Feb
3
Neglected Stepchild of Social Media Marketing
Filed Under Best Practices, Blogging, Facebook, Networking and Marketing Strategy, Outside the Box, Twitter, Web Marketing | 11 Comments
You want to market on the web and take advantage of the vast potential of social media. You start your blog, create your Twitter account, launch your Facebook fan page, and you’re ready to go.
Or are you? Have you missed any crucial first steps?
Sandy Abrams, begins her new book, Your Idea, Inc., with words that have been attributed to Mark Twain:
“The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking down your complex overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks, and then starting on the first one.”
This quotation presents three problems, which I believe ought to have troubled Samuel Clemens:
- Isn’t “breaking down your complex overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks” itself a step in the process?
- Aren’t understanding your needs and clearly defining your objectives vital preparatory steps as well?
- How do we determine the optimal sequence in which to execute all the small manageable tasks?
These are three aspects of planning.
Planning is not popular, which explains the all too common lack of direction and focus in social media work.
Lack of direction and focus impedes progress and can cause frustration.
Your Social Media Plan
Before you jump into social media, devise your social media marketing and PR plan. Here are 16 key areas that might factor into your social media plan:
- Understand your business and objectives.
- Think about your products and services, what makes each special and their respective market segments.
- Develop positioning strategies for each market or program.
- Compile a list of your online competitors for each market.
- Identify suitable social media, such as social networking sites and social bookmarking sites, for both your vertical and horizontal campaigns.
- Identify desirable directories and other sites that might link to your content.
- Research and evaluate the extent and quality of industry-specific online content.
- Devise strategies and techniques for developing and promoting your content.
- Define a policy for governing your employees’ interactions with the public through social media.
- Study the online methodology of competitors and identify their search engine keywords.
- Analyze and critique your existing web presence.
- Gauge your competitors’ online success based upon their standing in search engines, the number and quality of links to their site, and estimated traffic.
- Identify opportunities to outmaneuver your competitors.
- Use a process called keyword discovery to develop a potentially useful vocabulary that will attract targeted search engine traffic to your content through SEO.
- Analyze keywords to determine which ones ought to be emphasized, based on the frequency of search and the amount of competition for each keyword phrase.
- Create a lexicon as an output of your keyword research and as an aid to your content development.
Action is Everything
You need not be concerned about every one of these areas. Use your judgment, since these are more suggestions than requirements. Certainly, do not use the length of my list as an excuse not to take action.
Action is everything. However, action begins with planning.
What are your thoughts?
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Nov
15
Why WordPress? Plus List of My Top Dozen WordPress Plugins
Filed Under Best of 2009, Blogging, Web Marketing, WordPress | 21 Comments
What’s the big deal about WordPress?
In Website vs. Web Presence, I emphasize the role of social media in web marketing.
Darren Rouse, the author of 31 Days to Build a Better Blog, shares in a video his blog-centric approach to web marketing in which social media sites (which aren’t under our complete control) serve as outposts for our blogs and web sites (which we do control).
For further discussion about the control issue and the trade-offs, read How to Start a Blog Made Easy and Creating a Home for Your Blog.
Choosing WordPress for Blogs
WordPress is popular software for setting up and managing our own blogs and web sites which we are able to control.
Using popular software is like buying a popular car. It’s easy to locate parts and easy to locate mechanics. With WordPress it’s easy to customize using add-on modules and easy to locate technical help when we need it.
Bloggers who use WordPress appreciate the way its functionality can be expanded or customized using plugins, which are add-on software modules (that are easy to append from within a blog’s control panel and often about as easy to use).
Choosing Plugins for WordPress
The best way to choose plugins is through word of mouth recommendation. Most WordPress plugins are free. However, if we don’t choose the plugins that are correct for us, our blogs will not perform the way we wish.
I’m sharing my top dozen WordPress plugins. I use more than twelve, and I’ve tried many others. These are the twelve WordPress plugins which I find the most handy for social marketing:
- AddThis Social Bookmarking Widget - One of many widgets available which enables readers to easily share and bookmark blog content. There’s an option to register with AddThis and track the widget’s usage.
- Akismet - A must have! Without this SPAM filter, life can be quite unpleasant.
- All in One SEO Pack - Has had competition, but apparently, this plugin has proven to be reliable and well maintained. It provides control over meta tags and other aspects of SEO.
- Easy Icon - Helps set and determine the blog’s icon so the visitor can see the logo on browser title bar. Really is easy!
- Google XML Sitemaps - Another must have. Helps Google find all the blog’s content. Works quietly behind the scenes.
- Link to Me Textbox - Not a must have at all, but this plugin makes it easier for readers to link-in from their own blog and gives them a not too subtle hint. Cough. Cough.
- Nofollow Case by Case - This is the plugin which I referenced in The Blogger’s Guide to Links and Comments. I love it, but not everybody wants a dofollow blog.
- Really Simple Sitemap - Strongly recommended! Helps create a site map like mine that’s helpful for both readers and search engines.
- Simple Tags - Has many features. My favorite is the auto-complete feature.
- Tag Managing Thing - Offers basic tag management. I like the combination of this plugin and the previous plugin.
- Ultimate Google Analytics - In my opinion, the easiest way to incorporate Google Analytics in one’s blog.
- WordPress Mobile Edition - Creates an interface enabling mobile users to access the blog. Why not?
Your choice of plugins depends upon your needs and objectives.
Be Careful About User Registration
I have a suggestion that has nothing to do with plugins but is important to mention. Disable blog registrations! Do not let blog visitors set up accounts. Letting in strangers creates an unnecessary security risk.
Instead, set up a subscription system that enables readers to subscribe by RSS feed or email. I’ve found that FeedBurner and Aweber work very well together.
What Are Your Favorite WordPress Plugins?
It’s your turn to share some of your favorite WordPress plugins. You can share as many as you like, but please, explain what each does.
Do not list any plugins which have already been listed. However, if you’ve had a bad experience with a plugin that has been listed, feel free to explain.
I’m especially interested in hearing from other social marketers.
Here ya go. Comment away! 
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Oct
28
Website vs. Web Presence
Filed Under Networking and Marketing Strategy, Search Engines, Web Marketing | 15 Comments
Once upon a time, a business would put up a website with its contact information, and that was the beginning and end of its web presence.
Those days are long gone. Savvy marketers today are very aware that a multidimensional approach is essential if one hopes to build a strong and responsive web presence.
Social Media and Search Engine Optimization
Social media and SEO are two of the most important aspects of building a presence on the web.
I’m reminded of a conversation I had several months ago with Christopher Boyer, creator of the Hospital Online Marketing Education site on the Ning network.
Chris mentioned that he tells his Healthgrades clients that search engines are where research starts on the Internet, and that a researcher’s attention is captured by the websites and social media content displayed on the very first page of search engine results. He asks hospital marketers to think of Google.com as their home page and to focus on dominating search engine results for their respective niches.
Social Media and Relationships
Darren Rouse of Problogger.net fame shows in his video, How I Use Social Media to Promote My Blogs, the way he incorporates a large number of social media sites in his web promotion strategy.
Notice that Darren not only uses social media to drive traffic to his blogs; he uses it to build valuable relationships with people. Relationships and Internet buzz play key roles in today’s web marketing.
A Web Presence is Much More than Just a Website
The web presence paradigm has evolved. Search engine optimization, social media, relationships and reputation all contribute to the impact that we and our brands have on the web.
Your valuable comment below (and your subscription to this blog) will help us to build our relationship.
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Oct
14
Is Email Marketing Dead?
Filed Under Communication, List Building, News, Personal Development and Success, SPAM, Social Media and Social Networking Sites, Twitter, Web Marketing | 13 Comments
I read an excellent article this afternoon in the Wall Street Journal by Jessica E. Vascellaro about the declining role of e-mail in our day-to-day communication, as services like Twitter, Facebook and lots of other social networking sites continue to grow in popularity.
According to Ms. Vascellaro, we obviously still use email. However, email was better suited to the way we used the Internet in the past, when we’d go online intermittently to read our messages.
“Now we are always connected, whether we are sitting at a desk or on a mobile phone. The always-on connection, in turn, has created a host of new ways to communicate that are much faster than email, and more fun.”
If more of our attention is being directed toward social media and away from email, is there a future for email marketing?
The success of email marketing depends on our ability to efficiently reach our target markets via their email inboxes. As people increasingly turn to social media, and internet service providers apply more aggressive spam filtering, email marketing becomes less viable.
Just last night, a friend messaged me on Facebook saying that she was “shifting over from an e-newsletter to blogging,” and that she was looking for a little advice.
Email marketers want to know how to react to the trend toward social media and social marketing.
Advice for Email Marketers
Here are seven tips for coping with the decline in email communication:
- Act Now - Don’t sit on the sidelines like your old media friends. There are still plenty of newspaper publishers scratching their heads wondering what they’re going to do about their failing businesses.
- Diversify - Adopt a variety of new social marketing channels, but do not discontinue your email marketing campaigns. Build on your past successes.
- Stay Cool - Don’t overreact. Email communication isn’t going away any time soon. Gradually make adjustments and find the allocation of resources that delivers you the best ROI.
- Learn Social Media - There are many social marketing resources and a fairly steep social media learning curve. Either make social media training a priority for yourself and stick with it or find someone to whom you can delegate or outsource all or part of it.
- Learn SEO - Learn search engine optimization as well, or again, delegate or outsource it.
- Keep Testing - Just as you’d test different lists or advertising copy, test different social media venues and content to determine what works for you, and what doesn’t. Be flexible.
- Get Help - Even if you do decide to educate yourself, look to social media and web marketing experts for help along the way. Their guidance will save you much time and money in the long run.
I still use my email autoresponder to communicate with many of my blog subscribers. However, email accounts for only 2% of my total blog traffic. Google, Entrecard and Twitter combined account for about 80%, and all other sources add to the remaining 18%.
I will have more to say on email marketing and on list building in future articles. I suggest meanwhile that you read List Building Paradigm Shift which I wrote at the beginning of the year.
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Oct
12
Social Marketing Momentum
Filed Under Networking and Marketing Strategy, Outside the Box, Web Marketing | 14 Comments
In Social Marketing Leverage, I stated that the Internet gives us the ability to transfer information with relative ease and enables a great variety of online tools to provide us with a virtual type of leverage.
In this article, I discuss another physical phenomenon, that of momentum, as it applies to the non-physical social marketing process.
Momentum is the impetus of an object or a process, its tendency to remain in motion. If you’ve ever skated or cross-country skied, you’ve enjoyed momentum or gliding. 
When riding in a car or bus that stopped short, you were thwarted by momentum as the vehicle stopped, but you kept going.
Most of the time, we don’t want to lose momentum. We’ve worked up some speed, or we’re highly productive — and we want it to continue.
Losing Physical Momentum
In the physical world, these factors can cause us to lose our momentum:
- Collision - Its outcome is generally hard to predict and is often catastrophic.
- Friction - Air, water and even our own brakes slow us down or stop us completely.
- Turning - To avoid collision, negotiate speed bumps or alter our final destination, we must brake partially or completely to change our direction.
Losing Social Media Momentum
In our non-physical social marketing work, the same factors contribute to our loss of momentum and productivity:
- Collision - Hitting the proverbial brick wall. A major plan is flawed, we accidentally delete all of our Twitter followers, or our Facebook account is phished. My advice in Social Marketing Leverage to “develop good contingency plans for when Murphy’s Law does strike” applies here and to all aspects of our lives.
- Friction - Indecision, multitasking, working at home while the kids are seeking attention, working at the office while a co-worker in the next cubicle is blabbing, slow social networking sites, associates who don’t keep their word, etc. These all tend to slow us down.
- Turning - This is huge. Abandoning a blog, changing our branding strategy midstream and other false starts lead to directional changes that slow us down and cost both time and money.
Social Marketing Prescription
What is my prescription for preserving social marketing momentum?
Planning, focus and consistency.
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Sep
23
Social Marketing Leverage
Filed Under Networking and Marketing Strategy, Outside the Box, Web Marketing | 15 Comments
A lever gives us the ability or leverage to move heavy objects with relative ease. Metaphorically speaking, the same is true of any tool that can empower us to perform a function more effectively.
The Internet gives us the ability to transfer information with relative ease, and it is also enables a great variety of online tools to provide us with virtual leverage.
Web-Based Tools
Here are six web-based tools that we’ve come to rely upon to save us time or money or to help us be more effective:
- Internet-based mail - e-mail, autoresponders and PDF Files
- Live communication - VOIP phone, chat and webinars
- Digital media - websites, blogs and micro-blogging sites such as Twitter
- Social networking sites - Facebook, Ning, LinkedIn, etc.
- Content sharing sites - YouTube, Flickr, StumbleUpon, Digg, Delicious, etc.
- Search engines - Google, Bing, etc.
I wouldn’t be surprised if you’ve had some experience with each of them, and this is a very partial list.
What Can Go Wrong
I probably don’t have to tell you that things don’t always go right. Here are the three obstacles that can most easily sidetrack you:
- Using the wrong tool - Download a large file using dial-up Internet, and by the time it finishes downloading, you’ll forget why to wanted it in the first place. Use a shabby autoresponder, and most of your e-mails will end up in recipients’ spam folders.
- Using the tool wrong - Social media tools and search engines have steep learning curves, and learning how to use them properly is typically a big undertaking. Misunderstand or misuse social media or SEO techniques, and your work can be set back by months.
- The tool breaks - Your Internet connection goes down for a week, your Facebook gets phished, or your blog gets corrupted. You’ll be pulling out your hair, unless of course you’re fortunate enough to be bald.
Many marketers contact me for help because they’ve been using the wrong tool or using the tool wrong.
An Ounce of Prevention
So — choose the right tools, learn to use your tools properly, and develop good contingency plans for when Murphy’s Law does strike — because it most certainly will, and at the worst possible moment.
What do you think?
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Sep
9
Doesn’t My Website Deserve to Get Traffic?
Filed Under Best of 2009, Networking and Marketing Strategy, Search Engines, Web Marketing | 24 Comments
We discussed in Why Doesn’t My Website Generate Sales? four different aspects of poor website performance: too little website traffic, the wrong website traffic, insufficient stickiness and poor conversion.
Today we shall examine the all too common problem of too little website traffic and answer three important questions:
- Doesn’t my website deserve to get traffic?
- Why doesn’t my website get traffic?
- How can I create traffic to my website?
Doesn’t My Website Deserve to Get Traffic?
If your website offers useful information or creates value for visitors in some way, it deserves traffic.
It’s really that simple.
Why Doesn’t My Website Get Traffic?
Deserving traffic is one thing, and getting it is another. I believe that most websites deserve traffic. They were put on the web to present information or create value for visitors in some other fashion. Nevertheless, most websites sit and collect dust to the disappointment of their owners.
Here are a few reasons for the lack of traffic to deserving websites:
- Lacking web marketing savvy - Most website owners do not know how to market their sites and generate traffic to them. This is alright as long this shortcoming is adequately compensated for which is usually not the case.
- Assuming that web developers know marketing - Many website owners hold the mistaken belief that web developers will optimize their sites to attract traffic from the search engines. When the site is finished, there is often a keyword expression such as the company’s name that shows up on the first page of the search engines, but that keyword expression is trivial and doesn’t bring much traffic if any. This mistake is pretty common and very sad. It’s a major cause of the following problem.
- Negativity - Too many website owners don’t appreciate the great marketing potential of the web or don’t believe that the web’s suitable for their business. This is a good example of a self-fulfilling prophecy.
How Can I Create Traffic to My Website?
Here are four ways to generate traffic to your website:
- Buy advertising - Your best options are print, radio and Internet. You may need a copywriter to develop an effective ad for the media you choose. Before you spend much on advertising, satisfy yourself with an experiment that your ad works and that your site can convert visitors into buyers. If you don’t take this precaution, you may end up throwing away money on advertising that doesn’t produce results.
- Connect with your target audience on the web- Online social networking is a path to free website traffic. Building your audience and your brand online is the main focus of this blog. Find the time to explore my site map and read a whole bunch of my articles. Use comments to ask questions. Social networking sites can be very useful, or they can be a very big waste of time. Knowing how to use networking sites effectively makes all the difference.
- Learn search engine optimization - You can read some books and optimize your site by yourself, just as I have done. There is an SEO learning curve, but in my opinion, it’s not as steep as the social media learning curve. Good website content and good SEO can attract thousands of free search engine visitors to your site.
- Get marketing help - find a web marketing consultant to guide you or do everything for you. That person could be me, or it could be somebody else who’s knowledgeable.
This is your website traffic road map. It’s up to you to choose the route and destination that are best for you.
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Aug
9
7 Tips for Winning the Social Media Marathon
Filed Under Best of 2009, Blogging, Networking and Marketing Strategy, Personal Development and Success, Social Media and Social Networking Sites, Web Marketing | 21 Comments
Building a social media presence is much more a marathon than a sprint. There’s plenty of content to develop, place and promote, and there are lots of relationships to build.
Running a marathon requires physical endurance and much more mental endurance than most people think.
I ran two marathons, so I speak from personal experience. I’m crossing the 1985 NYC Marathon finish line in the picture below. Months or years of difficult and sometimes painful training lead up to the day of the big race.
The social media marathon requires commitment, persistence and lots of patience, the type of mental endurance needed to complete a 26.2 mile race.
When I wrote Social Media One Bite at a Time back in March, I emphasized the importance of motivation and focus.
In the present article, I’m suggesting that you adopt the mindset of a marathoner. Commit to do whatever is necessary to succeed, and pace yourself, so that you don’t injure yourself or get burned out during the process. This principle is behind most great achievements.
I love the way my running coach Bob Glover puts it, “Start off slow and taper down.” Bob’s mantra counters our natural tendency to come “out of the gate” at full speed and keep running — our human egos at work.
How does all this translate into long-term social media success?
Marathoner Mindset
Here are seven ideas to help you develop the mindset of a marathoner:
- Make a serious commitment to do whatever is required to attain your social media or web marketing goals. This is an absolute prerequisite.
- Find your “Bob Glover.” I had more than one coach on my way to becoming a chess champion and teachers to help me learn cello and Talmud. I have mentors now and plan to have more mentors in the future. Get yourself a mentor. As I now like to say, “The ultimate shortcut is doing it right the first time.”
- Don’t wait until the conditions are perfect for launching your campaign. I’ll always remember what I heard Mike Litman say, “You don’t have to get it right. You just have to get it going”.
- Join one business networking site at a time and take the time to master it. Social networking sites can be intimidating at first. Learn a new feature, practice it, and go on to the next.
- Start out blogging once a week. It’s hard to begin, especially if, like me, you’re not a professional writer. You can increase your posting frequency later.
- Realize that there’s a steep social media learning curve. Do not quit. So many people join Twitter or Facebook or begin blogging and quit shortly thereafter. They expected to sprint a 100-yard* dash, not to run a marathon.
- Don’t forget about the “social” in social media. Get to know a lot of people and have a blast!
I invite you to share your ideas below.
*A unit of length equal to 0.9144 meters, something that even our British friends across the pond can find quaint.
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Jul
12
8 Great Choices for SPAM Free Promotion
Filed Under Best of 2009, Blogging, List Building, Networking and Marketing Strategy, SPAM, Search Engines, Social Media and Social Networking Sites, Web Marketing | 13 Comments
I’ve written about the problem of spam both offline and online at social networking sites in How Do You Like Your SPAM? and Why Do People SPAM?
With this article, I’m delivering on the promise I made last week to discuss marketing channels you can use to promote yourself or your business — without ever resorting to spam.
Legitimate promotion alternatives fall primarily into these basic categories:
- Advertising - Expect to pay — unless you prefer getting marginal results, running around town, lurking in parking lots and posing for security cameras, all while schlepping around stacks of flyers and carefully avoiding people you know. Online, free advertising attracts people without money and spammers, although you may get good results with Craigslist. Offline advertising includes newspapers, magazines, direct mail, radio, television, offline directory listings and billboards. Online advertising includes Pay Per Click, e-zines and online directory listings. I do not recommend using banner ads. Advertising ROI will depend on the net lifetime value of each acquisition or conversion and the cost of each acquisition.
- Press Releases - If your business is newsworthy, or if you can create a newsworthy event, then you may be able to get some free exposure. Your press release needs to be well written in a suitable format and distributed either offline, online or both.
- Speaking and Contributing Articles - It is an accepted practice to establish your reputation and generate leads by speaking at meetings or contributing articles to journals. Don’t expect to get paid anything until you become a recognized expert in your field.
- Strategic Alliances and Joint Ventures - A business or list owner promotes your offer to his or her clients or e-mail list based on an agreement through which you both stand to gain. It’s not uncommon to give a joint venture partner all the profit from an initial product offering in exchange for helping you to add new contacts to your list.
- E-Mailing Your List - You can send relevant commercial messages to subscribers who previously opted into your database. Try to avoid using purchased lists. If you must, be sure you know with certainty that the subscribers agreed to receive offers from third parties. Be genuinely helpful and careful not to abuse your list.
- Search Engine Optimization - You’ll need a web site, and unless you’re an SEO maven, you’ll have to pay for SEO services. There’s more to doing effective search engine optimization than most people realize. However, SEO will be worth the trouble if it gets you ranked high up in the free organic search engine results that most searchers look at and care about.
- Social Media - Social marketing is similar in philosophy to speaking and article contribution mentioned above. You share online videos and articles to educate, inform and entertain people, and to build a relationship with them. If they want your product or service, they’ll be inclined to buy it from you, since they know you, and you’ve earned their respect. Your blog on a social networking site, a blogging community such as Blogger.com, or you own hosting, are good places to share your content. For ideal results, create and post new original content on a regular basis. If your content is geared toward your target market, then you’ll attract qualified customers to you and your site.
- Business and Social Networking - Networking is meeting new people and developing relationships with them. You can network at your local Small Business Association, Chamber of Commerce or BNI. I can go to Network Plus, a group in my area founded by Ted Fattoross. Online social networking is more convenient. You network from your computer at any of thousands of social networking sites. My favorites are Ning and Facebook. You build relationships by asking questions and getting to know people. Keep in mind that spamming doesn’t work at all, and exchanging business cards is no more than a cordial first step in starting a relationship.
I like the web marketing channels: my e-mail list, search engine optimization, social marketing and business networking. I coordinate them to benefit from the synergies between them.
Now it’s your turn.
Which methods do you use? Which ones are you hoping to use in the future? What challenges do you foresee?
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Jun
21
Social Media vs. Search Engine Optimization
Filed Under Best of 2009, Networking and Marketing Strategy, Search Engines, Social Media and Social Networking Sites, Web Marketing | 21 Comments
Social media sites are rapidly altering the web marketing landscape. Now you can use social media to drive targeted traffic to your websites.
You may be trying to determine whether social media is a viable alternative to search engine optimization.
After all, search engine optimization requires extensive keyword research and ongoing content development to achieve top search engine rankings. Is it possible that social media sites might provide a more expedient web marketing solution?
I’ve found in my experience that social networking sites and other social media can generate a modest level of response much more quickly than search engine optimization initiatives. So why not focus exclusively on social marketing?
Social Media AND Search Engine Optimization
Please read The Long Tail and Social Media, and you’ll start to appreciate the extent to which search engine optimization can enhance social media.
Not only does search engine optimization help you promote your website, it also helps you promote your social media content. Your website and your social media together constitute your web presence, and search engine optimization helps you to market your overall web presence.
Interestingly, the converse is also true.
Social media helps your search engine optimization efforts. It adds to the links back to your website generating both referral traffic and credibility with the various search engines.
They key is to coordinate your social media and search engine optimization, creating the maximum synergy between the two through an integrated approach.
The New Online Marketing Professional
It’s no longer enough for online marketing pros to be fluent in search engine optimization technique. They must also fully understand social media sites and their role in building both your online presence and the desired backlinks to your website.
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Jun
11
Why Doesn’t My Website Generate Sales?
Filed Under Best of 2009, Networking and Marketing Strategy, Search Engines, Web Marketing | 10 Comments
Could it be that your website looks nice but fails to help you meet your web marketing objectives? Too often that is the case.
Lots of effort and expense went into building your site, but your return on investment is marginal or non-existent.
Here are possible reasons why your website isn’t generating leads or sales and some ideas that might help you correct the problems.
Too Little Website Traffic
Perhaps you lack an effective strategy for driving visitors to your site.
You set up your storefront but didn’t tell potential customers that you were in business, a mistake I often see both online and off.
Lack of traffic leads to lack of exposure for you and your offer or message.
Don’t assume that traffic will somehow find its way to you through word-of-mouth, search engines or otherwise. It rarely happens that way.
Generate exposure for your website offline via print advertising, direct mail, radio, etc. and online using social media, search engine marketing, search engine optimization and so forth.
Think big. You can dominate your niche, so don’t settle for less.
The Wrong Website Traffic
You have traffic, but either your traffic is not targeted or it’s poorly targeted, the result of using bad copy, selecting the wrong media, or choosing the wrong keywords.
For greater and more targeted traffic, employ a good mix of research, analysis and experimentation.
Direct marketers have been using this approach offline since before you and I were born, and it works like a charm online as well.
Insufficient Stickiness
You have plenty of visitors, but they leave your website too soon.
Consider these questions:
- Are you targeting the right traffic?
- Are your branding and message clear?
- Are your pages too cluttered, or do you give your visitor too many choices?
- Is your font hard to read? Try to avoid white on black in all your media, since it slows down your reader.
- Is important content “above the fold?” Can visitors see your most important content without scrolling down?
- Is your content up-to-date, relevant and interesting?
- Do you use social techniques on your website to engage your visitors?
Poor Conversion
You have plenty of visitors who stick around but nothing happens.
Here are more questions to ponder:
- Do you have a conversion strategy?
- Does each of your pages have a call to action?
- If not ready to buy, can your visitor join, opt-in to or subscribe to your site?
If you don’t have a lead capture mechanism and follow-up strategy, you’re leaving lots of money on the table.
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May
31
Where Does Your Twitter Lead People?
Filed Under Networking and Marketing Strategy, Social Media and Social Networking Sites, Twitter, Web Marketing | 10 Comments
You may have tried without success to use Twitter as a marketing channel. Many marketers struggle with Twitter for one reason or another. It’s often because of where their Twitter leads.
Let me explain.
Spamming
Spammers often follow myriads of random people on Twitter hoping that enough of them will follow back like sheep, or that they’ll click through the spammer’s profile link to view his or her offer.
However, too many marketers with good intentions adopt a similar strategy. They follow large numbers of targeted people but expect them to follow back without providing ample reason for them to reciprocate.
Getting and Staying Followed
People often ask me how I was able to get tens of thousands of followers. They’re hoping that I can point them to some magical system that will generate as many followers for them as I have.
I don’t use those types of systems nor do I recommend that you use them either. At best they match you up with large numbers of unresponsive followers.
Part of any outreach strategy includes following the people whom you would like following you. Life would be simple if each person you chose to follow reciprocated and followed you back.
While some Twitter users will follow back everybody, most of the ones who are desirable to connect with will be selective. They will follow you back only if they like what you’ve been tweeting or if they like you.
Unless your name is Oprah Winfrey, people will probably size you up based on some combination of your …
- Username - Avoid the use of underscores (_) and numerals (0-9) if at all possible.
- Name - Your real name is usually best.
- Picture - Use a professional looking head shot or company logo.
- Background - Use a layout that’s interesting and tasteful.
- Location - Nothing dorky please!
- One Line Bio - Mix professional and personal details. People search on profiles, so use carefully selected keywords.
- More Info URL - Point to content that’s helpful and makes a good impression.
- Privacy Settings - Don’t make your profile private if you want people to follow you. Marketers aren’t supposed to be secret agents.
- Follower Count - It pretty much is what it is.
- Follower Ratio - If you follow many more than follow you, you might look like a spammer. If you follow too few, you look unapproachable or like you don’t value two-way communication.
- Tweet Count - All other things being equal, the more the better but again, it is what it is. Just make sure you post a half dozen representative tweets before you start following people. Fewer than that can be a big turnoff.
- Tweets - You are what you tweet. What you tweet will be the single biggest success factor in your Twitter career. Refer to Tons of Great Twitter Resources or The Twitter Power System Review.
- Retweets - Some Twitter users like to connect with people who are somewhat likely retweet their tweets.
- Tweet Frequency - Some don’t like to follow people who tweet too often, as it tends to fill up their “timeline”.
- Date of Last Tweet - If you stay away too long, your followers will start giving you the axe.
- Personal Recommendations - It certainly helps to have fans to promote you, especially on what’s come to be known as #followfriday or #ff, which is actually every Friday.
With such a long list of criteria, it’s a wonder anybody gets followed or followed back. Fortunately people are looking for reasons to follow as much as to reject, and a reasonable effort on your part can be effective enough.
Web Marketing Strategy
As a marketer, the quality of your content off Twitter is as important as the quality of your tweets on Twitter.
You will use your “more info URL” and a portion of your tweets to reference your content, and your content will determine your marketing success with Twitter — and other social media initiatives as well.
It is this to which I refer when I ask, “Where does your Twitter lead people?”
Your Twitter, social networking sites such as Facebook and LinkedIn, blog and website all link together to create a web marketing strategy that builds your image, your community and ultimately your business.
Well written, produced, and placed content and skillful search engine optimization and social media marketing both on and off Twitter will enable you to achieve your key objectives.
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