Archive for the ‘Social Media’ Category

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Facebook ‘Questions’ The Next Step for your SEO/SM Campaign?

Aug
02
2010

The internet is a vast source of free information and over the years a real emphasis on questions and answers has emerged – with Ask Jeeves initially leading the way by providing a search engine specifically geared towards recognising and answering questions.

Question MarkThings have moved on quite a bit since then, and numerous specific websites and communities have sprung up to deal with this constant need for answers. Yahoo Answers and Metafilter are two established websites that harness the knowledge of internet users to help other users, and now Facebook has taken its next logical step (after building a huge community of users) and launched a beta of something they are calling ‘Questions’.

You can find the Questions function explained on the Facebook blog here: http://blog.facebook.com/blog.php?post=411795942130

Effectively it allows any user to publish a question visible to all users and to anyone online, suggesting these pages are also visible to the search engines. Questions can be tagged with a specific topic, making searching for questions you can answer easier.

Although it remains to be seen how well this works and what quality of questions are asked, this could be an excellent way of businesses raising their profile on Facebook, and also in the search engines given that your answers may show up in results pages.

Here at WNW Design, we have used Yahoo Answers in the past to raise the profile of websites as part of our client’s SEO and will be closely monitoring the Facebook Questions product to get a good idea of how useful this could be. Answering questions that are posed from potential clients could be an excellent way to build on your Social Media and SEO campaigns.

If you are on Facebook already you should take a look at the Questions area and watch its development. If you’re not on Facebook, you probably should be. And if you are a client, we may well be talking to you about facebook Questions in the future.

Posted in Facebook, WNW Staff Blogs | Comments Off

Is Google Really Developing a Facebook Killer?

Jul
26
2010

No less than CNN is reporting rumors that Google does indeed have a social networking site in the works which could give Facebook some competition. This new social site/program is supposed to be called GoogleMe or Google Me.

Only Google knows the truth.

However, creating such a site would be a smart move on Google’s part since they do need to compéte with Facebook, mainly because Facebook is turning into a real search engine, one that could possibly give Google a run for all those lucrative search dollars. Ridiculous you say – not really, especially when you consider Facebook’s recent move towards “Open Graph Search” and its use of the “Like” button and box. is the number of plugins which you can add to your blog.

Unless the surfing public changes overnight, Bing/Yahoo is not going to give Google any real search competition, but Facebook with its massive number of users and rating system could present a true contender.

We also might see a complete change in how the surfing public sees online search. Google and the other search engines are quickly becoming one big “joke” in regards to organic search with big companies buying and selling their way into the top 10 spots and the search engines are helpless to stop it.

Link buying and selling has made organic search a joke and more and more web users are catching on to this fact. Once this becomes common knowledge, search engines will be appropriately viewed as corporate billboards rather than anything of true relevance or importance – even the mighty Google could fall.

That’s why Facebook and its actual ratings/rankings by actual consumers/customers are becoming much more important. While even this kind of search equation is open to abuse, a search engine based on such “user-based” results will beat Google’s SERPs any day.

Once web users realize the true value of such rankings and search engine, then Google will have some real competition at last.

Of course, Google is not standing still. As those of us who make a full time living from search engine marketing will tell you, Google is placing more emphasis on “user-generated” content and ratings. They have placed more emphasis on the “truer” ranking systems on the web, those coming from social networking sites like Twitter, Digg, Del.icio.us, YouTube, MySpace and even Facebook.

How many Tweets does a post get? How many Diggs does your content gather? How many comments does your YouTube video have? How many Thumbs Up? How many times is a web page bookmarked in Del.icio.us and recommended to friends.

Granted even these social bookmarking sites can be manipulated, but it is just a little harder to do than simple link buying or employing simple SEO tactics/services to get your site to the top spot. Which brings us back to the question at hand – is Google developing a social networking site like Facebook? If you count all the programs/sites which Google currently offers up: Google Wave, Google Voice, iGoogle, Google Accounts, Google Buzz, Gmail, Google Profiles… one could argue… does Google really need another social networking program?

Considering all of these current offerings, is it just me, or is there a lack of focus to all these Google products? Google needs one site which connects all of its programs/products at your fingertips. Maybe iGoogle could fill the spot, but it doesn’t take in everything or have that crucial social networking element.

Google should have a social network site like Facebook, where you can easily connect with family, colleagues and friends, but the site should also have a sidebar which lists all the Google programs/sites that you use. The site should be a “one-stop-center” for all things Google.

Google and all its countless programs needs a concrete solid focus or center. One clíck and everything that Google has to provide is displayed on ONE page. More importantly, all Google’s products need to be consolidated and connected – Google Voice, Wave, Buzz, Maps, Mail, Profiles, Search… all need to be functional in one simple social networking platform.

Create or develop a user-based ranking/rating system within this newly formed social networking site and Google will be able to rival Facebook when it comes to true democratic search. Such a site, if it does materialize, could give Google’s Search Engine, and search in general, a much needed dose of honesty. Then again, if wishes were horses, beggars would ride and Google would no longer be a one trick pony.

About The Author
All opinions expressed in this piece are solely those of the author who has been following Google since it was a mere BackRub. He is also a full time search engine marketer who operates numerous niche sites, as well as two sites on Internet Marketing, where you can get valuable marketing tips for free: internet marketing Titus Hoskins Copyright 2010. This article may be freely distributed if this resource box stays attached.

Posted in Facebook, Social Media | Comments Off

How Social Trends Benefit Business

Jul
21
2010

Although many businesses now realize the power of social media, they have a hard time discerning which social services are effective and which are not. To make matters worse, new social sites, services and applications are emerging almost daily.

So, how can businesses keep up? It’s a challenging task, but a necessary one. As discussed in the video on the left, businesses should try to watch the most current social trends before deciding if they need to embrace them.

Currently, one of the most popular social trends is location. People are constantly “checking in” with applications such as Foursquare and Gowalla. Both Twitter and Facebook support location information support as well.

Since these location services are continuing to grow, businesses have the opportunity to leverage them through promotion, advertising, and more.

A second social trend that is growing that also involves location is group buying systems. These systems provide daily bargains for people within certain cities as long as a specified number of people participate. Two examples of these systems include GroupOn and LivingSocial.

By getting listed with these services, local businesses can use them to attract new and repeat customers.

Thirdly, businesses should pay attention to mobile ads, since mobile is growing in significance right along with social. According to a recent report from large mobile advertising network AdMob, smartphones have doubled their share of ad requests in the past 2 years.

Incidentally, Google acquired AdMob last year but was only recently granted regulatory approval. Apple is also investing in this space with its iAd platform announced last month. If both Google and Apple find the mobile ad space important, then it is probably something businesses should watch as well.

The last trend that also pertains to mobile and is quickly gaining momentum is mobile payment systems. Consumers are doing more and more from their mobile devices, so why not allow them to close the deal directly from their mobiles?

PayPal has payment apps for the iPhone, Android, and Blackberry mobile devices. Square is another mobile payment method that works with iPhones for credit card transactions. Interestingly enough, Twitter Co-founder Jack Dorsey is listed as one of the developers of Square.

Visa has stated that it plans on entering the mobile payment market as well.

As you can see, there are many ways that businesses can benefit from these social trends. Can you think of any other important trends that could provide opportunities for business?

About the Author:
Abby Johnson is a Video Reporter/Anchor for SmallBusinessNewz.

Posted in Social Media | Comments Off

Providing Could-Be Customers With What they Seek Via Twitter

Jul
09
2010

There’s a good chance that by this point you have found a way to incorporate Twitter into your marketing efforts. There are certainly multiple ways this can be done.

Sure, Twitter results appear in the major search engines in various capacities. They are getting even more prominence in Google now that that it has launched its newly redesigned search results. Users can now filter results specifically by updates. A great deal of these come from Twitter. Twitter results can now be viewed easily for any query, as opposed to just newsy queries. Social media use is more important to being found on Google than it ever has been.

But forget Google for a moment and think about just Twitter itself. Users can of course search directly from Twitter, and plenty of people are doing just that. Maybe not all of their searching, but they’re looking for help on Twitter, and brands can take advantage of this.

Danny Sullivan knows a lot about search marketing. He runs Search Engine Land as well as the Search Marketing Expo, a conference series bringing together industry thought leaders and professionals. He is always on top of consumer search trends, and has been studying how people use Twitter to search.

“Many marketers understand Twitter search is a powerful way to monitor brand mentions and reach out to customers,” says Sullivan. “But I think few realize what a powerful platform it provides to reach out on non-branded generic mentions. To better illustrate this, let me introduce the “Anyone Know” Twitter search.”

He goes into the concept at great length here. If you are looking to reach more customers on Twitter, I suggest giving the article a read.

What it boils down to is that you can perform Twitter searches yourself using queries like “anyone know”, “can anyone tell me,” and variations, while adding keywords that pertain to whatever it is you are offering.

“This type of outreach has to be done right,” says Sullivan. “No one wants reply spam.”

But remember that you are looking at people publicly looking for specific things, and if there is something you can offer them that they are already looking for (let’s not forget that Twitter has location-sharing features now as well), you may find some good opportunities.

“Perhaps many people are already doing this type of outreach on generic terms, and I’ve just missed the stories. Perhaps,” he says. “However, I suspect most search marketing involving Twitter remains focused on brand-oriented searches. If so, I also suspect that will change.”

About the Author:
Chris is a content coordinator and staff writer for SmallBusinessNewz and the iEntry Network. Subscribe to SmallBusinessNewz RSS Feeds.

Posted in Social Media, Twitter | Comments Off

Twitter and Privacy: History Doesn’t Retweet

Jul
02
2010

Ever had a case of the *tipsy tweets*?

You know what I’m talking about. The type of tweets you’d not post to Twitter sober but that seem highly amusing after a couple of alcoholic beverages. The ones you rush to delete on Monday morning in a coffee-induced panic when you remember what or who you tweeted. Yeah those.

Well, the next time your fingertip hovers over the send button after you’ve had a few, you might want to think twice about letting it make contact with the keyboard.

It turns out that the Library of Congress has decided to digitally archive EVERY public tweet that has been posted to Twitter since the site launched in 2006. With 50 million tweets processed by Twitter every day, that adds up to billions of messages.

The Announcement

The news came in mid April, first via the Library of Congress’s own Twitter account and then via public announcement during Twitter’s first Chirp conference for developers. This was followed up by blog posts from both the Library and Twitter.

Why Archive Tweets?

So why the interest in digitally archiving tweets and is it really necessary? Staff at the Library of Congress think so:

“Twitter is part of the historical record of communication, news reporting, and social trends – all of which complement the Library’s existing cultural heritage collections. It is a direct record of important events such as the 2008 U.S. presidential election or the *Green Revolution* in Iran. It also serves as a news feed with minute-by-minute headlines from major news sources such as Reuters, The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times. At the same time, it is a platform for citizen journalism with many significant events being first reported by eyewitnesses,” says Matt Raymond, the Library of Congress’s Director of Communications.

“Individually tweets might seem insignificant, but viewed in the aggregate, they can be a resource for future generations to understand life in the 21st century.”

Don’t Panic

Now before you panic about your entire Twitter history being laid bare to a grubby public, you should know that there are some protections in place.

Twitter has insisted there be at least a six-month window between the original date of a tweet and its date of availability for internal library use, non-commercial research, public display and preservation by the Library of Congress. Private account information and deleted tweets will not be part of the archive. Neither will linked information such as pictures and URLs.

The Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington also doesn’t see a problem with it:

“I think folks understand that whatever they post on Twitter is meant to be searchable”, says their senior counsel John Verdi.

“I don’t see a big issue here.”

That might change, he says, if the US government tried to identify individuals through their tweets or by cross checking user tweets with their information from other federal databases.

Personally, I can see this happening unless further protections are put in place. It’s probably happening every day.

Gift Wrapped

It’s important to note that the Library did not purchase the archive. It was gifted from Twitter and the original legal document outlining the donation is publicly available via PDF.

“Recently, the Library of Congress signaled to us that the public tweets we have all been creating over the years are important and worthy of preservation. Since Twitter began, billions of tweets have been created”, says Twitter co-founder Biz Stone in their official blog post about the donation.

“Today, fifty-five million tweets a day are sent to Twitter and that number is climbing sharply. A tiny percentage of accounts are protected but most of these tweets are created with the intent that they will be publicly available. Over the years, tweets have become part of significant global events around the world – from historic elections to devastating disasters.”

“It is our pleasure to donate access to the entire archive of public Tweets to the Library of Congress for preservation and research.”

About the Library of Congress

The Library of Congress is the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States and it is the largest library in the world, regularly researched by government staff, law enforcement agencies, law firms, authors, scholars, scientists, students and academics. The Library receives more than 1.75 million readers and visitors annually and employs a staff of more than 3,600. According to Twitter, it’s a logical home for their archive.

What Does it All Mean?

So with billions of tweets added to the federal archive, how can we expect the data to be used? With Twitter’s entire history archived, it shouldn’t be long before we see tweets being used as evidence in criminal trials and various lawsuits.

Tweets have already been cited in defamation cases such as the one between 25 year-old Chicago resident Amanda Bonnen and her landlord, Horizon Group Management LLC. Following a disagreement with Horizon Group about mold allegedly found in her apartment, Bonnen posted on her public Twitter account:

“Who said sleeping in a moldy apartment was bad for you? Horizon realty thinks it’s okay”, to which Horizon Group responded with a defamation case to the tune of USD 50,000.

Although a Google-cache of her now deactivated account shows she had just 17 followers, Horizon claimed Bonnen’s tweet severely damaged their good name because it was published “worldwide”. Ironically, the publicity the case receíved probably did more damage to Horizon’s public image than Bonnen’s limited tweet. The case was thrown out due to lack of specific context in the tweet, but it does set an interesting precedent for other potential cases.

Whatever the legal and privacy implications, knowing your tweets are being preserved for historical significance and stored in the same building as priceless documents like the Declaration of Independence, should be somewhat humbling.

Who knows, future generations may one day point to your “OMG you guys! @justinbieber just walked into @starbucks!” tweet with the same awe reserved for George Washington’s copy of the US Constitution.

About The Author
Article by Kalena Jordan, one of the first search engine optimization experts in Australia, who is well known and respected in the industry, particularly in the U.S. As well as running a daily Search Engine Advice Column, Kalena manages Search Engine College - an online training institution offering instructor-led short courses and downloadable self-study courses in Search Engine Optimization and other Search Engine Marketing subjects.

Posted in Social Media, Twitter | Comments Off

Could Facebook Even Survive Without Email?

Jun
28
2010

Facebook thinks email is dying. Classic. How many times have we heard this now? Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg gave a speech at the Nielsen Consumer 360 conference recently, essentially claiming as much.

“In consumer technology, if you want to know what people like us will do tomorrow, you look at what teenagers are doing today, and the latest figures say that only 11% of teenagers email daily. So email (I can’t imagine life without it) is probably going away. So what do teenagers do? They SMS and increasingly they use social networking.” (hat tip to WebGuild.org)

First off, Facebook couldn’t exist without email. You need an email address to sign up and to log-in. Many of us rely on email for notifications from Facebook to know when someone has sent us a message, commented on our posts, invited us to an event, tagged us in a photo, etc. In fact, I’d be curious to see how frequently the average Facebook user would come back to Facebook daily without email notifications.

Email lubricates social interactions on Facebook, and I’d be very curious to see how successful Facebook would be without any email integration. I suspect it would die.

To be fair, Sandberg was looking to the future, and not the present when she made this claim. She even said that she couldn’t imagine life without email. It’s interesting, because Facebook is in some ways helping keep email relevant for the reasons mentioned above (though email certainly doesn’t need Facebook’s help to stay relevant).

Facebook requires you to use email to sign-up and log-in, but we are seeing more and more open protocols being used around the web for ID authentication. There are also not-so-open protocols in use, like Facebook Connect. I can log-in to a wide variety of sites/apps with my Facebook ID, but I can’t log-in to Facebook with anything other than my email address. If Facebok thinks email is dying, does that mean it will adopt some other open authentication protocols? Don’t these protocols generally come back to having an email address in the first place anyway?

We’ve written about why social media isn’t killing and will not kill email several times in the past. I don’t want to rehash all of the same points here, so I’ll simply reference a couple of these articles:

- 10 Reasons Social Media isn’t Replacing Email
- Spam Will Not Keep You Away from Email

The popularity of specific social networks comes and goes, but email has been around for a while, and has really shown no signs of going anywhere. Here’s something to consider – how many years has your inbox been flooded with spam? Has it caused you to use email any less? Granted, Facebook does continue to grow, even in the face of massive privacy concerns, but that’s hardly an indication that it could replace email. Sandberg didn’t suggest Facebook itself would replace email, but that SMS and social networking in general would. We’ll see. If Facebook hopes to be a significant part of that replacement on the social networking end, they’re probably going to have to play a little nicer with the open web movement.

I’ll come back to the conclusion we always reach. There is room for both email and social networks. Just like there is now, there will be in the future. As far as marketing is concerned, social networks appear to be greatly enhancing email campaigns. A recent study from GetResponse found that campaigns utilizing these networks were able to increase click-through-rates by 30%.

About the Author:
Chris Crum has been a part of the WebProNews team and the iEntry Network of B2B Publications since 2003. Follow WebProNews on Facebook or Twitter. Twitter: @CCrum237

Posted in Facebook, Social Media | Comments Off

Facebook Group vs Page – Which Is Better?

Jun
25
2010

During an hour and a half travelling in Exeter recently, four out of five of the conversations I overheard included the word ‘Facebook’. With many businesses wanting to engage with their customers on social media sites for this very reason, a lot of our clients have been making their first forays onto Facebook, and one of the more common questions I am asked is whether a Page or a Group is better.

There is not a clear yes or no answer – it will depend on your intentions and company type. It is certainly a good idea to choose just one route though, as creating both a Page and Group can risk simply diluting your presence and confusing your customers.

Some of the most important factors in choosing are now shared by both Groups and Pages. Both are indexed by Google and public for non-members, so it will list in the search engines and non-Facebookers can still read the information on your Wall. A Page offers a little more information with statistics/insights and also more flexiblity with customised Facebook applications (allowing you to create functional tabs and make your Page more interactive).

But essentially it comes down to how you want to communicate with your customers and what you want to achieve. A Page is a professional method of turning your customers into ‘fans’ and updating them with your latest news, offers, encouraging conversations that they will all see and be able to take part in, and allowing them to build on your Page by opening the Photo and Discussion tabs up to participation. A Page is very often the route I recommend for a company.

Where a Group comes into its own is when used to create an area for a ‘common interest’. A Group requires that people ‘join’ instead of just ‘like’, which implies a willingness to actually take part in the Group (as opposed to just passively approving of a Page). This is where a Group also has the potential for viral marketing, with the members taking a hand in inviting friends and spreading the word, because they have a vested interest. Each member has the option for sending out bulk invites to their friends to join the Group, which is not possible with Pages. Updates to Group members are also sent by email, which offers less of a chance for conversation but of course grabs the attention more.

So which is right for you?

Most standard companies will be best suited to a Facebook Page. You can update fans, provide a base for discussion and alerts for events, open up the Page to collaboration as much as you like and engage fans as much or as little as your time allows.

Companies emerging into the market with a unique or exciting product (such as some new environmentally-friendly gizmo that will grab the attention of green enthusiasts everywhere and has no competition as yet) may suit a Group, and therefore take advantage of members’ investment and excitement to market virally and gain new members. This is only really going to suit 1% of companies out there, however.

A better way to actively cultivate your customers may be to create both a Page and a Group, but not both for your company.

If you create and develop your Page, find you have time to converse and engage with your fans and want to take it a step further, you can then think about creating a Group dedicated towards something connected with your area of business. Gather together enthusiasts of your subject, give them somewhere to visit and talk, and be the moderator and creator of that space, with your logo and voice present throughout. You will make sales, and you will emerge as a market leader and a forward-thinking company in the your business sector. A shop selling imported American Candy for example, could set up a Group for American food enthusiasts as a method of cultivating the very community they wish to publicise to.

So, in short, think about how you can best communicate with your customers, whether you need bait (a Group with an already established interest to bring them together) or just clear communication and engagement (a Page as a base for your customers) or both. Then be prepared to be flexible and adapt to the community you create. Social media is still an experiment even to those most comfortable with it, so take the first steps, seek advice from those that have done it before, ask for and then listen to customer feedback, and be flexible.

About The Author: Camilla Todd manages Search Engine Optimisation, social media campaigns and brand awareness for WNW Design SEO clients. You can follow her on Twitter @camilla_wnw, email her at camilla@wnwdesign.co.uk or phone on 08456 588310. You can also follow WNW Design on Facebook here.

Posted in Blogs By Camilla T., Facebook, Organic Optimisation, Social Media, WNW Staff Blogs | Comments Off

Can Google Become The Next Facebook?

Jun
11
2010

Is it just me but didn’t Google recently put everything on its main homepage except for Google Buzz? What’s up with that? For heaven’s sake, they even put the PacMan game in their logo for two days running… you would think some of the brightest minds on the planet would have figured out by now if Google truly wants to try to win on the new memeyouyou web, they simply have to fully integrate all their programs into one homepage or at least place Buzz right there along side the Gmail button.

Google Buzz has all the ingredients to finally make Google your one-stop center on the web. It can be THE place for sharing not just your conversations but photos, videos, and everything else. Will it live up to its full potential and become a true Facebook killer?

The main reason Facebook is such a threat to Google is not because of the massive amount of users it has, but the amount of time those users stay on Facebook. If you just look at the Alexa comparison alone, Facebook users spend over 30 minutes on the site, which is triple the time users stay on Google. Facebook also beats Google in the bounce rate and page views per user. Could all the recent changes to their SERPs be, not only Google’s answer to the upcoming Bing/Yahoo marriage, but a strong way of presenting a real challenge to Facebook’s overwhelming stats.

Web users are lazy and they want a one-stop solution to meet all their needs. They want to connect with friends and family, they want to broadcast to the world, they want to search for something to purchase, they want to be entertained… iGoogle should be that solution/center but I don’t believe it quite passes the test because there is still no Google Buzz?

The main problem with Google is that it has no well-defined center which users could call their own. Perhaps I am reading this wrong, but have Google users fully bonded with iGoogle? Putting the privacy issues aside, I don’t think they have embraced it in the same way web users have embraced their Facebook. What is missing are all the elements that are present in Google Buzz, but again we seem to have two disjointed programs rather than one solid rallying point.

For many web users, Facebook is the starting point of their web day… in many cases, it is probably the only place they go on the web religiously each day. Why? Because all their friends/family are on there and they don’t want to miss out on any news or gossip. Not checking your Facebook page has become the ultimate faux pas of this new social media etiquette.

No one is going defeat or compëte with Facebook you say?

Not so fast! Even empires come and go; a web site is even more fickle, especially if something more convenient comes along. Does anyone remember MySpace which is still a very popular site but no longer has the numbers it once had. Facebook or even Google could suffer the same fate if something better comes along.

Google’s main business is online search. It is its bread and butter, which may have blinded those in charge from seeing the bigger picture. The bigger payday.

Google owns so many popular sites within the top 20 including YouTube and Blogger… if only they could better connect all their interests into one SuperSite or one SuperDevice for those thinking within the box. Online search can still be the main course, but you need to corral all of these different users into one starting point or center with a couple of Billion users logging in each morning to start their web day. Just imagine the ad revenue potential that would generate for the big G.

Impossible you say, but not really, all the ingredients are there to form this SuperSite but it needs one big bang to get it going, to create a center of the web universe, which will be Google.

Whenever I think about Google, I am reminded of a class 5 Hurricane with all these popular sites and programs swirling around it like mad, but there is no eye to this hurricane, at least not yet. Google needs a solid center to draw everything into focus and get everybody at the same starting point. Whether it is the Google search page, Google Buzz, Google Profiles, Gmail or iGoogle… but it all needs to be pulled together if Google wants to truly battle with Facebook for all the marbles.

About The Author
All opinions expressed in this piece are solely those of the author who has been following Google since it was a mere BackRub. He is also a full time search engine marketer with many sites: internet marketing tools or try here free marketing courses.

Posted in Facebook, Google, Social Media | Comments Off

Facebook Gives Businesses More Data to Measure

Jun
09
2010

At this point, most businesses have probably come to the realization that they are missing out on some serious opportunities if they do not have a Facebook presence. Facebook is showing that it will keep growing, despite all of the recent privacy concerns capturing the media’s attention, and more and more sites across the web continue to get integrated with Facebook, which means Facebook is becoming more and more integrated into people’s online activity in general. While this in itself means great things for businesses, Facebook is now offering businesses new tools to better understand data around user engagement with their brands so they can take advantage of it and better monetize their Facebook presence.

Facebook has now made significant improvements to its analytics for websites, applications, and Pages. This means businesses have increased insights into how people are engaging with their Facebook presence on and off their sites.

Improved Analytics

The improved analytics come in the form of the new Insights Dashboard, which shows data for fully-integrated sites and sites that use Facebook’s social plug-ins. You can also add a non-integrated domain. In addition, the Dashboard displays data from application, including canvas, mobile, device, and desktop apps. Finally, it displays data around Facebook Pages – those created on Facebook itself, and those that are part of Facebook’s Open Graph.

To put it into simpler terms, you can view analytics around specific stories that people “like” on your site, or how many users commented on posts made on your Facebook Page. “From there, you will have a better idea of what your audience finds most interesting and capitalize on that content,” says Facebook’s Alex Himel.

The dashboard has been around for a while, but now it contains more data, as well as new visualization tools. You can view graphs in full screen, print them, or save them. Facebook has also released a new demographics visualization, which shows more info about the audience that is interacting with your site, your Facebook Page, or your app if you have one. Obviously, this can be of tremendous benefit to your marketing efforts.

“As a domain administrator, you can now access sharing metrics and demographic information per domain and per URL so you can optimize your content for sharing and better tailor your content to your audience,” says Himel. Of course growing your audience brings new opportunities for monetization.

Important Info for Webmasters

Site owners should associate their domain with a user ID, Facebook app, or Facebook Page that they administer. This can be done by clicking the green “Insights for your Domain” button on the dashboard and adding the meta tag that is generated within the tags of the root page on the domain. Note that if your site utilizes subdomains, the root file of each one must be claimed separately.

“If you administer a Facebook Page or have integrated the Open Graph protocol into your Web pages, you can now see analytics for referral traffic and stream stories in the Insights dashboard, as well as tab views for your Page,” says Himel. “Insights will capture engagement with Pages regardless of whether an action was taken on or off Facebook.”

The Bigger Picture

One of the biggest gripes businesses have had with social media, is a lack of measurement. Clearly, Facebook is doing more to tackle this problem, and Facebook is obviously the social network that gives businesses the potential to reach the largest amount of people. Recent estimates have Facebook with close to 500 million users.

It also doesn’t hurt to keep in mind that Facebook is evolving, and rapidly at that. It is already competing with Google for unique visitors (which really equates to mindshare during time spent online). Some may consider such a comparison apples and oranges, but there may be more to it than that.

About the Author:
Chris Crum has been a part of the WebProNews team and the iEntry Network of B2B Publications since 2003. Follow WebProNews on Facebook or Twitter. Twitter: @CCrum237

Posted in Facebook, Social Media | Comments Off

Twitter: Followers, Niches, and Myths

May
24
2010

Twitter has certainly emerged as one of the most popular social networking/blogging platforms of the past few years. There are various reasons why Twitter has become so wildly popular. It is a simple concept where brief messages can be sent to loyal followers. This is why Twitter is so helpful to small businesses. It can aid in promoting a business in the most cost effective manner. Really, this is one of the very best systems for promoting updates, info, and deals to the followers of the Twitter account.

The one problem here is that most entrepreneurs look towards quantity as opposed to quality in their followers. This can prove to be a huge mistake since you don’t ever want to sacrifice quality when looking to amass Twitter followers.

How do people make such a mistake? Well, they look at volume as being the secret to their success. The problem here is that the process is not going to be a very successful one. Rather, it can prove to be disastrous more than anything else because your business ends up promoting itself to those that are really not interested in the products or services you are offering.

Yes, some people will sign on to be followers of your Twitter account with no real interest in being customers. That is why you need to develop a strong niche following as opposed to a large following.

The bottom line here is you do NOT want a large list of followers. You want an EFFECTIVE list of followers.

Some may consider this notion to go against the grain in which a Twitter account should be approached. After all, Twitter is wildly popular so why not follow the trends? The average Twitter account has changed dramatically since July. The number of followers the average account maintains has jumped from 70 to 300. This has led many accounts to boost their number of postings. In July, the number was in the range of 119. Today, it has jumped significantly to 420.

But, is there a great deal of benefit from such increases? In all honesty, if the followers are not going to purchase, the numbers do not really mean much. That means all those increases in updates have less value as well. Again, you want your efforts to be effective. Promoting volume in your approach is not the way to achieve any true level of success.

One problem with a large number of followers is that your tweets need to be adjusted to handle larger volumes. That means your tweets need to be clearly understood by all. As such, you need to promote a generalized approach to the tweets. This is not always the best method because you are not providing detailed and specific information in the tweets. This means those that are serious potential customers may lose interest in the tweets or cease taking them seriously. This is not a good thing if you are seriously trying to sell a product or service.

It becomes a full time job to sort and respond to the real people who are interested in you. Twittering without engagement of your audience defeats the entire process of marketing. I believe many people are using twitter as “lets throw it out there and see what sticks”. I can tell you from testing that this approach does not work. No wonder people are leaving twitter in droves.

This leads to a more potentially serious side effect. If more members of Twitter venture towards promoting generic, uninteresting, and uninspiring tweets so as to boost the volume of people reading, the health of the social network site will not stay strong for long.

Basically, why would anyone would want to follow Twitter when the tweets decline in value? This would certainly not be a positive in terms of the ability for a small business to procure new customers that are vital to the health of the business.

Again, exploring options for expanding a business’ success should center on niche marketing. This approach needs to be taken with Twitter or else the value of Twitter will decline. Based on what we are seeing, the decline will be difficult to avoid in the future based on current actions.

Does this mean that Twitter is decidedly lacking in value for those seeking to utilize what it has to provide? No, no one is making such a statement as it would be a decidedly inaccurate one.

Twitter, in fact, has taken steps to promote niche marketing. This is evident in the ability to devise “Twitter lists.” Twitter lists allow you to take certain members of your massive group of followers and put them in a particular category. You can then promote your tweets to individual members of these various lists. So, you can present wide, generic tweets as well as individualized tweets to those that may be considered more serious potential customers.

For example, you can create a group of people that have already made purchases in the past. Then, you would be free to issue tweets directly to such individuals as you wish. This would be an effective form of niche marketing that would be far more beneficial than putting forth perpetually generalized tweets. One of the other problems with having 1,000′s of non-niched followers is seeing through the noise of twitter.

As such, it is best to look towards growing these individual lists in order to expand the potential to niche market. Yet, many will seek to put forth the exact opposite goal. They will look towards greatly expanding their number of followers into the thousands while not stopping to examine whether or not such a massive list truly boosts their success potential. Such a strategy is a flawed one that will not lead to the empirical success that is sought.

And, if you are not looking to succeed with your business, then why even bother being in business? Twitter has tremendous value and it delivers great benefit to those looking to expand their small business’ promotional strategies in a cost effective manner.

In conclusion, try not to become hung up on the notion of greatly expanding your followers’ list. Seek to promote effective niche marketing strategies instead.

About The Author
Duncan Wierman is an Ex Software company CEO turned Real Estate Investor and Marketer. Discover how you can use creative marketing methods to do more deals online. For more details setting up an automated internet marketing system, please visit Duncan Wierman’s website and get his free 14 day e-course. www.DuncanWierman.com

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