2010 SeptemberMirna Bard Page 2 | Mirna Bard - Part 2

September, 2010

Join Me On Facebook for “Fun Friday” Giveaways
Posted Sep 18th, 2010 By Mirna Bard in Facebook, Social Networking With | No Comments

As you may already know, I launched my new Facebook page a couple of months ago. My goal for this page is to educate likers on how to properly use the social web for their business and to empower them to think of unique and creative ways to engage their audience as part of a long-term strategy.

On October 1, I will be announcing a huge giveaway exclusive to all likers of the page. If you are not already a liker, I would love to have you as part of the community so you can join all the excitement!

A couple of weeks ago, I announced “Fun Friday” to give back to my community. This is my attempt to create a fun learning experience, get to know and educate my community as much as I can as well as give them an opportunity to get to know me better. Every Friday, I post a trivia question or scavenger hunt at 9 a.m. Pacific. The first person to answer the question or find the item I hide of the hunt, will receive a 1-hour complimentary phone/Skype consultation with me.

I already gave away three free consultations and all were extremely excited about what they learned just from a 1-hour phone call. Below are the unsolicited comments they posted on Facebook and Twitter:

This week, Jarrett Gucci of Dynasty Web Solutions (the brilliant mind behind my Facebook page design and a WordPress WIZ) helped me come up with a fun scavenger hunt. All participants had to find “Mini Mirna” (a small image of me) on Jarrett’s page, then double click my image to receive a social media tip (see images below). The first person who reported the tip back on my page won the scavenger hunt. There were approximately 30 people who liked Jarrett’s page to try to find me.

A lot of creativity and planning went into this, and I hope many of my Facebook likers learned a new fun way to engage their audience with social networking. This is what it means to entertain, educate, and collaborate — all essential elements of social media.

There I am standing on top of the world!

It’s been a blast every week, and I hope a lot of you will join us every Friday and spread the word, please!
Producing Content That Will Make Readers and Search Engines Come Back for More
Posted Sep 14th, 2010 By Mirna Bard in Blogging, Content Marketing, Search Engine Optimization (SEO) With | 3 Comments

Millions of people from all over the world produce content for the Internet on a daily basis. It is almost impossible to keep track of everything that is written and posted. Search engines are the number one tool that people use to sift through all of the content that is available on the Internet. However, when people search for something, they usually end up clicking through only the first few results that show up. This means that you need to optimize your content for search engines. This will allow your content to show up as one of the top results when people search for the topic you are writing about. However, it is important to place too much priority on search engine optimization. You will also want to make sure that your content is high quality and pleasing to readers.

Producing Good Content for the Internet

You need to have solid, relevant content before you can even start to think about search engine optimization. You should try to set yourself apart from the thousands of other articles available on the Internet. You need to offer people something that they cannot get anywhere else. Do some research on what is already available about your topic. You should think about ways that you can improve upon what is already out there and make it more relevant to readers. The content that you produce should also be well written. Nobody wants to read something that is filled with errors and misspellings. You should write in a way that is clear to your reader. You have to understand your audience and give them what they want.

Search Engines Use Keywords

After you have produced content that is worthy of being read, you need to understand how search engines work. Search engines enter all of the text on a website into a very large database. Search engines go through this database when something is being searched for. Websites are ranked based on relevance. The relevance of a website is usually based on how often the word or phrase that was searched for appears.

You should select one keyword or a couple of keyword phrases that you think best represent the content that you have created. You will want to make sure that these keywords appear throughout your article. However, you should be careful to not overdo it. You want to have your keywords appear naturally throughout your writing. It should not be obvious to the reader that you are stuffing your content with keywords.

Search Engines Like New Content

A lot of search engines will display new content ahead of content that has been on the Internet for months. This means that you should always be updating and refreshing your content for websites to make sure you rank highly on search engines. Constantly updating content will also help you attract new readers and keep old ones. People will be interested in frequently visiting your site to see if any new information has been posted. In addition, adding new content will allow you to practice your writing skills. You will find that your new articles will flow better and be more readable. You will also get more practice in using keywords so your content will be optimized for search engines.

Do you do keyword research before you create your content? What content strategy have you found helpful for your business?
Is There Such A Thing As Competition?
Posted Sep 10th, 2010 By Mirna Bard in Business With | 4 Comments

As you may recall, I wrote two posts about competition not too long ago: 3 Major Reasons You Shouldn’t Ignore Competitors on Social Networking Sites and 3 Undeniable Ways to Turn Competitors into Enemies on Social Media Sites. I think Ivan Misner’s Philosophy below really complements these posts well. Enjoy!

My philosophy about competition is best summed up by Henry Ford, who once said, “The competitor to be feared is one who never bothers about you at all, but goes on making his own business better all the time.”

In my business organization, BNI, members or directors often express concern about other competitive networking groups that are forming and bad-mouthing our company or attacking our program in some way. I tell my team that if they feel like someone is biting at our backsides, it’s because we’re out in front. Success in business is about constantly improving your product or service and making it better all the time. The process is a journey, not a destination. However, if you are constantly working to improve the system, improve the product, improve the culture and improve the team, you will also improve your position in the marketplace.

Almost 10 years ago I had a particularly aggressive competitor publicly state that he was going to bury our organization. Since then we’ve grown by almost 400 percent. I haven’t heard about his company in years. I’m not sure whether it’s still in business. Ford got it right. Keep making your business better, and you’ll have no need to fear your competitors–your business will be the one competitors fear the most.

Guest Author: Called the “father of modern networking” by CNN, Dr. Ivan Misner is a New York Times bestselling author. He is the Founder and Chairman of BNI the world’s largest business organization. His newest book, Networking Like a Pro, can be viewed at www.IvanMisner.com. You can also read more of his valuable information on the Neworking Now Blog.
Is Social Media a ‘Get Rich’ Scheme or Competition?
Posted Sep 8th, 2010 By Mirna Bard in Social Media, Social Networking, Viral Marketing With | 7 Comments

Do you want THOUSANDS of friends/followers within days/weeks?

Please become a liker of my Facebook page because I need to reach 1000 likers!

Make money FAST using social media…

Let me show you how I made $100K in one day using social media…

Learn how to grow followers FAST on Twitter…

Anyone can make money using Twitter…Learn how NOW!
Any of these sound familiar? I have lost count of how many of these messages I receive per day. I am sure you have too. Tired of them yet? I know I am!

If you spend any time on any social media site, you will find that there appears to be a race to see who can have the most friends/followers or who can find the quickest and easiest way to get rich using social media. There are schemes that can help you get thousands of new people to follow you on sites like Twitter.

There are even sites that sell friends by the thousands. If any of these come across your e-mail or your social media accounts, please IGNORE them. Two words: “Buyer Beware!” And, if you are sending out these messages, please STOP!

Social media is not for people who want to get rich fast nor is it a competition. There is no short cut to using social media. Social media is another powerful tool to help you build genuine, quality, and long-term relationships. It is NOT about the quantity of friends or likers you have. If you are using social networking sites to increase the visibility of your business, the concept is very simple. Think of it as taking your offline networking online.

When you are at a networking event, you connect with people and try to build relationships. Then once you establish credibility, you may try to introduce people to your products and services. And, if you have given enough value, you will automatically attract your ideal clients. Well, the same rules apply to social networking. It is truly as simple as that! No need to reinvent the wheel.

When trying to build your likers and followers on social networking sites, you must think about your target audience and not how many followers you are going to have by the end of the month. For example, imagine you sell steaks. They might be the juiciest, tastiest steaks in the world, but if you try to sell them at a raw food convention where there are thousands of people, guess what? No one will buy! That’s what it’s like when you gather 20,000 people through random methods just to get followers on whatever social network you are targeting. I guarantee that this approach will not get you the results you are looking for and will not increase your business in any shape or form.

Now, imagine you take these amazing steaks to a meat-lovers convention. Do you think these people might be interested in your food? I bet you’d sell out in no time! Keep this in mind when you are finding followers on Twitter, Facebook, StumbleUpon or any other social network. You need to focus on targeted followers — the ones who appreciate the value you provide and are interested in what you have to offer.

In summary, social media isn’t a competition to see how popular you are . . . unless that happens to be your sole purpose (But, why would it be?). However, if you are there to increase the visibility of your business, you need to start looking at things differently. Quality follower or likers will make all the difference in your bottom line!

Follow these 12 social media tips and see the difference it makes in your business:

1. Have a strategy
2. Use listening skills
3. Provide value
4. Build credibility/rapport
5. Be genuine/honest
6. Be conversational
7. Be interesting/amusing
8. Be creative (think outside the box)
9. Be consistent
10. Use proper etiquette
11. Be patient
12. Most importantly, have fun!

Am I missing any schemes? Please list any hype that you have seen or received in the comments section below . This will help educate others and prevent them from making costly mistakes.
5 Effective Tips for Avoiding the Email Spam Can
Posted Sep 6th, 2010 By Mirna Bard in Business, Content Marketing, Email Marketing With | 2 Comments

Email marketing is an incredibly popular marketing strategy–and for good reason. It works! Unfortunately, tougher SPAM filters mean more and more valid messages are winding up in SPAM folders.

Would you like to guarantee YOUR email campaigns are delivered to the in-box where they belong? Then you absolutely MUST implement these best practices. Because an email in the spam-can is a waste of your precious time and money.

1. Provide Valuable Content

Make sure all of your emails are relevant to your contacts. Send you customer and prospects an invitation, a tip or trick of the trade, a coupon, a friendly note, or an offer. Just make sure it’s something they’ll want to receive from you.

2. DON’T Buy or Rent Lists

Doing so almost guarantees you’ll be spamming people. Did you collect the names? Did the people ask you for information? Nope? Then it’s SPAM!

“But where do I get names from?” you might ask. Well, start with what you’ve got, ask for referrals, put banners on sites, use pay-per-click-ads, get people to post about you, use lead generation tools, and use social networking. May sound like a slow start…buy boy does it beat paying fines for breaking SPAM rules.

3. Double Opt-in Your Contacts

That basically guarantees you have permission to market to them. Double opting-in requires your contacts to confirm their contact information BEFORE you start you email marketing campaigns. It’s an extra step, and yes, you will lose some of your potential leads. But the odds of being considered a “spammer” go way down!

4. Clean Your Contact List Every 6-12 Months

This means you take every contact that you haven’t engaged with somehow – no downloads, no requests, no new opt-ins – and do one of two things. Either delete them from the list or send an email that asks them to confirm their continued interest.

5. Know the CAN-SPAM Guidelines

The rules about SPAM regulate your header content, your subject line information, your opt-out requirements, and how you identify yourself. Know the rules so you can keep your money in your pocket.

For more information about improving your email marketing practices, download a free guide about Email Marketing 2.0.

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