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Monday, September 29, 2014

Social Media As an Internet Marketing Tool


Advertise on various social media platforms.
Online advertising in today's world has become a lot easier, compared in the previous decade when the only option to advertise was to pay search engines for showing you on search results. With the help of social media websites and millions of users using these sites, social media marketing has become an integral part of many companies' promotional strategies.

It is imperative that your business should make high quality ads that are informative and entertaining at the same time. Your ads can get thousands of views every single day if they incorporate entertaining and informative factors. When users will click to open your ads, the promotion of your business starts naturally.

Interaction is a must in promotions and therefore it is imperative that you give attention to the reviews and comments that the consumers write. Do not think that only videos can bring you more consumers. As far as you have got good quality content, you are in for some really good flow of new customers.

Interact with customer comments and reviews


An easy way to build up your customer contact list is to ask them to fill out a survey for you, regardless of the fact if they buy from you or not. Surveys help you to get useful information about demographics and preferences and at the end of survey you might ask the users to subscribe to your emails.

In addition, to get the accurate results you might need a consultant. Together with putting up your ads, a consultant will be helpful in promoting user interactions and comments area and evaluating the analytics for campaigns and also tweaking them when trends change. Plus he will introduce your business to new media groups.

A proper strategy is paramount for the success of your social media marketing. This includes having a
detailed plan before executing it live. You should make short term and long-term goals along with allocating a budget for carrying out all operations effectively.

Social media websites are used all over the world. Remember everyday more and more new users log on to these sites, which means that you have greater chance of connecting with newer users every day. Remember, you need to stand out from the clutter, so make sure that your content has quality and creativity.
Conducting a survey


At last remember that the more you interact with your users, the more they will go for your brand, even though you are just a beginner in the market. And the more people see your brand, the greater chance you have of getting more consumers.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Taresa_Farfan

Saturday, September 27, 2014

6 Tips To Increase Social Media Shares

Although some people believe that great content will magically get exposure on its own, even the best content requires a push. When content isn't actively marketed, it's never going to get as much attention as it would if it were. In terms of what to focus on with your social marketing efforts, shares are a very good metric.

While shares themselves aren't going to translate into new leads or customers, when the number of social shares for a piece of content continues to grow, it greatly increases the likelihood that more people from your target demographic will come into contact with your business. So if you want to put your brand in front of as many potential customers as possible, let's take a look at six different ways to increase social media shares:

Write a Great Title

Regardless of how good a piece of content is, if it doesn't have an awesome title, it's not going to receive maximum exposure. In addition to spending enough time to come up with a great title, you may also want to use social media to test the effectiveness of different titles.


Share Through Relevant Sites Like Reddit 

Even though your blog post may not be a good fit for the Reddit homepage, chances are there's a subreddit with people who would enjoy reading and sharing it. By taking time to identify relevant subreddits and other forums, you can give your content a big social media boost. Just remember that it's considered a social media best practice to spend some time contributing to an online community before you do anything that may be considered self-promotional.

Have a Keyword Strategy

Although keyword stuffing isn't an effective strategy, doing your research to find relevant keywords and then incorporating them into a post will maximize its short and long-term exposure. If you're concerned that you don't have the resources to do keyword research, enlisting the social media services of an agency can take care of this issue for you.

Reach Out To Contacts

Since momentum can play a big role in the total amount of shares a piece of content receives, don't be afraid to directly ask people in your network to check out your latest piece of content and then share it with others.

Choose the Right Time


A key social media marketing strategy that many people overlook is the impact of when an item is shared. As a rule of thumb, sharing earlier in the day is the best way to get as much exposure as possible.

Add a Picture

Pinterest isn't the only social media site where images are important. Since data shows that pictures increase exposure on Twitter and Facebook as well, be sure to include at least one really great image in any post that you publish.

This is the syndicated copy of an original article posted at webstrategyplus.com

CEO of Web Strategy Plus a full service digital agency & a passionate Internet Marketer with 15+ years of successful online business development experience. We help businesses by providing web services such as website design & redesign, social media design, social media management, website logo design, SEO and more!



Tuesday, September 23, 2014

How to Turn Your Followers Into Content Marketers for Your Brand

Businesses today look for the best ways to reach potential customers online. The interruptive forms of advertising, such as "pop-up" ads, are no longer seen as effective. Consumers are more apt to close an ad after giving it the briefest of glances. For this reason, brands are turning to content marketing as the best way to draw in customers.




Content marketing is not about writing descriptions of your products, giving them a title and posting them across the Web to any site that will have them. It is to provide valuable information to consumers, which is relevant to your brand. In doing so, you are presenting yourself as an expert and a business that can meet a person's needs.

One of the keys to a successful content strategy is to incorporate it, hand-in-hand, with your social media strategy. Once you produce content, social networking channels are the best way to share it with your audience.

A challenge that companies face in this strategy is producing enough content that is going to encourage the audience to interact and engage. A way to keep unique content coming is to encourage your followers to create content for you.

There are apps available that will make it easier to invite your audience to make and share content that is related to your brand:

Put It to a Vote

Using voting apps, create a topic that your followers can vote on. For instance, a t-shirt design or the name of a new menu item. Voting not only gets people to cast a vote for their favorite, but it also starts a conversation within the comments. You gain valuable insight from the people who support your brand.
Choose a topic, ask your followers to vote and see how far the conversation goes.

Personalize the Experience

You can use engagement apps to provide your followers with a more individualized experience. For example, if you are a clothing brand, you can send each user suggestions for clothing pieces that match their style profile.
Find ways to make the fan feel as if you have singled them out for a new product or service. This level of service is something that they will be quick to share among their own social networks.

Invite Fans to Submit Content

When you invite your followers to create something for your brand, it contributes to that sense of community that you are trying to build. It makes your fans like an important part of your business.
Ask them to submit videos, stories, and photos for you to post on your site and share on social media.


Throw Down a Challenge

People like to test their knowledge against others, so putting up a quiz is a good way to engage with your followers. Ask people to submit their own questions that will be informative for the audience while relating to your brand.

For example, if you are a travel company, you can post questions that relate you favorite destinations. These types of posts see a lot of engagement on social media because they are fun and interesting.
Encouraging your audience to take an active role in your content marketing doesn't just make things simpler for your brand. It also creates a connection with your followers that cannot be created in other ways.

People want to feel like the things they have to say matter to you. Bringing them in as a part of your content creation leads to stronger bonds with your customer.

How are you getting your audience to help with content marketing?

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Dawn_Pigoni

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Thursday, September 18, 2014

Social Media Marketing Made Easy

Social media marketing is a rapid form of marketing. Getting the word about your business, services and products faster than one ever could do using the power of this medium. Users today are constantly "available" on social networking sites and care to interact and engage with something that's interesting out there. If you want to get that initial attention for your business, going social is the right option. Create your business profile and make it as interesting as possible. Never let your business page get boring - keep it full of life with interesting stuff to share.


There are so many ways to keep your social media profile live and full of activity. Here's listing a few:
Share images
Images receive more appeal then text content. Images convey the message faster. So even if the main message of your business is in the form of text, it's a good idea to accompany it with an image. Images drive more traffic and effectively help spread the word about your business. It is said that posts with images receive 18% more clicks than posts with plain text.


Share content More than once
You cannot let your online profile be dull. Posting more than once a day has become a mandate. Your existing fans will like to read about you more than once. Plus there is an "out of sight - out of mind" factor. You have to keep up the activity going. Sharing information, some similar external information, services, products, new launches - everything is fine! Just keep it "alive".


Target different time zones
Well, this is an important aspect of sharing when you are thinking of online marketing using social networking. Reaching your audience from different time zones could mean more business page fans for you. You can even tweet the same link twice. Although it's recommended to share unique content every time you post.

Keep the audience in mind for your content
Content written with the audience in mind always works the best. Looking at the type of business and the type of audience, draft content to be shared carefully. Make the content worth a read. Don't forget to post a landing page to your main site. Content that captures the attention in the first go drives more traffic to your website.



Social media marketing could be a powerful tool for your business. Customers and businesses can freely and transparently interact, building good customer relationships and building great brands.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Pranali_Mehta

Monday, September 15, 2014

How To Use Twitter to Build Your Brand

Launched in March of 2006, Twitter is a social media success story. On average, users now post more than 500 million tweets daily. Moreover, the use of hashtags (#) allows the grouping of similarly-themed tweets, meaning you can easily find and follow topics of interest.

twitter for business
Bottom line: Twitter is a powerful tool for media professionals looking to keep up with topical news, monitor a topic, research a topic, or network with others. If you think Twitter is irrelevant or full of talkers, think again. By utilising a few simple tools, you can reap valuable information with relatively little effort or cost.

And the more you know, the better prepared you are to make informed decisions.

What can you measure with Twitter?

You can't manage something you can't (or don't) measure. Twitter allows you a close look at a surprising number of important metrics, thereby giving you pertinent statistics and insight for strategic planning.

For instance, here are three important metrics you can easily determine about your Twitter account:

  • Follower Count: While not a stand-alone indicator of either popularity or interaction (follower count is easily skewed, just buy a few thousand), follower count does provide insight, especially when you look deeper to WHO is doing the following. No special tool is needed to determine this metric. Every Twitter profile reveals the total number of tweets, the number of followers, and how many others are being followed.
  • Follower Growth: This one takes some tracking over time. You can do that manually; simply record starting numbers on a spreadsheet and record the change at intervals. You can also find tools (paid and free) that provide growth tracking. Online services come and go, so it is always best to perform a current search for them. Check Twitaholic for an interesting look at a simple and revealing read out.
  • Reach: When you tweet, are you shouting down an empty pipe or are others really listening and reacting? Reach tells you how many others your messages are (potentially) touching. Want to know how much buzz a television special generated last night? Are you wondering how well a certain hashtag is doing? Try TweetReach on for size.
These three are but a beginning. Think about the metrics important to you. Chances are the tool to determine them is already developed and waiting.REMEMBER: Twitter data is almost entirely transparent. You can look deeply at the metrics for your own account and you can scrutinise the accounts of others.
twitter for business

Set up a listening post

Some Twitter services are free. Some are paid. Most offer both a lite (free) and intensive (paid) version. The possibilities are constantly in flux, with new tools and services popping up (and going away) on a regular basis.
By setting up a listening post, you can monitor any person, any company, or any topic being discussed on Twitter (which covers a whole lot of ground).

Here are a few of the best-known providers:

  • Hootsuite: One cool tool. Hootsuite is a command station for managing your own account, following other accounts, keeping up with the activity being generated around terms and hashtags — it is a full service monitoring tool. And you can not only listen to what is happening, but send out tweets (or schedule tweets to be sent later) directly from the dashboard. Even the free version is powerful. Hootsuite gets the Writer's Choice nod.
  • Topsy: If you've yet to be overly impressed by a social media research tool, this one might turn the tide. Social search, social analytics, social trends — Topsy churns out a user-friendly ton of data. Definitely take a look at Topsy.
  • SocialOomph: This service is similar to Hootsuite. Compare both to consider which would provide the best match for you and your needs. While the free version is not as robust as the one offered by Hootsuite, the premium model is stacked with research possibilities.
One more observation of importance: Twitter is especially powerful for finding out about mobile users. The 140-character limit for tweets matches the normal activity of text-messaging aficionados perfectly. The Compete 2012 study confirmed that one-fifth of all mobile Twitter use is on tablets — a growing segment as the industry evolves — with the majority being either Android or Apple tablets.
twitter for business

Why does type of device matter?

Mobile users tend to be more active, more engaged with brands, and more engaged with content. Once considered only a young person's favourite device, mobile has exploded. Even Grandma is carrying a smartphone — and she is using it.

By monitoring the Twitter terms, people, or topics that matter to you and engaging those who care about the same topics in conversation, you'll find out more, do more, earn more and have more fun.
Written by TeamSMF

Contact us on Twitter, on Facebook, or leave your comments below. To find out about social media training or management why not take a look at our website for more info http://socialmediacambridge.co.uk/.

Saturday, September 13, 2014

Social Media, International Reach, and Increased Spending

Are you a small business owner with the big goal of reaching an international audience? While it may be a challenge to sign on customers from other parts of the world, this is not nearly as difficult as it once was.
 
Thanks in large part to social media, you now have the chance to expand your international reach, showing prospects in other parts of the world that you have what it takes to provide them with the best product or service for their company.

Don't believe this to be true? Consider the following: Facebook recently announced that it has 100 million users in Africa. This may be a drop in the hat when compared to other parts of the world, such as the United States, but it shows that the opportunity to connect internationally is greater than ever before. The more people who use social media sites in other parts of the world the easier it becomes to connect with them on a business to business level. Sticking with the international talk, a recent study by Conference Genie shows that small and mid-size businesses in many UK industries are getting involved with social media marketing at a higher rate. Here are some interesting stats from the study:

Travel, retail, and technology companies noted that they would spend the most money on marketing as 2014 comes to an end 71 percent of companies surveyed in the fitness and health industry believe that social media is a cost efficient way to promote their business. Half of retail industry companies surveyed showed concern about engaging with their audience via Facebook. These are all interesting statistics, as there is a good chance that at least one hits home within your company.

Do you plan on spending more money on social media marketing during the last four months of the year? Do you believe this is a cost effective way to spend your marketing dollars? Do you have concerns about how you connect with your audience? In today's day and age, there is a big time opportunity to expand on an international level.



It can be a challenge to take the first step, but the use of social media will ensure that you are on the right path. Facebook, among other social media sites, are growing in regions throughout the world. This is prompting more and more companies to spend additional time and money on expanding their international reach.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Peg_McDermott

Wednesday, September 3, 2014

How to Market on the BIG 4 - Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+

However, there is also the fact that not all these people can reach you when you are trying to market your services online. The problem is not that they cannot reach you, the real problem lies in the fact that you are not able to reach out to them in the most appropriate way so far.



Engaging the users
When you take a closer look at the social media platforms that are out there you will come to realize that the biggest thing that they all thrive on is the ability to engage users. If you cannot keep users engaged chances are high that you will be a one off stop for them as they move on to the next big thing. Do not just fill them up with information, make sure that the information you are giving them is something that has a call to action, something that will definitely keep their minds thinking, and you will have had your first win on marketing strategies.

Commenting and Liking on content
Do not underestimate the shares, likes, retweets, comments and so forth. These are very important to your strategy because the more your content is shared out there the easier it will be for the relevant social networks to consider your content as relevant and the more it will be shared all over. These social networks also work in the same way that search engines work. They appreciate relevant content because users also appreciate the same, and this way it becomes easier for you to gain an advantage online.

Keep it short
Indeed you would love to tell the users some interesting story, but by the end of the day, not all of them have that time to read through all of that. The longer your posts are the easier it is for them to get distracted. Try and keep your content relatively shorter but precise and to the point.

These are strategies that have been used in the past and still work for a lot of people. The main reason for this is because of the fact that these strategies are perfectly designed to work across all the major social networks, and there is no other way you will expect to succeed if you are not working towards this line of thought. If you are a serious marketer it is time you considered effectively optimizing your social network presence to get the best results by understanding some of these strategies well enough.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Becky_Watson

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/8702154