9 Ways to Engage Your Facebook Fans

 

The Internet is the most powerful, free tool accessible to small business owners. However, using the Internet effectively poses challenges. The endless advertising options are daunting and Facebook is a brain teaser in and of itself. Taking an insider's look at the massive social network, we have compiled nine ways to successfully engage your company's Facebook fans.

1. First and foremost, the easiest way to stay in contact with fans is updating the status of the fan page daily. Fans want to see activity and know they are valued. Posting daily allows them to check in on the company's happenings.

2. Link your company's website and blog to the fan page in order to give fans quick access to your products at their convenience.

3. Comments are the foundation of Facebook. Therefore, if someone posts a comment or question on the fan page, answer it immediately, giving them as much information as possible. Even if it is just saying thank you, making the fan feel important to the company will keep him or her coming back.

4. On your Facebook wall, Post or link YouTube videos of company events, jobs or anything relating to the company that might interest your customer base. Giving fans a reason to check out your fan page daily will keep your company on their minds all the time.

5. Take photos of the office, projects and your newest products and upload them to the page. Create a personal touch to the fan page. Hiding behind a logo is a great way to be forgotten.

6. Create a Facebook fans-only event and send it out to all your followers. Throw a special deal in the message or an interesting fact about a new product to keep fans intrigued and wanting more.

7. Having a sale or releasing a new product? Tell your Facebook fans first! Offer exclusive deals and insights through status updates to your followers.

8. Find groups that support your company or product and connect your followers.

9. Repost any fan's comments concerning your company.

Employing Facebook takes time and diligence, however, the rewards are immense. Facebook has become a cultural phenomenon and everyone from teenagers to the elderly are checked in. Use the free website to your advantage to expand your customer base, retain satisfied customers and engage the public at large. Expand your small business today using the largest network in the world!

Click here to read full article

5 Reasons Twitter is Social Media Marketing Gold

For small- and mid-sized businesses that want to increase revenue, social media marketing can be a huge leap in the right direction. For instance, Facebook can be an incredibly helpful tool to begin networking with and promoting company blogs. However, there is another often dismissed social networking site that should receive some special consideration. Here are five reasons why Twitter should be on the top of your digital toolbox when it comes to promoting your company.

Twitter makes conversations simple

It's very important for small-business owners to understand what makes their clients tick. Twitter makes it very easy to get to know each other by means of what the other does and does not like. The best part is that the conversations are not privy to only two people; they are easy to follow and respond to, regardless of who you are to the original poster.

Twitter is easy to update

The nice part about Twitter is it makes it simple for small- and mid-sized business owners to quickly update their customers about new things within their companies. It's very important that any business keep its customers updated with the latest news about policy changes, as well as new products. You can also keep readers engaged in your blog much easier by posting updates via Twitter.

Twitter is a fast avenue for communication

Updates that you make about your blog or business can go viral in literally seconds if you post them on Twitter. There are thousands of users who log into the site every day and it's easy to make use of that in your favor. After all, once one person re-tweets your tweet, it goes out to everyone in their circle, as well. This can continue for as long as people keep finding your original post interesting enough to keep tweeting about.

Twitter offers real-time data

For a small-business owner, it is very important to know what your customers think now, not later. By monitoring tweets about your business, you can almost immediately receive feedback on whether or not your new campaigns are successful. This eliminates the need to wait until your updates have been indexed by search engines.

Twitter can net potential clients

One of the most difficult aspects of owning your own business is finding clients. By using Twitter, you can get your tweets out to hundreds of people every time one of your existing clients re-tweets something you have posted.

Click here to read the full article

Why Your Small Business Needs a Blog

  0
inShare

 

When you are a small business, you want two main things. First, you want your customers to know that they are everything to you and that you will do your absolute best to take care of them and their needs. Second, you want to get your name out to the consumer market and general public so you will be able to grow your business. A blog is one of the best ways to accomplish these two things in today's Internet-driven marketing world.

A blog will help your customers feel that you actually care about them and are striving to meet their needs. Creating loyal customers is the best way to grow your business, as the word-of-mouth advertising they will provide is priceless.

Setting up a blog is a great way to provide an open forum that will help your customers provide feedback on your products and services. It also provides a great place for your customers, both old and new, to find out about your company's specials and sales all in one place.

Many small- and mid-sized businesses today use social media to connect to their customers. Social media is a great way to draw people into your blog and have immediate and constant connections with your customers. This is important in today's market when so many consumers are constantly online through their phones or computers. Marketing with social media, including your own blog, is a great way to consistently keep your company's name in the front of your customer's mind, which is key to any marketing strategy.

When you have set up a blog, it is important to maintain it. This may sound like a lot of work, but it actually is a simple and even fun way to connect with your customer base. It also will ensure you come up in search engines.

Providing information on your company, products or services, and specials is great, but providing other fun things on your blog can be just as effective. Sometimes a company's blog actually has very little to do with the company, and is all about building a following. By posting interesting news, fun facts, tidbits and even links to games or entertaining videos, a company can build a blog following that then translates into consumers who follow and recommend the company itself. Your blog should fit your company—whether serious and stoic or fun and eccentric.

Your customers will appreciate having a place to come and "hang out" while online; and you will appreciate the business that brings.

Read more about blogging here, here and here.

For help deciding what content and approach is best for your business' blog, contact NewMediaPlus for a free consultation.

Click here to read full article.

The Evolution of Social Media

One of the most common and popular terms that is being used today in the field of communication is "social media". In very simple words, "social media" can be described as a Web-based application used to exchange thoughts and ideas between different people, which in turn leads to better and more creative ways of doing business.

Social media sites can be categorized depending on their content and information they share. YouTube and Flickr are examples of video- and photo-sharing sites; Facebook, SixDegrees and Twitter are sites meant for social networking; and sites such as Friendster, Hi5 and MySpace are more specialized.

The roots of modern social media can be traced back to 1979 when the Usenet was used to post messages and news to "newsgroups". The Usenet networks do not have any dedicated administrator or server, but served the purpose of increasing the number of people getting information from online sources.

Another type of network, distantly similar to the ones we currently use, came into operation with the advent of bulletin board systems, or BBS. BBS's were the first platforms where one person could actually interact with another on a one-to-one basis.

The first real models of online communication on a mass scale started with CompuServe and Prodigy. CompuServe was one of the first companies to incorporate a chat program in its range of services. While CompuServe introduced social media to the masses, Prodige it more affordable. With the introduction of AOL, the Internet was revolutionized on a big scale, spreading all over America in a big way.

In the history of social media, ICQ is regarded as the first online instant-messaging client. As more people came online, different types of online forums began to spring up, increasing the level of interaction among different groups of people.

SixDegrees and Friendster were the pioneers in this field. These forums gradually became more specific and service-oriented. For example, LinkedIn is one forum used by people for professional networking. Napster is used by music lovers to share music files, and Foursquare is location-based networking site designed for mobile phone users.

Social media has definitely come a long way since its Usenet and IRC days. Today, it is a one of the biggest commercial services on the World Wide Web. However, with growing popularity, it has raised some serious privacy and security questions in the minds of many users. Social media is a wonderful platform, and if they are used properly and the right "netiquette" is followed, then it can be of real assistance to people from all walks of life.

Click here to read the full article

5 Ways to Maximize LinkedIn

LinkedIn is a social media website that is ideal for those who own or work in small- and mid-sized businesses who want to brand themselves, improve their networking or expand their job options. By posting a profile on LinkedIn, it is easy to optimize your marketing. This professional network can lead to more customers, a pay raise or even a new, better paying job.

Here are five ways to get the most out of your LinkedIn profile and build an online network for your business:

Fill in the details of your profile

The more information you share about who you are and your company, the better your profile. By writing about your work experiences, educational background and associations you have joined, you increase the likelihood of making professional friends. Additionally, recruiters often review profiles by keywords. So, if you're looking for better job prospects, use industry buzz words and appropriate jargon to create the right keywords. And don't forget to leave your location and ways you can be contacted online.

Personalize your profile with a photo

When you add a photograph to your profile, you become a real person to the reader rather than an abstract collection of career information. If you don't have a good digital picture, then put up your company logo, but a picture is the best form of personalization.

Develop your network

You can develop your network by making online and offline contacts. Online, you can email a request to befriend someone who is in your industry. Offline, you can ask your colleagues and customers to look you up on LinkedIn, join the website and connect to you. The whole idea of networking is to sell yourself rather than just represent your business. It will be much easier to sell products or services when people know, like and trust you.

Join groups

By joining groups on LinkedIn and entering into online discussions, you will create your own community. Connecting with others in groups is as simple as asking and answering questions, sharing news stories, mentioning links and participating in discussion threads. If you want to improve your exposure even more, consider becoming a group moderator.

Get others to provide recommendations

Professional people you have worked with, or clients who have benefited from your efforts, can provide recommendations. You can exchange recommendations with managers, colleagues and friends. The more recommendations you have posted in your profile, the more your business prospects will improve. Recommendations are easy to get and they create social proof that you are somebody who is worth getting to know.

Click here http://bit.ly/hBBpSR to read the full article

Social Media Optimization And Social Engine Optimization Why You Need a ...

Best and Worst Social Media Marketing Practices

Social media has dramatically changed much of the standard, old school marketing paradigm. The key difference is that traditional marketing consists of a carnival barker-like approach: one voice shouting out over a distracted crowd, trying to entice people to buy a ticket to see the Wild Women of Borneo. Social media marketing is having people in the crowd who have already seen the Wild Women, loved it, and are telling everyone else about it. While there are some obvious similarities (carnival, Wild Women), the differences are key.

Here are some of the best and worst practices for social media marketing that highlight these distinctions.

Best Practices

Start with an overall plan. Who is your audience? What are your objectives? What is the best strategy to achieve those objectives? What tactics will make your strategy a success, and what tools and assets do you need? Finally, how will you measure your success? Unlike standard marketing and advertising, the goal of social media marketing is to influence purchasing decisions, not drive them. Therefore, metrics need to take into account goals such as increasing the number of connections, comments and repostings as well as more direct ROI, like increased sales.

Give before you get. You're not the carnival barker anymore and you need to encourage people, not brow-beat them. For example, offer anyone who becomes a Foursquare mayor of your business a discount or gift certificate.

Reach out first. If you want 100,000 people following you on Twitter, someone needs to invest the time in first having you follow 500,000 people. If you want people to read your blog or watch your video, then leave comments on their sites or channels.

Be upfront and honest. The carnival barker will tell you the Wild Women of Borneo are ferocious; the happy customers in the crowd will tell you they're sexy women in fur bikinis. If you're not transparent, you risk alienating the very people you want to establish relationships with, and they, in turn, are going to tell others.

While you need to protect your brand and trademarks, you cannot control your message. This hard fact makes being honest even more important. In old-school advertising, you can control the message, but in this brave, new world, once something hits the Web, people are going to adapt it and change it as they see fit.

Encourage participation and feedback from your customers. It's one thing when a customer, whether she is happy or not, posts something on Yelp or Twitter about your business. It's something completely different when she gets a response from you that lets her know you're listening, thereby building or strengthening your relationship.

Don't forget about search-engine optimization. You can have the hottest website in the world or be putting out the wittiest tweets ever written in 140 characters, but if no one knows you exist, it's all for naught.

Make a commitment to all of the above. It will take time and resources to be successful, and that's where NewMediaPlus can step in. You wouldn't print up a bunch of flyers and then fail to go around and put them on windshields, right? We're here to guide your business through this process and ensure that your online marketing efforts are a success.

Worst Practices

Going the hard sales route is a mistake. Taking your traditional marketing or advertising campaign and funneling it into Facebook is not going to work, and many online communities will even ban you if your messages are overtly commercial. Going back to the carnival metaphor, imagine a friend telling you about what's really inside the Wild Women tent when the barker comes over and starts screaming in your ear.

Know the culture before you get involved. All sites have terms of service or use guidelines, and knowing those is important, but even more vital is having a sense of the pulse of the users. This requires spending time on the platforms, reading posts and comments, and getting a feel for the virtual land.

Don't lie or be fake. Certain practices have even become illegal, such as hiring people in chat rooms to pretend to be fans of your product or service. Other bad practices include starting fake blogs populated only by employees. The blow-back once you're discovered (and you will be discovered) could permanently harm your business' reputation.

Ignoring feedback. Social media marketing is about making the flow of information into a two-way street. If you're not listening to what your clients and potential customers have to say, you will fail. While it might seem like a daunting task to monitor every online channel out there, tools do exist.

Don't over-post. If you don't have anything valuable to share to your community, the best thing to do is not share it. Posting the same information about a sale, for instance, several times a day, will cost you far more followers and fans than you'll gain in purchases. Unlike traditional advertising, repetition will do more harm than good.

Click here to http://bit.ly/h4m8Zd read full article.

Interested in working with NewMediaPlus? Click here.

How to Build & Design a Website : Website Layout & Design Tips

Website Design Tips: The Standard Website Layout

Color Can Make or Break Your Website

 

 

The first thing to consider before starting any project is the use or misuse of color. Color theory, integrated with psychology, is extremely important to any design. Colors will affect the way people perceive a design and how they react to the message, as well as how long they stay on your website. Choosing the wrong colors can mean failure; choosing the right ones can mean closing a sale.

Below is a list of common colors and what type of emotions and thoughts they invoke in people:

Red: Love, passion, danger, warning, food, impulse or immediate actions

Blue: Trustworthiness, success, seriousness, calm, power and professionalism

Green: Money, organic, animals, health, healing, life, harmony and ecological consciousness

Orange: Comfort, creativity, joy, youth, affordability and celebration

Purple: Loyalty, justice, uncertainty, luxury, fantasy, dreams, fame and royalty

White: Cleanliness, innocence, purity and simplicity

Yellow: Amusement, curiosity, playfulness, joy and hope

Pink: Sweetness, innocence, youthfulness, tenderness, softness and femininity

Gray: Indifference, reservation and neutrality

Black: Seriousness, darkness, mystery, secrecy and allure

Mixing colors in a tasteful, creative way will bring out the best results of each, while deepening or lightening hues (such as changing red to burgandy) can soften some of the color's power while not diluting it.

Are you using colors and color theory to your business' best advantage? Contact NewMediaPlus today for a free, no-obligation 28-point tune-up on improving your business online presence.Click here http://bit.ly/dM6yC8 to read full article

10 Tips to Improving Your Search Engine Rankings

If you are one of the many, many, many people who struggle with search-engine optimization, or SEO, then have no fear, here are some key points to help you out.

Now, there is no perfect SEO to any site. There are a lot of sites that are really good at SEO and have pretty much nailed it, but they can always update and improve it.

When it comes to the SEO leader, Google, it is always changing and improving how SEO works and what changes need to be made. For example, you can't keyword spam anymore (i.e., writing hidden code for a website about Britney Spears that reads "britney spears, britney, spears, pop, rock, roll, dance, dancer, sing, singer" etc. as opposed to simply creating content with natural keywords).

As well, it supposedly doesn't matter if your images have keywords in them (I still add them, anyway).

Here are the tips to get you started or help you out. Just remember to always update your content; content rules!

1. SEO is not something that can be done once and then forgotten. The way search engines operate changes daily, so expect to work on your SEO daily
2. New content helps boost your rankings by making your site appear more relevant to search engines. Add it on a regular basis
   
3. Submitting your new website through Google’s regular submission form can take a long time. The quickest way to get noticed is by getting a link to your site through another quality site
4. Blog at least three time a week with good, fresh content to attract search engine attention
   
5. Make your site easy to use. Easy-to-use sites are more popular, and more popular sites are ranked higher
   
6. Good navigation and linking will help you more than relying only on an XML sitemap, but be sure you do have that sitemap present
   
7. Links from sites that end in ".edu", typically used by schools and non-profit groups, are given emphasis by search engines. Look for non-profit .edu sites that you can partner with
   
8. SEO won't help if your call to action is weak, or worse, non-existent
   
9. Try to impress or win over influential bloggers and authority sites that might link to you
10. Check your server headers with any of the free tools available online. Be sure your URLs reports a “200 OK” status or “301 Moved Permanently ” for redirects. If anything else appears, check that your URLs are set up properly and used consistently.
    

Interested in working with NewMediaPlus? Click here.

Click here http://bit.ly/hyfZsD to read thefull article.

Square Simplifies Accepting Payments

As a small business owner, I have had to complete the voluminous applications for merchant account services and sign personal guarantees for everything. Anytime I can find a simple solution to something as important as accepting payments, I want to shout from the rooftops.

Square Inc. is shipping card readers again. What is Square? The service allows small businesses to create accounts and either key in or swipe customers' credit cards to pay for products and services. Businesses create an account, and once approved, begin accepting payments from credit or debit cards. Square promotes that it does not require a contract, monthly fees or any hidden costs.

Receipts are sent electronically to customers. There are even some customer and transaction tracking information available. Square states that it complies with all PCI security standards regarding customer information. "Smooth, Even, Steady" is Square's tagline and my greatest wish for all of your business endeavors.

Click here http://bit.ly/ie8C6E to view full article.

Statistics Show Social Media Marketing a Growing Concern

Social media is important now, and all research indicates it will be important in the future, with companies continuing to invest in it. Marketing decision-makers at large companies preach that any business plan to invest in online efforts creates a clear, overall strategy. Social media might make up a significant portion of a smaller business' marketing efforts, but it will not (nor should it) reflect the complete marketing effort.

For this reason, you will want to do a little research on your target audience.

For instance, who are your customers? What social media platforms do they use? Do they blog? Are they on Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, or some combination thereof?

If, like us, your business focuses on business-to-business relationships, here are some interesting statistics:

5 Things to Do Offline to Increase Your Online Presence

openSocial media marketing efforts definitely improve your company's bottom line, and every company should devote some resources to creating and cultivating their online presence. But, you have a business to run and you can't necessarily be online all of the time.

Thankfully, there are several things that you can do offline to promote your online assets.

Every piece of printed advertising can and should include your company's Facebook and Twitter addresses. It's okay to even make a short statement to "friend" or "follow" your business for specials or deals that are only available to online customers.

Your business card was originally designed to facilitate gaining new opportunities. Retool that design a bit or have a custom stamp made to add your Facebook and Twitter addresses. Offer a discount code to those who "friend" and "follow" you.

Consider converting your vehicle into a mobile billboard by placing your Facebook and Twitter addresses on your car. Check with your accountant and ask about any potential tax benefits from using your vehicle to advertise your business.

If you have events at your business or you sponsors an event in the community, post the photographs, videos and a recap on your company's social media platforms. Also, find a way to have the general community either vote on the best photograph or post their own pictures.

Find fun, interactive ways to engage your online community in real-world activities. Whether it be scavenger hunts or asking customers to post photographs wearing your brand for free stuff, find ways to encourage interaction. Consider printing new company T-shirts or uniforms with Facebook and Twitter account information.

Social media is best when it actively engages customers with the business. Find fun, effective and low-cost ways to make your online presence exist in your customers' real lives.

For more suggestions, contact NewMediaPlus today.


http://ping.fm/8169l