Archives : Social Media
What You Need to Know About the New Facebook Timeline Layout
Facebook’s newest profile update was unveiled in September of 2011, but not everyone got to see it right away. A lot of people used a developer’s trick to enable the new profile, and since then, people have been installing it on their own. Facebook has been offering it as a choice up to this point—they haven’t forced it on any users.
That is, until now. Facebook is now urging every user get their newest update—the Facebook timeline. And if you don’t get it yourself, Facebook will do it for you.
While the ever-present naysayers bemoan this latest update, the timeline also has a lot of supporters. But people from both sides are wondering—what kind of privacy risk is this? Each of the 800 million Facebook users are going to be getting this update in the next few weeks, so what should shouldn’t we know a little more about it?
The Facebook Timeline + Style
The Facebook timeline is the most attractive of past updates, and it’s definitely an improvement over the last profile look. The timeline allows you to have a cover photo—a banner over your entire Facebook profile, as seen in the picture below.
The Facebook Timeline + Privacy
None of your privacy settings will change when you get the timeline—the only difference is that all of your past Facebook updates are going to be more accessible. It’s going to be easier for people to scroll through your Facebook profile and see updates and pictures from four or five years ago—as long as you’ve had a Facebook account.
If you think you might have content back a few years that could potentially embarrass you now, it might be a good idea to go back through and delete or hide posts that you’d rather your new friends not see.
The Facebook Timeline + Past
The Facebook Timeline is the timeline of your life—a life that started before you ever logged onto Facebook for the first time. But now, Facebook is asking you to bring that information into your Facebook profile, though the timeline. You can add major events from the time of your birth to now, complete with pictures!
There is no reason to resist the Facebook Timeline layout (and even if you did, you’d get it anyway), so if you’re ready to fill out past information, make it look more attractive and hide a few past status updates and pictures, you can head to facebook.com/timeline now, and get started!
[Businesses can't get timelines yet, but while you're on Facebook, be sure to check out the Smart Solutions page!]
Google+ Pages Now Offer Admin (or Manager) Rolls
When Google+ rolled out pages, people jumped on board and quickly realized a problem—no ability to add additional administrators? You could have a total of one owner, making it difficult for companies with several employees working on social media.
The new social network has finally remedied the issue—allowing one Google+ page to have multiple page administrators, which they call Managers. This feature is a lot like Facebook’s ability to “Manage Admins.”
Facebook vs. Google+ Admins
There is a very large difference between how the two social networks use administrators, and that is ownership. While Facebook pages allow any admin to delete a page, only an owner can do it on a Google+ page. For instance:
- On Facebook, if Person 1 created the page, but added Person 2 as an administrator, Person 2 has full control. He can delete the page, or even remove Person 1 as an administrator.
- On Google+, if Person 1 created the page, he has ownership. He can add Person 2 as manager, but Person 2 cannot delete the page or remove Person 1 as owner, because Person 1 has ownership.
You can debate Facebook and Google+ on other aspects of the two social networks, but Google+ comes out the ultimate winner in this battle. Some things to consider are these:
With Facebook, if a client with admin capability goes rogue, your Facebook account could quickly become compromised. They could delete every other administrator, and post whatever they want on your company’s Facebook.
Despite that disadvantage, though, selling companies with social media equity is easier thanks to that. You can easily hand over the Facebook account to someone else and remove yourself as an administrator.
On Google+, you have the best of both worlds. While you are safe from having an employee go rogue (you can quickly remove them as an administrator, and delete any posts they may have made), you can also hand over reigns very easily. In the admin for your Google+ page, you can transfer ownership quickly to any manager you have added.
Google really thought through their manager system before they launched it, and they did a seamleass job. It is smooth and easy and provides for a lot more than Facebook does. It’s just a step for Google+ in the fight with Facebook, but it could be an important one.
To keep up to date on other social media stories and updates, circle us on Google+! You can also like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter!
Putting Together a Social Media Plan
Recently we were asked if someone could promise 2500 unique visits to their business website a month—from social media alone. It’s a good question to ask—there’s no point in working on a social media plan unless it drives traffic to your site, and brings conversions. But when we replied asking about their numbers on current social media channels, we were told that they have 25 fans on Facebook, and have yet to set up a Twitter or Linkedin account.
Our answer? Yes. It is possible, but not right away. Social media is a gradual exercise, not something that can be completed once and forgotten about. When you’re starting from scratch, it will take some time to truly gain a following and get some results. You need to have a social media plan.
Why you need a social media plan
To stay on top of current trends
Social media platforms come and go. If you set up a MySpace account for your business and left social networking years ago, you’ve fallen behind. There are new platforms announced every year, and each one updates and changes from month to month. You need to be on top of the latest social media advances, and so does your business.
Your customers are there
One thing that every business owner knows is that you need to be where your customers are. Your customers are on Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare and StumbleUpon without you—so join them!
Your competitors are there
Many small and large businesses have come to see the importance of marketing on social media, and they’re out there talking to your customers, while you’re not. Don’t let them take control of your market!
But if you can’t…
Sometimes it just isn’t possible for you to keep up a social media plan. If you don’t have the time to check your social media outlets once a week, much less every day, get someone else to. Designate a person on your team, get your daughter to handle it or hire social media services—just don’t neglect it. Social media is only becoming more popular, don’t fall behind—get a social media plan in place!
Optimizing Your Linkedin Business Page
Earlier this week, we discussed how to optimize your personal Linkedin profile, and a few Linkedin networking tips to make your profile be more effective. Today, we’re talking about the Linkedin business page. This is the page that features your business, so it’s very important that it have all the information it needs.
It’s pretty easy to set up your Linkedin company page, as long as you have a company email address tied to your Linkedin personal profile. After you’ve made sure that your business isn’t already on Linkedin, simply visit the Add Your Company page, and enter your email address and business name! After clicking continue, you’ll be able to create the page and add your company’s information.
Once you’ve completed your company page, you’ll be able to edit information through the tabs lining the top. You’ll have “Overview,” “Careers,” “Services” or “Products,” and “Analytics.”
Overview
This is your main page. This is where you can find the synopsis of your company, employees, and contact information on the right side. You can also grab some “Follow us on Linkedin” code at the bottom of this page.
Careers
In the Careers tab, you can post job openings, to be seen by people browsing your company page. This would be a great way to get real professionals to apply for your job. However, this part of Linkedin does cost—$95 for a 30 day posting. You can see this information by clicking on the Careers page. If you don’t have any job postings, the tab will not show up. This goes for the other tabs, as well—if you haven’t posted anything, people will only see your Overview.
Products and Services
Place your services and products on the third tab—this is especially important if your company is specifically business-to-business. Other professionals who stumble upon your company profile might just need what you have to offer.
Analytics
This tab is only viewable to employees at your company. Here you can see how your company’s Linkedin performance compares to other businesses in the same industry. It’s important to note that you won’t have any statistics until after being on Linkedin for a couple months—views and visitors take a while to start appearing. There are several different graphs on this page, and you’ll want to get familiar with all of them.
Linkedin Status Updates
The newest feature for companies on Linkedin is the Linkedin status update. This tool was released two months ago, and isn’t being used as much as Linkedin would hope. It works just like a status update on Facebook, and can be a great way to drive traffic. Be sure to utilize this feature when creating your Linkedin business page.
Although Linkedin isn’t the most popular or the most used social network, it is still a very important part of professional networking. Use the Linkedin company pages to your advantage, and tell us how it works for your business! And while you’re on Linkedin—be sure to follow our company page!
Using Linkedin for Professional Networking
When marketing a business in social media, people tend to focus on two fronts: Facebook and Twitter. As a matter of fact, most people even skip the second and focus on the first. Facebook is a great marketing tool, of course, but it is certainly not the only one.
Linkedin tends to be tossed under the bus when it comes to social media. People aren’t as active on Linkedin as they are elsewhere, so the site is sometimes considered out of date. Unfortunately, this means that it is often neglected as a social media marketing tool. While it may not be the most popular social network, Linkedin has its own niche—professional networking.
Linkedin Social Networking
Linkedin was built for professionals, and if you fall into that category, you should be networking there. Although the layout may remind you of Facebook, the position it plays is completely different. Linkedin describes itself as “the world’s largest professional network on the internet.” With more than 100 million members, they’re absolutely right; this is the kind of network that you want to be a part of.
Your Profile on Linkedin
It’s easy and free to sign up for Linkedin, and worth the time that you’ll have to put into it. You can start out by filling in past employers, your current job, a picture, summary and your specialties. You can also add your business website and Twitter account!
But the most important part is connections. You can import your email contacts or search for friends and co-workers, but it’s very important that you grow your connection list as much as possible. If you have a large amount of connections, you’re considered an influencer—something you want to be seen as in professional networking.
You can create a personalized URL on Linkedin by going to your profile page and clicking ‘Edit’ next to your Public Profile link near the bottom. You can then change your public profile URL in the box on the right. Be sure to pick something memorable and lasting. Although you will be able to change it, you shouldn’t. You will lose people who have bookmarked your profile in the past, as well as search engine traffic.
Be open and be visible on Linkedin; share business-related posts, and be sure to interact with your connections. Make sure that your profile is connected to your business, and that you share a few links back to your website every so often.
Linkedin Business Marketing
We’ll be posting another blog on Linkedin this week—but focusing specifically on Linkedin company pages. Check back this Thursday to see!
If you want to see what a Linkedin company page looks like on Linkedin before our next blog publishes, follow our Linkedin page!
Google+ Business Pages – What You Need to Know
In early September, Google+ opened up to the general public, inviting an influx of millions of users—eager to try out the newest feature from Google. However, many users noticed a distinct problem with the site right off the bat—where were the Google+ business pages?
Two months later, the pages have finally opened to the public, and social media managers are flooding the site, adding their businesses and trying to figure out how to use Google+ to their advantage. At this point it is difficult for small business to gain a following, because even though the numbers are large, it is still nowhere near Facebook in terms of active users.
Despite the lower amount of users though, Google+ has a lot of advantages. First of all—it’s a Google product. Therefore, Google+ business pages are going to be integrated into Google’s search engine results pages very quickly. As a matter of fact, many of the larger Google+ business pages have already been indexed and are showing up on SERPs.
Using a Google+ Business Page
If you still haven’t set up your Google+ business page, here are your goals this week:
- Set one up! Remember to do it from a company account that someone else has access to, as well. www.google.com/+/business will give you all the directions you need.
- Put together your scrapbook photos. This is the most noticeable part of your Google+ business profile, so make sure it represents your business well—and looks nice!
- Promote, promote, promote!
The third is the most important goal—because of the few active users on Google+, your small business isn’t going to get added to a lot of circles for a while… unless you promote it. Put a Google+ logo on your blog or website, tweet about it and share it on your own Google+ profile.
After your Google+ business page is up and running, post often on subjects your circlers will want to hear about! Let your circlers know that you’re there and provide them with content that’s worth sharing. Remember to track your traffic to see how you’re doing!
And while you’re at it—add Smart Solutions to your circles! See you on Google+.
Timing Twitter | Scheduling Tweets Ahead of Time
If you are in charge of managing a business Twitter account, you know how time consuming the service can be. Professionals suggested that you tweet several times a day, but every time you log into Twitter, you end up spending time that could be better spent elsewhere.
Frankly, you don’t have the time to stare at Twitter all day. The minutes that you spend on the site are taking away from other important projects, and even though it’s beneficial—it isn’t necessary.
Scheduling Twitter updates is an important aspect of social media marketing. If you don’t have a grasp on how to do it—or a service to help you, you are losing valuable time. We’ve listed a few of the basics below, to help you get started with scheduling Twitter.
Finding a Twitter Scheduler
If you don’t have a Twitter scheduler in use already, than it’s time to start looking into the different options available. There are several great services, and we’ve listed a couple of our favorites here:
This is the tweet scheduling service that we use, because you can simply log in with your Twitter account, and you’re ready to schedule. You don’t have to remember another password! It’s as simple as it gets, though, so you won’t have any other feature but the scheduling.
This is probably the most popular system for scheduling Twitter updates. It comes with a lot of other features other than scheduling though, so if you’re looking just to schedule, this service might overwhelm you. You can also monitor your other social networks on Hootsuite—so it isn’t strictly Twitter.
TweetDeck has actually been acquired by Twitter. It’s a program that you can download right to your desktop, program tweets, look at mentions and messages, and monitor other social media platforms, as well.
This service is a lot like Twuffer, but you can also use it for Facebook. We don’t recommend using a scheduling service for Facebook, but it’s an option you have with this website. You can log in straight through your Twitter profile—no extra password to remember—but it’s not the service we chose, because it isn’t as pleasant to look at as Twuffer is. If you’re scheduling tweets as much as we do, you need a site that’s easy on the eyes.
Scheduling Twitter Updates | Putting Together a Twitter Schedule
Once you’re set up with a Twitter scheduler, you’re going to want to figure out a plan:
- How many times will you tweet a day?
- How many links, mentions and hashtags?
- What time of day will you schedule Twitter updates for?
- How often will you load tweets into your Twitter scheduler?
You can save a lot of time by scheduling twitter updates, and it’s something we suggest for all of our clients. However, sometimes it’s still too overwhelming to put together a Twitter schedule and keep your business Twitter account updated. If you want to save some time and stress, give us a call about our Twitter monitoring services.
Free Marketing For Businesses Through Foursquare
Social Media has advanced a lot during the past ten years, but never so much as when location-based reviews entered the scene—Yelp in 2004, and Foursquare more recently in 2009. In this blog post, we highlight Foursquare’s new platform that is revolutionizing the way businesses use location-based advertising.
On Foursquare, users suggest tips. Instead of offering a review of time spent at a location, something that Yelp provides, customers can offer 200 character tips about what new patrons should try out. It’s all about community on Foursquare, and that’s the draw of the website.
Because Foursquare is a location-based mobile platform, the most important thing that a business owner can do is get their clientele to “check-in” when they walk into the shop. This is free advertising for businesses, because “checking-in” often automatically posts to the consumers’ Facebook, Twitter and Foursquare pages.
Since the “check-in” is the ultimate goal for businesses, you need to offer your customers incentives: as a business owner, you know that patrons won’t stop by unless they have a reason. The new Foursquare platform gives them a reason. To better understand how it can, we offer this step-by-step guide for your business.
1. Sign Up
If you aren’t on Foursquare yet, you will need an account in order to continue.
2. Claim Your Venue
We’ll assume you already have a presence on Foursquare, because most businesses do without knowing it. Find your business on the site, and click “Claim Here” in the upper right hand corner. You will have to verify your business through a phone call.
3. Choose a “Special”
This is how you will get your check-ins. On the Foursquare homepage, in the bottom right hand corner, you’ll see a button that says “merchants.” The second tab is where you can select a “special” to pull in your customers. Passersby will notice the “special” that you’re offering, and stop in to see.
Next, think about your marketing strategy. If you’re going for new customers, you’ll definitely want to use the Newbie Special. Want to keep them coming back? The Check-in Special would be a good choice. The Mayor Special is a fun one, because it not only rewards your most loyal customers, but it creates competition for your other customers to try to gain Mayor status! Be sure to read through all the specials available to pick the perfect one.
4. Tell Your Employees
Make sure that your employees know about the new specials as you add them. You have the option of placing a code into the special, which will let your employees track it correctly.
5. Promote!
Let people know about your new Foursquare specials! Customers will see them if they’re near your shop, but what if they’re at home, browsing Facebook? Let your loyal patrons know that you’ve got something special for Foursquare users through your Facebook, Twitter and any other online marketing vehicle you use.
Another suggestion is to market your Foursquare presence inside your shop. Foursquare sends business owners stickers to put on doors or cash registers, but you can also hang up a sign in your window or even reserve a special seat for the Mayor, as well! The possibilities on how to promote your business within the Foursquare community are endless.
Don’t miss this new opportunity for free online marketing and increased sales—claim your business on Foursquare today!
Five Top Social Media Campaigns to Learn From
1. Gap
The Campaign: Gap teamed up with popular group-buying site, Groupon, to offer a nation-wide deal: $50 worth of apparel for just $25. By the end of the day, 441,000 groupons were sold bringing in a little more than $11 million.
What Worked: This was Groupon’s first nation-wide deal with a major brand. For Gap, the deal brought in a ton of cash and, hopefully, new customers.
What Flopped: Some people commented that the Groupon deal was a bust because Gap doesn’t “need” more word of mouth. He saw it in terms of revenue loss rather than customer gain.
2. Toy Story 3
The Campaign: Pixar and Disney let out a barrage of videos, tie-ins, and ads to promote Toy Story 3. Aside from traditional banner ads and billboards, Disney created viral videos including fake, vintage-style ads featuring the new characters, an iAd featured on the IPhone 4, and a Facebook page complete with a built-in ticket-buying app.
What Worked: The video successfully played on the nostalgia of their entire demographic. Kids could appreciate the fake toy commercials while their parents could reminisce about their own childhood toys; a sentiment entirely in line with the Toy Story brand. The Facebook app was connected to news streams such that you could share when you bought tickets to the movie.
What Flopped: The social media campaign was pretty solid on most counts. The danger of associating with major brands (like the iAd) is that your product can appear too polished or too corporate. It all comes down to knowing your product and knowing your brand. In this case, Disney-Pixar hit a home run.
3. AOL
The Campaign: AOL set out to hire an ambassador for its social aggregation site Lifestream. More than just a mascot, the ambassador position was known as “the best job ever” with bonuses like a cushy apartment and VIP access to concerts and events across the country. The hiring process was a mix of traditional “resume and interview” applications and an extensive social media voting process headed up by the hopeful employees. The eventual ambassador was asked to reach out to their fans with regular updates.
What Worked: AOL is trying to reboot as a “cool” brand. Rather than spend a fortune on commercials with hip people using the product, AOL offered a service that its desired demographic would actually want; namely, a sweet job. Having the position decided by fan vote helped organically spread the word and create a supportive community that was invested in their product.
What Flopped: One let down was the inevitable decrease in hype. The buzz around AOL’s new dream job died down once the spot was filled. No amount of celebrity spottings or updates from the winning ambassador could compete with the initial creativity of the campaign. Planned follow-up campaigns are also suffering from this.
4. Starbucks
The Campaign: Starbucks has been busy with a bunch of successful social media campaigns across a range of networks. The coffee giant offered mayorship deals on foursquare, free goodies for Tax Day via Twitter’s then-new promoted Tweets, and a free pastry day promoted through Twitter and Facebook.
What Worked: If you’re going to offer discounts, make sure they’re on products you want to feature. Rather than setting up blanket deals, Starbucks focused on areas where they wanted to improve sales. Free pastry day got publicity for their non-coffee offerings, the mayor deals often provide discounts on new products, tax day’s free coffee promoted recycling — part of the brand’s greener image. Jumping on Twitter’s promoted tweets early also garnered Starbucks a lot of publicity in the tech and social media worlds — a demographic that generally has money to spend on premium coffee. Essentially, if a news organization wanted to cover promoted tweets as they launched, Starbucks was a major go-to example.
What Flopped: Starbucks is good at promoting things — its social media campaigns seem less concerned, however, with building a vibrant community. Starbucks already has near-religious levels of customer loyalty, so this may be a smart resource allocation rather than oversight.
5. Mountain Dew
The Campaign: When Mountain Dew wanted to create a new flavor, they did it the social media way. DEWmocracy was a multi-part, long-term project aimed at creating a new soda flavor through fan voting. The campaign started by narrowing down a series of fan-made flavors with home-tasting packs. The three were chosen through a country-wide tour complete with voting and video booths. Mountain Dew then created “Flavor Nations” composed of fans, experts, and professional ad agencies. Each flavor nation was responsible for the packaging, graphics, and social marketing of their flavor including viral videos, promotion on Twitter, and professional commercials. The winner was chosen by mass vote.
What Worked: Like AOL, Mountain Dew gained a ton of exposure and loyalty by mobilizing its customers to help grow the brand. The largely grassroots movement built natural buzz around the new flavors with a huge net of social media exposure. Mountain Dew was also able to keep the projects on-brand. Despite having disparate communities working on the flavor nations, the ad agencies and experts helped guide the discussion and create a polished finished product while allowing fans to have a real say on the company’s marketing direction.
What Flopped: The nature of the campaign means that two of the flavors won’t get made. Assuming the voting was close; this means Mountain Dew could alienate a relatively large portion of its fans who worked on the losing, discontinued flavors. This also assumes that Mountain Dew’s fans took the campaign to heart and would be more frustrated at losing the competition rather than excited to be shaping their brand’s future.
How Yelp Can Help Your Business Grow
Yelp’s purpose is “to connect people with great local businesses.” It was founded in 2004 and as of August 2010, had over 12 million reviews on their site. Around 38 million people visit Yelp in any given 30 days.
Yelp is basically a business review site, a search engine for local businesses and a social network combined into one. Yelp users can rate, provide pictures, write reviews and update information on local businesses.
So that’s the user side of it, what about the business? How would a business profit from using Yelp?
The answer is simple: find out what people think about you. Whether your business is a coffee shop, a hair salon, a fine dining establishment or a dog groomers, Yelp allows users to rate your business and write reviews about what they thought about their experience.
But what can you do to promote your business through Yelp?
Another thing that people do on Yelp is search for services they require, based on customer reviews. They might see your company on Yelp, but they won’t necessarily want to go there unless they see good ratings and reviews.
We suggest getting reviews in the easiest way possible: asking for them. Now, we certainly don’t mean bribing (“Give us a good review on Yelp and we’ll give you a free coffee next time you stop in!”), but rather by shooting out an email to past customers, asking them to tell you what they think… on Yelp.
Every time you go to write a review on Yelp, they’ll tell you the same thing: “Please don’t review this business if you received a freebie for writing this review, or if you’re connected in any way to the owner or employees.” And they mean it. Their tagline says it all: “Real people. Real reviews.”
Don’t give (or give bribes for) fake reviews, no matter how much you need them! A past customer is fine to ask reviews from, but don’t ask your family or employees to review your business.
Here’s what you need to do to get started on Yelp:
- If you don’t have an account, start one. Review other businesses, establish a following, find people you know and befriend people like you.
- Claim your business. Head over to https://biz.yelp.com/signup/ and see if your business is already on Yelp. If it is, great! If it isn’t, you’ve got a clean slate to start with.
- Get all the information you can onto Yelp. Don’t be too wordy, but make sure you include all that your business encompasses.
- Shoot out that email! Tell your past customers that you’re now on Yelp and that you’d love to hear what they thought of you!
So that’s Yelp in summary, but the site certainly has a lot more to it than what we’ve mentioned here, so we suggest taking some time to get to know the site and what it’s all about!
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