The power of the Internet to disseminate information is awe-inspiring and frightening at the same time. And nowhere is this inertia felt the strongest than in the social media networks.
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.
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.
The goal: Turn Lurkers Into Leads
Are you getting traffic from social media? Want to convert some of that traffic into leads?
Some background
Start by evaluating your current lead generation process and whether it’s helping or hurting your efforts.
It’s important to understand the relationship among your:
- lead generation strategies
- your social media channels
- your blog
- and your landing pages
Many times, when we think of generating leads in social media, we look at the content we’re posting and neglect to look at the surrounding elements that also touch the user.
Every status update about a new blog post has three steps to drive lead generation: the status update, the blog post, and the landing page. Each one of these has a different role in the process and offers a unique opportunity to optimize lead conversion.
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
Facebook Friends and Quality Likes
As a business with a Facebook fan page, it’s natural to want to gather as many friends and Likes as possible. As always, though, it’s quality over quantity that will bring you the best return.
Take a few moments to see if you want them as a friend/Like. Check out their Info page and determine if they are interested in similar things, and check out their wall posts, if it is available, to see if they post offensive things, play Facebook games all day, or post gifts all over people’s profiles.
- Accept people who appear to have good morals, who post encouraging messages, inspirational quotes, and basic status updates. Pay attention if they cuss in every sentence, have poor grammar, and talk about things that make you uncomfortable — and don’t accept their friend request.
- Check their wall for several game posts. People who play a lot of Facebook games may send you lots of game invites or harass you with games status updates.
- Be careful allowing third-party applications to have access to your Facebook account. Sometimes these are people who are trying to get your personal information, attack, or hijack your account for your personal info. Just like with email, don’t click on any suspicious links that could be a virus.
- On their Info page, are they interested in activities and things that pertain to the content of your posts, products, or services? Those are the people you want to extend a friend invite to, or accept their request.
- If anyone becomes a nuisance, you can always unfriend them. The option is at the bottom of that person’s profile page on the left-hand side. They will not receive a notification that you have unfriended them.
- If you take out a paid ad on your page or group, make sure you filter it with people who have interests in what you provide, but with whom you do not already have a connection.
By David Jackson (c) 2011
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!