May 19, 2012

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Pinterest: 11 Ways to Leverage for Business Marketing

January 23, 2012 By 4 Comments

Many of you have heard of Pinterest and may be wondering how this social network can be leveraged for your business. I too had some intense curiosity and have since begun to realize the vast amount of capabilities of this network for engaging your target audience and driving traffic to your website. In fact, some brands have stated their Pinterest site is creating more web traffic than their Facebook page: Real Simple: Pinterest Drives More Traffic For Us Than Facebook. So now’s the time to jump on this trending bandwagon before it gets too saturated.

Pinterest is a social network and content curation site that allows you to share images and videos that people can then “pin” to their  personal “boards” which represent a common theme. These photos and videos can be linked directly to your website. People can comment on these images within the boards. A business can create their own Pinterest site and “boards” and drive brand engagement that way as well. 

Check out the infographic below (created in a Pinterest board style) and get some great ideas on how Pinterest can boost your brand. 

 

using pinterest to market products
Pinterest Infographic, an Infographic by Linchpin SEO

 

There are many Pinterest Goodies that can be added to your website and blog posts that will help drive traffic and build valuable SEO links.

If you found this post helpful, please share with your social networks or leave a comment below on how you have found Pinterest effective for your business.

Filed Under: Pinterest Tagged With: , , , , , ,

8 Indisputable Reasons To Use Twitter for Business Marketing

January 1, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Twitter started in 2006 and since has expanded to 200 million users and 1.6 billion searches per day. It’s an ideal social media tool for business owners to connect with their customers in real-time, a huge asset to customer satisfaction.

However, many business owners find Twitter to be somewhat complex when first approached. Twitter also has etiquette and best practices far different than that of Facebook and LinkedIn which often leaves business owners perplexed and overwhelmed. But with a little practice and effort, Twitter can be a very effective business marketing tool for the 8 reasons outlined below.

1. Customer Service

Customers sometimes just want a quick question answered immediately….Twitter is the perfect platform for this. If the issue or question can be asked within 140 characters or less, typically it can be answered and diffused in 140 characters or less. 

2. Reputation Management

Twitter allows you to easily monitor the sentiment surrounding your brand, it’s products and services. From here you can either thank the person who was singing your praises or intervene and attempt to make a dissatisfied customer happy again, thereby creating customer retention, another major benefit of Twitter

3. Lead Generation

Twitter is an easy platform to share any value-based information such as your company’s blog posts, eBooks and webinars, all essential inbound marketing content that will make your brand stand out from the crowd and appear as an industry expert. If you are using Twitter as a lead generation tool, make sure you are using landing pages that can capture a lead’s information before allowing access to the content. 

4. Market Intelligence and Research

Twitter is a great way to gain insight from your customers quickly. Curious how your customers would like to receive sales promotional information, text or email? Ask them on Twitter. Would your customers prefer a downloadable coupon they can print off or a coupon code to be used in a shopping cart, or both? Ask them on Twitter.

5. Competitive Research

Twitter data is open to everyone by default and most companies who market on Twitter do not protect their tweets, so Twitter is ideal for monitoring your competition. Use a third party application such as Hootsuite to set up a stream and monitor keywords and mentions of your competition. 

6. Keyword Phrase Opportunities

Another great way to engage with a targeted audience is to use the advanced search option and locate tweets via keyword phrases for a unique opportunity to reach out to people who would benefit from your product or service. For example, if someone tweets, “looking for a plumber” and your business is plumbing, you can monitor these keyword phrases in tweets via a 3rd party software and intervene. 

7. Promote Other Social Networks

If you are having a sweepstakes on Facebook, share it on Twitter. If you just updated your company profile on LinkedIn, share it on Twitter. If you have strong engagement on a status update you posted to Facebook, share this on Twitter and encourage your followers to post their opinion. Cross promoting other sites allows your followers to get to know you better on your other networks as well and increase brand awareness. 

8. Personalize Your Brand

Probably one of the most valuable reasons to use Twitter is it allows your brand to have a personality. People want to connect with people, not businesses. Your Twitter voice should be genuine and likable. If you accomplish this, you will create long-lasting customers who will likely become brand advocates.

Share a photo of your smiling co-worker, share an image of your trade show booth, ask a question that elicits an opinion from your followers, promote an offer exclusive to your followers, share a compelling quote and why you like it, get excited for the launch of your new product, re-tweet a customer’s kind comment about your brand and thank them, engage in conversations around your niche, share a video of your most recent conference event. This is the real power behind social media marketing and Twitter; you become relatable, valuable and inspire others to buy your products and services. 

 

What other ways have you found Twitter to be a valuable asset to your marketing? 

Need help keeping up with Twitter? Bee Social can help. We can completely manage your Twitter account for you, co-manage it with you, or consult with you on best practices, effective strategies and marketing campaigns. Contact Us to learn more. 

If you found this post helpful, please share with your social networks!

 

Filed Under: Social Media, Twitter Tagged With: , , , ,

Facebook Adds Subscription Button to Personal Profiles

September 19, 2011 By 3 Comments

Yes, another Facebook change! How exciting! <—–sarcastic tone. This one mimics Twitter and the new Google+ Circles feature. Looks as if Facebook is trying to be everything every other social network is.

2 Benefits of the Facebook Subscription Button

You may have noticed the “Subscriptions” link under your profile picture. This new feature allows Facebook users to be able to ‘subscribe’ to other’s updates without even having to be their friend. This will help those who have capped out their friend limit at 5,000.

Also, more importantly, the new ‘subscribe’ button allows filtering out some status updates from your activity streams that have become too “noisy” or annoying or just simply not of interest to you without un-friending them.

Editing Subscription Update Preferences

By default, you are subscribed to all your existing friends. You can change this setting by clicking on “Subscriptions” under your profile picture, then you will see ‘Public Subscriptions’ and ‘Friend Subscriptions’.

Click on “Subscribed” next to your friend’s name to edit the updates you will see from them. Below are the options:

How many updates?

  • All updates
  • Most updates
  • Only important updates

What type of updates?

  • Life events
  • Status updates
  • photos and videos
  • games

Unsubscribe

 

Public Subscriptions

‘Public Subscriptions’ are those people whom you aren’t friends with but who provide entertaining or interesting content. I have subscribed to a nationally known social media marketing expert as well as a project manager at Facebook due to the nature of my business.

Hope that helps with understanding the new ‘subscribe’ button on your personal profile!

 

Share the Love!

If you found value in this post, please share with your social networks. Leave a comment below with your questions or personal experience/insight with Facebook subscriptions.

To Your Social Success,
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Filed Under: Facebook, My Blog Tagged With: , ,

Google+: All the Google Goodness and Then Some

August 3, 2011 By 16 Comments

Many people have asked my thoughts and opinion on Google+, so I decided to write a post to share all that I know, all that I like and what’s on the horizon.

OK first off, it’s Google, so you might want to take it seriously. As have 20 million users within the first 3 weeks of its debut. Secondly, I loathed thinking I needed to be on yet another social platform. So just know, that I entered into Google+ with a bad attitude. But all in all, it has been a smooth and worthy transition.

 

All the Google+ Goodies That I Like

Targeted Sharing

Love this. Finally I can post something and not worry who I may be offending. Google+ has the concept of “circles” where once you make a connection with someone, you add them to a category of circle that you have created. For example: family, friends, colleagues, social media superstars, clients, high school friends, college friends, geeks, shutterbugs, etc. could be individual circles that you can choose from to put them in. Now you have the ability to target your message to groups of people it is relevant to.

 

Easy Access to the Google Peripheral Applications

Google Docs, Google Reader, Google Calendar and of course Google+ are easily accessible within my Gmail email account. If you are like me, I pretty much live from my Gmail account and have it open all day long. (See my future blog post on how to import all your email address into Gmail and have a cool email signature). So having easy access to all the other Google tools I use is very helpful. Also is allows for more efficient data dissemination as you have the ability to publish Google Docs to certain groups of people (or circles of people).

Hangouts

Google is pretty much the champion of video chat compared to Facebook. Google lets you video chat with up to 10 people at the same time, Facebook has Skype now, but its capability is limited to one-on-one video chat. Another cool feature is you have the ability to launch a YouTube video right within the group chat and all participants can watch video simultaneously.

I am already imagining the usefulness of Hangouts with my clients weekly or monthly meetings, especially those who have multiple decision-makers. Also, I create video training tutorials for the business owner who wants to tackle social media on their own with my consultation. In this way, if they are having difficulty with a concept or set up, we can view the video together and I can help assist them where they are having an issue.

To start a hangout is easy, there is a “Start a Hangout” button on the right sidebar of your Goolge+ homepage. You will need a web cam (most newer computers already have these built in), Google Voice and Google Video plugins installed to initially use it. Once you launch it, it will prompt you to do this.

Huddles

This is a group-based text messaging feature where you have the ability to chat with several friends at once from your smart phone. The interface is easy to understand and super simple, just like Google+. There is a downside, at least for right now, you can only “huddle” up with Google+ friends. But of course that will change once Google+ gets more popular. This app is good for Android and iPhone devices.

I could see this being helpful at business conferences similar to Twitter, but a much more tighly-focused audience or “circle” of your colleagues.

There’s a “Go Mobile” button on the right sidebar of the homepage if you want an install URL sent to your phone.

Sparks

Sparks are a way to catch up on your favorite topics. Once you click “Sparks” in the left sidebar, it will prompt you to enter a keyword of your topic of interest, then just click “Add Interest”  From here it will create and save a feed of the topic that is generated from many different websites.

This is a great way to quickly find content to share with your circles. I use Google Reader similarly. Yet another way Google+ is a one-stop shop with everything at your fingertips.

 

What’s to Come: Google+ for Business

This feature is rolling out soon, within a few months, and should prove to be even better than Facebook Pages with regards to branding and messaging. Plus there is rumor that Google Adwords will be integrated. We shall see and I will keep you posted, literally, on the topic.

If you found value in this post, I would love for you to share it with your social networks. What are your thoughts on Google+, yea or nay?

 

Socially Yours,

Renee Harrison

Social Media Manager, Bee Social, Inc

Filed Under: Google+, My Blog Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Facebook Sponsored Stories

April 2, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Facebook recently introduced Sponsored Stories. Yeah, I know, ‘Sponsored Stories’ may sound sweet and innocent, but it clearly is another way for Facebook to get yet even more wealthy and another way for brands to advertise on Facebook. Sponsored stories leverages interactions that people have had with your brand and publishes it as an ad on the right-hand side of the news feed. It works remarkably well because essentially it is a word-of -mouth recommendation of your brand, which is the best kind.

 

A 2-Step Process

1) Someone “likes” an app, “likes” a brand, or checks into a location via Facebook Places.

2) If the brand or app they “liked” or the business they checked into is set up in Sponsored Stories in a Facebook Ads campaign, then the friends of the person who “liked” or “checked in” will see the activity in the right column on the feed page.

 

The Value is 2-Fold

1) to users: a trusted recommendation from a trusted friend is the best kind

2) for businesses: it produces word-of-mouth marketing that is scalable and predictable

 

4 Types of Stories

The following 3 options work exceptionally well for larger, more popular brands that are looking to increase their fan count. Someone is more likely to act on a friend’s recommendation of a brand they already like and trust and will prompt them to “like” it too for possible deals and specials and timely updates.

1) Page ‘Likes”

2) Application interactions

3) Place check-ins to a physical location

For 1-3 above, friends of fans will see this content or Sponsored Story. (i.e. Renee Harrison just “liked” Social Media Examiner”). If you think about it, this is very valuable. I have 4,468 friends as of this posting. When I like an app or a fan page that is featured on “Sponsored Stories,” I have just exposed that brand or app to that many people. And I am just one person who “liked” it.

4) Page posts-which is your latest published post on your fan page.  This one is a little different than 1-3 above. It is the only one that will only be seen by people who are already a fan of the page. The benefit of this is that it will re-engage your fans to come back to your page, or simply continue to build brand awareness and exposure and keep your brand top of mind. Even though your fans could see your page posts in their news feed, this isn’t always the case, especially if they have several friends with several updates or if your post wasn’t a popular one, these kind of posts can quickly get buried and never seen again. Sponsored Stories allows the update to be seen for a longer time so the majority of your fans will get a chance to see it.

I feel option #4 is best for smaller or younger brands as it keeps your fans engaged and exposed to your brand which is essential for building a following. Use this with Facebook Ads for optimal results.

 

Incorporate With Facebook Ads

Facebook encourages brands to use Sponsored Stories in conjunction with Facebook Ads for the most effective marketing. This is especially true for brands with smaller fan bases. Sponsored Stories is a message from fans of the page, Facebook Ads are a message from the business. Two different strategies that work for different reasons. Sponsored Ads has the same pricing and structure as Facebook Ads. You can also run both simultaneously and combine to meet your ad budget.

 

Sponsored Story Quick Facts

  • you can’t edit it
  • it populates on it’s own
  • status update text will cut off at a certain point
  • pulls in page image
  • pulls the most recent status update
  • it respects all privacy settings-if people have blocked your content in their news feed, they won’t see the sponsored story either
  • sponsored stories always appear above ads in the right-hand column of the news feed page
  • an auction determines the order of sponsored stories and up to 5 Sponsored Stories/Facebook Ads appear in the right-hand column
  • get started here: Create a Facebook Advert

I would love to hear your feedback on Facebook’s Sponsored Stories, if you have used it and your experience or plan on using it in the near future. If you enjoyed this post, please share it with your social networks by using the links below.

To Your Social Success,
Photobucket

Queen Bee at Bee Social Biz

P.S. “Like” my fan page and I will “like” you forever!  Bee Social Facebook Page

Filed Under: Facebook, My Blog Tagged With: , , , , ,

Facebook News Feed Optimization: 3 Tips On How To Get Your Updates Into Your Target Users News Feeds

March 24, 2011 By 13 Comments

Every wonder if your status updates are even being seen by others in your network?

That is a topic that I investigated for my own purposes and came up with a wealth of information I felt every business page admin should know about.

Many Facebook users don’t even know that when you view your news feed, you can view it by the default setting which is ‘Top news’ or by switching it to ‘Most recent’. ‘Top news’ is all the updates Facebook deems most important to you, where ‘Most recent’ is all updates by all of your friends and pages you’ve ever liked. So the vast majority of Facebook users are viewing their home feeds in ‘Top news’ because  1) they don’t pay attention to this and don’t know it exists or 2) don’t know or care to know what the differences are.

Which leads us to a bit of a problem…..how can you get on Facebook’s most popular list and get your updates seen in the ‘Top news’ feed?

Facebook has a well-planned algorithm called EdgeRank which determines which updates actually get shown and to whom. It assigns points to your posting (which they refer to as an ‘object’) by how many interactions you are getting (which they refer to as an ‘edge’). The more edges your object has, the more likely you will be featured on the ‘Top news’ feed of your friends who have liked your page.

So to break it down:

  • Increased EdgeRank = Visibility
  • Decreased EdgeRank = Obscurity

News Feed Optimization Tips to Achieve Increased EdgeRank

1. Relevancy/Relationships-how much engagement you are receiving and the frequency of these interactions

2. The Type of Engagement Activity-this will determine how many EdgeRank points your post receives.

Friends that stalk you=good. If you have a friend who is repeatedly seeking out your page and interacting on it (i.e. clicking on links and viewing photos, etc.), this will help you get seen not only more often in the their newsfeed, but others as well.

You stalking a friend=not good. You will not appear more often in their news feed by doing this, so quit being weird like that :roll:

Links to other content on the web trump normal status updates. Facebook values this more as it drives user engagement. When someone clicks that link-you get EdgeRank points.

Photos and Videos trump links. Because both of these deliver more clicks as compared to a regular text update or a link, Facebook loves videos and photos postings and will give extra brownie points when someone clicks on these.

The power of a comment on your post is better yet. This will get you even more points and seen on even more target user’s feeds. Ask your audience an engaging question from time to time to elicit comments.

Here is a bit of advice to keep in mind when adding friends who you will want to suggest your business page to: the more popular they are (i.e. 600+ friends) the less likely your status update will make it to their ‘Top news’ feed as you are then competing with many more updates. So when possible, add friends who have a network of less than 200 friends which will increase the chances that your update will get seen.

3. Timeliness-It is best to receive your comments, likes and clicks the day of or the day after the posting. Facebook values recent activity.


The Game Plan

The Problem: So how does one get people to interact with their postings if they aren’t even getting seen in the first place?

The Solution: Get a posse of friends and employees who will volunteer to help you in your quest to get ranked better and get your content seen. Make sure they all obviously have a Facebook account and that they currently “like” the business page. This should only have to be a temporary period of time. How long it will take will depend on the commitment to quality engagement and the number of volunteers. Just have them start engaging per the above outlined tips and over time, you will start generating some of that natural social buzz that you deserve.  Facebook will start taking notice of your increased popularity and award you with a ‘Top news’ worthy ranking and your post’s exposure will vastly increase to your target market.

If you found value in this post, please share with your social networks or kindly leave a comment below.

President, Bee Social, LLC

Social Media Manager

 


Filed Under: Facebook, My Blog, Social Media Tagged With: , , , , ,

Are You LinkedIn? Learn How To Leverage This Powerful Marketing Platform for Your Business

March 1, 2011 By 1 Comment

LinkedIn is a social community, but unlike Facebook, it is a network of professionals. It is a great place for professionals to promote themselves as well as their companies or personal business. In addition, it is a great platform to connect with customers, prospects and industry thought leaders.

LinkedIn is an excellent place to generate high-quality leads, you can find, be introduced to and collaborate with qualified professionals who can help you accomplish your business-building goals.

It is very powerful marketing platform as you can see by the facts below.

LinkedIn Facts

  • Represents over 150 countries and over 170 different industries
  • Executives from all Fortune 500 companies are members
  • The average household income of LinkedIn members is $109,000/year
  • There are 60 million available connections in LinkedIn
  • A new member joins approximately every second

Watch this quick video for an overview of LinkedIn, then read the rest of the post:

Because this is a community of professionals, the rules are a little different than Facebook.  However, the leads you generate will be highly targeted and highly qualified.

The Benefits of a LinkedIn Presence

  • Increased visibility of your company and products
  • Easy collaboration with colleagues, customers, and industry thought leaders
  • Excellent source of SEO-friendly links. Google loves LinkedIn and you have the ability to create great anchor text for your website links, which are given the do-follow attribute.
  • Allows you the ability to research your competition, customers  or partners.

Profile Creation Pointers

First off, make sure your LinkedIn profile reflects how you want others to perceive you. Give it personality and make it known to others what you are most passionate about. LinkedIn profiles rank high in search engines when someone googles your name, so take your time with this process.

Headline:

Add 2-3 compelling items here. Make sure they answer the questions, who do you help and how do you help them.

Photo:

Make your profile credible by adding a photo. It should be more professional and only of you.

Recommendations:

This will give you and/or your business instant credibility and social proof. Ask one of your current connections, previous employers or other business contacts to do one for you, or recommend them and when they receive it they will have the option to create a recommendation for you. Make sure you ask someone who you’ve worked with and who know you well.

Education/Past Positions and Experience:

Only include relevant information. You do not need to go into great detail about education or past positions that do not relate to your expertise.

Websites:

Make sure you are incorporating keywords in your profile. This is especially true when you add your websites as you will be able to create a hyperlinked targeted keyword to describe your website instead of the default “My Blog”. If your business is well known, use its name, if it isn’t yet well known, use the best keywords to describe it.

You will want to go to Profile—> Edit Profile—> click on ‘Websites’ which will take you to ‘Additional Information’—> click ‘Edit’—> from the drop-down menu choose ‘Other’ for each website—>you can then fill in your keyword—> next add the website URL for that keyword.

Summary:

This is where you will speak of your value to others, or your Unique Selling Proposition (why would someone want to buy from you or work with you?). This is where you will also discuss your intent for being on LinkedIn. Include your story or your why for being in the industry you are in or why you created your company. You want others to personally relate to you on this common level.

Adding Contacts:

This is clearly where LinkedIn differs from Facebook. You need to qualify how you know someone before you add them. Categories to pick from are: colleague, classmate, done business together, friend, other (in which you will need to add the potential connection’s personal email address). One thing to remember when you are accepting connections from others, once they are connected to you, they have access to your entire network of connections. So make sure you are comfortable with this.

Don’t forget to add friends and colleagues-LinkedIn makes this easy by looking into your email address book to find current contacts that are already on the network. You can also use the ‘Search’ box at the top.

Advanced People Search:

This is a great way to really narrow down your search more specifically, such as by keyword, location, industry, seniority, function and company size. To access, go to the top right where the search box is—> click on ‘People’ in the drop-down menu—> on the other side of the search box, click ‘Advanced’. This will bring you to a page where you can narrow down your search considerably.

Communicating with your Connections:

*Do not give your website link when you initiate a connection. Add a personal message and identify something you have in common and why you want to connect with them.

*Add about 30 new connections per day.

*Share how long you’ve been in your industry, your goals, your struggles and how you have overcame the; initiate questions back that would lead to more interaction from them.

Status Updates:

Post often since when you update your status, it will show up on your connection’s walls each time. The more you participate and interact on groups and discussions, you will get seen on the status update feed by all of your connections. Link it to your Twitter account and it will automatically tweet your status to your twitter followers. Create curiosity and intrigue, but make it short and to the point (140 character max). Make sure your message is relevant to your audience and somewhat professional in nature.

Groups:

Once you’ve added your personal connections, you can further connect with others via groups. Make sure you pick groups with a common interest. When you search for a group, it is keyword-driven, so you can search by your industry, or the services/products your business offers. Sometimes the administrator needs to approve your request before you can be a member. Once you are a member, you can go to the main group page, go to the ‘more’ drop-down menu and choose ‘members’. From here you can message a particular individual and ask to connect. Since you are both members of that same group, they are automatically available to connect with you.

You can also post relevant and informative content in the “Discussion” section of each group. This is where you could include any new blog post content you create. It should be of value to others. You should  never pitch your product, services or business, it looks spammy, it’s not professional and could possibly get you banned from the group. At the end of the discussion post you can add your blog or company website URL beneath your name.

On a side note: There may be groups available where you can promote your services or products from your business, but make sure this is allowed before you post. Most of the time these are location-based groups where people go to search out a service/product they need locally. Make sure when you post you are addressing the needs of the consumer and how your product or service is the perfect solution to this need.

Create a Group:

There are several benefits to creating your own group on LinkedIn:

  • It will brand you as a leader in your niche.
  • You will connect like-minded individuals who can learn from one another.
  • It will drive traffic to your website.
  • Give you the ability to market events, speaking engagements or your business services.
  • It will build your personal network as others will invite you to connect with them.
  • You will be able to send weekly messages to your member’s in-boxes for free.You will be able to create an auto-responder email. Group managers can send out a welcome email directly to the member’s personal email inbox. From there you can invite them to your blog or website or to connect with you on your other social networking sites.
  • You can create up to 10 sub-groups which allows you to target various locations (i.e. for invites to regional events) or sub-niches.
  • You have complete control over the content posted and ability to delete members.

Create a Vanity URL:

Make sure your brand gets recognized. Go HERE to create a Vanity URL (make sure you are already logged into your LinkedIn profile.)

Keyword Placement for Search Engine Optimization (SEO):

Place keywords in the custom ‘Website’ names you choose (as mentioned above), in the ‘Summary’ section, the ‘Headline’ section, the ‘Specialties’ section and the ‘Experience’ section.

Utilize Applications:

Access these applications and others by going to  ‘More’ at the top of your profile—> click on ‘Application Directory’ from the drop-down menu.

  • WordPress-allows an RSS feed of your blog
  • Twitter-Integration of latest tweets
  • SlideShare or Google Presentations-allows powerpoint presentation and YouTube videos via SlideShare
  • Reading List-especially great if you have authored a book
  • Polls-a great market research tool
  • Company Buzz-a great reputation management tool as it shows what people are saying about your business or brand

Answer Questions:

To access the question/answer area, go to the search box at the top right—-> click on ‘Answers’ on the drop-down menu—> then click ‘Advanced’ on the other side of the search box. This will then take you to a page where you can search by keyword or category to see which questions have been posed and then you can decide if you want to answer.

This is an excellent way to drive traffic to your blog or company website. After you leave your answer, after your name you can add your website. If people vote that you have “The Best” answer, it will improve your status as a thought leader which will increase exposure to yourself and your website.

You could ask a question that could drive more business to you. Such as if you were a social media management business, you could ask,  “What types of social media are you using to generate more leads for your business?” In this way, you aren’t blatently advertising your services, but you are creating curiosity where others may want to learn more about your business and visit your website.

Answers are also indexed by Google making it another way to create SEO for your website and LinkedIn profile.

Recruitment:

LinkedIn is an excellent way to recruit for your business. I will discuss recruitment and how to establish a company presence on LinkedIn in another blog post. As long as you have a personal profile on LinkedIn, you can add your company’s profile as well.

I hope this helps you understand how best to utilize LinkedIn for your business. Please don’t hesitate to comment or ask questions and I will do my best to answer them.

Also, if you found this information useful, please comment or share on your social media sites. Thanks!

Respectfully,

Filed Under: LinkedIn, My Blog, Social Media Tagged With: ,

16 Compelling Reasons Why Your Business Needs To Have A Social Presence Online

February 28, 2011 By 4 Comments

So what’s all the buzz about? Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube…oh my! It can make any business owner dizzy, frustrated and downright freaked out, especially when they see a competitor bedazzled all over social media sites.

Well I’ve comprised 16 compelling reasons why your business needs a social presence, and honestly you need this presence like yesterday. It’s happening whether you like it or not, and the statistics indicate it’s popularity is soaring. Watch the video for some amazing statistics…

But it ‘s not too late, and there are some surprising huge advantages to marketing this way. So read on and become enlightened…

1. Get an Edge Over your Competition/Monitor Their Activity

2. Generate Leads/Customers

3. Customer Retention

4. Customer Satisfaction/Support

5. Increase Targeted Traffic to Your Blog, Website, or Event

6. Broadcast Promotional Offers/ Digital Coupons, New Products or Services, Awards/Recognitions

7. Engage Deeper With Your Customers or Prospects

8. Research/ Monitor Trends on What Your Customers & Prospects Want or Need, Figure out Their Purchase-Drivers?

9. Monitor What is Being Said About Your Business, Brands, Products or Services.

10. Increased Exposure & Awareness To Your Business & Into the Minds of Your Customers, Patrons & Prospects.

11. Increased SEO (i.e. Get Found By The Search Engines-Google and Bing) By:

*Social Media Providing Backlinks to Your Website

*Google and Bing Now Index Facebook & Twitter Updates & Are Included In Search Results

*YouTube- Videos Can Be Tagged With Keywords Related To Your Business That Can Be Indexed & Appear In Search Results

12. Build Trust and Credibility-Get To Know, Like & Trust Your Customers & Patrons & They Will Become Loyal Customers Who Will Gladly Recommend & Promote Your Business To Others

13. Reduces Your Overall Marketing Expenses (Social Media is Free)

14. Helps You Educate & Promote Your Products/Services Which Will Make Closing Business & Making the Sale That Much Easier

15. Results In New Business Partnerships

16. Look Like You “Get It”, Become the Savvy Business Your Customers Expect You To Be. Stand Out From The Crowd Of Businesses Who Aren’t Utilizing Social Media…Yet.

All this probably makes a lot of sense to you, right? But right about now you may be asking yourself  ‘how do I find the time to do this?’, or ‘how do I do this?’ or ‘where do I even start?’.

Well that’s where someone like myself comes to your rescue and makes life easier. I will manage your online social presence for you. Freelance social media managers are affordable and you don’t have to hire another employee. Check out the “Services” tab at the top to learn more about Bee Social’s suite of services.

To Your Social Success,

Social Media Manager & Owner of Bee-Social Biz, LLC

P. S. Subscribe to my blog above to receive my latest blog posts directly to your inbox. These will include step-by-step on-screen video tutorials social media techniques and strategies. I will also be able to inform you of any new service offerings or promotional discounts and keep you in the loop of all the latest and greatest in social media advances!

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8 Facebook Business Fan Pages Done Right

February 10, 2011 By 20 Comments

Why should your business have a fan page?

Well, first off Facebook is the 2nd most trafficked website in the world according to Alexa and Compete. Facebook has 500 million active users, 150 million of those active users are currently using Facebook via mobile devices and the average American spends 7 hours per week on Facebook according to a recent Neilson report.

That combined with poor ROI on traditional marketing methods is reason enough to consider having a Facebook business fan page.

The advantages of engaging with existing fans and new fans is something that can be easily accomplished on a Facebook fan page, when done right.

Here are 9 examples of business fan pages who have nailed the Facebook fan page concept effectively. They are engaging with their audience and bringing in new business because of it.

1. ChickfilA
Starts off as the menu as their landing page with clickable images and text to their actual website. If you are a brick and mortar business it’s a good idea to have a store locator widget, like ChikfilA does here.

2. Russ Robinson Photography
There is a clear call to action the minute non-fans land on the page, plus the owner has added in a 10% coupon incentive for liking the page. He also has a “Share Us!” tab which easily allows for the user to invite their friends to like your page as well. Also notice the Foursquare tab Place Widget. It shows an actual map and address to his studio. Russ also spotlights his work and creates promotions based on fan feedback.

3. 1- 800- Flowers

The feature I think is great on this site is the tab called “Guy’s Guide To Flowers”. Through Facebook insights you are able to get demographics on visitors to the page, obviously more men were visiting the site and 1- 800 – Flowers had a great idea providing this male specific how-to tab. They also do a great job of encouraging fans to comment, give their thoughts, ideas and feedback. If you are an eCommerce store you can integrate that into your fan page as they did here in their Facebook shoplet via Alvenda.

4. Kampgrounds of America (KOA)

Again, a great call to action landing page is visible to all non-fans of the site. You only have a few seconds to get someone’s attention, you want them to click that like button before they leave and may never find you again. KOA also have an Involver Facebook app that shares all their other location-based fan pages. This fan page also offers a YouTube tab with fan videos of family camping trips. Also they incorporate fan camping photos at area KOA Campgrounds.

5. Intel

Great use of promotions and contest that engage fans and keep them coming back. The Facebook Wildfire app is a great for running contests. Intel will sometimes interview their employees and have them explain the quality of the products they create.

6. Firehouse Subs

Great landing tab for non-fans promoting their birthday subs. They have their other social sites prevalent and share button obvious at the top. Anything you can do to make it easy for someone to share and connect will dramatically increase their chances of doing just that. They do a good job of engaging fans in the Notes tab where they ask their fans opinions and include exclusive offers.

7. Ritz-Carlton

The landing tab for non-fans immerses them into their various amazing resorts and services by using beautiful photography. Another way of engaging their fans is by sharing interesting location-based resort factoids creating stories.

8. Teavana

The non-fan landing tab has the like button visible and obvious as well as the great benefits of their products which in itself will help to immediately engage the user. There are obvious links to their other social sites. They also add some social proof by displaying photos of  famous people that like their page. A great way to engage their fans is by a Tea of The Week tab along with a What’s In Your Cup tab where fans send in their photos and can win a contest.

Hopefully you have gained some great insight and tips on how to create or spruce up your Facebook fan page. Bee Social has Facebook fan page customization services that can help bring out the best in your business and engage your fans. You can learn more on our Services tab.

Just remember these pointers when you create your Facebook fan page:

  • choose a strategy that fits your brand
  • create multiple custom tabs to highlight your products/services
  • ask interesting and fun questions
  • try to create an experience for your audience-spread your passion about your brand
  • make it fun with activities, polls, and contests that will keep your fans coming back
  • use video
  • take risks-you can always go back and change it
  • always, always publish great content that offers value

What are some fan pages that you have found to be particularly engaging? What apps or widgets did they have that made it work better?

If you found value in this post, please share with your social networks and/or comment below.

To Your Social Success,

Filed Under: Facebook, Facebook, My Blog, Social Media Tagged With: , , ,

Twitter Tools For Business Building-Part 3

January 19, 2011 By 2 Comments

This is the final installment of Twitter Tools for Business Building.

To view Part 1, go here: Social Oomph

To view Part 2, go here: HootSuite, TwitPic & bit.ly

Tweet Beep, Twellow, Twollo, Twitter Tab and Revisit will be discussed. As new innovative Twitter tools become available, I will mention them here in my blog. The 5 mentioned in this post are very useful and will help you engage with a more targeted audience which will drive more traffic to your website and more importantly, 3 of the tools discussed will help you monitor and manage your online business reputation.

Tweet Beep allows you to manage your online Twitter reputation. Alerts will be emailed to you whenever someone tweets about your business, your name, or your domain. You select the alert criteria and what to watch for. This is great for monitoring what is being said about your brand, your business, it’s products and services.

Tweet Beep can get you more traffic to your website. Determine your targeted keywords and enter them into Tweet Beep. Tweet Beep will then send you emails whenever someone mentions your subject matter or keywords in a tweet. What you would do next is follow these people (usually they will automatically follow you back) and give them updates about the subject matter and share information with those followers.

There is a Premium account; at $20/month you get 200 alerts, a 15 minute alert option, and no advertisements.

Twollo is very similar to Tweet Beep. It also allows you to manage your online reputation by tracking what people are saying about you or your website or products. Twollo also allows you to gain targeted followers. When you create an account, you will be allowed to submit keywords and Twollo will then automatically locate and follow people who share your interests. Many of these people will then follow you. There is a monthly cost that starts out at $5.99/month for 5 keywords, but you can trial it for free for 4 days.

Twellow is a Twitter directory that categorizes users according to interest/topic and some list users from most followers to least. Within your account can set up a personal profile where you will be able to show your recent tweets, share links to your websites and create an extended bio. Most profile pages are indexed by Google, so this is also an added bonus of Twellow.

Twellow and Twollo, besides their cute little names, are good places to listen to the issues and questions in your industry, where you can also have a chance to provide appropriate answers. These websites can be one of the first places you hear about new developments in your industry, as well as allow you a chance to build valuable business relationships.

Twitter Tab is an application within Facebook that lets you include your Twitter updates as a Tab within your Facebook Profile and Facebook Pages.

There is a VIP option which allows you to customize the appearance of your twitter page on Facebook, including a background image, and choosing background color, text color, hover color or border color. You can also use your default Twitter background which is what I did. The cost for VIP is $10 for 3 years.

Revisit lets you create a really cool, animated Twitter wall. Basically it collects tweets related to a topic of your interest and will then display them along a time line. The tweets that have received the most popularity will be displayed larger and near the center. It is constantly changing (not static). Click on the this demo for an animated visualization of Revisit in action.

On a lighter note, I wanted to wrap up this 3 part series on Twitter tools by sharing a super funny video about Twitter users. Fortunately, if you are primarily using Twitter as a business-building tool, you don’t fit the mold depicted in this video. But I am sure a fair amount of people will identify with the message ;)

Please share the love if you enjoyed this post or kindly leave a comment below.

Best Regards,

Social Media Manager

Owner of Bee Social, LLC

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