2010 was a big year in terms of businesses starting to establish a social media presence, and 2011 expanded on that with an explosion in the number of businesses that started taking social media seriously as a marketing tool. Now that we've done an adequate amount of setting things up, it's time to start thinking of 2012 as the year when we really push forward and begin to innovate in terms of using social media in the best possible way, and customizing the experience so that each business is serving its own customers in a manner that suits their particular situation.
Peg McDermott
Over the past few years, online marketing, and especially social media, has developed into a situation where there is less "businessy" talk, and more real human interaction between businesses and customers. Spouting slogans and pasting logos everywhere is no longer the best way to get customers - you have to have actual conversations with the people you are marketing to, and let them know that they're dealing with real humans, not some corporate machine.
If there's one thing this year's Google updates have taught us, it's that we can no longer rely on raw numbers to tell us how well we're doing when it comes to social media and SEO marketing. The Google Panda update back in February was a pretty big wake-up call that simply having a lot of content and attracting a lot of links wasn't enough to stay high up on the first page of search results. Counting fans, followers, and incoming links used to give us a good idea about how our campaigns were going, but as Google and other search engines move toward more engagement-based algorithms, it's up to us as marketers to respond appropriately.
When we talk about SEO and search engine ranking, the automatic assumption is that we're talking about Google. While it's certainly true that Google is the most important and influential search engine at the moment, and possibly for the foreseeable future, it's also important to remember that Google has other things besides search in its sights. As Google integrates other features under the umbrella of its brand name, other search engines with more of a single-minded focus may be stepping into the spotlight, and if you're thinking about the future of your SEO strategy, you might want to keep other search engines in mind.
Believe it or not, it's already December, and if you haven't already started thinking about how you want to modify your social media, SEO, blogging, and other aspects of your online marketing strategy for the coming year, now is a good time to get started.
In this age of the internet, the entire world is pretty much at our fingertips. From a commerce standpoint, this has to make a business owner wonder if it's appropriate to market to a worldwide audience. After all, if all anyone has to do to see your product or service is visit a website, why not market to as many people as possible?
This week Google finally announced that it was allowing businesses to create Google+ Pages for their brands. Since then there has been a lot of opinion in both directions about whether or not the pages are worth the trouble of signing up, and there are a few things that businesses need to keep in mind when considering a Google+ Page.
You probably already have a strong SEO strategy for your company's website, and of course that's important. Providing regular doses of fresh and relevant content on your blog, for example, is a great way to keep search engines interested in your site, which will in turn drive traffic to your business.
Sometimes in the world of social media, it's easy to get caught up in the idea that a greater following equals greater success for your business. So many people focus on "getting the numbers up" - increasing Twitter follower numbers, Facebook fans, YouTube channel subscribers, and so forth. However, there may be a sobering wake-up call if you manage to get your following to snowball somewhat, but aren't managing to convert those followers into customers. As so many social media marketers can tell you, just getting the following isn't enough - those numbers don't mean anything unless you can also engage with your audience in an effective way.
It happens even to the best of us from time to time - something thoughtless, inappropriate, or downright dumb gets said on a social network, people react, and next thing you know you've got a big scandal on your hands. In the context of a small or medium-sized business, even a minor uproar on a social network can spell big problems for you in terms of unhappy customers and a dip in sales. Just like in every other aspect of business, mistakes will be made from time to time on social media. Even if you're extremely diligent with your social media policy, there's not really anything you can do about the fact that people are human, and sometimes they say damaging or offensive things.
Ten years ago, internet marketing was much simpler than it is now. You had a website to promote your business, and that's exactly what it did. It was basically an online brochure that told your potential customers what you would provide for them, and gave them all the contact details to reach if if they wanted to do business with you.
Just when you thought you had the hang of this SEO and social media strategy stuff, a new player walked onto the stage: the tablet. Apple's iPad started a wave of tablet use that is beginning to change how we use the internet in a very real way.