Business Tips From Facebook

Social media websites have made it easier for small businesses to market themselves online. Today, it is easy to get the word out about your products and services for free or at a low cost. The major cost you are likely to incur is time. Facebook is the largest social media website and is a great avenue for small businesses to reach their prospects.

The following tips will help you get the most out of your marketing efforts on Facebook.

1) Get found on the web
Ensure customers can easily find your business location online. Use tools such as Google Places and Facebook Places to claim the location of your business. Take advantage of free business listings at Angies List, SuperPages, Google Local Business Center, MerchantCircle, YellowPages.com and Yahoo! Local. Some of these sites allow users to leave reviews about your company or products and this can help you gain trust among new prospects.

At the listings, indicate your business name, URL, hours of business, location and other vital information that your prospects are likely to be looking for.

2) Become an expert
Marketing is not always about advertising your products. Prospects are in need of valuable content and will reward you by buying and being loyal to your brand if you offer them valuable content. You can create instructional videos, write how-to articles, post pictures and tweet about your business or service. Know your product well and help your prospects and customers know how to use it.

3) Create fan pages
Create a Facebook fan page for your business and interact with your customers or prospects on a regular basis. Use the page to make important announcements about your company, post tips on using your products, answer questions or queries from customers, initiate competitions to build your brand loyalty, among others. Do not talk to yourself; listen to what your customers are saying.

4) Use social media ads
If you want to steadily increase your fan page followers, go for ad funded options. Facebook allows users to initiate paid marketing campaigns. These can be effective when a business has a clearance sale, is looking for new leads, has introduced a new product or has a promotion. Facebook ads can be targeted to be displayed to prospects that meet a set criterion.

The above are some tips that can help any small business that is looking to get into social media marketing on Facebook.

Protect Your Business’s Trademark On Twitter- Click here http://bit.ly/rgRWts for full article

Protect Your Business’s Trademark On Twitter- Click here http://bit.ly/rgRWts for full article

Whether you are just starting your business or you are an established company, becoming a presence in social media can be an important step in the promotion of your endeavors. Understanding your options is important, as is interacting with your customers and protecting your trademark. Making the most of your Twitter account is essential in reaping the benefits of social media.

Twitter does not yet have any options for business owners to verify their accounts. This means that there is no official way for customers to know your Twitter is authentic for your business. However, by making your account has high visibility, you can ensure that customers know the account is linked to your company. Placing links from your website to your Twitter account assures that your customers will be directed to the correct account. These links can also be made from your associated Facebook, Foursquare, Google+, or your blog.

When building your Twitter profile, it is vital that you place your brand throughout. Within the profile, note that the account is the official account of your business. Use your company logo, colors, and slogan to help your customers identify the account easier. Customizing your Twitter profile can help to protect your trademark.

While Twitter does not allow you to reserve a Twitter name, there are some options if you have a more common business name. If a Twitter account has a similar name to your trademarked business and they are seemly trying to confuse your customers into following their account, a request can be made directly to Twitter.

If the account is found to be intentionally misleading your customers, Twitter may suspend the account and in turn give you access to the name. Understand that if the Twitter powers-that-be find the account is simply confusing but not misleading, they may give the account user time to rectify the situation and maintain the account. If someone has an account under the trademarked name of your business, Twitter has no commitment to transfer the ownership to you.

Using your Twitter account can benefit your business greatly. Being able to interact with your customers, promote your products and ideas, and provide assistance. Maintaining the trademark of your business is important, allowing your customers to find you easily and network you to their friends and family. By using the appropriate means of trademark security, your business Twitter account can achieve its maximum benefit.

5 Apps To Manage Business Finance- Click here http://bit.ly/o3Er5w for full article

5 Apps To Manage Business Finance- Click here http://bit.ly/o3Er5w for full article

Managing business finances can often be a difficult and time-consuming task. This is true for both small and large businesses. Luckily, there are a growing number of apps that are available that will help business owners save time and be more productive.

Pageonce

A lot of banks offer online banking and mobile apps as well. Depending on the specific bank, these will vary as to their usability and access. Pageonce is an app where the user can review many different accounts all at once. There are also options to set up various alerts and a handy report section where one can see how various accounts are broken down.

Financial Calculator

The able to calculate things such as bond valuation and rate of return can easily be done on the fly with the Financial Calculator. This app is powerful but very simple to use. Calculations are done quite quickly with this program.

TripLog/ 1040

When traveling, it is important to keep track of mileage. TripLog is able to manage several different vehicles and to keep all of this information well-organized. Once the trip is completed, all the information can be easily e-mailed to the office for reimbursement.

Receipts

In addition to vehicle mileage, expenses for purchases and meals need to be appropriately organized for accounting and reimbursement purposes. On the road, it is all too easy to end up with a pocket full of crumpled receipts. With this app, one can easily scan in receipts and organize all expenses.

Bloomberg

While on the go, keeping track of financial portfolios is necessary. With Bloomberg, one can check these as well as other investment news and keep on top of the latest news.

Business does not always take place in an office building. Keeping track of finances must be done while on the road and away from the office. With these five apps, any business owner or executive can keep track of expenses, log receipts and mileage and stay abreast of the latest stock trends and business news. For the savvy business person who must stay connected and connected, he needs these apps.

Social Media At Work- Click here http://bit.ly/o8UaEF for full article

Social Media At Work- Click here http://bit.ly/o8UaEF for full article

Hours in a work day: 8. Time spent social networking: 7. The other hour was lunch.

Other than being the butt end of a lot of productivity jokes, social networking has changed the playing field. Like it or not, many people are tuning into sites like linkedin, facebook and twitter for their daily dose of what's going on. Why fight it when you can use that power? You can make social networking a part of every employees daily responsibilities, just enough to satisfy their need to log on.

Facebook became a huge networking tool because it's easy to share information with hundreds of people. You can keep people apprised of new happenings at the company with a simple post to the wall. Have one of your workers in charge of that. How exciting would it be to be the person announcing the new big thing for the company?

Twitter is a great example of where someone's social networking skills can come into play. People love to read tweets. Why? Because they want some juicy gossip about this and that without having to read a huge post. Twitter does that in just a few short words and phrases. Get one of the workers to add a twitter post about something new and exciting happening at your company. You are missing a huge opportunity for your company by telling your workers not to use twitter.

Linkedin does exactly as it's name suggest: it keeps people "linked in". Business contacts are created every day using this tool. Why deprive yourself of that help?

Social networking provides a platform for someone to easily gather information. You know those people that post their homework problems they can't solve on facebook? Why can't your company use that same idea? You can also have a common platform for all of the employees by creating a page and having everyone follow on facebook or twitter to stay informed.

There are of course, things to be noted. It can be very easy to transition from using social networking for work, to just surfing your friends posts. If you assign workers to be in charge of your social networking page, make sure you choose responsible workers. What about everyone else? Vacations allow people an opportunity to recharge their batteries. Think of letting your workers check that celebrities tweet as a mini-vacation. They'll come back recharged. By harnessing the power of social networking, you can keep the workers happy and benefit yourself as well.

Buddy Media Soared $54 Million- Click here http://bit.ly/nwQodP for full article

Buddy Media Soared $54 Million- Click here http://bit.ly/nwQodP for full article

Buddy Media has recently folded dozens of new high-end companies into its customer base in the first half of 2011, ending up with $54 million Series D funding led by GGV Capital. Buddy Media has situated itself to be the single most important company in the world that is connecting companies to their customers through social media. Many business owners have begun realizing that a marketing campaign with at least one foot firmly in Facebook, Twitter, or any of the other social media sites will have immediate access to over a quarter of a billion potential customers.

Buddy Media set out with a simple goal, to provide companies an easy-to-use platform from which to launch a Facebook campaign. This company has recently evolved into something so much more in recent years. Their software was originally used to make eye-catching Facebook pages with some basic information to offer to business owners and advertising specialists. Buddy Media would instruct companies on which days to make posts, how to optimize every word being read, and how to relate social media directly into more revenue. After their purchase of a handful of smaller companies, Buddy Media is now offering almost every facet of online marketing that any company would need no matter its size.

This social media company has recently taken on some rather large clients including Ford Motor Company, ESPN, and Virgin Mobile USA. They now offer their customers everything from customized Facebook pages, to real-time analytics of their Twitter feeds and Facebook pages. Another key feature that has made this company invaluable to so many is their experience. No other company can compete with the experience of Buddy Media as they have turned the power of social media sites into a blend of art, business, efficiency.

This company lands somewhere between market analyses, graphic design, customer relations, and brand recognition. It was not just ten years ago that this style of market was practically non-existent, and it is now a multi-billion dollar industry that has been streamlined from the bottom up. For the business owner or management, this can revolutionize the way that their company finds and maintains a loyal customer base. There is no easier program to use that will direct countless customers towards a company and drive revenue up than what Buddy Media has established.

5 Ways To Use Facebook For Your Business- Click here http://bit.ly/obcDAo for full article

5 Ways To Use Facebook For Your Business- Click here http://bit.ly/obcDAo for full article 

Social networking has become one of the biggest trends for helping consumers and businesses connect. It’s become so important that Facebook recently launched a “Facebook for Business” manual that helps businesses to fully utilize the site’s social networking features. Here are five ways to make the most out of your business’s Facebook page.

Network with Your Customers

TWhile the average person uses Facebook to catch up with friends, businesses network with customers in a different way. A Facebook page allows a business to engage customers by asking them for tips on how to improve, and compliments on what they’re doing right. Businesses can even take this a step further by allowing customer service representatives to handle problems right from the page, with no long-winded e-mails or phone calls required.

Advertising

Facebook’s business pages are convenient in that they allow users to “like” a business. This allows you to have an almost captive audience for your advertising. Customers that “like” your page will see advertisements from your business in their news feed. Not only does this give you more exposure, it allows you to advertise to customers you know are already familiar with and fond of your business.

Website Integration

One of the best features of Facebook for businesses is that it allows you to integrate Facebook’s networking features directly on your business’s web site. This could mean anything from allowing Facebook users to comment on site news, or even allow customers to “like” and share products on your site with others on Facebook. This allows buzz to instantly be generated and transferred from your site to other potential customers.

Using Facebook as a Shopfront

Similarly to integrating Facebook features on your own website, certain parts of your website can be integrated into your business’s Facebook page. Since Facebook allows businesses to customize the tabs on their own page, the possibilities for shopping directly from your Facebook page are endless. Users can add items to a virtual shopping cart without ever leaving Facebook itself.

Special Offers

Lastly, Facebook is a great opportunity for allowing businesses to offer exclusive discounts to users. For instance, a user that “likes” your business’s page could be offered a special coupon. This incentivizes users for helping to promote your business through social networking, all while nurturing a relationship with current customers.

Having a social networking presence is becoming increasingly more important to businesses. Following these tips is a great start to building such a presence for your business.

Facebook Apps Allow Businesses To Use Social Media To Sell- Click here http://bit.ly/nZAkRA for full article

Facebook Apps Allow Businesses To Use Social Media To Sell- Click here http://bit.ly/nZAkRA for full article

The prevalence and ubiquity of Facebook has already made it one of the most attractive platforms for advertising and marketing. The potential for e-commerce on Facebook seems enormous, but thus far the social media giant has not exploded with online shops like eBay and Amazon. Some social networking purists argue that there is no place for online stores on Facebook or Twitter, but economic activity is a significant aspect of the social experience.

One of the reasons why Facebook isn't being overrun with online shops has to do with the site's aesthetics. History has shown that allowing anyone to arbitrarily set up shop on a site is not guaranteed to work. Anyone who is old enough to remember MySpace can remember the uninviting and visually chaotic stores that materialized once e-commerce arrived. Facebook's commitment to maintaining a clean and tasteful interface will never allow garish shops to invade their beloved social network.

Keep in mind that, according to the company, there are more than 750 million active members on Facebook. Half of them log in to the network at least once a day. Facebook's global reach is not only massive, it is also waiting for the right shops to come along.

Leveraging the shopping potential of Facebook is as easy as choosing the right apps. When the company introduced iFrame to developers, it practically left its doors wide open for online stores. Several outfits now offer e-commerce solutions for Facebook, complete with product catalogs, shopping carts, and instant checkout solutions such as PayPal Pro (also known as Website Payments Pro).

TabJuice is one of the leading solutions for online shops on Facebook. The focus of TabJuice is to empower retailers by allowing them to create great-looking and highly functional online storefronts from scratch. Although a high degree of customization in terms of display and layout is possible with TabJuice, the app's built in checks and balances ensure that no retailer ends up with a MySpace-looking storefront.

The integration of PayPal Pro is a major component of the TabJuice experience. PayPal Pro is a payment processing solution that empowers retailers by allowing them to easily conduct credit and debit card transactions. An important feature behind PayPal Pro is that its unique integration allows shoppers to stay in their chosen Facebook store while completing a purchase. As far as pricing goes, PayPal Pro is 14% lower on average when compared to rival merchant processors.

Facebook Apps Allow Businesses To Use Social Media To Sell- Click here http://bit.ly/nZAkRA for full article

Facebook Apps Allow Businesses To Use Social Media To Sell- Click here http://bit.ly/nZAkRA for full article

The prevalence and ubiquity of Facebook has already made it one of the most attractive platforms for advertising and marketing. The potential for e-commerce on Facebook seems enormous, but thus far the social media giant has not exploded with online shops like eBay and Amazon. Some social networking purists argue that there is no place for online stores on Facebook or Twitter, but economic activity is a significant aspect of the social experience.

One of the reasons why Facebook isn't being overrun with online shops has to do with the site's aesthetics. History has shown that allowing anyone to arbitrarily set up shop on a site is not guaranteed to work. Anyone who is old enough to remember MySpace can remember the uninviting and visually chaotic stores that materialized once e-commerce arrived. Facebook's commitment to maintaining a clean and tasteful interface will never allow garish shops to invade their beloved social network.

Keep in mind that, according to the company, there are more than 750 million active members on Facebook. Half of them log in to the network at least once a day. Facebook's global reach is not only massive, it is also waiting for the right shops to come along.

Leveraging the shopping potential of Facebook is as easy as choosing the right apps. When the company introduced iFrame to developers, it practically left its doors wide open for online stores. Several outfits now offer e-commerce solutions for Facebook, complete with product catalogs, shopping carts, and instant checkout solutions such as PayPal Pro (also known as Website Payments Pro).

TabJuice is one of the leading solutions for online shops on Facebook. The focus of TabJuice is to empower retailers by allowing them to create great-looking and highly functional online storefronts from scratch. Although a high degree of customization in terms of display and layout is possible with TabJuice, the app's built in checks and balances ensure that no retailer ends up with a MySpace-looking storefront.

The integration of PayPal Pro is a major component of the TabJuice experience. PayPal Pro is a payment processing solution that empowers retailers by allowing them to easily conduct credit and debit card transactions. An important feature behind PayPal Pro is that its unique integration allows shoppers to stay in their chosen Facebook store while completing a purchase. As far as pricing goes, PayPal Pro is 14% lower on average when compared to rival merchant processors.

8 Tips For Business Homepage Design- Click here http://bit.ly/rux53f for full article

8 Tips For Business Homepage Design- Click here http://bit.ly/rux53f for full article

Just like walking into a restaurant or store, your website’s homepage design gives visitors an impression of your business, and helps them decide whether to become customers. Here are 8 tips for business homepage design that will help show your business at its best.

1.) Maintain Your Brand’s Image
Your business’s homepage look and feel should tie in with your other marketing. Use your logo, color scheme and style to reinforce what your business is about. You want your customers to instantly associate the website to your business.

2.) Focus on Your Message
Let your design focus on the message you’d like to deliver to your customers. Too much information can distract viewers, and they may leave without the message you hoped they would take away.

3.) Ensure Your Homepage is Readable
Use fonts and colors that are readable, even for people with less-than-perfect vision. Keep in mind that more people are visiting websites using smart phones and tablets, which makes it even more important to keep things easy to read.

4.) Reduce Scrolling
Keep the most important information within the display size of the typical browser window. Your viewers will appreciate not having to scroll for essential information. Viewers tend to expect scrolling on other pages, so of the 8 tips for business homepage design, use this just for the homepage.

5.) Show Your Business’s Personality
Use your website to stand out from similar businesses by featuring what makes your business unique and fun. Most people prefer to do business with a company that makes it enjoyable.

6.) Keep Customers Up-to-date
When your business is active on social media such as Facebook and Twitter, embed feeds from these status updates to keep your homepage content fresh. One caveat, if you can’t commit to keeping up with social media, don’t use this tip. It will leave a poor impression if your status updates are weeks old.

7.) Use a Featured Image
When your homepage has a featured image, it will show next to the link code when someone shares your homepage on Facebook or Google+. A good featured image entices viewers to click the link to your site.

8.) Remember SEO
If you hope to rank well with the search engines, you’ll have to consider search engine optimization. Your homepage might be light on text, but check your keywords and use them judiciously. Of course, you’ll use behind-the-scenes code to add a page title, description and alternate text on your images. This one of the 8 tips for business homepage design applies to all your pages.

Yes AOL Is Still Around, AOL Advertising- Click here http://bit.ly/mRzrVF for full article

Yes AOL Is Still Around, AOL Advertising- Click here http://bit.ly/mRzrVF for full article

American Online has been a cornerstone of the internet since it went online in the very first home. This company has enjoyed high peaks of service as well as multi-year slumps. After Google and other advertisement gurus begun to pick up speed in 2007, it looked like America Online was nearing the end of its lifespan. This was all until AOL took an aggressive turn for the better and began showing impressive profits in the first quarter of 2011. This had made AOL advertising the perfect option for businesses and business owners that are looking for an effective online component to their overall marketing strategy.

One of the changing points for American Online within the past few months is an increased network of advertising mediums including their news operation Patch and the acquisition of Huffington Post. These two news services have recently undergone aggressive expansion into new towns and providers across the country, allowing AOL new platforms from which to launch their AOL advertising tools.

Within the realm of online advertising and publishers, American Online is boasting some impressive numbers as of the beginning of 2011. They are currently in partnership with 91 of AdAge's Top 100 advertisers and 74 of comScore's Top 100 publishers are in their network as well. For businesses looking to expand their reach, this means that AOL advertising has more websites, dynamic ads, and the ability to reach more people with clearer information.

Another key point when determining to advertise with AOL is their rights to a substantial amount of information. America Online's dominance in the internet for so many years has resulted in their vast resources and mediums. From their instant messaging system to an email with tens of millions of users, they have the ability reach countless customers over multiple platforms. They also utilize a team of 50 researchers and developers to create a dynamic system of offering the correct ad to the best customer at the right time.

Whether a business is looking to expand their advertising campaign or become worldwide ad publishers, AOL has become an outstanding tool. Their teams has streamlined the process of signing up, developing ads, and reaching the correct demographics at a great price.