Pages

Thursday 11 August 2011

How Helpful are Social Networks?



Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and now Google+. How helpful these social networks really are for businesses? How to take advantage of these social networks? How to develop an integrated social media marketing strategy? How can you make it useful? Can we generate quality traffic to website and sales from these? The answer is YES and they can be really helpful. Here is the how.


What Should You Know/Keep in Mind?
  1. People won’t come knocking on the door to join.
  1. Your goal is to converse, not to send the people running.
  1. Most of your friends/followers/connections/groups are passive. Even though they might have liked your updates they wouldn’t Like/Retweet/Share/+1 it.
What Should You Do/Have?
  1. Secure best available/most suitable social URL for the organization.
  1. Develop / design / modify / refine the business page.
  1. Create profile and optimize it.
  1. Integrate suitable apps and create if necessary.
  1. Create better landing pages.
  1. Create Facebook Badge and use wisely.
  1. Use detailed info about the products/services.
  1. Use real photographs and use keywords in descriptions.
  1. Integrate Youtube videos with the biz page.
  1. How-to tutorials about products and its maintenance.
  1. Links to online reviews and comparisons.
  1. Add industry news, articles and events.
  1. Generation of discount coupon codes available only for social media fans.
  1. A tab for job openings.
  1. Syndicate your blog with the profile.
  1. Have Never-before-seen photos and videos.
  1. Integrate contests and polls.
  1. A page for Customer success stories.
  1. A page for office Locations and Directions.
  1. Invitation to sign up for newsletter.
  1. Network with interested groups.
  1. Find people by company and designation.
  1. Try to get in touch with the decision makers and heavyweights.
  1. Invite key industry experts to join and engage.
  1. Invite coworkers, past colleagues, and customers to join and start discussions.
  1. Invite the folks in your email list.
  1. Offer an incentive to join.
  1. Run Ad campaigns.
  1. Make the members aware/remind you are interested in them.
  1. Make special announcements on the social page before you do elsewhere.
  1. Flaunt social buttons on the website.
  1. Have a monthly draw just for fans.
  1. Ask for recommendations.
  1. Cross-market to related groups on different social networks.
  1. Integrate Social media to all of your marketing and branding efforts.
  1. Have genuine communications and maintain a friendly tone.
  1. Maintain a ratio between entertaining, engaging, educating and promotional messages.
  1. Update status messages periodically without grammar and spelling mistakes.
  1. Send updates targeting geographically and age wise.
  1. Respond to comments.
  2. Take a note of complaints, if any, and inform the concerned.
Results Expected
  1. Personal and better relationships.
  1. User generated content.
  1. Blended search results.
  1. More visits to website.
  1. Increased customer loyalty and retention.
  1. Enhanced brand awareness and recall.

Tuesday 2 August 2011

Why Search Engine Optimization?




Having a website is very essential in today’s geek world, but just having a website does not fulfill the purpose. According to studies nearly 7 million websites have been added in the year 2011 itself. How to survive in such a tough scenario? The best answer would be Search engine optimization.


70% of the net users use search engines as the primary method to find websites. Search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing are the majorly used search engines (Google amounts for 80% of share). There are millions of users who are searching online for the product and / or service that you provide. They don’t know you and won’t be referred by any one because they don’t know any of your current customers.
Designing a website and optimizing it are two different things.
SEO Makes your website easily accessed and viewed by potential clients from around the world.


Following are some of the points that explain why SEO is a better marketing strategy than newspaper ads and TV commercials:


1. Search engine visitors’ conversion ratio is better than any other traffic sources.


2. SEO gives your business global reach with minimum amount of investment in terms of money.


3. SEO is used by major SMEs and big corporates alike to generate traffic.


4. ROI (Return on Investment) is higher than any other marketing mediums.


5. Studies show that companies appearing well in search engines command more respect.


6. It gives you an edge and advantage over your competitors.


7. It works for you nonstop 24/7.


Things to be kept in mind while opting for a SEO company:


1. Performing SEO is about taking a marketing approach and having technical skills at the same time. It is best done by a marketing mind with technical support rather than someone with just technical background.


2. Ask for the company’s past works and check the results in the real time.


3. Avoid companies claiming guaranteed results within short span of time. SEO is not a short term process and takes at least around 2-3 months time to start showing up on search engine result pages.


4. Avoid companies who promise 1000+ directory submissions and book markings.


5. Select a company that does social media marketing along with SEO. Both SEO and SMM should complement each other to stay afloat, create brand awareness, reach and engage your target audience and be competitive.