Is Linkedin Right for Your Business?

Posted on April 11, 2013 by Abby Hartig

A common misconception on the business side of social media is that companies should take on all the different type of social media profiles to have a wide swath of social presence, pervading all parts of the social Web.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m definitely an advocate for a big social presence, but there are limitations. Many businesses don’t need to be on Linkedin. There, I said it. Now, gather around and I’ll tell you why.

With most social media, the effort and time you put into it is indicative of the results you will inevitably see from it. However, with Linkedin, the effort and level of results does not stop with the person posting on the company profile, it’s the whole team effort of the employees that make your presence there a valid tool or a complete waste of resources. That’s what sets it apart.

If you want your company to be involved on Linkedin, not merely as a passive content distributor, your employees need to be engaged on the site. This is especially crucial if your company is B2B, but salespeople and most employees of any company on the site should be versed in Linkedin and be using it on a daily basis, acting as advocates for their company by sharing company updates, engaging in group discussions, etc.

Not only is it a fantastic networking resource, but Linkedin can also be a place to share newsworthy company updates. I think of it an extension of your company’s ‘newsroom’ where you can funnel PR updates, product launches, management transitions, employment opportunities, etc, giving them a wider audience than their usual static reach of the News section of your site and press releases most people will never read.

However, it should by no means be seen as a content dumping ground from the posts you are broadcasting on other social networks. That post you just made about spring cleaning tips is perfectly fine for Facebook, Google+ and Twitter, but is most likely not appropriate for Linkedin. This can go both ways, as the industry jargon-filled report you just posted to start a discussion on Linkedin may fall flat with your Facebook fans as the audience may be completely different: employees and industry peers vs. consumers.

Oftentimes, people who are encapsulated on a daily basis with their industry and company have a distorted view of what is important and interesting to them and what is actually interesting or social-friendly and appropriate for social media. Not every move your company makes should be broadcasted on social media, but Linkedin is a more appropriate arena than most for company updates.

To reiterate my main point from earlier, Linkedin success goes beyond company profile updates sharing your latest blog post. To truly benefit from this unique site, your employees need to be active on it, sharing and conversing: building relationships.

To benefit from Linkedin, your company needs to do the following:

- Post regularly about company updates, industry news, etc.

- Completely fill out and optimize your company’s profile with products/services, design elements and more.

- Employees connect with your company profile and utilize the site to network, recruit, engage in industry discussions, etc.

Remember, don’t feel like your company has to spread itself too thin throughout all the different social media sites. Excel at a few, and forget the rest, rather than weigh yourself down in mediocrity with a pervasive and overwhelming, but ultimately milquetoast presence.

How are people in your industry using this powerful networking tool? Tell us in the comments below.

How Much Value Does Social Media Really Have?

Posted on February 26, 2013 by Jim Barry

Many clients and conversations we have with marketers ask us: Is social media worth any investment? The answer is yes, but maybe not from every channel that’s available. Just make sure you set up measurement data points, implement tracking tags from Google Analytics (or some other program), and post relevant content to your audience(s) and not just “clutter.”

You also have to look at what you deem as having value to your organization. If you see your audience, followers, comments, “retweets” are growing, and your Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest, YouTube/Vimeo, Linkedin and Instagram are all growing in numbers and in some cases driving people to your website, then it’s valuable and driving awareness. More than likely, you will find a few of them are not worth any direct time investment.

True, social media doesn’t allow you to measure it as closely as other Internet marketing pieces such as banner ads, Pay-Per-Click, or email marketing, but you can track direct leads and/or sales from each social media medium you use – if that is what you need to make sure the time, money, effort you spend on it is worth it. One key piece…don’t be lazy. Don’t just use a feeder system (like Tweetdeck or Hootsuite) that cuts off posts or uses hashtags where it’s not appropriate. Dedicated users will know you did not intend that message for that medium and it can lose some impact.

You also have to find what works for your organization – every business is different based on size, geography, client demographics, etc. You need to watch the data and optimize for what works specifically for your business. We can tell you – just a bunch of self-promotion is NOT going to generate social media strategy that will maximize the efforts you are putting into it and there is no “cookie cutter” solution that will maximize results.

Social media also allows people to use the Internet on their terms. They may never leave Pinterest or Facebook until they are ready to transact. If you aren’t there in that space, you could be missing 10-20% of your desired audience that didn’t know about you because you weren’t there and part of “their conversation.” If you could get 10% more sales from having a solid strategy here, that could be a lot of growth – but it won’t happen overnight.

The ultimate goal is to get a post in front of thousands through their networks – through the use of tagging, timely posts, and community/industry cross promotion. Marketing is the sum of all parts and the number of touch-points – something known as frequency – the number of times someone has to be exposed to something before they are willing to take an action. Through social media, you can increase those touch-points and be in front of them more often, which helps speed up the frequency time-period until an action will occur.

With an agency/resource who can monitor and report on social media for you (and also bring some creativity to your strategy), it can be the most effective $500-$1,500 a month (local-to-national type budgets) you spend out of your marketing budget and go a heck of a lot further than any advertising dollar could with reach. Just make sure you give it a few months and your resource for this is showing you the data and how it is moving in the right direction on the way there. Happy posting…

How to Optimize Your Blog for Social Media

Posted on February 18, 2013 by Abby Hartig

Social media’s possible impact on your blog traffic is something you ignore at your expense. A big driving factor for your blog’s strategy should be how posts will be disseminated and shared on social media sites. Distributing your blog posts on social media can gain your blog a larger readership, as well as, wider reach and exposure.

Optimizing your blog posts for social media is not only good for your exposure and reach but can benefit you when it comes to search ranking. Search engine algorithms factor in social indicators, favoring content that receives a lot of attention on social profiles. Plus, the more your content is shared, the more traffic is driven back to your blog, which may contribute to boosting your site’s ranking, and provide a gateway to your reader’s turning into leads.

Tips for Writing Social-Friendly Blog Posts:

Think social with your content – Before you even start writing your blog post, think about how it will look, and be received on social media. What do you like seeing on your Facebook Newsfeed? What are you more likely to share? Think of a social audience when composing your posts and how you can start a conversation around your topic.

While you’re writing, it also doesn’t hurt to think of a particularly catchy phrase or angle that you can use as the teaser or status for promoting the post on social media.

Thumbnails, Meta Descriptions & More - There’s nothing worse than the sinking feeling social media managers get when they find amazing content, go to post the link on a social network, only to discover that the thumbnail doesn’t match the content, or worse yet, there’s no thumbnail at all, making it a very aesthetically unappealing post.

A general rule of blogging is to that you should always add some sort of visual in the post to keep people’s interest. Now there’s the added advantage of having a relevant thumbnail in link previews for Facebook, Google+, Linkedin etc. that will be more enticing than if you simply had the Blogger or WordPress logo as the default thumbnail on the post.

Remember that on social networks you’re essentially fighting against many different factors to get people to actually see your post, let alone pause their scrolling and take in what you have to say and share or interact. A compelling thumbnail, nicely worded meta description and title are all simple tactics that can have an impact on people stopping to take in your content and will show that you take care in what you’re sharing, making people more likely to pass it along.

Pinterest adds another incentive to feature strong visuals in your blog posts,since Pinterest posts are all about photos and graphics. If you don’t have a photo or video in your blog, then Pinterest won’t pick up anything that it can use to ‘pin’ the link to, rendering the post unusable for the site.

Social Outreach - When it’s appropriate, to further the conversation your blog has started, promote a Twitter hashtag at the end of your post. Make it concise, the shorter the better, to allow for more characters in the user’s post. People are going to share your blog on Twitter anyways, wouldn’t you like to be able to put forth your own hashtag for people to use, so you can search for it and monitor what people are saying? This also allows you to join in on the Twitter conversation, start discussions, thank people for sharing your blog, and retweet their own Tweets mentioning your blog post.

In general your blog should feature a social media call-to-action, icons and/or follow widgets to promote your social sites. You should also have a plugin that facilitates social sharing for your blog posts, such as WordPress’s ShareThis to easily allow your readers to post your content.

Tips for Sharing Your Blog on Social Media:

Don’t be an auto-posting robot! - People don’t like automated messages, whether it’s an election-time robo-call or a plug-in pushed post from your blog to your Twitter or Facebook. It looks lazy, unoriginal and will likely decrease the amount of people who interact with the post or even click-through to your content, which is the whole point of sharing your posts on social media!

Test it out – Before hitting ‘post’ take a look at the link preview that pops up when you copy and paste the link into a Facebook, Google+, Linkedin status field. This allows you to see how your link will look once it’s posted, so you can doublecheck important aspects like meta description, thumbnail and title errors (html code replacing punctuation).

Be a tease – A common mistake is bogging your social post down with all the important information featured in the blog. You want to give people an incentive for clicking through to your post, not gain everything they needed to know just by scanning your post in their Newsfeed.

In the same vein, avoid simply rehashing the title of your blog in the status promoting the blog. People will see the title in the link preview; writing it in the status content is redundant. Twitter is the exception to this rule, since you should be shrinking the link to make more room for the written part of your post that should be enticing your followers to click through to the link.

Prioritize for the most compelling post - Sometimes you may want to let your actual blog link take a backseat in a social media post. If an image or video that you feature in the blog is more compelling and more likely to draw in people to the post, then you should have that be the main part of the post. Shorten the blog link using a tool like bit.ly and insert it at the end of your written status with a call-to-action to gain maximum click-throughs, i.e. “Learn more: [shortened link].” Check out the image for a good example of this method of social posting.

Social media should be a crucial part of your blogging strategy: Writing interesting content with a social audience in mind, content that people will want to socially endorse by sharing. Doing this and leveraging your own social networks for content distribution can grow your blog’s readership, boost exposure and give posts a longer shelf-life.

Facebook Introduces Graph Search: Social Discovery’s New Frontier

Posted on January 25, 2013 by Abby Hartig

Facebook has always emphasized the importance of the quality of your followers, versus playing the pure numbers game with your fan-count. With its latest feature, Graph Search, this is more true now than ever before.

The upgrade in Facebook’s search, which was notorious for its face-palm-inducing qualities in the past, will now allow you to scour Facebook for people, places and things – from not only your personal social network of Facebook friends, but the entire site, depending of course on the geo-modifiers and your search’s wording. Thanks to its partnership with Bing, Facebook search can also serve up results that expand past the limitations of the social site’s information.

Facebook’s business model is built teetering on top of all the personal information we willingly submit into its network, making it, in theory, a fantastic engine for personalized advertising, and personalized business recommendations. Graph Search is a sign that the site is moving further in the footsteps of Google, with a more search savvy, business recommendation direction, bad news for sites like Yelp, whose stock plummeted the day Facebook made its big announcement.

Graph Search takes the traditional idea of Google’s search and turns it on its head. It’s search results will inevitably be more about the ‘Who’ not just the ‘What.’ In true Zuckerberg-type fashion, the new search is in theory allowing you to gain deeper value from your Facebook social network.

Where you would Google the somewhat impersonal, “Indian restaurants in Grand Rapids,” now with Graph Search you can go one step further with “Indian restaurants in Grand Rapids that my friends Like.” Which one do you think is more powerful, the search controlled by site authority, Google advertising and various SEO factors, or the one governed by a friend’s endorsement? The idea of ‘Like’ as endorsement has always been there, but now it’s more potent and tangible, because the act of social discovery for your social group’s endorsements are as simple and fast as typing in a search query.

New Graph Search’s Implications for Personal Privacy

Be aware of your search record – Keep in mind that your search history, although not publicly displayed, is visible under your Activity Log section. If someone gains access to your account, they can easily review all of your searches, unless you take the effort to manually clear them on a regular basis.

No option for opting out – Recent privacy changes took away the ability to remove your name from searches; presumably to make Graph Search more overall effective in its depth of valuable social information. Now there’s no saying ‘No’ to Zuckerberg with using Graph Search. In this case, the best offensive is a good defense, so as always, be conscious of your ‘Likes’ and how they may appear to others. If you wouldn’t want your boss or significant other to know that you are a fan of a particular page, don’t associate yourself with it.

How will Graph Search Affect Businesses?

On Facebook it is easier now than ever to pinpoint what local businesses, major brands, non-profits, etc. that your social group likes and ‘Likes’ which has changed the core idea at the core of ‘word-of-mouth’ recommendations. Graph Search makes these ‘Likes’ even more powerful, because now consumers can search exactly for what restaurants, boutiques, toothpaste brands, etc. that their friends interact with on Facebook, making judgments and/or purchasing decisions from what a social media site suggests, rather than from what Google, or pay-per-click advertisements tell them.

What follows is that Graph Search can give an advantage to companies, particularly local businesses, who lack the proper site authority or search engine savvy to make it to the first page of search results. It changes the playing field, since the Facebook results will often depend on what businesses the searcher’s Facebook friend group has interacted with on the site, rather than SEO factors.

A large portion of Google searches include local geo-modifiers, “Best places to eat Chinese food in Grand Rapids” – so it only stands to reason that people will use Facebook search in a similar manner: “Chinese food restaurants my friends from Grand Rapids Like.” What better way to find a restaurant than to mine your friend’s recommendations from their endorsement of ‘Liking’ a particular local restaurant’s Facebook page?

If your business isn’t on Facebook, you need to definitely re-think your marketing strategy. You wouldn’t ignore Google, would you? (If you are ignoring SEO, you may have bigger problems.) If a particular restaurant is a superb eatery, but doesn’t have a presence on Facebook, or worse yet, has not been promoting its presence, essentially nullifying its efforts of existing on the site, then chances are it won’t show up in the search, because none of the searcher’s friends will have ‘liked’ it on the site. If you don’t promote your Facebook, you will essentially be limiting the amount of reach your business has through your followers’ network.

It’ll be interesting to see as the new search fully rolls out to the public, (it’s currently in beta) just how the new search will be utilized. Will it increase page Likes and other measures of engagement due to smoother social discovery? Will people use it in a more narrow, less business-friendly way – a new tool to aide in people’s digital voyeurism? I’m sure there will be a mix of both uses, but businesses should be conscious that the new search capability can mean a new level of fan growth, brand awareness, and ultimately, get people in the door, or through your online shopping cart process.

Graph Search’s reception and uses may vary, but one thing is certain: With Facebook getting more into the search game, you ignore it at your business’s own peril. Being a social media wallflower, you risk missing out on exposure that can translate into a greater following and ultimately new clients impacting your business’s bottom-line.

How do you think Graph Search will affect users and businesses?

Local SEO Building Blocks

Posted on January 4, 2013 by John Whaley

If you are a local business owner that has a physical location, it’s important for you to optimize your site for Local SEO. A report from Chitika found that 43% of search queries on Google seek local results, which demonstrates the value of a Local SEO strategy that targets local customers.

Often times when you talk to local business owners and mention Local SEO or SEO in general, you get a blank stare paired with a look of confusion. This is your cue to educate the local business owner on what Local SEO is and why it’s important. It’s also important to explain the complexity of Local SEO in layman’s terms so the business owners can understand what you are talking about.

With that said, I wanted to take a few minutes and outline some important features of a Local SEO strategy that would be simple for any local business owner to implement.

Get your site up to speed

Since local search volumes continue to grow exponentially, it is important for you as a local business owner to make sure that your website is properly optimized to target local searchers. Here are a few tips to implement on your site to help facilitate better rankings and increase search traffic: (1) optimize your site’s architecture to ensure that search engines can easily navigate your site and determine what it is about, (2) author good content that engages users and moves them through the sales funnel, (3) optimize your pages for 2-3 keywords paired with local geo-modifiers, (4) optimize your on-page content to incorporate local keywords as well as helping to build relevancy between the page title, description and on-page content, (5) make your content information easily accessible for users to find.

Claim Local Business Listings

Claiming your local business listings will help boost your local SEO search rankings because the number of citations, reviews, more specifically, how positive those reviews are will help boost your Local SEO rankings. You will also want to claim your Google+ Local Profile, which now is a combination of Google Places and Google +. Reviews left on your Google Local pages will help increase your Local ranking quicker than reviews left on other citation sites.

One of the resources I like to use when search for local business listings for clients is, getListed.org. getListed.org is a resourceful website that allows you to enter your business name along with your zip code to see how your business is listed on the three major search engines, as well as other second tier directories that can create good local citations.

Another great resource for building local citations by city is getListed.org’s “Best Local Citation Sources by City” webpage. If you’re not comfortable building citations by city, you can build them by business category. Both of these citation guides are very helpful in building authority citations.

It is very important to make sure the continuity of your business information is carried throughout all of your local business listings and citations. Also keep in mind that local business listings are a support tool to your primary website. That’s why continuity is important.

Social Media for Local Businesses

Recently Facebook updated the “Nearby” feature within their interface that allows Facebook users to search for establishments near their current location. This update changes how local businesses should be utilizing Facebook. Local businesses should optimize their Facebook pages for the appropriate service category or categories; include their physical address, phone number, hours of operation, and a link to their site.

Social indicators are also an important factor in Google’s Local Search algorithm. It’s important to not passively watch, but to actively engage with users on your social media profiles.

Local Business Schema and Geotag

Local business schema and geotag essentially allows you to use schema markup for your business type, business address, business contact information, business hours, and much more. Another great feature that Schema offers is giving webmasters the ability to specify your geographical location by including your longitude and latitude coordinates.

Google has favored structured and semi-structured data for years, and when reviewing a site, Google will look for structured or semi-structured data before review plain HTML.

Here is an example for Schema.org:

If you are a novice and would like to implement schema markup on your site, I have found Schema’s Local Business instructions to be very helpful with implementing this code. You can also implement schema markup through Google Webmaster Tools with their newly released markup tool.

Mobile Versions of Your Site

Earlier I mentioned that 43% of searches done on Google are local searches, but what I did not mention is that the same study found that 27% of the 43% of local searches were done by users using smartphones. With that said, it is important to not only optimize your primary site for local SEO, but it is equally important to have a mobile version of your site that is optimized for local search as well.

Not only do you want to optimize your mobile site for local search, but you will also want to make sure your site and your Google+ Local profile are listed on Google maps, and that you are listed on all popular local review and citation apps (yelp, Google+ Local, and so on).

If you are feeling up to the challenge and want to test a mobile site before having one professional designed, Google does offer a free mobile site builder that will allow you to create a mobile version your site. However, if you want a mobile site that is going to yield a return, as well as help boost your local rankings, I would partner with a firm that has experience doing so.

So there you have it. I have put together a simple list of tips that will help you make an impact in 2013 with your local SEO.

8 Ways to Improve Your Online Marketing Efforts in 2013

Posted on December 28, 2012 by David Veldt

With the end of the world behind us (we made it!) and 2013 just a few days away, it may be time for us to start looking ahead. In 2012, the world of online marketing took some hard turns and some trends have begun that will carry us into the next year.

I won’t ramble about what happened in 2012. Instead, I’d like to focus on some actionable items that will play a larger role in your online marketing success in 2013, based on changes and shifts we’re already seeing.

8. Pay per click

If you have been putting off pay per click (PPC) marketing, I have some unfortunate news for you: search marketing is increasingly becoming a paid game. First, Google announced that Google Shopping results are now “Pay to play.” Meaning, if you want your product feed to receive the benefits of higher clickthrough rates and conversion rates that come with Google Shopping results, you need to integrate that feed with your AdWords account.

Second, we’re seeing search engine results pages (SERPs) increasingly dominated by paid results. Between Shopping results, regular PPC ads and the increasing availability of rich snippets, organic results are being pushed out of view. Below is what I see above the fold (view of the SERP without scrolling) following a search for a new camera:

I see a total of eight full paid ads and just 2 ½ organic listings. Plus, how can I resist clicking on those Shopping results in the upper-right corner?

7. Company Blog

The trend for the past two years will continue: Fresh, quality content is crucial to maintaining favorable organic rankings. Search engines want to present sites that offer continuous and useful content for their audience. It isn’t always easy for what some would consider “boring” industries, but you need to find a way to always add value to your website. Continue reading →

Drive Engagement with New Google+ Communities

Posted on December 13, 2012 by Abby Hartig

Google+ recently introduced Communities, its latest feature designed to connect and group together like-minded users to share content and discuss subjects they are truly passionate about. There is a lot of room for growth with this feature and it could mean not only an excellent resource for all manner of passionate foodies, fishermen, knitters, yoga enthusiasts, gearheads, etc. but a cross-promotional tool for brands and an overall increase in engaged Google+ users.

What it can offer to Google+ users:

From a user standpoint, the new communities may be a welcome alternative to many people who are burned out from the more pervasive social channels. It can be positioned as the social network offering for those who are looking for a more meaningful social experience. A more active experience where you can find personal value and engagement, rather than a stagnant parade of ill-targeted Sponsored Stories and condescending corporate pandering, something that Facebook is becoming more and more aligned with.

Why your brand should join:

A self-segmenting audience that is passionate about a subject enough to spend their time sharing content and engaging in discussions; what marketer could ask for more?

Businesses that tailor to lifestyle or recreational activities can take the most advantage of this new social media tool. Similarly, blogs can foster a wider audience in an environment that not only allows additional promotion and links for their content, but offers an alternative to the more traditional, static nature of their blog’s comments section.

This distinction is partly thanks to a Community’s unique ability to foster genuine discussion and interactions that are more conversational and have a presumably longer shelf-life than the more transient nature of the constantly shifting Facebook Newsfeed and Twitter stream. Plus, the user endorsement of someone joining your Community, versus simply clicking ‘Like’ on a passing piece of content is much more valuable for your company.

The very conversational nature of a Community represents more of a two-way relationship, allowing users to contribute a more significant investment of time and emotion, because it is much more about what they want to share and discuss, compared with the less natural, often one-way Facebook/Twitter posting relationship. Content is broadcasted and often passively consumed on those channels, whereas Communities are comparable to an open discussion forum that breaks down the traditional power relationship of brand and consumer, page admin and casual consumer.

As a brand, wouldn’t you rather have a social media follower that makes a conscious effort to actively engage, create and/or post content, in a conversational format, rather than passively clicking ‘Like’ on a piece of content that you pushed out to them? The value of this higher level of consumer engagement is not the traditional business sense of ‘value’ because the ROI will most likely be just as elusive for Communities as it is with most other social media. However, there is a lot of value intrinsic in a positive brand reputation, top-of-mind awareness, etc. that can be derived from an active and conversational brand on this type of forum.

Another advantage of this feature is that Community members will view and interact with other people’s content, not just the brand’s; therefore making it a holistically different experience than the traditional social network, where user’s content contributions are generally relegated to visually small, awkward-to-find sections of profiles. This type of engagement endorsement routinely provided by users that they can relate to, will bring a wholly different level of experience than Facebook and Twitter can even hope to offer.

The set-up process is simple, with probably the biggest decision being what level of privacy you want to place on the membership. It’s also crucial to optimize your Community name for Google+ search and the description clearly outlines why it is valuable to become a member once they’ve found it. Once the entry barrier level and name is established, Community admins can create categories, begin to post content, initiate discussions and promote Hangouts.

How to Promote Your New Community:

Post links on your brand’s social profiles
Create an e-blast announcing the new Community
Add an ‘invite’ to join the Community in your staff’s email signatures
Utilize your site to draw people to the Community with buttons and links
Use your company’s blog to announce your new Community
Encourage your social media savvy employees to join, share content and promote it through their personal pages

Google+ Communities have great potential to offer aggrieved social media users a true alternative, with the promise of a less cluttered, more relevant and socially-valuable content stream. I like to think it’s more about the genuine roots of social media: Bringing people together to interact about the interest and passion surrounding your brand’s subject matter.

What are your first impressions of Google+ Communities?

Twitter Adds New Header Images

Posted on December 4, 2012 by Abby Hartig

If the highest form of flattery truly is imitation, then the social media giants seem to be in a constant complimentary war. The latest ‘battle’ features Twitter following both Facebook and Google+’s leads with the addition of ‘Headers.’

The advent of Twitter headers alters the overall layout of your profile page and allows you to feature a dominant image besides your profile picture and Twitter background. The Header acts as a cover photo, centered above your main Tweet timeline, with your profile photo and basic profile info overlaid on top of the header. It’s important to note that the default font color is white so your cover photos need to be a darker color to prevent clashing. However, keep in mind also that Twitter has been automatically darkening header photos to account for this, which can be problematic if you’ve already chosen a darker photo.

The new Headers allow for some creative uses, such as integrating your header with your profile picture, similar to how many Facebook user’s came up with fun ways of connecting their profile pictures with their cover photo. As usual with social media marketing, all of the visual elements should be consistent with your overall brand personality and offer an interesting visual viewpoint for your company, without overly pushing your logo and/or promotional content, which may seem too pushy for Twitter’s social and conversational atmosphere.

The adoption of Twitter headers does not simply reflect a layout change, but essentially a bigger emphasis on the visual aspect and images in general. For Twitter’s mobile apps, your photo stream, something I believe is sadly underutilized in corporate Twitter-land, will be prominently featured under your most recent Tweets. This will cause photo streams to be looked through more often, since it is easier to access and peruse with a mere swipe of your finger. This is something to remember when developing your Twitter content strategy: Don’t underestimate the need for using photos, as you do with typically more photo-friendly mediums ala Facebook, Pinterest, etc.

The new Twitter headers have been rolled out to all users, but the site has hot forced the layout change. Therefore, you do not have to immediately add a header photo to replace a default that Twitter created.

Conclusion: Use Twitter headers to your brand’s advantage, connecting it with your social presence’s overall design personality. Be sure to cross-promote your strong visual content, not just on Facebook, Pinterest and Google+ but on Twitter where images are now displayed more prominently, both in the desktop and mobile versions.

For more information regarding the changes and to check out some great examples, visit Twitter’s official blog. Tell us in the comments below: How will you use the new Twitter Headers?

Making Social Media More Valuable for Your Business

Posted on July 27, 2012 by Jim Barry

So you have dabbled in this. You get some people to follow you. How do you know if it is worth your time and really, what can you do to maximize what kind of web traffic you get from these mediums?

What if you changed your website experience based on how the visitor found you? The data is there to do this, you just need to interpret it and adjust accordingly. Set up correctly, you would be able to profile how your Facebook, Twitter, Linked-In, YouTube/Vimeo, Google+, Pinterest, and Blog readers all use your site and based on looking at your traffic’s referring source. You can then change the experience, path, content, etc that they have to maximize your conversions and exposure by utilizing what that data tells you.

Social Media 2.0 & Web 3.0

This is Social Media 2.0. This is web 3.0. Create a unique experience for every web visitor based on how they got to your site. Combine the social media elements listed above with Search Engine and Content related marketing – you have groups of keywords within a segment to promote something – based on keyword you could adjust what they see and the content they would get – changing their “path”. If they were from Organic search results – same thing – we all know that paid traffic typically differs 25-35% in what they do versus unpaid traffic – create specific content based on those patterns.

Every person, every way, every avenue and it allows them to use the web the way they want while still allowing you to reach them. Will every person do the exact same thing that visits from Facebook – no, but if you study the analytics, traffic patterns , implement goals, and adjust based on history – over time you will be able to predict relatively accurately what 70% of them do and improve their experience with your Brand and site.

5 Things About Using Social

You also need to realize the following things about social media:

1. It might not work for you - not everyone gets the value they need out of it for the investment they make. Just make sure you give it a good try and analyze before making any decisions.

2. People access from Mobile devices most often - so everything should be mobile optimized and easy to consume – especially if you have a global reach.

3. The bulk of social media time is spent on Facebook, - with newcomer Pinterest climbing rapidly. It should be treated as the dominate force it is for any consumer related marketing efforts. B2B marketing should have more of a mix – but the referring traffic reports and analysis will tell you what you need to know and where to best spend your time.

Continue reading →