspot.com

If you’re interested in redesigning your site, you’ll want to follow the ‘via’ link and read these 10 answers. HubSpot is also offering a free guide if you’ll provide your info. Comment, call or use the contact form to connect so we can talk about how these 10 answers apply to your business…

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Social Media for Farmers…

Bringing in the Harvest
Image by barockschloss via Flickr

Social media is not just for the kids, the young, hip and aware. It’s also for ag producers. I’m David Sparks and I’ll be right back to tell you why. My kids can’t wait to get on Facebook to tell everybody, that has committed to being their “friend”, everything they want them to know. It’s like a cyber self-promotion. Now all of a sudden, this phenomenon is catching on big time in the ag world. Why not? Doesn’t it make sense to promote good ideas, like cost savings, new technology, communicating with the public, otherwise known as the consumer? So social media is definitely catching on in the agriculture industry. AGCO Corporation started its social media initiative at the 2009 Farm Progress Show. Today – nearly 18-thousand Facebook users like the AGCO page and about a thousand more are following AGCO on Twitter. The company also blogs several times each week.

Sue Otten is Director of Corporate Marketing and Brand Communications Worldwide for AGCO and heads up the company’s social media efforts. “It’s a nice blend between our own original content and talking about our products and technologies which is something our audiences are interested in as well as interesting ag news from around the world. It’s good for farmers in one part of the world to know what’s going on in other parts of the world. Ag is getting a bad rap these days and this is a way for the farming community to tell their story.

Click here to go to the source and get the podcast; aginfo.net

AGCO rocks! Nice work, Sue…

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What Companies Want in a Social Media Intern

As well as looking good on your resume and netting you college credit, interning in social media can offer you incredibly valuable experience in the world of work, where social media experience is becoming ever-more important.

However, competition for good placements can be fierce, so it’s good to know what companies look for in a social media intern, so you can focus on improving or highlighting those skills.

From big companies, small businesses, non-profits, educational institutions and commercial ventures, we talked to the people who recruit social media interns to find out just what it is they want in a candidate.

via mashable.com

If you want to know what makes a good social media intern, look no further than Jamy Lyn Johnson of AGCO. In the spirit of full disclosure, Jamy is a client that has fully embraced the ‘e1evation workflow‘, personalized it and made it her own. A few weeks ago, the AGCO blog [which Jamy drives along with her boss Sue Otten] received a huge honor when they earned a spot in the Alltop Agriculture channel — kind of a bloggers ‘hall of fame’ making them the only Farm Equipment manufacturer to achieve that hallowed status…

What make Jamy so successful? Mashable lists 4 qualities that companies want:

  • Good communication skills
  • Solid writing skills
  • Top notch social skills
  • Enthusiasm

Jamy had all four out of the box. As a journalism major at Furman, she gained the solid foundation that many business bloggers are lacking. She was also familiar with social media tools but needed a system and a process for using them in concert to achieve business objectives. That’s where I came alongside her for a brief period of time to connect the tools and give her a logical workflow using Google Reader combined with all the tools on the AGCO blog.

If you’re looking for the real deal in social media interns, look no further than Jamy — she’s a model for success in this space! AGCO better snap her up soon… :-D

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Stop Phoning It In

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Image via CrunchBase

If you’re responsible for your company’s newsletter [‘or blog or any other outward facing communication’ ed. note], stop looking at it as a burden. Ask yourself this question: “What would be MOST useful to the people getting this newsletter?” And then ask yourself this question: “What else besides my company’s pitch can I put into this newsletter?” Then ask yourself this question: “Would I share this with someone in my family or with my friends?” That’s one way to figure out how to fix newsletters.

If you’re looking for new buyers, don’t just lamely ask people. Figure out how to find them. Use social tools. Use old fashioned search tools. Create interesting content that would appeal to the kinds of people you need, and figure out ways to promote that. Look OFFLINE. It’s amazing how few people do that last one, by the way, if they’re getting deep into the online world.

If you’re responsible for improving coverage for your company as a public relations professional, put more time into building your relationships with your network before you have a new story. Connect with them about their own things. Ask them about their own passions. Get to know them outside of the article. Ask them how you can help them, or much better still, just figure out a way to be helpful and do it, gratis.

via chrisbrogan.com
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Marketing Progress Poll Results

via churchmarketingsucks.com

With only 40 respondents, I don’t know how solid this data is but I still find it interesting. You can follow the ‘via’ link above to go to the source to read the rest of the article. e1evation = “simply powerful social media”!

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When Churches Keep Quiet: Is Silence Deafening Your Message?

Stained glass at St John the Baptist's Anglica...
Image via Wikipedia

Churches and their communicators are always sending a message to their local communities. Our given message is to be the kingdom of God and gift of Jesus Christ. When this message is not clearly proclaimed by our verbal and non-verbal communication, our audience fills in the blanks. Our neighbors come to two conclusions: we are either ignorant of their problem, or we don’t care. Or both. And unfortunately, there are churches in both camps.

No one accidentally concludes you are a loving church without hearing your message. No one guesses you are a serving church without seeing your actions.

The current religious climate demands we exhaust every possible avenue in carrying the message of Christ clearly and concisely to any open ear. If your church is not using Facebook, then start—your high school, chamber of commerce, library and most tax paying citizens are. If you don’t use Twitter, learn—your friends and community already have. Does your local community have a bulletin board, free town mailer, radio station or homepage? Get on it. Go out in your community, and do something. The church’s silence is killing her message. If you make people guess what you are about, they will guess wrong.

via churchmarketingsucks.com
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B2B Social Media And Lead Generation

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Image via CrunchBase

With a business blog, there are many different ways to get people to become a “lead” from a visitor.  For example: including buttons in the sidebar to talk to a representative, or text links within content to whitepaper landing pages or to download content.  HubSpot has found it successful to add calls to action at the end of content.

We have found that a majority of posts generating leads haven’t been published recently.  Older content is generating  leads.

It’s important to remember that your customers are more important than you are.  For example, HubSpot has a customer in Virginia that installs pools and spas.  All he does is share what someone might want to know when installing a pool.  He doesn’t directly sell his products, but that’s okay.  Even if people aren’t ready to buy, publishing value added content adds them into that consideration section.

Getting all team members involved in the business blog is vital.  People want content from people, not necessarily just companies.  Getting different people from different departments – i.e., research or product, allows marketers to expand the relevant information covered on a given blog to appeal to a larger subset of customers.

Business blogging drives leads and serves as a hub for search and social media visitors.  It doesn’t feel like they are visiting a website that hasn’t been updated in years.  A blog provides much better context for a business.

via toprankblog.com
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Big Talk. Small Acts.

If you’re going to do anything in Marketing, is it more important to focus on “how many?” people you put your message in front of or “who?” you put your message in front of?

You can see this as the classic “quantity over quality” debate or you can look at it as “big vs. small,” however you slice it, it’s hard to argue that brands can now get major results through many small (and sometimes minimal) acts. There are winning business cases (in fact, more than you may think) around every corner. A cause for celebration if you dabble in the Social Media space (we like to claim those small victories as our own).

But, Social Media alone will not save you.

While some small brands can do many small things that achieve incremental results, the bigger brands tend to be doing a whole lot more of the the little things while pushing their weight around if something clicks. One example of this would be the indie-turned Paramount Pictures scareflick, Paranormal Activity. Leveraging many of the Social Media platforms (from Twitter and YouTube to Eventful) the movie had an initial groundswell that enabled Paramount to kick marketing dollars into additional online spaces (and traditional mass media ones too) and slowly push it to become the blockbuster that it became.

via twistimage.com

You can follow the ‘via’ link above to go to the source and read the rest of the article if you’re interested in learning more…

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Warmth, Competence and the Value of Social Media

Open bottles of Extra Strength Tylenol and Ext...
Image via Wikipedia

Pop Quiz: How would customers rate your organization on characteristics like “honesty and trustworthiness” and “acts in the customer’s best interests?” While those may seem like far from relevant concerns in the realm of social media, I assure you that they should be among the first things you think about.

Yet another national study has proven that consumers instinctively judge brands in much the same way they judge other people. (It’s called the “warmth and competence model”) And what’s one of the key reasons that brands get into social media? To inject a level of humanity and dialogue not seen in most marketing efforts, of course! In other words…to make their brands more like people…to attract more people.

Yet, it’s not that easy. In the same study, they looked at why Tylenol, who had a large recall in 2010 fared so much better (leagues apart) than BP in the court of public opinion. It’s simple – Tylenol exhibited humanity across their communication channels – which developed trust in their brand. That said, the underlying reason that Tylenol (Johnson & Johnson) was able to do that in the first place stemmed from the selfless servant-marketing attitude that they have toward their customers and that’s ingrained in their corporate culture.

See, social media “value” isn’t really about ROI in many cases. Rather it’s a question of how it fits with your culture and brand attitude. If yours is a brand that could score well on characteristics like “honest and trustworthy” and “acts in the customer’s best interests”, then you’ll likely derive a great deal of value from social media. If not, it may not be the perceived effectiveness of social media but rather your culture that’s holding you back.

via marketingsavant.com

Who’s your favorite social media gooroo? Mine’s Dana VanDen Heuvel and I’m thrilled to be on a panel with him this Thursday to discuss Thought Leadership marketing. I’ll put up a link to the event a little later but in the meantime, follow the ‘via’ link and head over to MarketingSavant.com where you can learn more about Dana and his craft…

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Four reasons your Executive Director should be on Twitter

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Image via CrunchBase

Executive leaders at nonprofits should put community engagement via social media as a top priority in their job descriptions. They need to get their hands dirty.

But more often than not they don’t.

A broken model?

Usually, staffers do the “dirty work” with social media while management gets a debrief on ROI.

This is like having a nurses aid listen to a patient’s acute cardiac symptoms and tell the heart surgeon where to operate. A lot of critical information would be lost without the surgeon using her own stethoscope to listen directly to the patient’s heart.

Listening to your community is no different. Your community’s voice has a particular rhythm that can only be understood firsthand.

Four reasons EDs should be on Twitter

  1. Executive leaders can understand the community better through unfiltered direct access
  2. They can create greater trust within that community by demonstrating the orgs commitment to engage
  3. Respond faster to the community by eliminating the time it takes to play the telephone game
  4. They can anticipate needs that less experienced staff members might miss

But what if our executive leaders are too busy?

Too busy? If they aren’t willing to make an effort to hear firsthand from the people they serve, maybe they aren’t the right leaders for the organization.

via johnhaydon.com

…or maybe they don’t have the right tactics & tools. You can follow the ‘via’ link above to go to the source and read the rest of the article if you’re interested in learning more…

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Sorry, But McDonald’s Did Not See a 33% Increase in Foot Traffic Because of Foursquare

A McDonalds in a Toronto, Ontario, Canada Wal-...
Image via Wikipedia

According to a current headline on TechMeme, McDonalds saw a 33% increase in foot traffic to its stores when it ran a promotion during Foursquare Day earlier this year. At that time, the fast food chain offered users who checked into McDonald’s a chance to win $5 and $10 gift cards. On the Econsultancy blog, Meghan Keane reports that McDonald’s head of social media Rick Wion claims that, “with this one little effort [$1000 in gift cards], we were able to get a 33% increase in foot traffic to the stores.” These numbers, however, simply don’t add up.

There is clearly some confusion here about the numbers that Wion was talking about. Keane reports that McDonalds saw a 33% increase in check-ins from the day prior to Foursquare day and a 40% increase in check-ins for the week the special ran. Then, however, she goes on to quote Wion as saying that he “was able to go to some of our marketing people — some of whom had never heard of Foursquare — and say, ‘Guess what. With this one little effort, we were able to get a 33% increase in foot traffic to the stores.'” It seems clear that Wion was talking about check-ins here and misspoke when he claimed that this campaign increased foot traffic by 33%.

Some of our colleagues, however, then took this number and ran with it – after all, a 33% increase in foot traffic to one of the world’s largest brands because of one of the most over-hyped social media companies sure sounds like a good story.

via readwriteweb.com

You can follow the ‘via’ link above to go to the source and read the rest of the article if you’d like to dig a little deeper…

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Make the switch to Posterous [+ WordPress]

A couple of weeks ago, the brilliant guys at Posterous started an even more brilliant marketing campaign to tout the efficacy of their Posterous platform against other blogging tools. They culminated their campaign with a post on the ‘Top 5 reasons to switch from WordPress to Posterous’ by saying…

“We’d be crazy to declare war on WordPress. It’s the most popular blog platform in the world — gazillions of bloggers have custom WP installations with plugin functionality that Posterous won’t touch anytime soon.

But WordPress isn’t for everyone, a fact supported by the thousands of WordPress users who have switched to Posterous in the last two weeks. So we thought we’d let some of them tell you why they switched.” Source: Top 5 reasons to switch from WordPress to Posterous – The Official Posterous Posterous

I encourage you to follow the link and read the 5 reasons. They conclude by saying…

“We’ve made it easy for you to make up your own mind by making the move from WordPress to Posterous hassle-free. We’ll copy over your blog content, URL slugs, comments and tags. Just go to posterous.com/switch/wordpress and enter in the url of your blog and email address.

We’ll take it from there. You don’t even need to set up a Posterous account. We’ll email you when we’re done copying your blog. And don’t worry, your WordPress blog will still be there.” Source: Top 5 reasons to switch from WordPress to Posterous – The Official Posterous Posterous

Here’s where I’ll add my two cents — which I think is actually worth quite a bit more! While I have used Posterous alone to take down website competition with much bigger staffs and budgets, the point I’d like to make here is that the answer in business is rarely either/or — many times it’s both/and. IMHO, WordPress still reigns supreme when it comes to the ability to theme a site and leverage plugins — they said it themselves: “custom WP installations with plugin functionality that Posterous won’t touch anytime soon” but Posterous handles some of the more difficult WordPress tasks automagically. So, why not use BOTH?! Posterous can automatically post to over 25 different internet platforms so I post to my Posterous blog and then autopost to my WordPress site. That way, I can leverage the 5 reasons to switch while still using my powerful WordPress site with the theme, the plugins and the seo that I’ve come to love AND generate valuable seo links from my Posterous blog to my WordPress blog as well. As you can see below, it’s working like crazy…

My ‘e1evation workflow’ leverages the simplicity of Posterous and the publishing power of WordPress in one, easy to use approach. I used this workflow for the 2nd quarter of this year and my traffic increased 590%. What’s even better is that thanks to Posterous, it’s drop dead simple to teach. Comment, call or use the contact form to discuss how we can apply the ‘e1evation workflow’ to your business…

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Study Shows Time Pays With Social Media Marketing

Have you asked this question: Is the time I invest with social media really worth it?  Whether you’re new or an old hat with social media, chances are you’ve wondered if the time commitment is really worth the return on investment (ROI).

Make no mistake about it:  a true investment of time and resources is necessary to see significant social media marketing success.

But the real question is, “Just HOW MUCH time is needed to see solid success?”

This question was recently answered in the new study, 2010 Social Media Marketing Industry Report, authored by Michael Stelzner.  Based on the report findings, ROI is top of mind for most marketers using social media.

via socialmediaexaminer.com

Follow the ‘via’ link to read more…

Posted via web from e1evation, llc

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“Creating beats consuming”

Auren Hoffman has a great post on consuming vs. producing. He says…

“We are meant to be both creators and consumers. Today, however, most people consume far more then they create. Part of the reason for this is because being both a consumer and a creator at the same time is very difficult, and because goods and services have never been more accessible. But a healthy life is one that balances both creation and consumption.

When you consume you are often appreciating other’s work. You eat, watch movies, visit nice places, read books, and party. You vegetate to the sounds of your favorite musical artist on a wonderful couch while surfing Facebook on your beautifully designed laptop.

Creators do just the opposite: they strive to make something that others (or their future self) will appreciate. Creators toil, try different things, fail, and try again.” Source: Summation: creating beats consuming

…follow the link for the rest of his article.

It’s not hard to move from consuming content to producing content for your internet marketing. I’m working on a screencast to show you how Google’s Chrome, Shareaholic and Posterous can work together to help you make the transition from thinker to thought leader. Stay tuned…

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Make your LinkedIn profile as effective as it can be…

…while avoiding common mistakes. I’ve collected some great resources for you here…

Posted via web from e1evation, llc

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The answer is ‘both/and’

I’m always fond of saying that the answer is rarely either/or but both/and. Mitch Joel says the same thing here but in a slightly different way…

“Digital Marketing is not the silver bullet. Digital Marketing is not the only marketing a brand should be doing.

Branding works. Traditional mass media advertising words. Direct Marketing works. PR works. And every other niche of Marketing, Advertising and Communications still works too. It’s a matter of understanding the strategy of the brand, the marketplace of your consumer and then implementing a healthy strategy that will help you achieve your business goals and ROI. Yes, for some brands, that will mean a heavier focus on the Digital Marketing component, but it might also mean looking at your market from a different perspective. And yes, because of the growth of Internet usage and the multitude of new opportunities, Digital Marketing definitely deserves a seat at the adult table of a proper marketing mix.

Everything is “with” not “instead of.”

Some of the brands understand this so well. I’ve been in meetings where a CMO has shown me how their 30-second spot drives sales (and when they stop the TV advertising, the sales plummet) and how their Social Media activity keeps the interest and loyalty in-between and during campaigns. It’s that healthy balance that we all too often forget about. Just the other day (March 24th, 2010, to be exact), eMarketer had a news item titled, Combining the Strengths of Social and E-Mail, which stated:

“‘Even though people are spending more time using social media, they are not abandoning e-mail,’ said Debra Aho Williamson, eMarketer senior analyst and author of the new report, Maximizing the E-Mail/Social Media Connection. ‘The two channels can help each other, offering the opportunity for marketers to create deeper connections.’ More than four in 10 business executives surveyed by StrongMail said integrating e-mail and social was one of their most important initiatives for 2010, just after improving e-mail performance and targeting and growing opt-in lists.”” Source: Everything Is “With” Not “Instead Of” | Six Pixels of Separation – Marketing and Communications Blog – By Mitch Joel at Twist Image

When I spoke last week at the Ashwaubenon Business Association, I was chatting with a direct mail marketer afterward and I wanted to be sure that he understood — as I hope that you understand — that I don’t advocate stopping ANY traditional marketing methods that are working for you. Just add the social media ones that make sense!

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