Leading Edge Internet Marketing
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Social Media Playbook
Sep 10th
Last month, Joe Chernov, the director of content for marketing automation company Eloqua, contacted me with some material to share with you. And while I don’t always accept unsolicited material for this site, the content was just that good. Not to mention that Eloqua actually challenged us to steal it.
What they shared were two things: the Content Grid, which they created with the design firm JESS3. The Content Grid is a content marketing framework that plots type and channel across two dimensions: who should create it (a single owner or the entire staff) and how it should be distributed for maximum impact on the sales funnel. And here it is:
In addition to the graphic, there was also a document included. Let me just say that if I had this available to me some four years ago when I started this site, I would have been much smarter much more quickly. Eloqua’s Social Media Playbook is filled with exactly the kind of material that will bring you and your employees up to speed on social media. As Eloqua describes it:
The 10-platform, 42-page Eloqua Social Media Playbook was created as a veritable “how-to” guide for our staff to follow on the social Web. It’s frankly everything we know about social media, distilled into one awesomely designed document. Now you can have it. For free.
You’ll find uses and best practices for using blogs, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Flickr, Wikipedia, Delicious, Google Buzz, Foursquare and Gowalla for marketing purposes.
Steal it. Download it. Share it with everyone you know. Use it as a best practices document for your team. Because this is the single best playbook of its sort I’ve seen yet. Well done, Eloqua.
Free internet Marketing Techniques – 4 Most Essential Things to Know
Sep 4th
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Free οf charge Interpersonal Resource Net Advertising Tactics – 4 Mοѕt Critical Things tο Know:
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Why market on Facebook?
Sep 3rd
#1 social network in the world
~500 million active users (logged on during past 30 days)
Half logon daily
Average session time = 55 minutes
Global reach: 70% = outside United States
68% of US Facebook users “more likely to buy on a positive Facebook
friend referral” [eMarketer | Morpace]
This year Gen-Y will outnumber Babyboomers. 96% use social networks.
Social Media has overtaken porn as the #1 activity on the web
If Facebook were a country it would be the 3rd largest in the world.
Fastest growing segment on FB is 55 to 65 year old females
Proof That Facebook Means Business
Sep 3rd
Yes, you’ve heard about Facebook. But did you know Facebook is the second most trafficked website in the world, just behind Google (according to Alexa)?
Facebook has fully permeated popular culture across the planet. But this is not some flash-in-the-pan phenomenon—and it’s not just for kids.

Consider these interesting factoids:
* Nearly half of Facebook users over age 35: A significant 48% of
Facebook users are over age 35 (iStrategyLabs), putting to rest the
idea that Facebook is just for college kids.
* Facebook marketing on the rise: More than 75% of marketers plan
on increasing their use of Facebook in 2010, according to the 2010
Social Media Marketing Industry Report. There are more than 3 million
active Facebook business pages.
* Mass consumer adoption of Facebook: 141 million unique U.S.
visitors trafficked Facebook in June 2010, up 11 million from the
prior month and nearly double from a year ago (ComScore). With more
than 500 million users, Facebook reports that more than half use the
site daily.
* Facebook users spend more money: People who spend the most time
on Facebook also spend the most money online, according to ComScore.
* Small businesses are dominant players: Small businesses are
cashing in quickly on social media and Facebook. Surprisingly, half of
small businesses using social media say lead generation is its top
benefit (Small Business Marketing Forecast 2010).
via http://tomretterbush.posterous.com/facebook-online-success-summit-2010
Facebook Research: Brands Lean on Interactive Marketing –Yet Lack Social Marketing Skills
Aug 19th
Facebook Research: Brands Lean on Interactive Marketing –Yet Lack Social Marketing Skills
This is followup data from the Altimeter Report: The 8 Success Criteria For Facebook Page Marketing, you should read this first.
Thanks to your help, Altimeter Group’s latest research on Facebook Marketing Best Practices, which now has over 17,000 views, and over 1,900 downloads (see slideshare stats) in less than a week. While we tried to include as much helpful information in the report, it was only the highlights of our findings. There’s far more data, scorecards, and findings that just aren’t able to fit into the report. Below is some additional information from our quantitative and qualitative study about the findings. Expect us to share more helpful data to marketers over the coming weeks, Altimeter clients can contact us for more details from the specific criteria, data, screenshots and scorecard.
[A fundamental mindset change must occur as brands approach social networks. In addition to interactive marketing (human-to-computer) brands must add social marketing (peer-to-peer) to their playbook.]
In the below graphic, we’ve aggregated the scores of the 30 brands to find out which of the criteria they’re good at –and which ones there are missed opportunities. We’ve then provided additional analysis on why we think brands scored this way, and some recommendations to improve. Research Graphic: Brands Great at Messaging and Branding –Yet Lack at Setting Expectations, Peer to Peer, and Advovacy
| Criteria | How They Scored | Our Take: Why Brands Performed This Way | How Brands Can Improve Their Score |
| Set Community Expectations | 2.08 (Immature or”Take off”) | Brands failed to be clear why they were doing a Facebook effort, likely due to the fact that they jumped into the the social network bandwagon. Most brands are experimenting, and are unable to articulate their purpose | Clearly have a business objective and be sure the site goals cascades these objectives. By not doing so, sets company up for a potential backlash as unchecked or unsolved customer woes can quickly cascade to their friends, on brands owns pages. |
| Provide Cohesive Branding | 3.90 (Adolescence or “Climbing”) | Brands showed some sophistication from over a decade of online interactive marketing has taught them how to cascade their experience to all touch points | This is a huge risk. Customer that have product complaints may echo them loudly here, and if the brand doesn’t respond, this public griping could escalate into a full blown groundswell. Continue to reflect the brand in all digital channels, but don’t overwhelm the member experience. |
| Be Up To Date | 5.00 (Exceptional or “Escape Velocity”) | Brands have a strong legacy of broadcast marketing, which is also know as message bombardment. Brands demonstrated an incredible ability to propagate messages at a rapid rate, not unusual for other mediums as well. | Continue this energy of being interactive with their customers, but in addition to populating the Facebook page with up to date updates, ensure they are engaging in a two-way dialog. |
| Live Authenticity | 2.87 (Immature or”Take off”) | Brands suffered at being ’social’ in a social network, and are in many cases afraid to show their human side. Decades of being logo centric has cascaded to social networks and most members may question having conversations with a logo. | Behave in the same way the members are behaving: be social. Put the human side first by showing the team photos, giving human replies, and responding with first and last name. |
| Participate in Dialog | 3.10 (Adolescence or “Climbing”) | Mixed bag of performance, while some brands may interact, often it was inconsistent. Even after a few years of social marketing blogging, forums, and Twitter, brands are still struggling to have real conversations with their members. | Interact with customers by engaging in a two way conversation. To scale, you don’t need to respond to every message, but set expectations on how frequently you’ll respond. |
| Enable Peer to Peer Interactions | 2.03 (Immature or”Take off”) | Poor performance from brands here. In many cases, we expect brands hid from these features as they are difficult to moderate, manage, and risk of conversations going awry. | Better features are needed by using third party community applications, as well as hiring seasoned, well trained community managers to monitor and moderate. |
| Foster Advocacy | 2.27 (Immature or”Take off”) | Brands are barely able to participate in the conversation let alone rely on the advanced features such as sharing or using your own members to share on your behalf. | At the bare minimum, encourage members to share content with each other and to cascade the branded experience to friends. As brands gain confidence, create formal advocacy programs. |
| Solicit a Call to Action | 2.45 (Immature or”Take off”) | Unsure of even interacting with their members, it’s no surprise they didn’t know how to engage them for next steps or even conversion. | Don’t rush this. Until you’re scoring 4 or above on the previous mentioned criteria, I encourage brands to avoid this. Yet, for those that are succeeding in the other criteria, they can help members with conversion. |
Summary: Brands Must Learn Social Marketing –Beyond Interactive Marketing
Brands are applying their years of experience of applying interactive marketing and broadcast marketing to the social web and it shows. With the natural inclination to brand and broadcast, we see these same behaviors in the Facebook Marketing. Yet, despite these existing strengths, brands are missing the two way aspect or ’social aspect’ of social network marketing. They must start to leverage peer to peer communications to reduce costs and content publication, show their human side, and quickly set expectations of what’s required –or risk a brand backlash. While setting community expectations doesn’t guarantee that a customer backlash could occur, it could help funnel them to the right place to be quickly supported. Yet, as problems are resolved, don’t shove them under the carpet in the call center, be sure to indicate back to the community they’ve been solved. Above all, brands must change their mindset from interactive marketing (human to computer) to also include social marketing (human to human).
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Social Networking has Feelings
Jul 15th
Why Your Business Can’t Go Without Social Media
Jul 14th
- Gary Vaynerchuk did a study and found:
- $15,000 in direct mail = 200 new customers
- $7,500 for a billboard = 300 new customers
- 0$ for Twitter = 1,800 New Customers!
- Wetpaint/Altimiter found companies that widely engage in Social Media surpass their peers in both revenue$ and profit$.
- Over the last quarter, sales for companies that used Social Media grew over 18% while those companies with no social media were at -6%
- The computer company Lenovo reported a 20% reduction in call center activity as customers go to a community website.
- Burger King made a Facebook application:
- Cost $50,000
- Estimated Return > $400,000 in press/media value
- Total = 32 Million free media impressions
- That’s like reaching the combined populations of 19 states.
- BlendTec quintuples sales with “Will You Blend It?” YouTube Videos!
- Dell has sold over 3,000,000 computers on Twitter alone.
- 25% of Ford’s marketing budget is spent on Digital/Social Media, they are the only automaker that didn’t take a government loan.
- 3 out of 4 Americans use social technology – Forrester Research, The Growth of Social Technology Adoption, 2008
- 2/3 of the global internet population visit social networks – Nielson, Global Faces and Networked Places, 2009
- Visiting social sites is now the fourth most popular online activity, ahead of personal email – Nielson, Global Faces and Networked Places, 2009
- Naked Pizza set a one day sales record using Social Media:
- 68% of sales from Twitter
- 85% of new customers from Twitter
- “Technology is shifting the power away from the editors, the publishers, the establishment, the media elite. Now it’s the people that are in control.” – Rupert Murdoch, Global Media Entrepreneur
- Intuit introduced “Live Community” into their products 2 years ago and their sales has increased over 30% each year.
- Ebay found participants in online communities spend 54% more $
- Customer support costs:
- $12 via contact center VS.
- .25¢ via self service
- Customer support costs:
- “Why are we trying to measure Social Media a like traditional channel anyway? Social Media touches every facet of business and is more an extension of good business ethics” Erik Qualman
- “You can buy attention anymore, having a huge budget doesn’t mean anything in Social Media…the old media paridigm was pay to play. Now you get back what you authentically put in. You’ve got to be will to Play to Play.” – Alex Bogusky, Co-Chairman, CP&B
- Sometimes I’m asked the ROI of Social Media, I answer “What’s the ROI of your cell phone?”
- There are on average about 100,000,000 YouTube video’s viewed per day
- The growth rate of Twitter users increased 1,382% from January to February 2009
- There is an average of 3,000,000 tweets per day on Twitter
- People spend a combined total of 5,000,000,000 minutes on Facebook each day
- People share around 1,000,000,000 pieces of content each week on Facebook
- 3 million online donors contributed $6,500,000 to Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign fund through his social networking sites
- If Facebook were a country, it would be the 3rd most populated in the world
- YouTube is now the 2nd most popular online search engine, behind Google
- Social media is not just another marketing channel. It is so much more: Public Relations, Customer Service, Loyalty Building, Collaboration, Networking, Thought Leadership and Customer Acquisition.
- Over 50% of the world is under 30 yrs old and 96% of them have joined a social network.
- Facebook tops Google for weekly traffic in the US.
- Social Media has overtaken pornography as the number 1 activity on the web.
- Years to reach 50 million viewers
- Radio 38 years
- TV 13 years
- Internet 4 years
- iPod 3 yrs
- Facebook addes 200 MILLION users in less than one year.
- iPod applications hits 1 billion in 9 months.
- “We don’t have a choice on whether we do social media, the question is how well do we do it?” Eric Qualman
- US Dept of Education study revealed that online students outperformed those receiving face-to-face instruction.
- 80% of companies us social media to hire.
- The fastest growing segmant on Facebook is 55 – 65 yr old females.
- Ashton Kutcher has more followers on Twitter than the whole population of Sweden, Israel, Switzerland, Ireland, Norway, Panama
- 50% of mobile internet traffic is for Facebook.
- Imagine what this means for bad customer experiences!
- Some universities have stopped giving out email addresses and are now giving out: ereaders, iPads and tablets.
- Every 4 minutes 100 plus hours of video is being uploaded to YouTube.
- There are over 200,000,000 blogs.
- 78% of consumers trust peer recomendations, only 14% trust advertisements
- Ask yourself: How is my business staying in front of my customer EVERY DAY?!
- Only 18% of traditional tv campaigns generate a positive ROI
- 90% of people skip ads on Tivo/DVR
- eBooks outsold paper books on Christmas of last year
- 24 of the 25 largest newspapers are experiencing record declines in circulation.
- 60 millions status updates happen just on Facebook alone…we no longer search for the news, it finds us.
- We no longer search for products and services, they will find us through social media.
- The ROI of Social Media is that your business will still exist in 5 years IF you use it and use it right!
The Social Media tidal wave is here, are you swimming with the current?!
Social Media Corner
Jun 30th
Altimeter Group has some of the best information on Social Media available today.
Their information focuses on how to integrate this new market channel into traditional methods. http://www.altimetergroup.com/2010/04/social-strategy-33-webinar-recording-and-slides-getting-your-company-ready.html
Google TV
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/jun2010/tc2010061_669434.htm
Optimizing Internet Marketing Efforts
Jun 29th
What Your Customers Expect
Marketers are collectively seeking new, profitable revenue streams for their goods and services, and online is the most efficient option with the lowest barriers to entry and overall costs. Increased adoption of multi-channel distribution models regardless of wherever else you sell, you need to be selling online. Consumers and even brick and mortar retailers have come to expect it and accept it. -IMG Branding, September 2009
The investment into the market has the odds stacked against your company. With the market changing rapidly and how consumers relate to products today, has your company bridged this new conversation? “The New Consumer ” demands and expects access to your company. In addition, social media is generating hundreds of millions of new potential consumers that are open to new products and ideas. You want access to them but do you have the strategies, knowledge and labor pool to utilize this medium effectively?
Every Company has a Website but its NOT ENOUGH to display your business. It needs interactivity, branding, the ability to build consumer loyalty, effectively communicate to your base, defeat marketing objections, build traffic, create buyers, convert visitors to buyers which gives you analytics, metrics and monetization.
And What About New Product Introductions?
Do you have the knowledge and skill set to bridge the gap from traditional market settings to building your brand and company on the internet? There’s a whole new innovative process developed and taught by one the leading internet experts today. We know it, we’ve used it and employ it. IT WORKS!



