Saturday, February 5, 2011

View All of Your Favorite Content in One Place with Faveous

If you use sites like Google Reader, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube to find and favorite interesting content then you’ll love Faveous. Right now Faveous is a very basic service in its “first private alpha,” but if you check out the features page you’ll see that there are a lot of new things coming soon. What it does is import all of your favorites (and “likes” from Facebook) into a single location so that you have easy access to them.

Connecting your desired services is easy and takes only a minute to authorize each one. If you want to manually add content from other sites not listed above, you can do so via the bookmarklet or Chrome extension. Content added manually will be displayed on the Faveous tab.

Your content will begin importing right away and you can view all items together or separately by choosing a tab. The search box on the right side of the page is also a nice touch because you can search through all of your favorites and find exactly what you’re looking for. Right now there is no way to actually organize your favorites, but that is coming soon. Honestly, I think it’s fine without that feature since there is the ability to search, but some may feel differently.

As I mentioned above, Facebook items are not actual favorites, but “likes” on videos, links and pages. If you’re visiting a blog and “like” an article, things like that will be imported as well. Faveous does not to import likes on statuses and comments.

Right now, the only option for each item is to delete it. Clicking on the Google Reader, Facebook and YouTube items will take you to the actual page on that service. Unfortunately, the only things clickable on Twitter content are links included in tweets (not usernames).

On a final note, I feel that Faveous has staying power and potential. We have enough services out there that let us view all of our content and very few that let us focus just on our favorites. Users want a site that is easy to use and doesn’t require too much work and Faveous offers just that. Why bookmark content when you can have it automatically imported from the social network itself? The latter method is definitely more convenient and helps to increase productivity.

Friday, February 4, 2011

Why It’s Important to have Social Media Guidelines and STICK with them!

The message has been deleted, but the damage is done.

kenneth-cole

Social Media users are in an uproar about the Tweet posted in poor taste by Kenneth Cole yesterday. While this may not be the first time the designer has rubbed people the wrong way, this IS the first time it won’t be so easy to move on and forget about it.

Posted on the brand Twitter channel, “KC” inappropriately referenced the situation in Cairo to promote the new spring line. Even though he followed up with another Tweet aimed to ensure followers that he was not trying to “make light of a serious situation”, the damage was already done.

The offending Tweet was removed around 3:30 PM yesterday (approx. 4 hours from when it was published), but not before coverage of the Tweet and the negative ruckus it caused reached over 254 MILLION UMVs (and this is just the first page of Google results) and upwards of 27,000 Tweets. Online media coverage included the likes of Mashable, Forbes, Huffington Post, MSN, Aol News, Time, Ok Magazine, Yahoo! News, CNBC and Business Insider. While this uproar may have happened somewhat in a funnel (Kenneth Cole was not a trending topic nationally or globally, but rather is various hotspots around the world: Atlanta, Chicago, London, DC, San Fransisco and Business Insider reports an increase in shares), it does seem that we’ve come to a new age of digital crises.

Digital Influence colleague, Kaitlyn Wilkins is calling this the era of “Digital Crisis 3.0″:

“2.0 was just the inclusion of social, or it’s ability to springboard something like this into mainstream media – twitter trends, hashtags, blog posts. 3.0 is the fact that people have been empowered with the tools and platforms to quickly mock and riff and create new cycles of buzz.” (Check out satirical Twitter handle @KennethColePR)

Just think, all of this negative press (and potential loss of brand fans) could have been avoided if more thought and a bit of consideration had been put in to the 11 AM Tweet on Thursday, February 3rd. While Kenneth Cole is no stranger to social media, it looks like he may need a refresher on the brand’s social media guidelines…

10 Little-known Ways to Get Traffic to Your Blog

This guest post is by Onibalusi Bamidele of YoungPrePro.com.

Getting traffic to a blog is the major challenge a blogger faces. Many have read about various traffic generation strategies, but they find it difficult to get traffic to their blogs because these tips are no longer as effective as they once were. For example, guest blogging used to be very effective, but now that a lot of people are doing it and talking about it, it’s no longer as effective as it used to be.

Here are ten little-known tips to get traffic that I’ve discovered from my own experience. Implementing all ten tactics at the same time isn’t that effective; the way to get the best from these tactics is to choose two or three tactics that you think you like, and focus all your efforts on them for a period of time. You will be amazed at the results you will get.

1. Secret blogging clubs

A major and underutilized way to get traffic to a blog is by joining secret blogging groups or clubs. Very few people are using this particular method, but it can be very effective if you focus your efforts on it.

Secret blogging clubs consists of a group of bloggers with one aim: to help each other spread the word about their blogs with a view to generating traffic for each others’ blogs. The concept is simple: you join a club with around 50 members, share each others’ post with your fans and followers (around once a week), and this will generate more traffic, since it exposes your blog to a wider audience.

You dont need to worry about spamming and the likes, because groups like these are heavily moderated. Also, it is not necessary to share every link that is posted to the group—you only need to share the links related to your niche, that you feel are valuable.

A great example of an effective secret blogging club is the DailyBlogTips Retweet Club by Daniel Scocco. A post of mine that went viral through a secret blogging club was my guest post on getting more blog comments—it presently has 97 comments and 87 retweets on a site that averages 15 retweets and 40 comments per post.

2. Social blogmarking sites

Another underutilized but effective way to get traffic to your blog is by making use of social blogmarking sites. Even though this concept looks similar to social bookmarking sites like Digg and Reddit, it operates differently.

A social blogmarking site can be useful irrespective of whom you are and your status on the network. All you need to do is write your best post and give it the best title. Submit it to your favorite social blogmarking site and, if it’s voted onto the site’s homepage, it will send a stream of traffic to your blog. The articles that make it to the front page are not determined by the authors who submit them, or dependent on the domain name of the author’s site. The quality and title of the article is all that matters.

I also respect social blogmarking because of the quality of traffic it sends. The visitors that come from the blogmarking site I’m involved with (Blokube) spend an average of ten minutes on my blog. Presently, this is one of my best traffic sources, as far as traffic quality is concerned.

3. Ning communities

Getting traffic to your blog through Ning communities is a great way to get traffic to your blog, yet few bloggers use this method. I learned this formula from Kim Roach and it keeps on sending me traffic, even months after I use it.

Like blogging, a lot of people have a version of themselves or their business on Ning.com. You can create a portal in the form of yourusername.ning.com, which can also be a great way to get traffic to your blog.

All you need to do is help community members with their questions, and reference your blog if necessary. There is also a place where you can submit your blog posts for the whole community to see—another great traffic source. If you plan on doing this, you don’t necessarily need to write new posts: you can submit some of your old posts with a link back to your blog.

Not all Ning communities bring results. Some communities will send you zero visitors, while some will send you hundreds, so it’s important to be wise when choosing a community you want to join. I have discovered that what works is to make sure you join a Ning community that’s related to your niche, and has over 5000 members.

4. Free, no-catch ebooks

This is another powerful but underutilized tactic to get more traffic to your blog. I didn’t use this strategy until recently, but when I did, I got awesome results.

To use this technique, write as many free reports as you can. A report is a simple, seven-to-ten-page ebook. Make sure you embed links to your blog in the ebook, and encourage readers to visit your blog. Then, distribute the ebook to free ebook directories, post it to your favorite forums, ask other bloggers to help you share it, and do as much as you can to spread the word about it.

What has worked best for me is sharing it on my favorite Internet marketing forums, like Digital Point Forums. After utilizing this particular strategy, I saw a spike in my traffic: I got an additional 60-80 visitors per day for some days, and over 100 new blog subscribers.

5. Content syndication

I’ve noticed that a lot of people are not using this particular strategy, but it can be highly effective to syndicate your blog content to big online portals in your niche. Most of these portals are visited by countless people every day, and syndicating with them will go a long way to give your blog a traffic boost.

Great examples of some of the best content syndication sites I’ve found are Alltop and The Daily Brainstorm.

6. Blogging collaboration

It pains me to see that this particular traffic strategy is not better utilized. In 2010 I collaborated with a lot of well-known and respected bloggers to give my readers some entrepreneurial advice.

I was able to work with 24 successful online entrepreneurs, who contributed to the post, and shared it with their Twitter followers and Facebook fans when it went live. This sent me double my usual number of daily visitors and, eventually, more subscribers and followers. It is also one of the most shared posts on my blog.

Collaboration is a great tool and every wise blogger will use it sometime. Try to get some of the top bloggers in your niche to contribute to your blog; once the contribution is live, encourage them to share it.

7. Online podcasts

This is another great and underutilized way to get traffic to your blog. Pat Flynn from Smart Passive Income is very popular for his podcasts, and has been able to build a successful blog based on this and other methods.

While the podcasting technology is not new, very few people utilize it. Yet you can get more eyeballs to your content by creating a great and informative podcast relating to your blog. Submit it to the iTunes podcast directory and as more and more people search for podcasts relating to your topic area, they will end up discovering yours and, if it’s good, might end up visiting your blog.

8. Online groups

This particular approach is almost as old as some of the biggest websites on the Internet, so I’m amazed to see that very few people use it. I didn’t realize the power of this tactic until the day I woke up to see a spike in my website traffic generated by a LinkedIn group.

A lot of people still congregate and look for solutions to questions in online groups; many of these groups are also highly respected by Google, so they are indexed and ranked quickly. Thus, you have a great potential of getting traffic to your blog by utilizing good groups. The post I published to the LinkedIn group I mentioned attracted over 200 visitors from that group in the week it was published.

Two of the most popular online groups are Yahoo groups and LinkedIn groups—check them out.

9. Authority sites

I didn’t realize how powerful authority sites were until I interviewed successful entrepreneur Raymond Lei. He wrote a Wikipedia page in which a link to my interview with him was listed as one of the resources. This link sends me continuous traffic from Wikipedia even today.

You can use this strategy with some of the biggest websites on the Internet; since most of these sites find it easy to rank for competitive keywords in the search engines, you may find it easy to get traffic from them. For example, you can read and review some of the top books in your niche on Amazon while including a link back to your blog. Or interview the top bloggers in your niche, then include your link as a resource in their Wikipedia page.

10. Webrings

This is also a very effective traffic generation strategy that many people overlook.

A Webring is a collection of websites that are linked to each other. A major advantage of using a Webring is that it also helps you get high quality links which means both short term direct traffic and long term search engine traffic for you. Probably the most popular Webring is Webring.com.

These are my favorite little-known traffic tactics. What are yours? How have you got traffic to your blog? Share your thoughts in the comments section.

Visit YoungPrePro.com to learn how Onibalusi makes over $3000 online monthly and how he gets over 10,000 visitors to his blog every month. Download his guest blogging guide to learn how to get thousands of visitors from guest blogging. Also, make sure you follow him on twitter @youngprepro.

Social Media Monitoring Gaining Ground But Has Plenty of Room for Growth

As I prepare this morning to make a presentation on social media monitoring to a group of non-profit executives at the VOLUNTEER Hampton Roads, Hampton Roads Institute for Nonprofit Leadership Conference in Norfolk, VA, eMarketer is sharing an InformationWeek Analytics report about, you guessed it, social media monitoring.

The report shows that there is plenty of room for growth. Of course, we know Andy Beal already gets it (insert blatant Trackur social media monitoring tool plug here) but now it’s up to companies to get it more as well.

With 43% of the respondents having no plan to respond to any online comments it’s obvious that more business people need to understand this process before it is too late. There are many instances of companies and organizations having to scramble to respond to online issues and concerns. While doing something is usually better than doing nothing it is still very risky to have to put together a response on the fly when just some prior planning could prevent some seriously poor performance.

The study also looked at what companies are using to monitor the social space and most are still depending on search engine alerts which, in this space, is quickly becoming the equivalent of using smoke signals to communicate.

Since we are on the subject, be sure to check out the Trackur blog for even more information about the discipline of social media monitoring.

NOTE: One piece of monitoring we would like to do is to see what our readers think of this weekend’s Super Bowl. Who are the Pilgrims rooting for? Let us know in the comments. For me, it’s Go, Pack, Go! What about you?

Zuckerberg Gets Letter From Congress About Data Privacy Concerns

If you are a company that depends on your users’ information to make a good portion of your revenue like Facebook does for advertising you likely don’t want letters from politicians about your tactics. It’s like getting a letter from the Principal in school. You know you did something wrong but you are hoping it doesn’t go on your permanent record. Then the letter arrives at the house. Ouch.

Well, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg got one of those little notices. It came from U.S. Reps. Edward Markey (D-Mass) and Joe Barton (R-Texas), Co-Chairmen of the House Bi-Partisan Privacy Caucus and it was dated February 2. The concerns come from the plan that Facebook launched in January then pulled off the table to be tweaked for re-release that gave developers access to mobile phone numbers and addresses of Facebook accounts. Representative Markey’s website tells some more.

“Facebook needs to protect the personal information of its users to ensure that Facebook doesn’t become Phonebook,” said Rep. Markey. “That’s why I am requesting responses to these questions to better understand Facebook’s practices regarding possible access to users’ personal information by third parties. This is sensitive data and needs to be protected.”

“Facebook’s popularity has made it a leader in innovation and we hope they will also be a leader in privacy protection,” said Rep. Barton. “The computer – especially with sites like Facebook – is now a virtual front door to your house allowing people access to your personal information. You deserve to look through the peep hole and decide who you are letting in.”

Some of the questions that Facebook is being asked to answer include:

Would any user information in addition to address and mobile phone number be shared with third party application developers under the feature as originally planned, and was any of this information shared prior to Facebook’s announcement that it would suspend implementation of the feature?

What user information will be shared with third party application developers once the feature is re-enabled?

What was Facebook’s process for developing and vetting the feature referenced above before the feature was suspended, and what was the process that led Facebook to decide to suspend the rollout of this feature? What is the process Facebook is currently employing to adjust the feature prior to re-enabling it?

What are the internal policies and procedures for ensuring that new features developed by Facebook comply with Facebook’s own privacy policy, and does the company consider this a material change to its privacy policy?
What consideration was given to risks to children and teenagers posed by enabling third parties access to their home addresses and mobile phone numbers through Facebook when designing the new feature?

What are the opt-in and opt-opt option for this new feature?

Why is Facebook, after previously acknowledging in a letter to Reps. Markey and Barton that sharing a Facebook User ID could raise user concerns, subsequently considering sharing access to even more sensitive personal information such as home addresses and phone numbers to third parties?

It’s the last question in the previous quote that pretty much sums up how Zuckerberg and Facebook approach the world in most cases. You see, back October the company had told these same two representatives that sharing Facebook User ID’s with developers raised privacy concerns. Now, Facebook goes ahead and gets caught with its hand in the privacy cookie jar looking to give away even more sensitive information like mobile numbers and addresses. That’s either chutzpah or just plain disregard for concerns that had been voiced by these reps in the past. If you are Facebook does it make sense to ‘poke the bear’ and open this door again after ticking off the same two men you had issue with in just the past few months?

At any rate, it’s obvious that Facebook will push every envelope it can to get user data in the hands of people that can help Facebook make money. As a capitalist that makes sense. But Facebook’s apparent disregard for any convention of decency is going to come back to bite them in the end. Despite all the accolades and platitudes cast upon Zuckerberg as a visionary etc, etc there is no denying that he is also arrogant and feels to be above the law in many ways. In a word, there are times where he is just unlikeable. This culture and attitude has been created at Facebook as well so this will likely not be the last time the company gets called into the principal’s office.

If you would like to see a full copy of the letter you can do that here.

For Bloggers, Who Will Be the Next Digg?

It wasn’t that long ago that, for bloggers and other Webmasters, being on the front page of Digg was something of a Holy Grail. It meant an instant tidal wave of traffic, a lot of great publicity and, of course, major bragging rights.

However, Digg’s traffic, since the launch of the “New Digg” in August has waned. Though it is certainly still a traffic powerhouse, it’s no longer end goal for bloggers and webmasters, especially now that the front page of Digg is different for almost every logged in user.

In short, Digg is no longer the guaranteed traffic rush that it once was and, though sites continue to target it, it is no longer a lone champion or clear leader like it once was.

So what site or service could take Digg’s place? It’s a hard question to answer, especially since there may never be another site quite like the old Digg. But there are candidates that could do it or at least create something similar. Consider the following:

1. Reddit

Reddit is the natural choice for most. As a social news site, it’s similar to Digg in many ways, namely that users submit stories and vote them up or down until they reach the front page or fall off, but it’s also very different in many regards as well.

First, where all of Digg’s content links out, much of the content that climbs the charts in Reddit is self posts and image links. Most of the links that do point to other sites go to mainstream media outlets or a small number of high-profile blogs. Very few blogs, especially ones not about technology or politics, reach the default front page of Reddit.

But also like Digg, Reddit is fragmented with the front page being different from user to user and users being further divided into subreddits. Though Reddit can be a huge driver of traffic (according to Alexa it’s been more popular since New Digg was launched), from a webmaster standpoint, it’s a completely different beast than Digg, especially in terms of targeting.

2. Twitter

Many think that the problem is that sites like Digg have become obsolete and the Web has gone from social news to social networking. If that’s the case, Twitter is a logical choice as it certainly has a great deal of traffic, millions of active users and, most importantly, an extremely viral nature.

However, few people read everything in their Twitter stream and nearly everyone sticks to their particular circle, no matter how large or small it is. This means that, for a story to generate an extremely large volume of traffic, it has to either be picked up in a very viral way by hundreds of separate users or simply be tweeted out by a major Twitter user or celebrity.

3. Facebook

Facebook has many of the same advantages of Twitter including an even larger user base, powerful sharing tools and a robust network of tightly-connected individuals. However, Facebook just isn’t nearly as viral as Twitter, though people routinely share links on Facebook, they don’t share links from those they are as following as Twitter, partially because Facebook doesn’t have a “retweet” culture like Twitter.

Facebook, for the most part, works best with sites that already have a large volume of traffic, giving them a good number of people to post their content. Of course, as with Twitter, there is as lot of traffic to be found by targeting power users, however, that’s hardly a substitute for the (slightly) more democratic Digg.

4. StumbleUpon

Like Reddit, StumbleUpon passed Digg in traffic (according to Alexa) around the time of New Digg. It’s also a democratic site and one that a wide variety of sites seem to do well on. Users Stumble posts, users who might be interested in it are shown the article, they then vote up or down and, the more thumbis up a page gets, the more views it gets.

Indeed StumbleUpon can drive a LOT of traffic. But StumbleUpon is not a site as much as it is an extension or a bookmarklet. Also, as great as a StumbleUpon swarm is, the effect tends to be more drawn out, taking, at times, over days.

This means that there is no front page to reach and no way to know how large the swarm was, other than looking at your traffic.

Bottom Line

Of the four above, StumbleUpon is probably the most Digg-like, that is, at least for bloggers. It provides a strong burst of traffic, one that can, at its peak, easily compete with the Digg effect. It also has a good combination of democracy and targeting that gives just about any site a good shot at seeing massive amounts of traffic, so long as it has good content.

But that being said, there’s nothing out there right now, nor likely to be for some time, that’s like what Digg was. There’s no runaway leader is social news, no site that every blogger pines to get their work on the front page of. While there are some great niche alternatives, there’s nothing with the same presence and dominance as old Digg.

However, that might not be such a bad thing. Given that many felt that the traffic from Digg was of such poor quality, the alternatives that are out there may not generate as much traffic, but they may generate higher-quality traffic. This means fewer visitors, but more actual readers.

In short, the direction social news and social networking is taking is one that gets away from a system with one king that serves everyone and provides a tidal wave of traffic to a system that better targets content to the interests of readers, sending fewer visitors, but more engaged ones.

Though bloggers may not feel the high of a Digg effect for some time, they may feel a much greater one, the joy that comes from a steady stream of dedicated traffic built up over a long period of time.

Campbell’s Says iAds are Mmm Mmm Good

It’s kind of ironic that an old fashioned brand like Campbell’s is coming out as the spokesperson for the effectiveness of iAds. When the product took off in the early 1900′s, I’m sure they never imagined that one day people would be using hand-held wireless devices to find the best recipe that includes Golden Mushroom soup. But that’s exactly what’s happening and Campbell’s couldn’t be more pleased.

According to a five-week study conducted by Nielsen on behalf of Campbell’s and Apple, iAds were more effective than TV ads on a variety of levels.

As compared to viewing a Campbell’s TV ad, the viewers of iAds were:

– More than twice as likely to recall the ad.

– Three times more likely to remember the messaging.

– Four times more likely to purchase.

In addition to the ad boost, Campbell’s got something else, maybe something more important out of their pricey iAd campaign — the eyes of a younger audience. Up until now, Campbell’s advertising has been aimed primarily at moms who grew up with the brand. With the iAd campaign, they’ve opened themselves up to a whole different crowd.

But with this good news comes a reality check to the tune of one million dollars. That was the rumored cost of a buying in to the early adopter program and for Campbell’s, it sounds like it was worth every penny. Now Apple has to expand on that success to bring in more advertisers and reduce the overall cost of the program if they want to keep moving forward.

As a final thought, one has to wonder why this iAd campaign met with such success. It could be the simple fact that people learn and remember better when they interact with the information. If that’s the case, then iAds should continue to top TV ads across the board. But what if the real reason is the novelty? People clicked banner ads when they were new and fun, but now we mostly ignore them. Will iAd burnout happen over time as well, or will the content-based, interactive properties make them the one kind of advertising that works time and time again?

Thursday, February 3, 2011

Are you ready for some Football and helping hand of Social Media?

As a huge football fan, I always look forward to that time of the year when the Super Bowl is what everyone is talking about. But this year there is a new wrinkle, with social media such as Facebook and Twitter taking center stage. These two social media powerhouses have an estimated 700 million users worldwide, and it’s no surprise that users have been tweeting and posting about the upcoming Super Bowl.

Advertisers, who have historically spent large sums of money on Super Bowl commercials, are trying to link their clever and comical Super Bowl ads with social media. Estimates predict that 50 percent of ads shown during the Super Bowl will incorporate social media compared to just 25 percent of ads last year. For example, Visa created “Go Inside the Super Bowl with Visa” (http://sbtwitter.nfl.com/) where one can gain direct access to tweets by NFL players, executives and sports journalists. Visa even has a “tweet off” between the Steelers and Packers fans. Using a graphic of a hundred-yard field colored with the two teams’ colors, Visa is measuring the number of twitter mentions of #Packers and #Steelers at http://sbtwitter.nfl.com/matchup/. As of February 3, 2011, the Packers fans lead the Steelers fans 57 percent to 43 percent.

visa_image1

Mercedes-Benz is also having a promotion called “Tweet Race” where four teams driving modified 2012 C-Class coupes will compete against each other in making it to the Super Bowl. However, Mercedes-Benz added a twist by basing the teams’ fuel supplies on their own tweets and tweets from people following them. Each car will have a celebrity coach who will also help them by tweeting up their followers. Mercedes-Benz is calling it “The World’s First Twitter-Fueled Race”. VW took advantage of social media last year when it launched the “Punch Dub” commercial which drew 50,000 Facebook fans and more than one million views online.

Not to be outdone, Audi will be introducing some social media firsts this Super Bowl Sunday as well. Audi will be the first brand to display a twitter hashtag in its Super Bowl ad. The #ProgressIs hashtag will be displayed prominently during its ad.

Fans and players are also using social media by sending tweets on Super Bowl parties. Dallas Cowboy Miles Austin invited over 90,000 fans to join him for pre-Super Bowl party and a chance to win Super Bowl tickets. Other players nationwide are planning similar events closer to Super Bowl kickoff. It’s a great opportunity for fans to meet their favorite football player. I’m still holding to my dream that Darrell Green will hold a Super Bowl party at the local Green Turtle.

Online Spend From US Agency Clients Still Has Significant Hurdles To Overcome

The Internet side of the marketing world has always felt that ad agencies as a whole, and in particular the largest, have been behind the curve for a long time. The gap has closed considerably in recent years but those who claim digital marketing superiority still thumb their noses at the larger agencies that have built their business on traditional media.

Why has digital been slower to be adopted by these agencies and their clients? A study from STRATA (via eMarketer) may give some insight.

According to these findings a total of nearly 50% of the agencies polled are citing lack of channel effectiveness or lack of client demand as the reason for not increasing online ad spend. Roughly 25% of the respondents say there are no obstacles.

So there are two views that can be taken here. The first is that the digital industry still has work to do from a ‘proof of concept’ point of view. It is safe to say that measurement and proof of effectiveness can be elusive. A lot of what is used as proof that there is power in the Internet space is around what I’ll call ‘volume metrics’ which are number of followers on Twitter or Likes on a Facebook page. Those measurements are limited at best.

What area CAN be measured though is in search through paid search campaigns and any web analytics tool from Google Analytics up to the most expensive and complicated analytics package you can imagine. One of the most interesting capabilities of the online space is to measure effectiveness and certainly much more finitely than even traditional media measurements like ‘eyeballs’ (which is the offline equivalent of volume metrics but companies have purchased on that hollow measure forever).

The fact of the matter is that there is still a considerable amount of work in producing hard numbers to see results across the whole spectrum of the online space but should that be enough to keep companies out of the game with their agency?

The second view is that agencies that have a foundation in traditional media just don’t understand digital thus their clients are not steered in that direction. I find it hard to believe that 23% of the agencies surveyed for this can say with confidence that lack of advertiser demand is the reason for online spend not to increase is lack of advertiser demand.

Of course it would be helpful to know who these agencies are that were surveyed and who their existing clientele are. Maybe in the SMB space there is a perceived lack of demand which is actually, in most cases, just a lack of understanding of the digital space.

So how do you interpret results like this? Is the onus on the digital industry to provide more confidence in the channel through better metrics or is it on the agencies to get their clients up to speed? As with most good answers it is likely to be a combination of the two but what can you do today to help bridge this gap and move more advertisers into the area where there are no obstacles to increasing online spend?

Study Shows Social Media Impact Lags Search and Email

Amidst all the hubbub about social media being the cures to all business ills there are some numbers that paint the medium as less of a silver bullet and more like one with a lot of potential and a lot of room to grow.

ForeSee Results has conducted a survey of 10,000 online shoppers. The report is titled “Social Media Marketing: Do Retail Results Justify Investment?”. Although it is not advisable to draw broad stroke conclusions from any one piece of research, the findings here are interesting in that the more traditional online marketing and customer acquisition methods of e-mail and search had more impact on site visits (along with real old fashioned brand recognition).

The next chart shows the power of social media as an influencer. Search comes out as the mass acquisition leader but with lower conversion rates as compared to social media.

This points to why there is a desire on the part of businesses to get more people engaged in social media because they simply convert better. Think of social media as the long tail of Internet marketing and promotion in a study like this with less volume but more qualified leads. Also of note is the higher satisfaction numbers on those folks using social media.

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Groundhog Day, 21st Century Style

After a monster snowstorm pummeled much of the country last night, Punxsutawney Phil tweeted out his annual prognostication at around 7:30 a.m. EST this morning:

The tweet—which was retweeted more than 100 times within the first hour it was posted—is one of a daily stream the celebrity rodent has been sending out over the past month in buildup to today’s Groundhog Day event. Punxsutawney Phil has been on Twitter since 2009, entertaining followers with his stream of snarky Twitter updates from his personal handle, @GroundhogPhil. Now, with 1,250 followers, more than 372 tweets and a spot on @ScottMonty’s “Humor” Twitter List, Punxsutawney is becoming quite the social media star.

Following up on our post last week about using brand mascots in social media, Fresh Influence talked to the creator of @GroundhogPhil, Greg Swan, a digital strategist in Minneapolis, who started the handle for fun and continues to run it, he said, until an official representative of Punxsutawney requests to take it over.

In 2009, Swan said he saw a missed opportunity for promoting Groundhog Day in social media and decided to start the handle. A year later in 2010, when @GroundhogPhil received more than 1,300 retweets and major news pick-up by The Huffington Post, National Geographic, Urlesque, and Good Morning America, he said, “I knew I had something special here.”

“What surprised me most,” Swan said over e-mail, “is how easy it was for me to brandjack a beloved, historic character from halfway across the country with hardly any effort. It’s a key lesson for any company or brand who hasn’t yet secured their social media channels and started engaging with advocates in their preferred environs (in this case, Twitter users who like Punxsutawney Phil).”

However, Swan’s experience tweeting for @GroundhogPhil does not necessarily make him an advocate for using brand characters in social media. Explaining his advice over e-mail, Swan elaborated:

“I’m not the biggest fan of brand mascots in social media, mainly because few companies have the predilection for the amount of investment it takes (research, strategy, writing, monitoring, reporting, etc.) and high-level of risk in social media. A good social character is engaged with its followers, is dedicated to updating content for the long-term and most importantly, provides value. If a brand is committed to all of these things, they will be successful.”

For Punxsutawney Phil’s take on using Twitter, however, Fresh Influence decided to ask him personally—read on for a Q&A with the famous tweeting groundhog himself:

Fresh Influence: How and why did you get started on Twitter?
Punxsutawney Phil: I was on Twitter before all the egotistical social media gurus and Justin Bieber-loving pre-adolescents. That makes me 85 years old in groundhog years.

FI: What are some of your favorite responses you’ve received from your fans via Twitter?
PP: I’m continually surprised how violent and mentally imbalanced humans are when it comes to my responsibility to end winter. I get all kinds of tweets with threats of physical harm, kidnapping and even eating me (apparently I would taste like chicken).

FI: Are you a mobile user?
PP: Mobile? I live in a burrow and sleep all winter.

FI: I see in addition to Twitter, you also have a Foursquare badge in your honor. What’s your favorite aspect of social media?
PP: I can’t tell you how excited I am for 2011. This year people can check in at my burrow, enjoy some delicious grasshoppers and watch me defecate in the corner. Who wouldn’t want a badge for that?

FI: Forget the weather. What are your social media predictions?
PP: Mainstream media reporters will continue to struggle with using “Tweet” as a verb. Katie Couric will finally learn what an @ sign means. Newspapers will think putting Facebook Like buttons on their articles is a social media strategy. Oh, and the TSA will start live-tweeting those porno-scans, much to the horror of Jesse Ventura.

The Straight Dope on Facebook, Twitter, and SEO

image of a twitter icon

Ever wonder if all those links that result from people retweeting and sharing content on Twitter give you a boost with SEO?

For a long time no one was sure, because the dreaded nofollow is in use on big social sites to keep those links from being counted as a “vote” for search engine purposes. No matter what, social networking links are still highly useful from a traffic perspective, because they have the power to get new readers to your content.

But in December, Google confirmed that the playing field had changed a little. Here’s what that means for you and your content.

In May, 2010, Google’s Matt Cutts announced that Google was not using social media links as a signal. And then in December, 2010, he announced equally firmly that they had changed their mind:.

We do use Twitter and Facebook links in ranking, as we always have in our web search rankings, but in addition we’re also trying to figure out a little bit about the reputation of an author or a creator on twitter or Facebook. […]

This is something that is used relatively lightly for now, and we’ll see how much we use it over time, depending on how useful it is and how robust it ends up being. The one thing I would caution people about is, don’t necessarily say to yourself, “Aha, now I’m going to go out and get reciprocal follows and I’m gonna get a ton of followers,” just like people used to get a ton of links.

In the same way that PageRank depends on not just the number of links but the quality of those links, you have to think about what are the followers that mean quality, who are the people who are actually not just bots, or some software program or things like that.

What that means is that Google has decided that social media sharing is a smart way to weed the creeps from the good guys.

Right now the effect is still probably small, while the Google teams figure out if social media sharing patterns are a reliable way to uncover the best sites and pages — and leave spam at the bottom of page 10.

(Remember, the first rule of SEO is a lot like the first rule of Copyblogger — don’t try to send users to crappy content.)

Signals

Google uses about 200 “signals” to suggest if a given page is useful or junk.

Right now, links from Twitter or Facebook are still a weak signal. That means that more weight will be given to the usual suspects — how many traditional links you have, the authority of the pages that link to you, what kind of anchor text they use, and your on-page keywords and related copy.

(Check out our free report on SEO copywriting if you want to know more about how this works.)

But those links from social sharing are now a signal that search engines using — and if it proves a reliable way to get better pages to the top of the SERPs, they’ll turn up the volume on it.

Authority matters

Google and Bing have confirmed that they do take into account the authority of users who tweet links to your site.

If someone who looks, acts, and smells like a real user with actual authority tweets a link to your site, that counts for more than if a newbie (or a bot) does it. Which makes sense — just like if an authoritative site links to you, that counts for more than if a small, new site does.

Does that mean you should suck up to people with lots of Facebook friends and Twitter followers? Not exactly.

It does mean that you’ll want to create content that stands out in the crowd. Because of the nature of social sharing, the best stuff tends to find its way to the top. You may not have 100,000 followers, but someone in your 100 followers knows a bigger fish, and so on and so on.

But your content can only capture the attention of the biggest fish if it’s exceptional. So create the best work you can, always.

What should you do differently?

Probably the worst thing you could do would be to start gaming social networking sites to try and manufacture bigger follower/friend numbers.

Forget lame tricks that you think will make you look bigger than you are. Put that time and energy into creating better content — either by becoming a better writer or by partnering with a fantastic writer who needs what you bring to the equation.

(Your side of the bargain might be a paycheck, or it might be business expertise, or a great sense of graphic design, or killer chocolate-cream-cheese cupcakes. You’ve got to figure that part out on your own.)

If you’ve put off social media because you rely exclusively on SEO to get traffic, you might want to reconsider that.

Not only because social sharing will probably become a stronger signal, but because of the many other benefits that get the right visitors to your site.

That’s why Scribe SEO added Twitter to its link-building tools late last year. (And we’ll include more social media link-building tools in upcoming releases.) As SEO evolves, Scribe evolves.

Social media and SEO were never actually as separate as people think — but they’re becoming more entwined every day, and there’s every reason to think that will continue.

What if Google changes their minds tomorrow?

This is always a good question to keep foremost in your mind when you’re planning your SEO strategy.

Using Twitter or Facebook purely to generate links for SEO is a short-term play that probably isn’t worth your time.

But using Twitter and Facebook to:

yes, generate links and also …
get content in front of readers and …
develop relationships with other content marketers that will earn you high-quality organic links (the old-fashioned kind) and …
let prospective customers come to know, like and trust you and …
translate online connections into real-world relationships and …
do market research by listening for customer problems you might be able to solve …

… well, that’s a smart long-term play that will build your business.

5 Unique Ways To Get Backlinks

Getting a ton of quality backlinks can take forever and most people just don’t have the time or patience to wait that long. There are many great ways to get backlinks such as; blog commenting, forum posting, article submissions, social bookmarking and guest posting, but the problem with these backlink building methods is that you will end up spending too much time away from your site and more importantly your readers. Wouldn’t it be nice if getting backlinks could be set on autopilot?

Great news, there is a way you can set your link building on autopilot that only requires you to do a minimal amount of upfront work. Before I get into the methods that will put your link building on autopilot I want to make sure you understand that this entire method revolves around good quality content.

Remember, “Content is king”!

1. Utilize Yahoo Answers

If you have been building backlinks to your site then I bet you know that Yahoo Answers is really a No-Follow site, right? Well to tell you the truth, it is, but that isn’t the reason you want to post answers on Yahoo Answers. The reason you need to post on Yahoo Answers is because there is a piece of software out there called WP Robot that when placed on a blog has a tool that pulls Yahoo Answers off Yahoo and places it on their site.

Do you get why this is beneficial for you?

Getting links is not that tough. All you have to do is answer questions that have a descriptive title such as, “How do I make money online?” or “How can I lower my car insurance premiums?”. The reason you need to answer questions with a large niche in the title such as making money online, insurance, weight loss or whatever is so you have more people pulling Answers from Yahoo onto their site.

2. Create A Multiple Series List

There are a few reasons to create a multiple series list and all three reasons combined work very well to get backlinks and traffic. The first reason multiple series lists work is because readers can follow along better with a list, they are just easier to scan and make learning less complicated. The other reason why multiple series lists get more backlinks is because people love to link to lists and the more lists you have the more backlinks you will get.

Example: If you write a 3 part series titled, “15 ways to get more traffic through Facebook” I would be a fool to only link to one part on my blog, so instead I would need to link to all three. I don’t know about you but I would much rather have three links pointing to my site as opposed to just one.

3. Add Information To Wikipedia

This is something I tested a while back and it works beautifully. Wikipedia is the biggest online encyclopedia and has over 3 million articles just in the English language. This is why finding a page to edit is very easy to do.

Here is how it works, you first need to find a page that can use some editing (I recommend finding a page that doesn’t have a lot of content but has a decent foundation to go off of). Once you have found the page you want to edit and that relates to your site you need to make sure that you have an identical topic on your site so that you have a reason to link to your site.

Example of identical topics: If you had a site about blogging then I great page to edit would be the page of Problogger, Darren Rowse(considering you had something new to add). Now in order to make it every more closely related I would try to get an interview with Darren that way I could fill in some missing parts to his Wikipedia page. After I have done that I can edit the page, insert my website link and wait.

Something that you must know is that like Yahoo Answers Wikipedia is a No Follow site so the entire point of using Wikipedia to get people to see the article on your site and link to that instead of the actual Wikipedia page.

4, Exchange Site Links For Content

Something that I have done quite a bit for my niche websites is exchange site links for written content. This isn’t guest posting, this method involves a site owner placing a link back to your site in order for you to write a specified number of articles.

The reason this works is because site owners want to get more content whether it is to submit to article directories, sell or just put on their site. I know this may not make a lot of sense to you now but it will. If you spend enough time on forums then you will notice that not everyone wants to buy content for a decent price, so all you have to do is tell the person wanting to buy the article that you will write 1 article each month in exchange for 1 link on their site. Trust me, people like to do this.

5. Give Away A Gift

My favorite way to get backlinks is to actually put out some link bait(AKA give away a gift). The link bait I always put out is a $25 gift card for Amazon.com. Everybody wants to get the free gift card so I tell my readers that all they have to do is link to my site and they will be entered into the drawing for the $25 gift card.

How I set it up: Since I want to get traffic and not only links I make the requirement that in order to be entered into the drawing the linking site needs to send at least 5 visitors having all different IP addresses and anything over 5 will count as another entry into the drawing. Think about it, if you only get 3 links from quality sites it would probably cost you around $200 per month for those links, but instead you only pay $25 with the hopes that the site owner keeps your link up for the chance to win another gift in the coming months.

The biggest different between these 5 unique link building methods and the normal link building methods is the fact that these are a more set and forget type thing while the others have to be catered to constantly.

About the Author: Adam Snyder is a blogger, freelance writer, and internet marketer who loves the online lifestyle. He has been making money online for over 4 years now and is passionate about teaching others the methods that he uses to make money. If you want to see the techniques he used make sure you check out DormRoomCash.com.

Old Fashioned Message Boards Still Get the Job Done

71% of the Inc. 500 companies surveyed said they are using Facebook for marketing, up 61% from last year. It’s the biggest bite of social media pie but according to the same survey that bite is loaded with empty calories. (That’ll teach me to write when I’m hungry.)

The survey was conducted by the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Center for Marketing Research and was presented on eMarketer earlier today. Perfect timing, since I recently put up a piece about the declining click rates of Facebook ads and the high incidence of ad burnout.

According to the survey, 85% of respondents said they had success with Facebook over a measly 54% from last year. That’s pretty good, right? But there were three other kinds of social media marketing that topped Facebook for results. Blogging squeaked ahead at 86% but is actually on the decline from last year and that feels like a trend that’s going to continue. Podcasting also dropped considerably over last year.

On the top? Online video and message boards. Video isn’t surprising at all, but message boards? Bulletin Boards are the original form of social media, dating back to the early 70′s, though they really took off in the mid-90′s. From Fidonet and Usenet to VBulletin, these have always been a place for like-minded people to gather and chat. They may seem old fashioned compared to Facebook, but you shouldn’t be counting these websites out.

As more people grow tired of Facebook’s privacy issues and the noise to signal ratio of Twitter, it’s conceivable that they’ll move back to the tightly monitored, closed-door safety of the message board.

From a marketing standpoint, message boards can be a real gold mine of already qualified users. The only downside is that they’re harder to crack as they have a low tolerance for spam.

Are you still including message boards in your marketing program? I’d like to hear your thoughts on the effectiveness and how you’ve made it work.

Facebook Clicks Fade as CPC Rises

1,500 Advertising Campaigns

11,200 Individual Ads

2.2 Million Clicks

0 Happy Marketers

“Facebook Advertising Performance Benchmarks & Insights” is the latest whitepaper from Webtrends and it brings some sobering news. In short, Facebook ads aren’t turning out to be the gift to marketing we’d hoped and maybe Eric Schmidt was right, Google has nothing to worry about.

The most telling piece of information is contained in this chart. Basically, it shows that clicks have declined and prices have risen.

A big part of the problem is ad burnout. Because Facebook serves ads based on interest, the same ad is served to the same person multiple times over a few days. The study saw that people began to ignore the ad after only a few viewings. They counter this with Google search ads which only appear when someone is searching for that information, thus reducing the number of times the ad is seen, and thus, ad burnout.

Facebook’s one saving grace is the addition of the friended ad. Ads that have been “liked” by a friend received more clicks and they lasted three times longer before burning out. The problem with this is obvious, as a marketer, you have no control over who “likes” your ad. The best you can do is present a product or ad that is engaging enough to grab the audience — but isn’t that always the goal?

What categories of ads perform best on Facebook? Webtrends has a chart for that and it shows that media, entertainment, tabloids and blogs get the most bang for their buck. Travel and cars also fared well. On the downside, healthcare, financial services and oddly internet and software suppliers would have been better off taking their business elsewhere.

The takeaway from all of this is that Facebook isn’t the miracle marketing vehicle many were hoping for. For those in the entertainment arena, who have compelling ads that people like, it could be more profitable than the same dollars spent on Google.

It seems to me that comparing Facebook to Google ads is something we shouldn’t even be doing. Facebook is a completely different animal, so shouldn’t they have a completely different way of handling advertising? By allowing folks to “like” an ad, they’re on their way to putting the social in social marketing but they still have a ways to go. The future has to hold something more than alphabet soup (CPM, CPC, CPA, CTR, ABC and OMG).

What do you think?

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

6 Twitter Handles Every Social Media Professional Should Follow

The social media world moves fast and there’s an insane amount of best practices, latest news, studies, reports, case studies, metrics etc. that go along with it. For those who make social media their profession (or part of it), it’s nearly impossible to stay up-to-date on the latest and greatest. Below, in no particular order, are six resources that help me stay on top of things – or at least help me keep the façade of a social media “specialist” up for one more day.

@sysomos
Leading provider of social media analytics. Enabling Business Intelligence for social media
I’m a stat freak. I’m still impressed by the number of people on Facebook, the number of tweets that are sent each day, etc. That’s why I like @Sysomos – they blend interesting, useful analytics tweets (“Tweeting from Egypt has increased by 60% in the past week. See some stats here - http://bit.ly/gv9mOh #twitter #egypt”) with straightforward blog post tweets (Is there such thing as too much engagement? - http://awe.sm/5FcYm).
@mashable
Breaking social media, tech and digital news and analysis from Mashable.com, the top resource and guide for all things web. Updates from @mashable staff.
Yeah, I know, no surprise here. Seriously though, not a day goes by that I don’t “Favorite” a @mashable tweet on my cell to read later. They’re on top of the latest changes to various platforms (“Facebook To Launch Third-Party Commenting Platform - http://on.mash.to/dNNH8I [UPDATED: With Comments from Facebook]”), they alert me to cool things (“10 Incredible Interactive YouTube Videos - http://on.mash.to/eEDayx”), they have useful best practices (“HOW TO: Optimize Your Company’s LinkedIn Profile - http://on.mash.to/ebZrgP”), they provide interesting stats and infographics (“Americans & TV: How Social Media Users Watch Video [INFOGRAPHIC] - http://on.mash.to/gj2HBs”)… they got it all and I’m extremely jealous and grateful.
@socialnetdaily
Our mission is to provide our subscribers with the very best resources for Social Media to help them grow their business!
@socialnetdaily has clearly done their research and knows that their audience likes and responds well to lists. “5 Ways…,” “8 Tips…,” “20 Facts…” are how the majority of their tweets start. Their tweets may be formulaic, but I fall for them every time. Knowing when I read the tweet, that I’m only have to read 5, 8 or 20 things and that they’re probably going to be in a list, makes me want to click and I almost always do. Their tweets promise and always deliver practical advice that you can often implement immediately.
@socialmedia2day
World’s best bloggers on Social Media and Web 2.0
First, I love their logo… I’m pretty sure that color scheme will influence my next interior design project. Second, I love their handle description, “World’s best bloggers…” It’s like all the places in New York that put up a sign, “World’s best bagels…” Aside from that, they are an incredible resource for case studies (“Southwest Airlines Social Media Strategy – Lessons for All Organizations http://goo.gl/fb/XZQ6I #sm”), stats and infograhics (“65 Terrific Social Media Infographics http://goo.gl/fb/5TV6L #sm”), new technology and platforms (“Daniel Kehrar asks… are you using Yammer yet? Well, are you? http://fb.me/zrBbgjeO”), and everything in between.
@InsideNetwork
Inside Network - Focused on the Facebook platform and social gaming ecosystem InsideFacebook.com InsideSocialGames.com InsideVirtualGoods.com
Although not all of @InsideNetwork’s tweets are of interest to me, they do seem to be the ultimate authority on everything Facebook and I find about 1 in 10 of their tweets really helpful (e.g. “Facebook Confirms Removal of Suggest to Friends Feature from Pages, Reducing Virality http://bit.ly/fdr9oi” and “Facebook’s Redesigned Page Creation Flow Helps Admins Choose a Category http://bit.ly/eQJWye”). I also love what other brands and organizations are doing on Facebook, making their weekly tweet/blog post featuring various Facebook campaigns a “must click.”
@Pew_Internet
The Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project, a nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization. Twitter feed managed by @SusannahFox & @kzickuhr.
Possibly an odd addition to the list, but @Pew_Internet provides a continuous supply of research and data that I am repeatedly referencing during my work. Although their research covers the much broader issue of everything “online,” they’re a great resource for social media use among various demographics.

So, do tell, what are some of your “must follow” Twitter handles? What resources do you find invaluable in your work every day?

P.S. You can easily follow all of the Twitter handles listed above with one quick click.

Blogger Insight - Social Media

Saturday, February 5, 2011

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Tuesday, February 1, 2011

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