Category: Social media marketing

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Why is there spam?

It works. It makes money. Think about it.  Why would so much effort be made to create and disseminate something that it seems everyone hates and never reads?

There is a lesson about social media marketing in today’s example. My wife received an email that spoofed my name. It wasn’t from any of my accounts. It was correctly marked “Junk” by her email app. She didn’t notice anything other than it seemed to be from me, opened the email and clicked the link. This was a successful transaction in terms of marketing and shows why companies are spending money of Facebook to replicate this kind of effectiveness because of the social engineering that is involved. People are simply more likely to act on something recommended by family or friends.

You can do something to counteract this kind of effectiveness. It may seem like a lot of work but you should make sure before you click any link that:

  • The name of the person and the email address make sense
  • The link’s text makes sense with the URL that you are going to visit. In most browsers you can see this address near the bottom of the screen when you mouse over the link.

The problem is compounded by the general lackadaisical approach people take to their passwords. A recent report on Mashable is titled:

This can make it pretty easy for unscrupulous spammers to hack into your address book(s). Especially if you use the same password for many different sign ons.
If not, your spam filter will need to work overtime.
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How to use social media to prove that you shouldn’t be trusted

A share appeared in my LinkedIn feed titled “10 Simple Steps to Building Trust and Getting Readers to Take Action”. I read the article but couldn’t believe what I saw. The author based none of his steps on actual results, didn’t follow his own advice and stated things that were just plain wrong.

For example, when someone makes a pronouncement like his opening “Getting exposure to your blog or website is the number one ingredient for a successful business.” I look for reasons to agree or disagree. He gives none. Lacking any input from him I would disagree by arguing something like “making sure your customer gets what you promised is the number one ingredient for a successful business”. I can give you many, many examples of successful businesses that get no exposure to either a blog or a website whatsoever. That means his “is the number one ingredient” might really be “can, in some cases, be a useful ingredient”. He should have followed that up with “… and here’s why” but he didn’t so we really learned nothing.

In light of his opening statement I began to look for what it is that he might know about “successful business”. It appears to be nothing at all. He identifies himself to be a student. He doesn’t have a business.

This post might be less distasteful if he could have said anything in the first person so that it was clear his points were personal opinions and were not based on facts either observed or researched. Instead he keeps to the third person impersonal which is a voice that is meaningless unless some kind of reasons for making the statements are listed. There are none.

As for following his own advice, his point “Use the Same Profile Picture on all Social Media Sites” is laughable since his Twitter portrait is different from his blog portrait. Ever hear the old saying about practicing what you preach?

Since he is emphatic about responding to negative comments “Learn that Criticism is to be Accepted Not Disputed” I tried to post my opinion to his blog. He did not approve my post as submitted.

If his points weren’t so elementary and disjointed he might be seen as explaining some, but not all, of the elements of personal branding. As I don’t need to explain to you branding is one of the most important aspects of your online presence. Since he didn’t mention branding at all he should not be given that much credit.

Social media is big news. Many people are looking for answers. There are no answers in this post. It should not be trusted.

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How important is SEO in lead generation?

 

The Samurai Business Group is one of the finest sales management training companies around. I was fortunate to have the opportunity to take their Black Belt Sales Training course and it gave me a string of epiphanies about the buying process and how marketing and sales fit into that process.

I have the pleasure of talking with both of the founders, Bob Lambert and Dan Kreutzer, on a regular basis. We frequently touch on various problems of interest to most people in business. I consider both of them to be trusted advisors.

Samurai has this to say about prospecting for leads:

5 Active Activities on Prospecting include: 
1. Quality Introductions (QIs)
2. Referrals
3. Alliances
4. Networking
5. Targeted Direct Mail/Phone

This is ordered to represent the most likely activity to result in a sale (QIs) to least likely. It is a good thing that numbers 4 and 5 can be helped by SEO because large numbers of interactions are necessary to achieve a lead, let alone a sale. Networking in particular must be seen to include not only search engine results but the entire ecosystem of online interactions. A business can begin to analyse metrics that include how many visits to the company website result in a lead or a sale.

What the list doesn’t suggest is how important validation has become in both the development of leads and getting a sale. Almost every buyer consults a range of online resources before making a buying decisions in nearly every type of transaction according to the research funded by Google in the pamphlet “Zero Moment of Truth”.

If we look at the process for achieving success with quality introductions, referrals and alliances we see that the validation process that is now so common in the buying process would be incorporated here as well. Wouldn’t you Google a potential alliance partner or referral?

SEO increases the number of qualified visits to your website. The specific number of visits necessary to reach your goals will vary but, in the case of website visits, more is always better. These visits are better yet when properly qualified to how people look for what you offer which is the point of SEO by sem[c].

This report shows the relative effectiveness of SEO against social media and pay per click:

2012 State of Digital Marketing Report - SEO company, Webmarketing123

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Social Media can be a part of successful search engine marketing

There should be no question that social media can be an integral part of search engine marketing. Social media content is content afterall.  At sem[c] we have been cross-linking our clients’ social media and websites for years. The prime business goal for a business, that will do the work necessary to best utilize social media (and it’s a lot of work), is to have good, real, frequently updated and optimized content on their website and an active and very interactive social profile. Each will drive traffic to the other. In both cases the strategy is based on the fact that sales are positively influenced by the amount of qualified traffic looking at your content. Each type of content serves a distinct and different purpose. Each type of content has costs and benefits.

You should think of your website as a repository of everything there is to know about your business. You should assume that by the time a prospect interacts with you they will have read everything on your website that is important to them. You really want to be in the short list of possibilities when a prospect is looking for what you sell. To be successful at this you need to develop a contemporary looking website with good, original content. The SEO process as practiced by sem[c] will help you to do this in a way that will get you found AND make it clear to a prospect what’s in it for them. A link to your social media will allow the prospect to see what other people are saying.  The costs are monetary: website development, hosting, domain name and time: content generation and organization.

You should think of social media as both part of the validation process when prospects are investigating your business and a potential source of traffic to your website when a prospects finds you via their social network. If someone gets interested in your business because of one your mutual friends they will want to know more and will visit your website. The great thing about social media is that it has little in upfront technical costs. The real cost comes in time. To get the most value out of your social media you will need to create content in an attractive way.  The goal is to get people to react to that content which allows you to interact with them. This is the most important task in maintaining social media and it works even in the case of “negative” comments. In fact, like in the old saw that there is no such thing as bad pr, any comment in your social media, no matter how bad it is, can send a powerful message about your business.

Social media can be a great tool in your online marketing toolkit.

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Social Media Marketing (SMM)

sem[c] can help you sort out the social media jungle.
We’ve been using various types of social media, as appropriate, for our clients for years. For all the hype one is led to think that Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and all the other permutations are the silver bullet of marketing. In fact, we have found that the effectiveness varies from business to business according to a number of variables. Some types of social media work better for lifestyle-oriented businesses while others are more appropriate for B2B.

One of the dirty little secrets of a successful social media deployment is the same dirty little secret that applies to websites – fresh content is absolutely necessary. This is a requirement that is easily met if a business owner likes to write or has someone on staff that is a good writer. If not someone needs to be hired that can act as the voice of the business. Social media is only successful when this voice is engaging to the audience.

The current “common knowledge” about the importance and ease of social media is reminiscent of the early overly enthusiastic “if you build it they will come” hype about websites. In either case, implementing a strategic plan is what is going to help generate the interactions that will be good for your business.

Please contact us with any questions about using social media successfully.

 

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Have you seen the latest feature of Google+?

Google is now including search returns that are influenced by their social network as a part of each search that you do.  What this means is that sites that are recommended by people that you know appear more prominently in Google searches. This means that your search returns are being tailored to you personally.

This makes your ability to create and promote a page on Google+ a really good idea. You can visit our page at Search Engine Marketing Chicago on Google+ to see what it looks like.  Once you create a page you can put a badge on your website to solicite +1’s from your visitors. You can see an example of one of the badges on our website Search Engine Marketing Chicago, Inc.

Bing has announced plans to make their returns influences by your social network contacts as well so this is clearly a trend in the major search engines.

Constant Contact has now made Facebook campaign tools available, too. Visit ours at Search Marketing Chicago on Facebook!
Contact us for additional information about how social networking can positively influence your business’ online marketing profile.
Got questions? Call, click or Google… you’ll reach us.
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The latest and greatest?

Groupon has become a huge phenomenon for B2C businesses. By combining old-fashioned coupons with social networking, Groupon has created a new genre by offering these businesses some great benefits: a very large audience, qualified offer recipients and a fast infusion of cash shortly after the offer runs. This doesn’t sound like it has a lot of downside, does it?
The problem can occur when all those happy Groupon customers want what they have paid for in advance all at the same time. The flood of requests can overwhelm most small to medium sized businesses. If the business can’t deliver their new Groupon customers what they’ve already bought when they want them these new customers are going to be disappointed.  Disappointed customers are not inclined to continue using a vendor who has disappointed them.

What this scenario reveals is a risk of providing a lot of goods or, more likely, services at a deep discount with a lessened possibility of a significant lifetime value that repeat customers offer a business.

The point of all this is not to avoid new opportunities like Groupon or other social networking approaches but to understand the risks so that a proper strategy that benefits your business is developed and implemented properly.

sem[c] works with its clients to harness their internal strengths to make this aspect of Internet marketing work to the business’ best advantage.

To find out more about how we work for your business, visit our website, email us, call us and tell your friends!

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Groupon – too much of a good thing?

Groupon has become a huge phenomenon for B2C businesses. By combining old-fashioned coupons with social networking, Groupon has created a new genre by offering these businesses some great benefits: a very large audience, qualified offer recipients and a fast infusion of cash shortly after the offer runs. This doesn’t sound like it has a lot of downside, does it?

The problem can occur when all those happy Groupon customers want what they have paid for in advance all at the same time. The flood of requests can overwhelm most small to medium sized businesses. If the business can’t deliver their new Groupon customers what they’ve already bought when they want them these new customers are going to be disappointed.  Disappointed customers are not inclined to continue using a vendor who has disappointed them.

What this scenario reveals is a risk of providing a lot of goods or, more likely, services at a deep discount with a lessened possibility of a significant lifetime value that repeat customers offer a business.

The point of all this is not to avoid new opportunities like Groupon or other social networking approaches but to understand the risks so that a proper strategy that benefits your business is developed and implemented properly.

sem[c] works with its clients to harness their internal strengths to make this aspect of Internet marketing work to the business’ best advantage.

To find out more about how we work for your business, visit our website, email us, call us and don’t forget to tell your friends!

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Is Facebook better for marketing than email?

Let’s set aside the fact that a large part of the population has given up on email. Many if not most people in their 20’s pretty much stick to text and Facebook. Other people of all ages have become hyper-sensitive to the wide variety of emails that may or may not be “spam”. So the real question is about how to use the current state of affairs to create an effective online marketing presence for your business.

There is a fundamental problem with thinking that email marketing is “better” than social media marketing. They both have strengths and weaknesses.  These characteristics make them great partners but in no way are they alternatives for each other.

Email marketing:

  • Pluses:
    • Elicits an immediate response.
    • Easy to implement and maintain using resources like Constant Contact
  • Minuses
    • It’s great that the effect is so quick but it is completely over in a few days.
    • Anti-spam mentality is so sensitive that there will always be “Do not write” responses to any list
    • The effectiveness is completely reliant on the quality of the mailing list


Facebook (Social media) marketing:

  • Pluses
    • Will produce pretty much forever since everyone seeing your messages has opted in.
    • Is viral by nature so there is a built-in mechanism that increases the number of people seeing your messages
  • Minuses
    • Takes time to establish a number of followers
    • Requires good content generation on a timely basis
    • Requires giving a value to interest new followers


The two, when working together, can overcome the shortcomings of the other and give your business a coordinated online marketing approach.

Contact me to begin planning how to achieve this for your business.