For example, to attend a live networking event, I would generally have an hour commute each way, plus I would spend 2 hours at the event for a total of 4 hours. During that time, I might meet about 4-6 new people, and possibly want to follow up with 1 or 2 of them. I probably would’ve paid for the event as well as for parking and/or public transportation. So, 4 hours, out-of-pocket costs for potentially a handful of contacts.

In comparison, I check in with Facebook about 2-3 times per day and average about 5-10 minutes each time. Each time I’m on, I interact with approximately 1-3 people. Over the course of a single week, I might spend around 4 hours total on Facebook and interact with as many as 40 people. The bonus is that I can do this at my convenience, and it doesn’t cost me a single penny. Four hours, no cost, and 10x the number of people with whom I can interact.

Which method of networking yields the most tangible results? It’s hard to tell since I blend my two worlds. But, I will say that I feel more comfortable asking someone I’ve been exchanging comments with on Facebook a direct business question rather than in person at a cocktail party. On Facebook, like email, they don’t have to answer right on the spot, so it’s a little less awkward. In addition, on Facebook I’m interacting with people with whom I already have a personal or business relationship.

I still attend in-person networking events – nothing is better than meeting online friends IRL (in real life) – but, due to family obligations and working from a home office in suburbia, it’s difficult to always be there in person. This is why I’m a strong believer in “clicks & mix” networking – click on line and mix it up in person. You need both. I use Facebook and Twitter to supplement the fact that I can’t physically manage to attend every conference, breakfast, lunch, cocktails and dinner to which I’m invited.

Here are a few other ways to think about managing your time on Facebook:

• Facebook can be a productive coffee break. As mentioned above, I log onto Facebook about 2-3 times a day; mostly when I need a mental break and/or human interaction. During the time I’m on Facebook, I may comment on a few posts from my friends. Or pick my 5 favorite films, songs, or dogs. I also might take a quiz, add any new friend requests, become a fan of a page, and see if anyone from high school or college has recently joined. However, most of my time is spent scanning the News Feed, where I inevitably find one of my friends spotlighting an article or video relevant to my work, so I’m quickly off and back to research and writing.
• Facebooking is easier than a cocktail party. Why? First, I don’t have to worry about what to wear or a dress code. But, more importantly, on Facebook, I’m interacting with friends who have already made a decision that they want to engage with me. This means that I can hop into conversations and share information without getting a queasy feeling in the pit of my stomach. Yes, even extroverts sometimes get nervous breaking into or starting conversations at networking events. It also means that Facebook friends will always be “warm calls” because you can build relationships talking about favorite movies, TV shows, sports teams or YouTube videos.
• High school reunions can be fun and fruitful. It seems that the majority of people on Facebook are reconnecting with individuals from the past. Don’t let a few bad high school experiences deter you. You’d be surprised at how people can change for the better. After all, you certainly did, didn’t you?

I can hear some of you still saying, “That’s nice, but why would I waste time with non-business contacts when I need to find a job or new clients?” My response – I’ve rarely mentioned what I do to my high school pals, yet there they are, … signing up for the Downtown Women’s Club, buying my books; getting me speaking engagements; and hiring me as their social media coach. Not bad for dishing about reality shows and my dog’s Marley and Me moments.

Diane K. Danielson is the CEO of http://www.DowntownWomensClub.com and the author of the new eBook, The Downtown Women’s Club’s Beginner’s Guide to Facebook, available for free with a Downtown Women’s Club DWC+ membership. See http://www.downtownwomensclub.com/facebookebook for more information.

Author: Diane Danielson
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: PCB Prototype & Manufacturing

© 2010, Tiffany Odutoye (@virtualpartner). All rights reserved.

As you probably have heard by now-you aren’t in the business of (fill in the blank here). You are in the business of marketing. Your marketing must be automated and systemized. Period.

- Create Passive, Income Generating Information Products

Create your own advances and get paid to create information products. Many, many target markets are considered “information hungry”.

- Build Your Most Important Asset… Your List

Success on the Internet is about providing high-quality information, solving problems AND the list.

- Use Social Networking Sites Such As Facebook, Linked In, My Space, and Twitter

Used strategically, social networks extend your brand and funnel thousands of new leads into your business funnel each and every quarter.

- Create A Very Profitable Internet Launch for Your Information Product or Book

Set up correctly, these launches generate thousands and tens of thousands dollars of income, new leads for you, and all your partners.

- Create Your Own Certification Program

Certification programs aren’t just for large companies. Solo online entrepreneurs can also benefit from building and creating a certification program within their company.

- Build Your Own Virtual Team

Learn how to find, build, and manage a virtual team. The key to “leverage” is the team. We all have weaknesses. Don’t make the most common entrepreneurial mistake: thinking you can do it all.

- Approach, Create, and Solidify Long-Lasting Joint Ventures

All successful businesses are built on thriving relationships-on and off the Internet. And with all relationships, you should focus on who and how you attract partners.

- Know Which Publishing Options Are Right for YOU

Learn what your publishing options are and make a choice based on the path that is right for you based on your personality, strengths, and weaknesses.

- Double Your List Size With A Virtual Event

One of the best strategies for growing the list is an online virtual event with multiple partners or joint ventures. Give customers free access and structure the event correctly and it is a huge list builder.

- Develop Your Intuition

Most entrepreneurs spend so much time focusing on all the “outside” stuff that they forget to get help on learning how to “think” like a CEO. Your success and ability to run a profitable company depends on your leaning how to develop your CEO intuition.

- Use Visual Tools To Set Goals and Stay On Track

All successful entrepreneurs incorporate visual components into their strategy planning. They spend as much time planning as they do in the marketing, operations, finance parts of their business.

Ready to learn all of these high ROI to do’s in detail this year? Go to: [http://www.sherimcconnell.com/]

Guest Blogger

Sheri McConnell is the President of the National Assn of Women Writers and the Assn of Web Entrepreneurs. She teaches online entrepreneurs how to discover, create, and profit from their intellectual knowledge. Get free reports and audios at nawwfreereport.com or awefreereport.com

Author: Sheri McConnell
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: Bumper guardian

© 2010, Tiffany Odutoye (@virtualpartner). All rights reserved.

While individuals and institutions gave nearly $308 billion in pledges during 2008 – a healthy commitment by any standard – it nonetheless represents a decline of over $6 billion from 2007, or 5.7% on an inflation adjusted basis. While the real decline started in the Fall of 2008, this year isn’t shaping up to be much better. What can a nonprofit do to begin turning this around?

The Importance of Branding
Some nonprofits have understood the importance of branding their organizations, but most give it only “lip service” while continuing to put pressure on their fundraisers to produce even more. Now, an important new study from Cone, LLC and Intangible Business quantifies the leverage that a stronger brand could provide.

The study ranks the top 100 U.S. nonprofit brands among organizations providing social, environmental and animal related services. Historically, while many surveys have analyzed the financial side of nonprofits and many have looked at image and awareness data, this new study puts both sets of information together and presents a Power Brand Rank. Comparing a brand’s “revenue rank” with its “image rank” points to a number of marketing implications:

• A high “revenue rank” coupled with a low “image rank” suggests the potential financial growth if the image rankings were strengthened;
• Similarly, leveraging a strong brand image asset should lead to incremental financial rewards.

The question then becomes, what’s the best approach for a nonprofit to take to build brand awareness and image. (It should be noted that while this study did not include universities, civic or cultural institutions, there is no reason to believe the conclusions regarding the importance of branding would differ for these organizations.)

Nonprofit Anniversary Marketing
The anniversary of your nonprofit’s founding is an ideal opportunity to galvanize your employees, board members, donors, foundations, government and corporate sponsors, and to re-kindle their commitment to the relevance, importance and needs of the organization.

This is a unique opportunity, with the potential for a yearlong marketing program that, done properly, sets the stage for your fundraisers, strengthens your longer term brand image and improves the organization’s ROI.

For-profit organizations, both large and small, have long recognized the importance of company anniversary marketing because it isn’t just the latest advertising, public relations, direct mail, internet or event program. Rather, it is a unique chance for an organization to link the strength of its past to its plans for the future. For nonprofit organizations this story can be especially important among new members, volunteers and donors.

And, importantly, anniversaries do not need to be celebrated in multiples of 25 years. Your 33rd can be as powerful as your 75th.

Planning for an anniversary marketing program should begin well in advance of the anniversary year. As you begin to develop your strategic plans and budgets, you also should audit your resources and perhaps conduct research to determine what your stakeholders really think. This research also can provide a benchmark against which to measure your progress and ROI at the conclusion of your program.

A theme and logo are essential. You should also consider a historical book, or CD, newsletters, direct mail, multiple events and the internet to communicate your story. Advertising and public relations may also play a part. All of these tactics require coordination and integration with your overall strategy, mission and vision statements.

Further, you should consider hiring an outside consulting group. Not only will they bring “fresh eyes” to your situation, but they will have the experience and ability to coordinate all of the facets of your program, something that your staff or volunteers may not have the time or expertise to do.

Today’s marketplace is uncertain, distrustful and, frankly, afraid of the future. When you celebrate your historical success, and position yourself for a vibrant future, you reassure people about your staying power and relevance. Ironically, the current environment couldn’t present a stronger marketing opportunity.

GUEST BLOGGER

Gary Kullberg has served on five nonprofit Executive Boards, two as President and one as Vice Chair. He is the CEO of the Kullberg Consulting Group (KCG), founded in 1994, a strategic alliance of sixty entrepreneurially driven marketing and marketing communications companies whose service, http://www.MarketingMilestone.com, provides both effective strategy and execution to organizations and brands celebrating their milestones. KCG brings together the combined experiences of its members, who have worked with over 585 organizations, profit and nonprofit, in 21 major industry groups.

Author: Gary Kullberg
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: Programmable Multi-cooker

© 2010, Tiffany Odutoye (@virtualpartner). All rights reserved.

Public social networking platforms (like Facebook and MySpace) offer a free space to cultivate connections and collect friends. The data is frequently erroneous and the site lacks reporting features. On the plus side it is free and available and comes with a site name that everyone knows.

Private online communities and membership sites offer your members the same robust, entertaining features and ability to connect, while providing your administration with something that we all long for — accountability. Reporting features within private communities deliver a strong level of accountability and allow you to monitor and export data on your members and their activities.

The number of friends (or fans) on your public site is not a viable measure of return on investment. In addition to bogus information/member data, the ease at which someone can become a friend or fan of your site actually becomes a negative for your organization as many individuals will merely succumb to the ease/pressure of pressing a fan button because their friend sent it to them, not because they have any interest in your organization. Becoming a member of a private online community is a much bigger commitment because it is an active approach and one that speaks (silently) to their intention.

The perfect fit for your organization may be a combination of both approaches — having a public membership site that funnels traffic to your private site. It’s often a good tactic to incorporate public social networking sites into your marketing mix. It’s certainly a good idea to fish where the fish are! But be sure to bring them home to your organization’s private community — where you can capture valuable member information and provide measurable value to them in return.

About YourMembership.com Inc.
Founded in 1998, YourMembership.com Inc. develops online member communities and web-based membership software for associations, non-profits, government organizations, corporations, congregations, secondary schools, universities, foundations, fraternal organizations and private social networking sites. Serving hundreds of customers around the world, YourMembership.com creates truly dynamic, secure and connected member communities with all product features, design, hosting, future product upgrades and customer service included for one low fee.

David L. Sieg
Vice President, Strategic Marketing
YourMembership.com Inc.

Author: David L Sieg
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: Creditcard Currency Conversion Fee

© 2010, Tiffany Odutoye (@virtualpartner). All rights reserved.

In the interim, we’ll do a brainstorming activity today and hopefully leave the room with a great name!

Here’s that article I mentioned:

When creating a truly great company name, the number one consideration should be the level of “engagement.”

“Engagement?” you ask incredulously.

Yes… engagement.
While there are all sorts of naming strategies… metaphors, acronyms, coined/invented, key attributes, positive connotations, etc., the one common denominator that separates the mediocre from the memorable, is the degree to which the name engages the mind of the consumer. Most new business owners opt for company names that inform and describe, leaving nothing to the imagination. They often fail to realize that the context surrounding the name (the ad, the store sign, the proposal, the brochure copy, etc.) will define what they do, so the name can be free to describe how they do it. In other words, no customer will hear or see the name in a mental vacuum. Yet this is the way we often judge names when “brainstorming”. And it’s why focus groups are such

notoriously bad judges of good names. It’s not the people that are flawed, it’s the process itself. Most of the feedback takes the form of free associations, all in an effort to determine if a name is “good” or “bad.” It goes something like this…

Interviewer: “What do you think of the name Monster?”

Respondent: “Ew! They’re scary and dangerous!”

Interviewer: “What about Amazon?”
Respondent: “Jungle… drowning… snakes… piranhas…”

Interviewer: “Apple?”
Respondent: “A bad apple spoils the whole bunch.”

Interviewer: “Caterpillar?”
Respondent: “Squishy, soft, and squirmy.”

Interviewer to new business owner: “I think we can safely assume these would be bad brand names…”

So if it’s not a matter of free associations, then what determines a good name? Again, it’s that all important element known as “engagement.” Engagement is what causes you to lean forward, ask twice, invite more information and pursue the conversation. A good name should invite a discussion, start a conversation and “engage” the other person’s interest and attention. That’s why Amazon, even though it says nothing about what it does, works better than Books-A-Million. Amazon is open and inviting and Books-A-Million is literal and descriptive. Amazon speaks to the process…flowing, easy, abundant. Books-A-Million speaks to the products… books. And while Amazon leaves room for the company to grow in any number of directions, Books-A-Million leaves the company in a bind. I once heard an ad for a company called Just Brakes. Since they had outgrown this narrow niche, they adopted a new tag line… “We’re more than just brakes.”

Let’s take another example. Linens & Things is needlessly redundant since most people, after seeing a newspaper ad, or walking by the store window, will know the company sells linens and things. It would be better to use the name to capture some key strategic position or advantage, or to evoke a feeling or emotion. Is Linen & Things the best, the fastest, the biggest, the most service oriented, the trendiest? We simply don’t know. They have described but they haven’t evoked. They’ve explained but they haven’t engaged.

The objection I routinely hear is “But with names like these, no one will know what I do!” And that’s when I explain that trust is needed… trust in the power of context to fill in the blanks. That way the name is freed to paint a picture, engage the senses and position the brand to reflect not what you do, but how you do it.

So will any weird word work?

No.

Weird for weird sake will just leave the customer scratching his or her head in bewilderment of moving on in indifference. Bold, engaging names will create the desire to know more, and that’s where you need to be ready to tell the story. The name then becomes a segue to a larger story. It starts with the name and tagline and then continues to the :15 second elevator speech and beyond.

One of our clients we named was TKO Surgical. When asked if that’s a boxing reference, our client gives an emphatic “yes,” explaining that they have a mission to both defend and fight for their clients’ needs. They’ll champion their cause and remain in their corner until the last bell sounds. Their tag line? “Technically Superior.”

So whether a name is based on a metaphor, a key attribute, an acronym, or a positive connotation, the overarching goal is to create a name that engages. Perhaps that’s why Albert Einstein asserted that “Imagination is more important than knowledge.” If given the choice of engaging vs. informing, opt for a name that begs for more. It may seem weird, but the results can be wonderful.

Phillip Davis is president and owner of Tungsten Branding, business naming consultants specializing in brand creation, product naming, tag line development, corporate identity and strategic brand repositioning. Phil’s client list includes PODS, Team Logic IT and Sea Of Diamonds to name a few. His complete client list and company naming philosophy can be viewed at http://PureTungsten.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Phillip_Davis

© 2010, Tiffany Odutoye (@virtualpartner). All rights reserved.

By speaking their language they were able to appear more intelligent (key word: appear) and win the business. Left-brainers everywhere rejoiced, as now these disciplines were under their control.

For too long marketing, business development, networking, direct mail, advertising, branding, PR (and more recently social media) were viewed by the left brain professionals as “the Black Arts”. They admitted that these were necessary, but since they were more creative and not always predictable, that they were some how less important to the success of a company than the more predictable departments on the org chart.

However, while this trend toward analyzing “return on investment” on everything makes people feel good — it has paralyzed many companies.

During a job interview years ago I told a CFO that sometimes to find success in marketing you have to try a variety of tactics. I used the old saying “throw some spaghetti against the wall and see what sticks!” The CFO responded that if a marketing campaign could not prove out results in advance, then his company would not do it. “No spaghetti could hit the floor!” The company hired a “ROI” oriented marketing manager (they did not hire me) and the company had minimal success in growing its image. The person they hired lasted 14 months on the job before the company changed direction, yet again.

While you do not want to waste dollars in promoting the image of your company, if you think there is a magic formula that will guarantee success, you will spend your life over thinking every opportunity and you will miss out on the allusive successes you seek. There is a difference between throwing money around and having an instinctive feeling on how to have an impact on your company’s positioning in the marketplace.

Instead of spending hours looking at the return on every investment on a spreadsheet, you should redefine the definition of ROI in regards to marketing.

ROI = Rely On Instincts.

Raising the visibility and brand of your company is not as easy as building a new website, joining Twitter, or sponsoring an industry conference. You need to fine tune your instincts or hire someone who knows the landscape of how all the “black arts” actually work together.

Take social media for an example: The term is getting a lot of attention in business circles, but it is not magic. Just like advertising, PR, networking, marketing, or branding alone will not make you rich…. social media is just another tool (although a trendy tool as this is being written). There are many “experts” advising companies on ROI in this medium, but I have seen few who can deliver the goods they present in a brochure. The real success here comes from hands on involvement of the company’s executives. You can’t outsource authenticity.

In a vacuum none of these marketing related disciplines will rocket your success toward the sky. But when strategically used together, they will have the long lasting power to help bring in new business.

If your instincts are rusty on these right-brain activities, then you need to do a little work and experimentation. You can learn to understand how to help promote the image of your firm by paying attention to the world around you. A good lawyer does not stop studying new laws and statutes that come into play and just rely on what they learned in school. They keep fine tuning their practice. (Note that it is called a “practice”, which means they never master it… but keep working on the whole process!). Likewise an accountant will not rely on tax law from 1989 to prepare their client’s return this year (at least you would hope not!).

Embrace the marketing world for the power it has to help your company, rather than try to cram it into a pre-structured spreadsheet. If the world worked that way then you would not be frustrated by lack of marketing success… and your competitors could buy the same structured program as you, and thus make you both a commodity, anyway!!! (Feeling like your product or service is becoming a commodity? Hmmmm, maybe there is a connection to the lack of creativity in your efforts!!!)

I expect this post will not be well accepted by those who want the world to be viewed in black and white… and by those who use fancy words and spreadsheets to win the business from left brain decision makers. But I am not attacking, as much as I am asking people to love the gray area for the possibilities for growth that are living there.

Thom Singer is a professional business speaker and the author of four books on the power of business relationships and networking. More information is available at http://www.thomsinger.com

Author: Thom Singer
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: Mobile device news

© 2010, Tiffany Odutoye (@virtualpartner). All rights reserved.

Whether you are selling products or services, or just publishing content for ad revenue, the efficiency and benefits of social media marketing is an unmatched method that will make your website profitable over time.

Social News Websites:

The benefits of a social media website vary, but a proven method is creating viral content and promoting it through social media channels. Link Baits, otherwise known as content created for the purpose of getting people to link to it, are a great start. Successful link baits are not hard to accomplish – you just have to know how to do it. Creating high quality content and then getting it listed on social media websites like Digg and StumbleUpon will lead to a number of benefits for any website.

There are two methods to this madness:

• Primary and Secondary Traffic: Primary traffic is the number of visitors who come directly from social media websites. Secondary traffic is the referral traffic that come from websites that link to your content and ultimately send you visitors back to your website.
• High Quality Links: Social News websites, like Digg or Reddit will get you a large number of links – that have the possibility, with high quality editorial content, to bring you traffic and ultimately raise your ranking in search engines.

There is no secret to this. As SEO has taking a bashing over the past few years – many SEO firms and specialist battle back and forth on the importance of keywords, Meta tags, link purchasing -you name it, they have fought over it. In the end though, the secret isn’t that hard to uncover, quality content, sewn together with valuable keywords and building inbound links, are the three components to placing your website in the top of search engine results.

When a website receives a large number of natural, permanent links from trusted domains, search engines begin to trust you. After gaining this trust, you continuously build upon it to either gain ranking or maintain it. And if you begin to optimize your website and begin link baiting – you can easily start ranking for competitive keywords, which in turn, bring you search engine visitors.

Continue this method of marketing and your website will undoubtedly increase its traffic. Many bloggers and Webmasters will see an article on Digg or del.icio.us and trust its usability and then reference through a citation link.

Even new websites that start with little traffic or trusted links – will find social link baiting to their advantage and can quickly establish a reputation and begin to build upon it. But just remember, it’s the quality of the content that ultimately matters. Content is still king and always will be when it comes to online marketing. Optimizing it in a number of ways will quickly gain you the trust needed by search engines to rank highly, and ultimately deliver the traffic you need to your website.

The Naysayers Are Out There

They’re out there. The Naysayers. The ones who adamantly agree that social media marketing is a waste of time and brings in useless traffic, leading to visitors quickly leaving after they clicked upon a website. Bounce rates are inevitable – even to your most loyal customers, they aren’t always going to be interested. But don’t mistake bounce rates for a lack of interest – if your entire website is relevant to the general interest of a social media website, there will always be a handful of users who will begin to track your website for future content.

Don’t forget about the secondary traffic either, which I think is more important in the end. General websites or blogs with the same interest will link to your content because it helps add value for their users and readers alike. Most of the time, this is done naturally on a daily basis.

Primary traffic might come in larger volumes, but secondary traffic build links from other websites and ultimately delivers their traffic to your website. This help build your brand, establish your presence online, ultimately making it more valuable in the end.

Why you must consider Social Media Marketing?

You could ignore the power of social media marketing, who needs it? After all, you could stick with link exchanges, banner purchasing, editorial ads and search advertising. You certainly could, but why would you?

Social media marketing:

• Is natural. Not only do you get natural links back to your website, it is also is exposed to large groups of people in an unpredictable fashion.
• Successfully mastered social communities can be a great source of web traffic that helps boost your ranking and add to your already established search engine results.
• It’s a low-cost/high return business model. If you do it yourself, costs are limited and the only time and expense you have involves hiring freelancers to do it. Ultimately, the benefits exceed the cost – it would take you thousands of dollars to purchase links, which some search engines penalize you for doing now, or are starting to. Social media gives you all of the above FREE!
• Social Media optimization and marketing normally won’t interfere with any methods of getting traffic to your website. This new level of marketing will only add to your already established campaigns – and most of the time, exceed them.

So How Does This Make Me Money?

Directly? It won’t – that is not how this method works. Your site needs to perpetuate itself and build upon its established exposure. The more supporters you have, the faster word spreads about your website. And social media websites deliver more traffic on a daily basis, compared to all other web communities. Because social media websites can be leverage for links and better search engine rakings, they ultimately increase your website’s potential. For example, you will be able to price ads higher or generate revenue from any paid business model.

The Blog Secret

It is as simple as it sounds, an excellent blog will bring you traffic and sales you need to succeed. There is a secret to blog writing and marketing thereafter – it’s very simple. Instead of creating numerous blog posts that ultimately go nowhere, just one excellent blog post, which is then pushed through social media channels and emailed to other bloggers through email pitches.

You can write just one post and get a enormous amount of links and traffic to your website through the use of social media.

Social media marketing is not a secret, but to do it correctly and monetize your brand, and bring in the new traffic you need to succeed – it takes know-how and the willingness to ‘give in.’ Everyday, I speak with someone who has interest in social media marketing, but are just not sure of how it might work for them and figure it may not be worth the investment. And that is the exact reason why people don’t pursue social media marketing, because they are unaware and are not sure to approach it .

Simply put, to ignore this new branding technique of social media marketing, would just be foolish.

By VWI Media

http://www.vwi-media.co.uk

Author: Nicholas Cifuentes
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: Cellphone news

© 2009, Tiffany Odutoye (@virtualpartner). All rights reserved.

Examples of Social Networking would be online communities such as MySpace and Facebook; these are very popular social networks of personal profiles, groups, blogs, photos, music and videos. Flickr is also commonly used today to share photos and YouTube is extremely popular for video sharing. There are other different forms of Social Media or Social Networking such as, internet forums, message boards, weblogs, podcasts, linking and blogging.

Social Media has different characteristics from traditional media such as newspapers, television, books and radio. The bottom line, social media depends on interactions between people or groups of people. An audience can participate in social media by adding comments, bookmarking or posting links, sharing files (websites, photos, videos, etc.), collecting connections or even just reading and following links. Content in social media can be text, graphics, audio or video. Several of the formats can be mixed and usually available via feeds, enabling users to subscribe via feed readers, and allowing other publishers to create.

Social Media Optimization or SMO is a process where content gets more widely distributed across all available Social Media networks. SMO refers to professional services that can improve a website by including or adding links to various services so webpages can be easily saved and submitted. Social Media Optimization includes good content writing that is unique and informative. SMO services can popularize your website via multiple social media outlets and off-page work can include getting involved in other blogs, forums, and niche networks or communities.

Search Engine Marketing or SEM involves utilization of all Social Networking platforms to brand your product or service website using techniques of effective mechanics and communication to the end user and consumer. By getting your website well-known on all the different social media networks, you are spreading the word about your company to all the search engines as well seeing as they crawl through all those social networks.

Social Media Marketing or SMM is marketing to achieve branding and internet marketing using Social Media or Social Networking. Social Media Marketing would be lost without effective and proven Social Media Optimization. This usually involves a campaign which differs for every business or organization but will build brand awareness, increase visibility and get feedback with dialog to possibly sell a product or service with measured results.

Author: Ryan Hicks
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: Digital pipeline

© 2009, Tiffany Odutoye (@virtualpartner). All rights reserved.

So why does traditional online advertising not work in social media? First, most consumers’ decisions on social media sites take place through the referral of friends. Case in point, 78% of respondents to the 2007 Nielsen Global Survey on Word of Mouth indicate consumer recommendations are the most credible form of advertising. Second, the push marketing approach does not apply to niche, fast-moving audiences found in social media sites. Three, the mindset of social media users is driven by self promotion and community (social engagement) – in order to connect there has to be an exchange that is of value to the user. If you chose to advertise on social media sites be conscious of the need to give that audience something of value as opposed to a advertising message.

Twiter, Facebook, Flyertalk and thousands of community boards, blogs and social media platforms empower consumers to communicate, network, contribute and make decisions about their everyday life. The gold dust of social media is consumer generated content and the sentiment it reflects about brands – dynamic word of mouth and conversation. The question is how to identify, harness, measure and act upon the conversational gold dust. In simple terms the challenge is to define and tie key performance indicators to the content and sentiment being measured.

The first thing to understand is that social media and consumer generated content serves as a repository and public record of conversations and consumer sentiment about a brand. A number of companies (Nielsen Buzzmetrics, Brand Watch, Market Sentinel) have popped up offering technology to capture those conversations for analysis but much of the application of that technology is still quite tactical or focused on brand reputation management. In fact, the consumer generated insight research opportunity is to use that insight on a regular basis and with quality marketing-based analysis to derive valuable insights that can improve marketing communications.

In our experience, the single most important measurement metric for social media is a variation of Net Promoter Score . Creator, Fred Reichheld of Bain & Co., measured the number of consumer “Promoters” (those who would recommend a product or services) and “Detractors” (those who actively discourage the use of a product or service) of hundreds of companies across many categories finding that on average the NPS leader grows at 2.5x. While the Net Promoter Score metric can provide a foundation metric, it is important to define additional metrics aimed at benchmarking the contribution of social media against other channels of consumer interaction.

Our work with Avis and OpenSkies on the social media space has allowed us to define a measurement approach to consumer generated content; based on five measurement modules.

1. Involvement
This set of metrics is aimed at understanding the propensity of involvement for either your own social media environment (community board, blog) or third party social media sites that drive users to your site. Assigning a unique referring ID to your social media property or third party social sites within your site analytics tool (Web Trends and Google Analytics) should facilitate this data.
- Site visits
- Time spent
- Pages viewed
- New vs. returning users
- Navigational path

2. Engagement
These metrics are aimed at understanding the specific actions and behaviors of users. Every engagement such as a comment should be equated to a call centre engagement or store visit. This approach allows for social media engagement to be viewed as part of the overall customer journey, providing a degree of benchmarking.
- Commentary volume
- Frequency of comments
- Sources of commentary
- Commentary creator segments
- Topics/Subjects

3. Sentiment
This set of metrics is aimed at identifying changes in positive and negative feedback across time and against competitors. This information can be used by Customer Service teams to proactively address specific issues being openly discussed by consumers. – Net Promoter Index variation

4. Propagation
This set of metrics is aimed at indentifying the distribution of social media content and its impact on how other consumers find and participate on the discussions about your brand. A key metric is search engine indexing which is related to the incremental impact of natural search traffic and visibility derived from social media.
- Citations
- Trackbacks
- Search Engine indexing

5. Transaction
While not applicable to all brands, transactions from social media can be measured by leveraging third party ad-serving and site analytics data. Establishing a control test against your average transactional site data can be an effective way of identifying variations on behavior and value.
- Registrations
- Shopping cart instances
- Conversion rate
- Revenue per transaction
- Revenue by user

© 2009, Tiffany Odutoye (@virtualpartner). All rights reserved.

How does one use profitable social media?

1. Figure out what form of social media you think best serves your marketing purposes. This may mean understanding what your business is about first so you can choose the right profitable social media. For example, if you like to blog, you might be able to create a business-oriented blogsite whose blog posts are solely concerned about your line of work.

2. Learn more about what type of content you can place in your social media tool. Some people rely on the addition of images, audio, video and text to heighten the impact of their profitable social media.

3. Know what kind of people (aside from you) tend to use that form of social media. Using the blogsite again as an example, there are blogsites that are devoted to online gaming aficionados. So if you are promoting a particular online game in your site, head for that type of profitable social media.

4. Post great articles on your profitable social media as well. Many people think that having high-end graphics on their social media site will automatically draw in visitors. However, if you do not have anything interesting to say, visitors will not come a second time. If you have to, hire someone to write for you.

5. Continuously update your profitable social media content. Change the graphics every so often, and keep posting new written content. This gives repeat visitors something to look forward to on their succeeding visits.

Profitable social media hinges on social media optimization efforts, so use your profitable social media to its full potential and reap the benefits.

Do you want to learn more about how I do it? I have just completed my brand new guide to article marketing success, Your Article Writing and Promotion Guide

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Sean Ray is an accomplished internet article writer, and uses articles to drive online traffic.

Author: Sean Ray
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: Guest blogger

© 2009, Tiffany Odutoye (@virtualpartner). All rights reserved.