Recent Posts

  • Astonishing U.S. Social Media Usage Statistics – Are Americans Social?

    Posted Aug 16th, 2011 By in Social Media, Social Networking With | 4 Comments

    I wanted to share this amazing infographic about social media usage in the United States.  Check out these astounding stats, share away, and leave your comments below.                                          

     

    Source:  AgentGenius is a rapidly growing real estate social media, tech, news, and opinion site built and designed by and for the on-the-go agent. Their mission is to be a positive force in the industry, led by people inside of real estate. They aim to keep you up to date on trends that we study closely in order to forecast what’s next on the horizon.

    What do you think of these astonishing stats?  Please leave your comments below.


  • 6 Tips for Creating Compelling White Papers for a B2B Audience

    Posted Aug 4th, 2011 By in Content Marketing With | 2 Comments

    White papers are more commonly used by B2B companies than B2C companies. This is because B2B companies are ready to dedicate their time to find out more about the solution and the product. Every B2B company needs a white paper to help market itself better.

    Some of the points you need to keep in mind while creating white papers are:

    1. Avoid direct selling – When you write a B2B white paper you need to forget about directly selling your services. B2B white papers only work when you sell your services in a subtle manner. You can write it persuasively, but you need to forget about using testimonials, call to actions that pressure readers, etc.

    You might think that this indirect way of selling will not work, but when it comes to white papers subtle selling works really well.

    2. Address it to a single person – Many writers think that when you write it for a business you’re writing for a whole bunch of people together and they need to address them as a group of people. It’s true that many people are going to read it, but they’re going to read it alone. You won’t have a group of people reading it together. This is the reason why you need to address your reader as a single person with a “you”.

    3. Keep it simple – It’s is common for businesses to use hard to read language in their white papers as they think that it reflects on the company. They think that making the white paper hard to read will make their company look sophisticated. But using complicated words could actually work against you.

    Your white paper is normally 6 to 14 pages long. It could take a lot of time for someone to read it and people who normally read white papers are busy decision makers. They are looking for white papers which are simple and quick to read. If they read a white paper that is hard to understand and keeps them visiting the search engines for answers and making it longer to read the white paper, they will just abandon reading it.

    This is the reason why you need to simplify the writing and look up meanings for every word and write it in a detailed manner. This will make it easy to read and more busy decision makers will read it completely, which will give it the opportunity to do its job of generating leads. (more…)

  • Should You Follow Your Favorite Brands on Social Media Platforms?

    Posted Aug 1st, 2011 By in Social Media With | 3 Comments

    Social media marketing is a booming trend, so it’s no wonder that it’s easier than ever to find all of your favorite brands on popular websites like Twitter and Facebook. Businesses of all sizes are relying on social media to improve customer communication since social networking is much more efficient and cost effective than communicating via the telephone or e-mail.

    If you’re a customer that has a concern, question, or a comment, you can reach out to the majority of brands through social media in a matter of seconds. On top of that, since brands are relying on social media for marketing purposes, many top businesses are giving their customers rewards for following them on Twitter or liking them on Facebook.

    Here are a few top benefits you can receive from following your favorite brands in social media:

    1. You can be heard. Rather than sending an e-mail to a business or even participating in a survey, you can post your comment or tweet a response in just a few seconds. Since most businesses are new to the social media plunge, it’s likely that you’ll receive a response within a few hours or even a day to your question or concern.

    On top of that, since Twitter is a public website, a business won’t want other customers to see a public customer concern that hasn’t been dealt with. If you’re posting on a public social media website, a business is much more likely to respond to you than if you just send an e-mail.

    2. You can find out about special deals and contests. Brands are more excited than ever to use social media to promote specials, giveaways, and contests. Even mega brands like Verizon have leaned heavily on social media by using hashtags on Twitter to promote a series of giveaways to drum up sales from new customers.

    If you have a favorite brand, it literally pays to stay in the know and use social media to take advantage of discount offers you can’t find anywhere else.

    3. You can eliminate confusion. If you’re confused about a company’s new product or how to take advantage of a coupon, you can post a question on Facebook to receive a near immediate response. This is much more effective than visiting forums with answers from other Internet users.

    Why rely on another customer’s speculation or perspective when you can go to the horse’s mouth and get your answer directly from the brand through social media? Even better, you won’t have to worry about staying on hold with a company for minutes on end to get the help you need.

    4. You can become part of the bigger picture. Starbucks is one of the leading brands in social media, and they have taken the next step by introducing the forum My Starbucks Idea. The amazing thing about this forum is that customers are allowed to post their ideas and suggestions, and Starbucks actually listens.

    This is a brilliant strategy on behalf of Starbucks. Customers everywhere are impressed that they are being heard by a large corporation, and Starbucks is getting great ideas for free that they can use for product development.

    Guest Author:  Bethany Ramos is an expert in Internet marketing and social media marketing, and she also co-owns her own e-commerce website, The Coffee Bump.

     

  • Is Google + Competing with Facebook?

    Posted Jul 25th, 2011 By in Google With | 4 Comments

    Hands-down, Google is the most popular website on earth. Yet they seem to be worried about their stiff competition coming in at a close second – none other than Facebook.

    This is precisely why Google has decided to introduce their own social network as Google +. Google has tried to make a number of different social media channels over the years, like Google Buzz and Google Wave. Yet nothing has caught on so far…

    But now we can consider Google + for a second. Google + makes no bones about the fact that it is supposed to be just like Facebook with a few enhancements. Maybe we could call it “Facebook with a facelift”? Instead of opening up Google + to the public, Google has decided to create a little bit of buzz, so to speak.

    Upon its introduction, you can’t sign up directly for Google + just yet. Initially, you have to be invited by someone else who is a member in the beta stage of this social network. But even with this type of exclusive appeal, Google + has managed to gather 10 million members as of July 2011. This is nowhere near the mega benchmark set by Facebook at 750 million members, but it seems to be off to a strong start.

    Google + versus Facebook

    At first glance, Google + looks like a copycat of Facebook. You can post your thoughts and updates, just like you can to the Facebook wall. There is also something called a Stream, which is exactly like the Newsfeed on Facebook. And to compete with the “Like” button on Facebook, Google + offers a +1 button so that you can show that you are a fan of a post, picture, video, or what have you.

    But the big, shiny difference between the two is that Google + has a little something called Circles.

    If you’ve ever had the thought when using Facebook that you’d love to say something a little more inappropriate, a little more private, or a little wackier than what you would share with all of your friends, Circles may be the answer. You can create circles of friends, family, acquaintances, and following, which is similar to Twitter. You can also create your own circles with specific members, like Grandparents or College Friends, where you can share private jokes or special stories to your heart’s content without boring everyone else on your Stream.

    And when you decide to share something, you are able to specify which circle that it is sent to. Of course, you can choose to send the information to all of your circles or just one to keep a bit of news private. This minimizes much of the fuss surrounding social media, like teachers getting fired for posting pictures of a drunken party or saying something inappropriate. If you want to post something that you don’t want your boss to see, then don’t post it to a public circle, plain and simple.

    Although this may be a subtle difference between Google + and Facebook, only time will tell how the Circles feature attracts users to this new social network.

    Guest Author:  Bethany Ramos is an expert in Internet marketing and social media marketing, and she also co-owns her own e-commerce website, The Coffee Bump.

     

     

  • Retailers Use Mobile Marketing to Attract More Customers

    Posted Jul 21st, 2011 By in Mobile With | 2 Comments

    As a customer, you’ve probably experienced the benefits of mobile marketing to give you discounts, specials, and freebies from your favorite brand. Right? Well, as a business owner, you can use this same type of hands-on mobile marketing to reach customers more effectively than ever before.

    Even the most popular fast food chains like Subway, Pizza Hut, Burger King, and Wendy’s started marketing to customers with text marketing, iPhone apps, and mobile coupons just a few years ago. Many of these mobile apps will allow a customer to place an order online and pick up their food moments later. Simply brilliant.

    Even large retailers like Target, Wal-Mart, and Best Buy stay connected with customers via text for holiday specials and discounts and have introduced iPhone apps to give customers more options. Instead of visiting the official website, customers can read reviews, order products, and create a gift list directly through their mobile phone.

    As a business owner, you can take your mobile marketing campaign beyond just the standard text message. You can get creative with the following ideas:

    • Mobile Payments: Starbucks recently introduced Starbucks Card Mobile payments available at more than 1000 Safeway locations via the Android App. Customers can load up their Starbucks card on their mobile phone and use their phone to pay for their coffee at their convenience. This means that Starbucks mobile payment is now available on 90% of all smartphones to make it virtually impossible for a customer not to connect with Starbucks through their mobile device. (more…)
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