Social Media Is The New Way of Life

in Social Media by iqmadmin August 22, 2011January 21, 2014 0 comments

Social media is the new mantra of life, irrespective of sex or age group. Throw a stone and you’ll hit someone on a popular social networking website like Facebook or LinkedIn, and so on. If the sweet memory of your lost school or college friend is haunting you, then become a part of social networking sites and you may find your lost friends.

The front runners among these social networking sites are the Facebook and newly added Google Plus.

Facebook is being called a giant in the kingdom of social networking; however, Google Plus joined the global collection last month with a big bang. In no time, a battle has started between the two, one being a giant and other being a social networking Titan.

Privacy is the biggest challenge of social networking sites. While sites such as Facebook have tons of tools to manage, it still faces allegations of abusing the private lives of its users. Google Plus promises more privacy by default, which users will certainly find attractive. However, Google is not immune to accusations of maligning the privacy of their users.

Google Plus seems to have an edge over Facebook

It’s been several weeks since Google Plus has launched, and the fanfare over its features has been loud and plentiful. Features such as Circles, where you can choose which friends hear what, and Hangouts, where you can video chat together are a significant advance. Google Plus has more features big and small than its rival Facebook; it also seems to have successfully played to the gallery with more privacy options, biting its rival where it hurts the most. Google Plus has emerged with better and more privacy controls and other features, even though it still resembles its rival in look and feel. There are plenty of studies and surveys that have assembled comparisons and are calling Google Plus better than its rival. In order to compete with the new features of Google Plus, Facebook has produced its own chat application in association with Skype.

Dual platform users

Google Plus claims to have crossed the ten million figure of users, which is still a small figure compared with Facebook’s 750 million. But then again, Plus’s numbers happened in the span of just one month. Nevertheless, the interesting aspect, which the analysts seems to be ignoring, is how almost all the Google Plus users are still on Facebook and are active there even though they like Google Plus. It will take some time for a complete paradigm shift.

Why It Makes Business Sense To Blog

in Internet Marketing by iqmadmin August 18, 2011January 21, 2014 0 comments

Intelligent Blogging Can Be A Fantastic Addition to An Internet Marketing Strategy

Consider that a successful and viable company is built on:

good ideas
a great product
visibility
a hard-working team

Blogs are an effective way of marketing all of those things in one fell swoop, and for bringing in the most important ingredient of success: customers.

Blogging helps you talk directly to people who are interested in what you have to say. There is no guessing game here. If you’re a designer talking about design ideas, people who are interested in design will come back repeatedly. People can mean more than just customers. Industry professionals, other bloggers who may source your content (and therefore increase your ranking), or journalists can all help to publicize your business.

Blogs also carry a lot of weight with the search engine algorithms when it comes to SEO.

Each individual blog post has the potential to generate a surge in back links and add to your search ranking. They are proven to get better positions for most keywords in search engine results. Simply put, it makes business sense to blog. Humanize your company and reap the benefits of that personal touch. Blogging intelligently will help produce greater results and effectiveness in your internet marketing efforts.

4 Awesome Reasons to Have Contests to Fuel Social Engagement

in Internet Marketing by iqmadmin August 15, 2011January 21, 2014 0 comments

1. Contests Are a Great Tool for Getting Fans

Whether you are beginning with 10 or 10,000 fans or followers, contests offer an exceptional way to increase your fan base. We have seen clients go from 50 to 1,000 and from 15,000 to 30,000 Likes in a matter of days or weeks when running a contest. Of course, this is not the only metric to think about, but it is one measure of the power of a promotion. A basic sweepstakes with a lower barrier to entry often provides the best option for those just starting out with social media contests.

2. Contests Allow You To Engage Your Audience

In addition to increasing the sheer number of people who interact with your brand, a contest provides a conduit to deepen the connection as well. A user-generated content (UGC) promotion such as a photo or video contest is a great way to do just that. UGC contests tap in to the human drive to compete, and they provide an opportunity for everyone to experience their 15 minutes of fame. Most importantly, when participants upload their personal content (e.g., a photo or story) to your promotion, they are naturally vested in your brand.

3. Contests Are an Amazing Source of Data

With the lure of a prize, many people are ready to share criteria with you as part of the entry process. You don’t want to introduce too many barriers, but don’t miss the opportunity to learn a bit more about your consumers (i.e., how they heard about your promotion, what their favorite product of yours is, etc.). Remember that what you ask should be relative what you offer in return. In addition to collecting data as part of the entry process, you can also learn a great deal from the interaction and conversation that takes place around your contest.

4. Contests Allow Consumers To Do Your Marketing

How would you like to have hundreds or thousands of your fans helping to spread the word about your campaign? It is important to have a promotion plan that encompasses multiple marketing channels, but thanks to sharing via social media, contests today enable an exponential amplifying of your marketing message that was never available before the Internet.

If your contest includes a voting aspect, participants will be inclined to share through their social graph, asking friends and family to support their entry. Some good rules to follow in voting competitions: You are likely to see ten voters for every entry (often many more) as well as ten clicks for every shared link. These numbers represent a significant multiplier of traffic to your contest site or application as a result of consumers marketing to other consumers.

Like other tools, contests can be extremely effective when used as part of an objective social media strategy. Any consumer organization, as well as many business-to-business enterprises, can take advantage of contests to realize the four benefits shown above.

Before you start a contest, though, be sure to familiarize yourself with local regulations. Every state has its own contest laws — and some can be dicey — so do some research to make sure your promotion is legal.

sourcing: Mashable

This is Why Social Media Etiquette is Important

in Social Media by iqmadmin August 11, 2011September 8, 2017 0 comments

Companies have long used criminal background checks and credit reports and even searches on Google and LinkedIn to explore the previous lives of potential employees. Now, some companies are requiring job candidates to also pass a social media background check.

A year-old start-up, Social Intelligence scrapes the Internet for everything prospective employees may have said or done online in the past seven years.

Then they build a dossier with examples of professional honors and charitable work, along with negative information that meets specific criteria: online evidence of racist remarks; references to drugs; sexually explicit photos, text messages or videos; flagrant displays of weapons or bombs and clearly violent activity.”We are not detectives,” said Max Drucker, chief executive of the company, which is based in Santa Barbara, Calif. “All we assemble is what is publicly available on the web today.The Federal Trade Commission, after initially raising concerns last fall about Social Intelligence’s business, determined the company is in compliance with the Fair Credit Reporting Act, but the service still alarms privacy advocates who say that it invites employers to look at information that may not be relevant to job performance.

And what unsuitable information has led to job offers being withdrawn or not made? Mr. Drucker said that one prospective employee was found using Craigslist to look for OxyContin. A woman posing nude in pictures she put up on an image-sharing site didn’t get the job offer she was seeking at a hospital.

Other background reports have turned up examples of people making anti-Semitic comments and racist remarks, he said. Then there was the job applicant who belonged to a Facebook group, This Is America. I Shouldn’t Have to Press 1 for English.” This raises a question. “Does that mean you don’t like people who don’t speak English?” asked Mr. Drucker rhetorically. Mr. Drucker said his goal was to conduct pre-employment screenings that would help companies meet their obligation to conduct fair and consistent hiring practices while protecting the privacy of job candidates.

For example, he said the reports remove references to a person’s religion, race, marital status, sexual orientation, disability and other information protected under federal employment laws, which companies are not supposed to ask about during interviews. Also, job seekers must first consent to the background check, and they are notified of any negative information uncovered.

He argues the search reduces the risk that employers may confuse the job candidate with someone else or expose the company to information that is not legally allowable or relevant. “Googling someone is ridiculously unfair,” he said. “An employer could discriminate against someone inadvertently. Or worse, they are exposing themselves to all kinds of allegations about discrimination.”

Marc S. Rotenberg, president of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, based in Washington, said that employers were entitled to gather information to make a determination about job-related expertise, but he expressed concern that “employers should not be judging what people in their private lives do away from the workplace.”

Less than a third of the data surfaced by Mr. Drucker’s firm comes from such major social platforms as Facebook, Twitter and MySpace. He said much of the negative information about job candidates comes from deep Web searches that find comments on blogs and posts on smaller social sites, like Tumblr, the blogging site, as well as Yahoo user groups, e-commerce sites, bulletin boards and even Craigslist.

Then there are the photos and videos that people post — or find themselves tagged in — on Facebook and YouTube and other sharing sites like Flickr, Picasa, Yfrog and Photobucket.

And it is photos and videos that seem to get most people in trouble. “Sexually explicit photos and videos are beyond comprehension,” Mr. Drucker said. “We also see flagrant displays of weapons. And we see a lot of illegal activity. Lots and lots of pictures of drug use.”

He recalled one man who had 15 pages of photos showing himself with various guns, including an assault rifle. Another man included pictures of himself standing in a greenhouse with large marijuana plants.

Given complex “terms of service” agreements on most sites and Web applications, Mr. Rotenberg said people do not always realize that comments or content they generate are publicly available.

“People are led to believe that there is more limited disclosure than there actually is, in many cases,” he said, pointing out that Facebook’s frequent changes to its privacy settings in recent years may have put some people at risk in getting a job now because of personal information they might have inadvertently made public.

“What Facebook was doing was taking people’s personal information that they made available to family and friends and make that information available more widely to prospective employers,” said Mr. Rotenberg, whose organization has several pending complaints at the Federal Trade Commission about Facebook’s privacy settings.

Joe Bontke, a manager for the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s office in Houston, said that he regularly reminds employers and human resource managers about the risks of violating federal antidiscrimination employment rules and laws by using online research in hiring decisions.

“Things that you can’t ask in an interview are the same things you can’t research,” he said, which includes the gamut of information covering a person’s age, gender, religion, disability, national origin and race.

That said, he added that 75 percent of recruiters are required by their companies to do online research of candidates. And 70 percent of recruiters in the United States report that they have rejected candidates because of information online, he said.

Dave Clark, owner of Impulse Advanced Communications, a telecommunications company in Southern California, began relying on Social Intelligence for background screening because he said the company needed a formal strategy and standards before assembling online information about job candidates. “They provided us with a standardized, arm’s-length way of using this additional information to make better hiring decisions,” he said.

About half of all companies, based on government and private surveys, now use credit reports as part of the hiring process, except in those states that limit or restrict their use. As with social media background checks, there are concerns about information that is surfaced. The equal employment agency filed a lawsuit last December against the Kaplan Higher Education Corporation, accusing it of discriminating against black job applicants in the way it used credit histories in its hiring process.

But it is not unusual for senior-level executives in many companies to undergo even more complete background checks by a private investigating firm.

“We are living in a world where you have an amazing amount of information and data on every executive,” said Ann Bilkhorn an executive recruiter in the converging technology, media and communications industry. “I think that puts the burden on the recruiter and the hiring manager to be really thoughtful about what is important and not important when making the hiring decision.”

Alas, be careful whether you use social media for entertainment or for work purposes because people are or will be paying attention. Words of wisdom.

Thanks to The New York Times

Facebook Marries Skype (Again)?

in Social Media by iqmadmin August 1, 2011January 21, 2014 0 comments

The social media realm is about to have a new sheriff in town.

The larger-than-life social network Facebook will reportedly be releasing a Skype-driven video chat platform.

Facebook’s Seattle-based tech team was behind the new feature, according to Techcrunch. Skype and Facebook were already in cahoots with a function that integrated Facebook social data directly into the Skype client. Now it looks like Skype will be coming to Facebook.

Rumors have circulated before about such a product, but it never materialized.

The report is sparse on details about how it will function. Will it require a software download? Will it support group video chat? No doubt it will be a major addition to the Facebook platform. Google+, the search engine giant’s answer to Facebook, launched with a group video chat feature, Google+ Hangouts. Google is seeing a lot of traction with the feature, but if Facebook can release a video chat product next week, Google+ Hangouts may not seem as revolutionary.

source: Mashable

Google Research: People Use Smartphones to Buy, Buy, Buy

in Social Media by iqmadmin July 28, 2011January 21, 2014 0 comments

A Google-commissioned study on smartphone usage has confirmed just how addicted we are to our devices and revealed how we use them to help make purchasing decisions.

The data, which were laid out by Google in detail during a webinar yesterday, revealed a ton of information about how we use the devices in general. A couple of takeaways were particularly interesting for businesses large and small.

Yeah, So We’re Addicted. So What?

For starters, 89% of smartphone owners use them on a daily basis, and many of them interact with their devices several times per day. People even said they’d rather give up such pleasures as chocolate, beer and cable TV than do without their treasured electronic companions. This is hardly shocking news, but it confirms just how connected smartphone owners are to their devices, a fact that has a slew of implications for marketers and businesses in general.

The research showed where (at home and on the go, mostly) and how people use their smartphones. Interestingly, more people (81%) said they browse the Web on their device than said they use native applications (68%). For ecommerce sites and other businesses, these numbers suggest that investing in one’s mobile-optimized Website could be more important than building native apps.

How Smartphones Help Us Buy Things

One thing for which people seem to use their iPhones, Blackberrys and Android devices quite a bit is shopping. Nearly 80% said they use their phones for shopping and shopping-related activities and 70% use their phones in stores.

Most people (67%) said they use their smartphone to do product research and then purchase an item in a store, followed by the 23% who research on their phones, check the product out in the store but then ultimately purchase it online.

The researchers also looked at what types of actions people take after conducting a mobile search. More than half (53%) ended up making a purchase and 68% visited a business online or in person.

Google Says Mobile Ads Work

People are far more likely to notice ads when using their smartphones than they are in many other circumstances. Eighty-two percent of respondents said they noticed mobile ads, and about half of them said they were likely to take some kind of action as a result, whether it be conducting more research or actually making a purchase.

The study was conducted by interviewing 5,013 U.S. adults (aged 18-64) about their phone usage. Although these results pertain to American users, a representative from Google said they’ve seen similar data in other countries.

from ReadWriteWeb

How Huge is Google+?

in Social Media by iqmadmin July 19, 2011January 21, 2014 0 comments

Google’s social network, Google+, might be one of the fastest-growing networks ever, having already reached 10 million users according to one estimate.

Paul Allen, of Ancestry.com — not to be confused with Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen — has developed an interesting method to calculate the number of Google+ members.

He sampled a number of surnames from the U.S. Census Bureau data and compared it to surnames of Google+ users. By comparing surname popularity in the U.S. with the number of users on Google+ with each surname, he can guesstimate the percentage of the U.S. population that signed up for Google+. Finally, he calculated a ratio of U.S. to non-U.S. users to generate an estimate for the number of Google+ users worldwide.

The result? Google+ has approximately 9.5 million users worldwide, with 2.2 million joining in the past 32 to 34 hours, according to Allen’s estimates.

This is amazing growth even for a giant such as Google: We cannot remember any social network reaching so many members so quickly after its release.

Coming from a third party, the data is obviously unofficial (we asked Google for comment on these numbers, but haven’t heard from them) and should be taken with a grain of salt. If they’re true, though, they indicate that — after a few missteps— Google might finally be conquering the social networking arena.

10 Biggest Internet Marketing Myths Exposed

in Internet Marketing by iqmadmin July 7, 2011September 8, 2017 0 comments

Merriam-Webster defines a myth as “a usually traditional story of ostensibly historical events that serves to unfold part of the world view of a people or explain a practice, belief, or natural phenomenon.”

It’s been said all myths are based in fact. Whether or not that’s true is debatable. What isn’t debatable, however, is like society, Internet Marketing also has its myths. This article exposes what I consider to be the 10 biggest Internet Marketing myths.

1. You Don’t Need Any Money to Do Business on the Internet

You wouldn’t expect to advertise on TV, radio, in newspapers, magazines, or any other media for free would you? Yet, for some strange reason, people think they can just come online and not spend any money, and advertise their business for free. To me, that shows an utter lack of respect for the single most important communication medium since television.

And while it’s true, there are plenty of free advertising opportunities available on the Internet, the fact remains, you still need money to effectively do business on the Internet.

2. Anyone Can Succeed at Internet Marketing

One of my favorite TV shows is Forensic Files. I am absolutely fascinated at how scientists are able to solve crimes with DNA evidence, animal hairs and insect larvae. It’s nothing short of brilliant. But I couldn’t ever be a forensic scientist. I simply don’t have the mental aptitude for it. Forensic scientists have to excel at math and chemistry and science, and quite frankly, those are the subjects I’m weakest at.

The same can be said about Internet Marketing. Despite how easy the slick sales letters and e-books make IM sound, not everybody has the mental aptitude for marketing. And while that may be a hard pill to swallow for many of you reading this, it’s also a fact. Not everybody has what it takes mentally to succeed at Internet Marketing. That’s why people hire marketing consultants like me. (Sorry, I’m not accepting any new clients).

3. You Can Get Rích Quick on the Internet

We’ve all heard the sensationalistic stories about individuals who came online and made a lot money very quickly. Well, sensationalism notwithstanding, those individuals are the exceptions rather than the rule. The fact of the matter is, far more people fail at Internet Marketing than succeed.

Contrary to popular belief, the Internet is not some kind of magic bullet. Besides, it’s not the medium that makes people successful, it’s the individuals themselves. And the people who succeed at the highest level online or offline are generally talented, hard working, organized, focused and determined.

4. People Don’t Read Long Copy on the Internet

If people don’t read long copy on the Internet, who in the heck is reading all those e-books out there in the marketplace? While this myth was disproven years ago, like birtherism, it still persists in the face of overwhelming and irrefutable evidence to the contrary. So, I’m going to attempt to lay it to rest, once and for all.

Research has shown that long copy generally outperforms short copy – provided the copy is compelling, well-written and interesting. And in addition to reading e-books, people regularly read long newspaper and magazine articles online. Bottom line: People WILL read long copy IF the subject matter is interesting to them.

5. All Traffic is Good Traffic

This myth is about as nonsensical as the tooth fairy. Here are the facts: If your traffic is originating from traffic exchanges or guarantéed traffic programs, it’s garbage traffic, plain and simple. And as the saying goes, “garbage in, garbage out!”

If you are advertising on websites, or in publications that have zero relevance to your site, you are pretty much spinning your wheels. And if you’re exchanging links with websites that have absolutely nothing in common with your site, your efforts are going to be futile because that traffic is not going to convert. All traffic is not created equal. Quality and relevance matters!

6. E-mail Marketing is Dead

With the advent of mega-popular social media sites like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn, alarmists have all but declared e-mail marketing dead and buried. Well, I don’t believe in erroneous declarations. I believe in facts. And here are the facts according to Nielsen…

U.S. consumers are spending more and more of their Internet time on their mobile devices. In fact, e-mail activity on mobile devices increased from 37.4% to 41.6% of U.S. mobile Internet time. And when you consider the fact smartphones now comprise 25% of a gigantic U.S. mobile phone market, there can only be one conclusion… E-mail marketing isn’t dead, its gone mobile!

7. Article Marketing Isn’t as Effective as It Used to Be

That is absolute nonsense! I’m personally experiencing more success with article marketing than I ever have. So too are many of my colleagues. And while it’s true, there are many more people involved in article marketing these days, it’s also true, there are many more bad or poorly written articles permeating the Internet. This has the unintended and beneficial consequence of making well-written, quality articles stand out in the crowd. And trust me, quality publishers do notice.

8. You Need to Be on the First Page of Google to Be Successful

Nothing could be further from the truth. Yes, Google is far and away the most popular search engine on the planet. No sane person would dispute that. But Google only has ten spots available on the first page. So, not only is it unrealistic, it’s impossible for everyboody to achieve first page status.

But even if it were possible for everybody to achieve first page status, you shouldn’t put all of your eggs in Google’s basket anyway. You’ve seen what can happen when Google has one of its many algorithm changes. First page today, not even indexed tomorrow. That’s why you should strive to have a multi-pronged marketing approach. Utilize a variety of methods to generate traffic.

For example, blogging, newsletters, social networking, article marketing, forum marketing, online and offline advertising, guest blogging, question and answer sites, etc. Diversify.

9. Saturated Niches are No Longer Profitable

This is only true if you don’t know what you’re doing. Let me ask you a question: Have you ever wondered why a particular niche is saturated? It’s because that’s where all the customers are. You see, contrary to popular belief, it really doesn’t matter how saturated or over-crowded a niche is if you’re a professional.

If you know what you’re doing, and execute your marketing strategy properly, there are plenty of customers to go around. You see, it’s how well you position yourself within a particular niche that will determine your success or failure. It’s all about differentiating yourself from your competitors. That’s Marketing 101.

You have to clearly explain to people what makes you different and/or better than your competitors. Then, you have to exploit those differences consistently. So, don’t run away from a crowded niche, embrace it. The Internet Marketing pie is plenty big enough for everybody.

10. If You Build It, They Will Come

Do you know what happens if you build a website and don’t tell anyone about it? Nothing. Absolutely nothing will happen.

Unfortunately, far too many marketers think all they have to do is build a website and customers will somehow magically appear at their doorstep. Sorry, it just doesn’t work that way. Building a website is only the first step. You also have to advertise your website to the world – and not just with free advertising methods either. That will only take you so far. You also have to be willing to spend money on paid advertising.

So yes, if you build it, they will come. But only if they know about you!