by winstonbromley | Aug 8, 2012 | Facebook, Google+, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Social Media, Social Media Management, Social Media Tools
In the twenty-first century, the World Wide Web has become a great way for anyone to reach an audience. From blogs to online businesses, social media takes on many different shapes and sizes.
To help illustrate what can go wrong in Social Media, I pieced together 5 Social Media “What Not To Do” Tips so that Businesses can avoid these costly mistakes. These are based on working with my Clients, being active in Social Media and some questions that I have got from our Online seminars.
The 5 Worst Things you can do in Social Media as a Business owner:
- Selling all the time: Social media involves many aspects, the first being you should be social and connecting with people, however that does not mean that you have to constantly be trying to sell something every time. If you have a blog, and all you do is sell things to your readers, you will soon see all your readers disappear because they get tired of it. Imagine meeting someone at a party, then they call you up every few days asking you to buy from them. I am sure you would soon block their number (I know I would)
- Ignoring your Users: Using the blog example once again, you have people who are going to your blog regularly (hopefully). It is highly important that you keep in touch with the people that frequent your website. This can be in the form of a regular posting every Thursday or having them sign up for a Newsletter so you can stay in touch weekly with them with even more tips. The idea is to stay Front of Mind.
- Targeting the wrong niche market: It is very important that you target the right people to your Social Platforms so it’s a match between your product/service and customer. For example, if you are a Mechanic on Facebook, discuss the types of cars you work on such as Chevy or Ford. Stay focused on that Market and , as the Mechanic, don’t start blogging about your new favourite Restaurant, unless it deals with cars some how. Stay on one Path.
- Using the right social media platform: Are you using the right platform for your business? There are a lot of choices out there to choose from when it comes to social media such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, Pinterest and many others? Take the time to figure out what system covers your Audience Market the best or you will be spending too much time on Platforms that will not bring you more business. As an Example, if you are a knitter, you will most likely find that most of your audience is on Facebook and Pinterest. There would be no need to join Twitter or LinkedIn for that Business type. Focus your Energy where you Audience resides. It will pay off.
- Not using social media at all: This is an interesting one. I have met businesses that still feel that Social Media will not end up with a Return on Investment for their Time (ROI). Here is my comment on that: The World Wide Web reaches millions of people, and any business that does not take advantage of it, is truly missing a golden opportunity. Just imagine all the customer contact you are missing out on from the sharing, commenting, and searching that goes on in these Platforms. Did you know that Facebook and Twitter are in the top 5 of all the Search engines for people looking up things? Google is number one of course. Social Media is here to stay. It’s time to figure out where you want to set up Camp.
Social media can be a great Marketing tool for your Business or it can be a double edged sword that can do more harm than good. Use social media effectively and you will reap the rewards. Use it poorly, and people will go elsewhere.
If you are stuck or don’t know where to go next, and want to learn how to use Social Media properly, consider hiring our services to get you on track and up to speed, or using our 1-on-1 Coaching that will get your Platforms and Businesses to the next level in Social Media, attracting new clients and being profitable. For more information and a no obligation quote, contact us at sales@thesocialmediabreakthrough.com or call us at 1-888-634-1465. We are here to help.
by winstonbromley | Jul 24, 2012 | Google+, Social Media, Social Media Management, Social Media Tools
{EAV:325b878b30a844a4}Social media is all about coming together and having a way to talk, find friends, and share everything. There are many ways to connect with the world around us through this still relatively new media, but one that has made heads turn is Google+. It is an interesting and attractive social media website that makes everything easy to understand and find out. Just like many other websites, it is in a constant state of change, upgrading and adding more each time. The brand new events feature from Google+ is an excellent example of their change for the better.
Social Media EVENT using Google+: Winston Bromley Social Media Marketer
Many may know of Facebook events, but this is a step up from there. You have additions like the live broadcast, which allows a person in a particular event to see the updates of everyone else in it. This makes for better managing and control of it all, as well as the ability to keep up on all incoming information. Events need to be watched and planned, and, with the ability to see everything as it happens, that is more than possible with the new Google plus events.
When you set up events, you want to get the word out as quickly and easily as possible. Using online websites like Google plus has become the best way to do so. People are capable of sending the invitations out to everyone at once and the invited will be able to say whether they are going. This provides the event creators with a solid head count, making the event that much more manageable. You can also list all of the facts and information to go with the events, as well as edit and change them as you go.
What sets Google plus apart from the Facebook events is that it has more features. One that really stands out is the live broadcast, which allows event goers to see what others in the event are saying and doing. Sharing information between every person is the best way to monitor everyone and ensure it goes off with as few problems as possible. Being able to view what one person says, regardless of whether they are added to your friend lists, will let everyone know what to expect. This does help the event creator immensely because they are more capable of knowing what everyone is planning and up to, giving them the opportunity to better manage the event itself, add in updates and images, but it is also greatly beneficial for those just going. There is a lot to know with large events, making the sharing of information and communication necessary. Live broadcast makes that an easy task, one Facebook events cannot match.
Proper planning and communication make every event a successful one. Just letting everything happen as it happens opens you up for mistakes, possibly even a ruined day or night. With the new events feature from Google plus, you can be sure that whatever you are planning happens as it is supposed to happen. With a stream that allows you to view everything other event goers are saying and doing, you know what to expect. You are more in touch with the people and what is happening, allowing everything to fall into place and work as it should.
What do you think? Of course to make this happen, you need to be signed into your Google+ account. But why wouldn’t you be? 😉
Winston Bromley
www.WinstonBromley.com
by winstonbromley | Jul 10, 2012 | Facebook, Google+, Klout, LinkedIn, Social Media, Social Media Management, Social Media Tools, Twitter
Social media is something just about everyone uses in today’s world. Many people enjoy it because we are given an easier way to talk to friends, and it is also a great tool to talk to a lot of people. When you are out there all day, every day, sites like Facebook and Twitter become part of your life, as do your followers and friends on those sites. How much they like what you write and do, how many share it all, and the amount of people wanting to speak to you all determine your influence on the world around you. Those unsure of how much influence that they actually have can look to Klout.com to figure it out. There, you are given the ability to learn your influence score from the major Social Media sites.
See Klout.com combines all of your Social Media activity and turns in into a number from 1 to 100 (being the best) based on 54 factors. The more influence you have (meaning people who share you stuff, click on your links, talk about your stuff) the better your Score. And there are great perks to a higher score.
As the internet grows, so do the jobs that can be had on it. When a person works in marketing, for example, they spend a lot of time on the internet. That is part of their job and the more people they can get to see what they say, the better they can do their job. Using your Klout score, employers are able to see just how big of an influence you have in the world, which can help them determine whether or not you are worth hiring (and this now becoming a trend to put Klout on application forms). Your relationships with the people around you, the connections you have made during your career, and the impact you make around the world help an employer or client know if you will pay off. They want a person who can reach many people because it matters to stay connected to the world around you, being seen and heard.
Although Klout is not the only Influence Score to be had (and it’s still growing), it is currently the best online indicator for people to see how much real influence they can control. And it Matters.
Our Klout scores are already playing a larger role in the decision making processes in other real world applications. One example that is happening all the time now, is hotels in Las Vegas are looking up your Klout Score to see if you are worthy of an upgrade, because if your Klout Score is high enough, they know you will talk about it on your social media accounts thereby giving them free advertising from you. See when you talk on your Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, Google+ accounts about a great place and you have a high Klout score, there is a great chance that your followers will listen and be interested about that Topic and remember that location/hotel/product.
Another example is one that I and others with a higher score get often, is what is called Klout Perks. Companies are hooking up with Klout to send new products to people with Klout scores over certain numbers. I recently got a full kit of AVENA NATURALS products (no cost to me) sent in the mail to me. You bet I talked about it on my Social Media Feeds.
A guy in San Francisco had a Klout score of 74 (and he was just a well connected 25 year old) and he got the new VOLT car for a weekend to test drive. No cost to him at all. You can bet he posted it everywhere thus giving the VOLT a lot of advertising from an influencer.
Take a moment to see what your Klout Score it by clicking here. Let me know how you fair… You may be getting Klout perks soon enough.
by winstonbromley | Jul 5, 2012 | Google+, Social Media, Social Media Management, Social Media Tools
Google Plus (Google+) is a great option for a business looking to get noticed and wanting to standout from other pages. Easy to create and easy to use, it is a growing platform for business sharing. The following explains just some of the great aspects why Google Plus is becoming a must for business leaders and webpage designers and just how it might benefit your business.
Easy Distribution of Ideas
Sharing is important and your business needs to take an active role in doing this with their webpage or website. This act is not simply about promoting a product or idea but actually creates an interactivity between the consumer and the business itself. With Google Plus for business this can be completed quite easily. One of the greatest tricks to get a response from clients and potential customers is to share photos and other images and messages that help to promote the brand without overtly doing so. It leaves the client interested, gets them talking, and thus builds the brand from the backend of the business rather than overt advertisements all the time.
Clarity
Google plus is a great way to tailor your business to the individual or client themselves. With Google plus in business, the beauty is that there can be clearly delineated separations between different aspects of your business. This means that if an individual is interested in one area, they can focus on that while others can find exactly what they are looking for in another section. This is a highly touted point as described by business webpage owners who say that clients respond better to the ability to find what they are looking for easily without getting lost in a web of other information that is unneeded. In this way, then, Google plus for businesses provides a clarity and ease of specificity that business webpage designers thrive upon.
Social Media
Social media is an ever growing platform for recommendations and discussions in customers’ lives. For this reason, Google plus has made it easy to share and promote your business through easily navigable and usable social media sharing options. Just one share can lead to a trickle out affect which holds the potential to get your business noticed even more. There is also a button on Google plus that allows customers to actually make a recommendation, all with a simple click of the mouse. Be sure that your webpage has this as this is one of the best tips you can know to really getting a mass discussion and recommendation for your business page.
What is your take on Google+?
by winstonbromley | Jun 23, 2012 | Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Social Media, Social Media Tools
Almost every business has realized the potential of social media. If not, now is certainly the time to get on board.
However, social media is almost always used just as a marketing tool by itself. There are marketing benefits of using social media which I am fan, trainer and user of, however creating a social business can do a lot more and reap huge benefits in the long run.
Social business is a fairly new term on and not many entrepreneurs would know what it actually means. It definitely does not imply a business using social media for marketing purposes. It has far more utilities and benefits lined up for any business.
A social business is typically a business that uses social media in all facets of the company’s modus operandi. It is being widely believed, and rightly so, that social media is all set to become a focal point for any business. Right now, social media is just at the peripherals of any business whereby some marketing efforts yield fruit while others are simply futile attempts at conducting promotions and special sales.
Here are some of the benefits of doing social business.
- A social business puts much more focus on the value that social media can offer a business rather than only the marketing rewards.
- Social business calls for an inclusive involvement of social media and internet users which offer a wider platform to share and discuss almost anything about a business. Right there, a business gets to build a foundation for employees to interact with online citizens and gauge popular opinion. The opinion, feedback or thoughts can then be taken back to the boardroom for illustrations and a business can take appropriate steps to enhance a positive feedback or to curtail some criticisms.
- Several major corporations in the world are mulling over an idea to get the consumers involved in the creative process of product development or in the conception of an idea and developing it as per popular sentiments. In fact some companies have already started this process with various degrees of success, such as Nike.What this does is, it offers any business the leverage to do prelaunch market research and also gain specific product feedback even before something has been created or developed.
- Being a social business can have far reaching effects in terms of brand value. With social media gaining more acceptance as a common mode of communication and interaction, customers are more likely to interact with individuals and trust them rather than a brand. With people getting more exposure to social media from businesses and brands they like, it is upon the shoulders of the the entrepreneurs and executives to drive their brand value using their own reputation and skills.
Let me know what you think.
by winstonbromley | Jan 19, 2012 | Facebook, Google+, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Social Media, Social Media Tools
I will make a bold statement here: If you are not on Google+ now, you should be as it is an important part of your Social Networking and Marketing toolkit, as it will change how we interact, purchase things as well as rank in the Search Engines.
If you haven’t heard of Google+ or have been sitting on the fence, Google+ is a newer social media platform from Google that brings together the best of Social Media networks as well as Search engine optimization and a lot of great features. A bonus is that the layout of the site is very clean and easy to read.
There are quite a few things that separate Google+ from it’s rivals. Here are the key ones in my mind as a Business owner leveraging Social Media.
Circles – Laser Focused Marketing:
One of the features is the introduction of Circles. Circles are clusters of your Contacts placed into a group that you would like to address separately. You can put your Family into the Family Circle, your Friends into a Friends cirlce, Boat enthusiasts into another circles, Joggers into another one, etc.
What this allows you to do is to be able to broadcast your thoughts or messages to select groups, such as a timely article to only the Jogger Circle. That way you are not telling your whole list about the activity that will not relate to most of your list.
By having Circles, it helps to organize the people you have friended, into circles that are easy to give them a name that is easy to remember.
As a business owner, this is a great thing to have. What you can do, is as you find people on Google+ in an area that you are looking to target, you can place them into a circle. Let’s say you are looking for Musicians to be part of a festival and you only want local musicians. All you have to do is search for them via the search features and when you find them, without leaving the page, you can Add them to the appropriate “Musicians” cirlce. From that point on, if you have an item you need to say or market, all you have to do is click on the SHARE button and pick that Circle, and voila!, only those people will see it. Again you are not “spamming” the rest of your list so people will appreciate this.
To invite people to Google+, you simply add them into your Circle that you would like them to be part of. There is a button that says “Add a new person”. Next, you need to put them into a circle. Pick multiple ones if that person should be in 2 or more circles. Type in their Email address. Once they are located and they will get an invite from you.
+1 – Increase your Popularity and SEO while telling people that others like your stuff as well:
As you can see pretty much everywhere on the internet, a lot of sites are showcasing the +1 Button. This is the Google+ button that allows you if pressed, that you appreciate this article and find it valuable.
So if you like an article, even this one (hint hint), you can click on the +1, to show you like what information is being provided.
From a Search Engine optimization point of view for our Business or personal sites, Google is the king of all search engines. We all know that. Well, since it’s their social network, you are starting to see (if you are logged into Google+ while searching around – and usually unless you log out, you stay logged in), as you are logged in, Friends and contacts in your Circles that have +1’d an article and this provides the magic component of Social proof. Social proof is a way of showing others like your stuff, and makes it more appealing to like as well.
An example is if you +1 an article, and your friends on Google+ go searching for that items, say a restaurant review site, they will see that you +1 or liked it and that will make you more want to click on it as it’s like Winston likes this page, I will check it out as well.
The other MAJOR thing about the +1 is that for Google, once again the biggest Search Engine in the world, is starting to arrange the algorithm from how it indexes now to more of Social engagement. Put another way, the more that pages are +1 from Google+ users, the more it will help to move up the rankings.
Example: Bob pulled out all the tricks with SEO (search engine optimization) to create a top ranking page for a product on an Event in his town. Tim, another local person has a page for an event on the same day and wants to beat out the ranking of Bob’s site. Tim also does a great job but is behind Bob’s site. Leading up to the event, Tim gets quite a substantial number of +1’s and comments on his page. Since Google tracks this and the social input, it will cause Tim’s site to rise to the top, as it’s social proof that people are finding and enjoying that page.
This is crucial for SEO, development of sites and marketing from this point on. Google and other search engines see that basing rankings on what people like is truly the best way to rank pages.
Business Pages:
On Google+ you can create Business Pages for your Businesses, Brands and other non-personal items.
Agan, the main benefit is that Google is running the show and this will lead to be indexing of your Brand and better page indexing than Facebook could ever do.
NOTE: Facebook is not indexed in google other than personal page indexes that link to you, if at all.
Video Chats:
As a Google+ user, you can bring together your team on the site in a video chat area, called Hangouts. You can have up to 10 people at one time.
Facebook created a deal this past year with Skype however on FB, you can only do 1 person at a time on Video conference mode. They are still catching up and keep adding in features that look a lot like Google+.
In your Account Profile:
Once you have setup your Profile (and you can even transfer over all of your details from Facebook to Google+), people can see your Stream of conversation (or if you assign status updates for specific circles, on those can see it), About you, photos and videos as well as all the articles you have +1. I like that viewing of +1 as it allows me to bookmark sites I like with the +1 and then can refer to my profile to review them or re-read them.
URL Shortener:
There is a great site, called http://www.gplus.to that will take the ugly URL that links to your page and make it into a short URL for you. Just go onto the site, enter your long URL, add a nickname, as shown above and it will create a shorter, easier to use URL. I use this as it’s a lot cleaner in my Email signature.
This is mine: http://www.gplus.to/winstonbromley
Why Google+ Matters:
As there are many Social Media sites out there to be part of, I highly recommend for all it’s benefits, that you get a Google+ account today and start building your Network. It’s a very intuitive Site and poses many features that will help you and your Business to succeed in Social Media, SEO and whatever else Google thinks up. Google is the king of Content so let’s be part of their system and get the results we want.
Come and find my on Google+ and add me to your Friends circle.
http://www.gplus.to/winstonbromley
See you there!
