Archive for the ‘Analytics’ Category
Social Media and Journey…Don’t Stop Believin’
April 5th, 2010 | 
Author: 
It’s hard not to notice all the local AND national brands out there in social media land that just don’t get it.
For instance, on Twitter I see many well-known businesses and organizations who have apparently just given up completely. Typically, they haven’t posted a tweet in 2 months or longer and they don’t follow back. It’s like they tried it, didn’t work…moving on. Giving up is the easy thing to do.
A popular song by Journey suddenly pops into my head…”Don’t Stop Believin’”
Here’s the chorus:
Strangers waiting, Up and down the boulevard
Their shadows searching in the night
Streetlights, people, Livin’ just to find emotion
Hidin’, somewhere in the night
Yep, that sounds about right. They’re hiding somewhere in the night…waiting on “the boulevard.”
With so much hype surrounding social media, it’s easy to understand how a business can set up a Twitter account, post a few tweets and then wait patiently for the social media tooth fairy to arrive with thousands of new potential customers…only to be disillusioned when nothing happens.
Sorry, but it doesn’t work that way. Social media is just like anything else. You get out of it what you put into it. Take some time every day and do a Twitter search to find interesting people to follow and by all means, follow people back. You don’t have to follow everybody back, but you should check them out and follow those that make sense to you.
Most importantly…engage. One of the best ways to grow your audience is to participate in pertinent conversations and provide interesting information to your followers.
Don’t expect a glorious appearing of new business in the first month. But, do monitor your analytics closely to see what’s working and what isn’t…keep managing & tweaking the process and you will see results. Above all, “Don’t Stop Believin’”!
For more information, or to get help with your social media strategy, CONTACT US!
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5 Ways To Spot A Snake Oil Salesperson
The social media “experts” are coming out of the woodwork like crazy. Here’s a little tip for you…there is no such thing as a social media expert. Social media lives and breathes. It evolves and changes. It turns left and right and this way and that way. There are no experts. There are only some who know more than others and some who pretend to know more than others…otherwise known as a snake oil salesperson (notice I didn’t say salesman or saleswoman).
Having said all that…here are a few tips on how to tell if the person who called on you is someone who truly knows their stuff…or someone who may know the lingo, but probably can’t deliver.
A snake oil salesperson…
1 - Tweets about themselves and what THEY are doing…constantly.
2 – Uses automated programs like “Top Followed” to grow their list of followers.
2 – Does not re-tweet others and isn’t involved in conversations on Twitter.
3 - Has a Facebook page containing posts with no links, has only been live for a month and only has 20 fans.
4 – Doesn’t have a blog on their website, or they haven’t posted on their blog in 2 months.
5 - Can’t provide success stories or share any case studies of their work.
The snake oil salesperson is out there and on the prowl. Don’t get led down the primrose path. Do a little homework and make a good call. Work with a consultant who has a proven track record of success and can back it up.
For more information, or to get help with your social media strategy, CONTACT US!
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Report: Social networking up 83 percent for U.S.
Source: Cnet.com
The explosion in social networking may be even greater than imagined. The time that people in the U.S. spend on social network sites is up 83 percent from a year ago, according to a report from market researcher Nielsen Online.
Facebook enjoys the top spot among social networks, with people having spent a total of 13.9 billion minutes on the service in April of this year, 700 percent more than in April 2008, Nielsen said. Minutes spent on Twitter soared a whopping 3,712 percent to almost 300 million, versus around 7.8 million from the same month a year ago.
Former top dog MySpace watched its usage drop nearly one-third to around 4.9 billion minutes, from 7.2 billion in April 2008. MySpace still scored the number one spot for online video among the top 10, thanks to its users streaming more than 120 million videos from the site for April of this year.
10 Ways To Get Your Readers Hooked To Your Blog
Source: http://davidmcdonough.com/393/10-ways-to-get-your-readers-hooked-to-your-blog/
The best way to retain a constant flow of traffic to your blog is to get your readers hooked. Once you have a loyal bunch of readers who hang on your every word and can not wait for your next post, you can call yourself a successful blogger. So how do you get your readers hooked on your blog? These 10 quick tips will show you the way.
1. Surprise Your Readers
People love the unexpected. Make yourself unpredictable by doing things differently once in a while. This could be taking a new direction, using video or just simply something you don’t normally do. This keeps people interested.
2. Be Funny
Most bloggers are overly serious so being humorous can make your blog stand out. Blogs should be entertaining and not full and readers should not fall asleep reading your posts.
3. Predict the Future
Occasionally you can use your knowledge to make some bold claims about the future related to your niche topic. People will take notice, particularly if you have some authority on the subject.
4. Be Honest
People can pick a liar from a mile off; they can also pick those who are skirting around the truth. Telling the absolute truth is bound to gain attention.
5. Tell Stories
People love stories and stories can put a lot of weight behind your posts. Think up some great short stories and post them once a month or so. People will look forward to these posts as part of your schedule.
6. Break The News
If you can be the first to break a story, then your blog will be linked to like crazy. Stay on top of events to put yourself in this envious position.
7. Use Pictures
Pictures can tell a thousand words. They can also be used to entertain. Why not find a funny picture to go with a special post once per week?
8. Disprove Facts
If other bloggers are all talking about a particular topic but you can prove its wrong, do it! Being controversial gains you attention.
9. Put Readers First
Readers want to feel special. Write for them and you will be rewarded.
10. Quality over Quantity
Rather than post 3 unexciting posts per day, cut down to a few times per week and make them longer, more interesting and well researched posts. These posts will stay around a lot longer than short, meaningless blog posts.
How Facebook Will Upend Advertising
Source: BusinessWeek.com
With social networks like Facebook transforming the way companies communicate with consumers, it’s time for the ad industry to get its head out of the sand.
The guessing games over Facebook’s worth are back on again. They were reignited by the news on May 26 that Facebook has accepted a $200 million investment that values the company at $10 billion.
Much of the discussion centers on the ability, or lack thereof, of Facebook and other social networks to sell advertising and deliver advertising results. People get on Facebook to socialize, not hunt for products—or so the argument runs.
But that argument misses the point. The question isn’t how advertising will work on Facebook but rather how Facebook and social networks like News Corp.’s (NWS) MySpace are changing advertising. I’m loath to affix the 2.0 moniker to yet another phrase, but if ever an industry needed to be 2.0-ized, it’s advertising.
Almost a century ago, retailer John Wannamaker is reported to have said: “Half of all advertising works, I just don’t know which half.” Today the percentage may be far lower. On the Internet, click-through rates have fallen precipitously as clutter has replaced clarity. These days an ad has performed exceptionally well if at least 1 in 10 people who see it click on it. Much of the time click-through rates that once approached 3% are more like 0.3%.
Twitter Proves Its Worth as a Killer App for Local Businesses
New Orleans Pizza Joint, Chicago Yogurt Chain See Results From Promos on Microblogging Service
NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — All those brands trying to figure the ROI of Twitter? They might do well to follow the lead of the local pizza joint.
Naked Pizza, a New Orleans healthful-pizza shop that’s hoping to go national — Mark Cuban is a backer — has been marketing itself via the microblogging service. And recently it has started to track Twitter-spurred sales at the register. In a test run April 23, an exclusive-to-Twitter promotion brought in 15% of the day’s business.
“Every phone call was tracked, every order was measured by where it came from, and it told us very quickly that Twitter is useful,” said Jeff Leach, the restaurant’s co-founder. “Sure, there’s the brand marketing and getting-to-know-you stuff. … But we wanted to know: Can it make the cash register ring?”
Mr. Leach is one of many small businesses using Twitter as a marketing tool — and his group could turn out to be a lucrative market for the fast-growing site if other local entrepreneurs have similar experiences.
Twitter’s real-time messaging service is turning out to be a boon to local establishments, who are starting to get onboard — mostly because the message pops into users’ Twitter feeds and they’re close enough to act on it. For Mr. Leach, who is targeting people within a three-mile radius of his store, that’s key. He’s gone so far as to erect a billboard outside his store publicizing Naked Pizza’s Twitter handle (which got him written up in TechCrunch). After that, Twitter contacted him; he’s going to be working with the company to beta test some applications for small businesses.
Poll shows wide business acceptance of social media
Business use of social media appears to be gaining wide acceptance, according to the results of an online survey by the Silicon Valley/San Jose Business Journal.
More than two-thirds of those who responded to the most recently completed Business Pulse survey said they use sites like LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook for work.
About 12 percent said they use social media only for business. About 18 percent said they use it only for personal enjoyment.
Another 37 percent said they use the sites for both reasons.
About 11 percent said they have tried the sites but don’t use them while about 19 percent said they have never been to a social media site.
Reader Tim Bailey sounds like a wary user: “Social media is both a marketing/product planning/support opportunity and could become a nightmare. Businesses now need to be constantly using and reviewing what’s stated about their company and products.”
Steven Buchholz is a business-only user: “I use LinkedIn and don’t think I’ve even looked into the Web sites of any of the others.”
Trudy Holmes concurs, sort of: “I agree that LinkedIn is the site for business referrals and networking opportunities. Facebook seems to have a lot of fun and games that people play. OMG. I just played one!”
A reader who didn’t give a name is another happy LinkedIn user who is experimenting with other sites: “LinkedIn, I agree, is very useful for business. I’m trying to figure out how to use Twitter — it seems to have no redeeming value whatsoever. Plaxo is redundant and less useful than LinkedIn, IMHO.”
How Twitter Can Drive Your Bottom Line
by Stephen DiMarco
Given this explosive growth, is there any doubt that brands will try to tap Twitter as a marketing tool? But therein lays the challenge: marketers haven’t encountered anything like Twitter before. Despite its large user base, the underlying mechanics of Twitter are really about being atomically small. As a marketer, how can you hope to drive sales or create a branded experience when you’re faced with a 140-character limit and a massively fragmented audience? How do you attract a following? How does it influence your other marketing programs? And how do you know if your efforts are creating ROI?
More than half of 2009 Top 500 e-retailers have a presence on Facebook
A study of social networking for Internet Retailer’s forthcoming Top 500 Guide shows that 56.8% of all retailers, or 284 companies, have a presence on the social networking site Facebook.com. Research conducted from late 2008 through early April also shows that 207 of Top 500 e-retailers, or 41.4%, have placed a video or are mentioned in one on online video community YouTube.com. A total of 143 Top 500 merchants, or 28.6%, are on MySpace.com and 102 – 20.4% – are linked to followers on Twitter.com.
Top 500 retailers also are identified with less prominent social networking sites. A total of 52, or 10.4%, have a presence on shopping-oriented Kaboodle.com; 19, or 3.8%, on ThisNext.com; and 27 – 5.4% – on fashion-slanted StyleHive.com.
Social Networking Generates Leads, Closes Sales for Marketers
by Jack Loechner
According to a social media study by Michael Stelzner for the Social Media Success Summit 2009, 88% of marketers in a recent survey say they are now using some form of social media to market their business, though 72% of those using it say they have only been at it a few months or less.
| Marketer’s Use of Social Media Tools | |
| Social Media | % Respondents Using |
|
86% |
|
| Blogs |
79 |
|
78 |
|
|
77 |
|
| YouTube or other video |
41 |
| Social bookmark sites |
38 |
| Forums |
38 |
| StumbleUpon |
28 |
| Digg, Reddit or similar |
26 |
| FriendFeed |
18 |
| Source: Social Media Marketing Industry Report, March 2009 | |
- Small-business owners are more likely to use LinkedIn than employees working for a corporation
- Men are significantly more likely to use YouTube or other video marketing than women (52.4% of all men compared with 31.7% of women)
- For those just getting under way with social media marketing, LinkedIn is ranked as their number-two choice, pushing blogging down one notch
- Among those who have been using social media for a few months, Facebook is in second place. This group also has more Twitter use
- Twitter is used by 94% of marketers who have been using social media for years, followed closely by blogs. This group also endorses online video significantly more than the other groups
