internet marketing « The Side Note

Archive for the 'internet marketing' Category

Mar

And it Has Changed…Again.

Just when we all have gotten used to the “new” look of Facebook, the beast has evolved once again.

It seems that Facebook is trying to keep people on their toes with the endless face-lifts, and while most of us struggle to figure out how to simply maneuver to view photos, businesses are using the new Timeline to their full advantage.

How you ask? Here are a few perks of the new Timeline that will get your company ready for the switch:

Cover photo and profile image

Instead of just one small image to represent your brand, you can now also use another image as your cover photo. This photo spans the top of your page and is the background for your smaller profile image.

Large pinned posts

Timeline will not allow you to create a default-landing page, however you can manage the posts that appear on your wall. By moving a pinned post to the top of your wall, you can keep the most important and intriguing information and images in the forefront.

Ability to set company milestones

The Milestone section of your Timeline can update your fans about big events in the life of your company. People can visually see the history of your company and relate past experiences to themselves and other companies similar to you.

Facebook Offers

Similar to the Facebook Deals seen on the old Facebook format, the Facebook Offers are sent out to your fans via the news feeds. Not only is this more visible, but it is more personable when they click to claim the offer and it is sent directly to their email.

Whether you are a new company or a mature one, the new Timeline can help to increase awareness of your brand and expand your network.

Give it a go, and let us know how the re-facing of Facebook is working for you, or if you need help adjusting- give us a call!

Feb

Move over Facebook, there is a new social media channel in town

By Heather Horsey Leave a Comment

Pinterest has turned the act of “pinning” into a downright obsession among its 10 million users, providing never-ending pages of images that suck you in and leave you scrolling for more. Needless to say, this site has taken procrastination to the next level.

Maybe it is the ease of pinning a variety of interests to your own boards that other people can “like” as well, or maybe it is just simply enticing because of the wealth of diverse images at your fingertips. In any case, the female fan base has found reason to take up pinning as their new hobby.

Not only is Pinterest surpassing Facebook, Tumblr and the like in driving traffic to top websites such as marthastewartweddings.com, cookinglight.com, and self.com but according to The Week, it is doing so at an exponential rate unseen in other social media channels.

Once an image is repined, it is exposed to an entire new circle of people. A cycle of advertising exposure that is essentially never-ending.

It makes sense, then, that businesses should jump on board this speed train. And that, my friends, is exactly what is happening. Because when it comes down to it, this is target marketing at its finest.

Businesses considering Pinterest can:

Create their own pin boards that represent their company and their values. Think past and future designs, products, interesting product uses, ect.
Smaller companies can even go as far as pinning interests that its employees have, making their company more personally relatable.
Add pin buttons (similar to the Facebook “like” button) to their website so people surfing their site can follow their boards on Pinterest.
Feature new and upcoming products on these boards so the company can get a feel for the popularity based on the number of repins. In short, it is test marketing without the legwork.

Obviously Pinterest is a great social media channel for any company who is advertising products that can be represented visually (food, magazines, fashion, automobiles, home improvement, art, etc.). But it doesn’t have to stop there. For instance, travel agencies can use visually enticing beaches or monuments to capture attention and fitness centers can use images of fit models to make people stop, think and click for more.

When it comes down to it, the basic psychology is this: people want to share their interests, but more importantly they want what everyone else has. The higher the repin number, the more appealing that product becomes and the more attention it gets.

What do you think about Pinterest and how is your company including it in your social media efforts? Have you pinned today?

Sep

Google Instant: More than Interactive Search

By Mark Plumb Leave a Comment

Categories: Advertising, B2B, B2C, Business Strategies, business to business, business to consumer, Google, internet marketing, Marketing, PPC and SEO
Tags: Advertising, B2B, BtoB, business to business, Communications, Google, Marketing, marketing strategy, PPC, SEO

On Sept. 8, Google announced the improved search feature, Google Instant. Users on Google Chrome, Firefox, Safari or Internet Explorer 8 will begin to see results displayed as soon as they type in queries.

At first glance, this simply seems like a time-saver, Google estimates 2 – 5 seconds saved per search. Really only enough time to sip your coffee. However, there is real value to the consumer, and marketers will need to step up vigilance on search term optimization especially for pay per click (PPC) campaigns.

For the consumer, Google Instant is better than the Google suggestions at the bottom of the first page of results. By seeing results as you type, you are better able to refine your search on the fly. Google Instant makes interactive suggestions based on where others have been before.

For example, I typed in ‘ex’ and as you can see Google Instant delivers Expedia as my first option.

BEWARE! Marketers need to be concerned with the rest of the Google changes. In preparation for the launch of Google Instant, Google quietly updated their keyword tool. This generated numerous reports of huge drops in search traffic numbers.

According to Gary Adam Shannon of searchenginewatch.com, the (exact) phrase [golf clubs] used to report an estimate of 165,000 monthly searches two weeks ago:

As of right now, the (exact) phrase [golf clubs] reports 33,100 monthly searches.

If you are currently running a PPC campaign, you must re-evaluate your search terms based on the changes Google has implemented. This will impact website planning, SEO efforts and embedding keywords in websites.

Additionally, a faster, more streamlined search means less opportunity for long tail searches. This will drive up the PPC cost for popular search terms. Online marketers are going to have to go back to the basics as it relates to managing the search engine.

Let us know what you think of Google Instant and if you have seen a drop in your search traffic. Follow Weise Communications on Twitter for more updates.

Jun

Searching for answers: Quora and the boom in the web search industry

By Heather Horsey Leave a Comment

Categories: Bing, Facebook, internet marketing, LinkedIn, Marketing, Microsoft, Quora, Social Media, Twitter, Wall Street Journal, Web sites, Wikipedia and Yahoo! Answers
Tags: Facebook, Microsoft, Quora, Twitter, Wall Street Journal, Wikipedia, Yahoo! Answers

The web search business is booming for engineers hoping to fill the gaps they see left open by Google. One of the new hopefuls who publically launched Monday is Quora.

Developed by two engineers who previously worked for Facebook, the site is a “continually improving collection of questions and answers created, edited and organized by everyone who uses it.” Sounds a little like Wikipedia, but rather the site is a search engine for knowledge that people posses that might not be on the web. Things like how to get a reservation at an exclusive club or the inner workings of a specific company would be searchable Quora items. Users must enter their real names and connect the Quora account with a Facebook or Twitter profile. This link helps Quora route questions posed by other users to those who can potentially answer the questions.

To give you a little more insight, here’s the results from searching: How much of a threat is Google Buzz to Facebook and Twitter? on several search sites.

Quora:

Yahoo! Answers:

Google:

and finally, Bing:

As you can see, Yahoo, Bing and Google come up with similar articles written about the topic, where as Quora brings up a long answer direct to the question from a supposed expert on the topic. Quora, which employs a staff of nine, joins the likes of Yahoo and LinkedIn in trying to build a search-like question and answering service that relies on real people, not machines to do the answering. The key with Quora will be in the user being able to identify the validity of the expert’s knowledge on the question as well as someone answering the question posed.

These efforts of industry leaders and start-ups illustrate the continual evolving web search industry, which must constantly adapt to new information and technology. However, the legitimacy and longevity of these startups seems tenuous. Even the more established Yahoo! Answers has received questionable reviews. When asked about the company’s business model, Quora co-founder (and previous chief technology officer at Facebook) said, “if I had to guess, it would probably involve some kind of advertising,” in a Wall Street Journal article.

Nevertheless, others are taking notice. Facebook, Google and others are testing technology for question and answer-based search services and Google, Yahoo and Microsoft are trying to capture more content uploaded directly by individuals including results from Twitter and Facebook.

Definitely something to keep our eyes on because as the search industry changes, so does the effort to appear in the results. If Quora becomes successful, the way marketers create SEO strategy would need a total overhaul, or at least a facelift.

What are you thoughts on this new industry? Does Quora stand a chance?

Jun

Healthcare: Social Media Marketing in Practice

By Heather Horsey 2 Comments

Categories: healthcare, healthcare marketing, how-to, internet marketing, Marketing and Social Media
Tags: healthcare, healthcare marketing, Marketing, marketing strategy, SEO, Social Media, Social Networking, Twitter

Contributed by Vern Singleton, CEO, Eating Disorder Center of Denver

Vern Singleton, CEO, Eating Disorder Center of Denver

Eating Disorder Center of Denver is one of the nation’s foremost centers for the diagnosis and treatment of the full range of eating disorders, including anorexia, bulimia, binge eating and diabulimia. Based on an individual’s particular clinical needs, EDC-D offers a variety of treatment options, including a partial hospitalization program, intensive outpatient programs, nutritional counseling, outpatient therapy and an evening treatment program.

Full disclosure to our readers: While we typically do not write about our own work, we feel it’s only fair for you to know EDCD is a client of Weise Communications.

How have your marketing initiatives changed in the last 18 months?
We have overhauled our marketing efforts, and online marketing is currently a big part of our media mix. This is quite a change for EDC-D compared to previous years.

How have your public relations initiatives changed in the last 18 months?
Our proactive public relations initiatives have stayed consistent in the traditional outreach we do. But in the last 18 months, we have added a complete social media plan to compliment and enhance our traditional public relations. We are also highly focused on using PR to drive people to our website. It has been a successful endeavor with site visits increasing month over month.

What is your current opinion of social media and its ability to drive business opportunities?
Social media and Internet marketing in general is a measurable way to drive new business – you can see such a return on investment here. Social media can directly drive business opportunities and can increase general exposure when the right tracking methods are in place. Plus, the campaign can be easily tweaked when needed.

What social media outlets is your company actively using? Why?
Facebook, Twitter.

The main goal of social media is to engage others, share information and learn from your network. With people talking about EDC-D, our staff, their experiences at the center, and/or the eating disorder industry, we wanted to “get in the room” – the social media site — and be part of the conversation.

Our Facebook page enables EDC-D to connect with target audiences and build relationships. It also provides one more way for search engines to find EDC-D – social networks rank high on Google searches. Facebook allows us to interact with those who are involved with us on a more personal basis. We also use a Facebook group to help build relationships and support for our network.

Our Twitter campaign increases exposure to our brand and helps us push out important information to those who may be interested in EDC-D. We have used a Twitter account to provide updates and news and direct readers to the website for more information. We also use Twitter to ask questions of our peers and receive the relevant information and/or feedback on where we can go to get that information. Overall Twitter is another helpful branding tool for EDC-D. The Twitter account has also supported our media relations outreach.

What are your corporate goals with social media?
Our corporate goals are to drive business, to increase patient referrals and increase census. We also hope to increase our reach in the eating disorder community in general. By using social media we can hope to make a difference for those who are suffering but not quite ready to seek treatment.

Do you believe social media outlets are here to stay? Why or Why not?
With the mass-penetration into our culture, I think social media is smart for business and a part of our culture that is here to stay.

May

Top Six Secrets to Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Revealed

By Mark Plumb Leave a Comment

I participated in a webinar conducted by HubSpot, the Cambridge-based Internet marketing company, focused on tips and tricks to organically optimize a company search engine rankings.

The biggest takeaway was the creating of a ranking algorithm as a combination of context, authority and social graph. HubSpot identified six SEO tips for companies.
1.    Optimize Your Content – The content you create must be a combination of what ‘searchers’ are looking to find and the keywords that search engines require.
2.    Attract Links to Your Content – Links are on-line recommendations from trusted websites. The most often shared items are new data and insightful blog posts. On the other hand, discount offers and product information are the least shared items.
3.    Publish Relevant Content Frequently – Internal HubSpot research showed that 61 percent of blogs are updated once a week or less. Also, if you commit to a daily blog, you’ll be in the Top 10 percent of businesses.
4.    Be Active in Social Media – With the explosion of Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, del.icio.us and Digg, interesting content is shared by trusted sources. Sharing content you find interesting will also help others consider sharing your content.
5.    Build Large Social Media Networks – Lisa Barone of SocialNetDaily gives 8 Ways To Find Relevant Followers On Twitter – see how easy it is to share relevant content.
6.    Use Call to Action on Landing Pages to Convert Leads – Once you have increased traffic to your website, you need to capitalize on the increased interest in what your company is saying. In the same HubSpot research, 41 percent of businesses acquired a customer through Twitter and LinkedIn, 46 percent through their company blog.
Tell us if you have any success implementing these tips, if your search engine ranking increases and if you are able to convert a lead generated by your social media efforts.
Follow Weise on Twitter and check out Weise Communications on Facebook and “Like” it for future updates.

May

5 Keys to Successful Fusion Marketing

By Mark Plumb Leave a Comment

During challenging economic times, businesses are always looking for low-cost ways to market products and services. Today’s idea is not only inexpensive; it is also a reliable and effective method of marketing products and services.

In its most simplistic form, fusion marketing is partnering with other businesses for the purpose of marketing for one each other’s business. Here is an example, my neighborhood dry cleaners is located next to a sub sandwich restaurant. When I dropped off some dry cleaning, I found a 20 percent coupon for the sandwich shop. I thought I would grab some lunch and when I was paying for my discounted sandwich, I found a 20% percent coupon for the dry cleaners.

These two businesses were sending customers to each other. They had formed a strategic alliance and in marketing lingo, this is called fusion marketing.

The most critical component to successful fusion marketing is to identify the businesses with which to create strategic alliances; identifying these “Power Partners” is the foundation for success. A Power Partner is a business that has a similar target market as your business but doesn’t really compete with the products and services your business offers. Imagination is the only limiting factor when identifying Power Partners.

A powerful fusion marketing combination could be a wedding planner, a florist, a photographer, a baker, a mobile DJ and a bridal shop. How powerful would it be to have a ‘preferred partner’ link on each business website? How about having marketing materials at each business location, so when a prospective bride asks the florist, “Do you know a good photographer?”, the florist has a handy recommendation.

Here are the five keys to setting up a successful fusion marketing alliance:

Key 1: Identify your Power Partners.

Key 2: Determine the offer for each Power Partner. The offers don’t necessarily have to be the same as in the coupon example above.

Key 3: Communicate with each other. Set up a regular meeting time to ensure that everyone agrees how to market each other’s businesses and refer customers.

Key 4: Share prospects and lead generation lists. It may be possible to combine offers in the next customer sales pitch.

Key 5: Responsiveness and follow-up. Respond to customer inquiries and leads from Power Partners. Share lead conversions with Power Partners for future follow-up.

Tell us if you have any fusion marketing success, we are really interested in the combination of Power Partners and your best customer conversion story.

Apr

Creating Provocative Headlines

By Mark Plumb Leave a Comment

Categories: Blogger, Blogs, Communications, Copy writing, Creative, Digital Media, internet marketing, Marketing, PR Tactics, SEO, Social Media, trends, Uncategorized and Viral
Tags: Communications, Marketing, Public Relations, SEO, Social Media

One of the keys to successful online marketing is to have fresh, break-through content updated on your website regularly. However, getting people interested in your content means that you have to have a headline that immediately captures attention.

There are times when authors struggle to generate catchy headlines, now we have a resource – and it’s free!

The Linkbait Generator performs a simple function; it generates captivating headlines based on the subject you type. As most know, linkbaiting creates a natural backlink for your web page by getting people to tweet about it, blog about it or post on user generated content sites. In short Linkbaiting helps your content go viral.

For example, I typed ‘Social Media’ in the subject line and the Linkbait Generator returned these headlines.

10 common misconceptions about social media
Why social media sucks: myth vs. reality
5 insane but true things about social media

I could easily see blogs about any of these topics. As a side note, not every headline will be good or relevant, but with a little patience, it will return something you can develop into an interesting idea.

Tell us if you have any success using Linkbait Generator and get tangible ROI as a result of a more provocative headline.

Apr

Twitter finally reveals mysterious number of registered users

By Mark Plumb Leave a Comment

Since launching in March 2006, Twitter has more than 105 million registered users and is adding 300,000 new accounts a day, co-founder Biz Stone said Wednesday speaking at ‘Chirp’ the first software developers conference.

Twitter also boasted that it’s seeing 600 million search queries per day, which explains the plans to launch an advertising service called “Promoted Tweets” that has already lined up some impressive advertisers, Starbucks, RedBull and BestBuy.

Promoted Tweets will obviously bear watching for marketers as well as a need to develop an understanding for Twitter’s version of SEO. Even more important than learning what is behind the code to get your information to the top of Twitter’s search will be crafting the message to promote your company in 140 characters.

Tell us if you think Twitter will become the next search engine of choice and become a viable social media advertising opportunity. By the way, that last sentence was 133 characters.

Apr

Franchising idea exchange highlights sales, franchisee relations

By Tracy Weise Leave a Comment

Categories: Communications, Franchising, how-to, internet marketing, Marketing, Public Relations and Web sites
Tags: boot camp, franchise sales, franchisee-franchisor relations, Franchising, microsites, online marketing, Optimize

Contributed by Heather Hutchinson, Public Relations Account Manager, Weise Communications

Last night Weise Communications hosted an event for the local chapter of the International Franchise Association’s Women’s Franchise Committee. Professional women in franchising from the Denver-metro area gathered to exchange ideas on relationship challenges, compliance, and thinking outside the box for franchise sales.

One great idea that came from the “group scoop” brainstorming session was hosting a boot camp for your franchise each year. By gathering franchisees, franchisors and the franchise sales team, the group can reconnect on the core mottos, systems, and metrics of the franchise. Basic training reminds everyone why he or she became a part of the franchise in the first place. It also shows were deviation had occurred and provides a path back to success for struggling franchises. The idea is sure to help franchises and other businesses stay on track for long-term success.

Another great idea, which has been previously written about on The Side Note, is about online sales for franchises creating a microsite. Microsites, a separately promoted part of a larger website, are perfect for the franchise sales application. When optimized, the microsite directs the sales messaging to those interested in starting a franchise. Thus, hot leads are sent straight to the sales team. Keeping customers and potential franchisees separate by using your website and microsite in tandem ensures that each audience gets the messages and content that matters to them.

Thanks to all who attended the event. The idea exchange and brainstorming session brought to light some encouraging franchise relationship tactics, sales ideas, and created strong women in franchising connections.

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Archive for the 'internet marketing' Category

Google Instant: More than Interactive Search

5 Keys to Successful Fusion Marketing

Franchising idea exchange highlights sales, franchisee relations

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