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Social Media Marketing by Liana Evans | video book review

May 18, 2012 Leave a Comment

Social Media Strategies for engaging in Facebook, Twitter, and other Social Media by Liana “Li” Evans is an enjoyable read broken down into 5 sections with 45 brief, easy-to-read chapters allowing you to easily and quickly hone in on the information you seek.

This book does not focus on any particular platform, which makes it navigable for those learning about social media. The heading of the first chapter, “The Basics of Social Media,” dives right into the nitty gritty: “it’s not easy, quick, or cheap” (to do well at social media). Those who have a hard time with social media will benefit greatly from this book.

Set goals for social networking sites, like Facebook and Twitter

Volume/value of friends
Comment content
Sentiments
Quick response time
Inbound traffic measurement
Tagging
Posts by others
Traffic to your site

Blogs goals include

Wikis
Social events
Social sharing sites
KPIs & metrics measurement

How to’s/ “genius nuggets”

How to spot a troll or constant complainer
How to spot the upset customer
How social media can play and interplay between departments

Tips: A balance of beginner and advanced strategy

If you’re beginner: The first chapters give you friendly insights and tips into social media
If you’re advanced: You can easily flip through the chapters and multitude of headings to score some insights

Social Media Marketing: Strategies for Engaging in Facebook, Twitter, & Other Social Media

By Liana “Li” Evans

Published December 2010 (3rd Edition)

Best for: Beginners looking for a solid foundation, and advanced practitioners who seek quick tips and good insight

Filed Under: Social Media, Video Book Review Tagged With: advanced, basic, Beginner, best practices, blogs, Brand, Branding, Brands, comments, Content, customer, Engagement, Evans, Facebook, goals, hashtags, insight, internet marketing, Liana, Liana Evans, LinkedIn, Marketing, media, posts, social, Social media, Social Media Marketing, strategy, tags, tips, tools, traffic, Twitter, video book review

How to Make Money With Social Media | Video Book Review

May 7, 2012 Leave a Comment

Monetize your social media efforts with lessons from Jamie Turner and Reshma Shah’s book, How to Make Money With Social Media: An Insider’s Guide on Using New and Emerging Media to Grow Your Business. In this book, these two marketing professionals give the inside scoop on strategies and tactics to gain value and make money from your social media efforts.

Published on September 20, 2010, Turner and Shah‘s book digs into the various social media platforms and how to utilize each for your business. It also covers how to create a campaign strategy, how to strengthen your brand, and how to size up your competition. Plus the quick start guides provide a solid 101 for the social media novice.

How to Make Money With Social Media is comprised of 25 chapters divided into 6 sections addressing the various social media platforms.

Sections in How to Make Money With Social Media

Social media landscape
How to set yourself up for social media success
Social media platforms
Social media integration
Measurement
Conclusion

In these chapters, the authors delve into

Email Newsletters
Content aggregators
Wikis
Voting
Forums
Virtual worlds

Turner and Shah’s How to Make Money With Social Media is authoritative and highly engaging. The text also includes quizzes, such as “are you set up to create circular momentum with your social media campaign?” to further readers’ development.

This book is a solid read for social media experts to novices who would like to grow and develop their business with social media.

How to Make Money With Social Media: An Insider’s Guide on Using New and Emerging Media to Grow Your Business

By Jamie Turner and Reshma Shah

Published September 20, 2010

Best for: Brands considering social media and experts looking for some new idea triggers.

Filed Under: Social Media Book Reviews Tagged With: book, book review, business, Experts, guide, Jamie Turner, Marketing, monetize, Money, new media, platforms, Reshma Shah, Social media, strategies, sucess, tactics, video book review

Crowdsourcing: The Future of Marketing? OMMA Social Panel Discussion

May 4, 2012 Leave a Comment

Looking forward to OMMA Social 2012 next week. Here’s a nugget from last year’s.

In social media’s infancy, marketers used crowdsourcing to get involved with social media. But, as social media got more complex, crowdsourcing tactics had to change to make brands more exciting.

Initially, social media was used to solicit audiences to create commercials for brand contests, but as social media use increased, it is used daily by marketers to communicate with consumers and promote brand evolution.

This OMMA Social panel, moderated by Mel Carson, Microsoft’s advertising community manager, discusses how to use consumers’ opinions to drive brand initiatives, with the end goal to make brands more appealing.

Crowdsourcing

A way to constantly engage target demographics and maintain a consistent channel
Integris Marketing’s article on crowdsourcing

Crowdsourcing tips

To avoid mob mentality, ensure your groups are composed of individuals with real identities
Define what you’re looking for: Structure and planning vs. pure creative

Brand tips

Stay current

Life cycle of content is 3 hours; the solution is to keep producing more
You don’t have a choice anymore: Quarterly research campaigns are passé, need to stay current on a daily basis
Once you dive in and start getting feedback from passionate customers, do something with it

Listen to your audience

Trust your consumers
Understand them, and then make your plan
Do not overlook differing views
Have to take the mindset of how will people REACT to your content not how will they read it

Final brand tips

Experience and share your surroundings!
If you are asking, ask for the smallest thing possible
Be transparent: More transparency, more real conversation
Social media activation takes strategy and planning, don’t just dive into it

To summarize and reflect on marketing’s initiative, here’s a great quote from OMMA Social participant @brandone: “Marketing is about mirroring a good idea with the right delivery vehicle.” Social media can be that great vehicle for marketers, if used properly. Be super engaged with your consumer, learn what they want, and then plan out the proper brand execution strategy.”

Thank you @JackWagner54, @HeatherCinOC, @ogilvydigital, @katiedel, @thebuddygroup, @HeatherCinOC, @jencorbett, @YahooAdBuzz, @nicoledunc, @brandone, @socmedsoc

Filed Under: OMMA Social Tagged With: audience, Brand, brand strategy, Branding, channels, Consumers, Crowdsource, crowdsourcing, discussion, Engagement, evolution, Future, goals, Marketing, Mel Carson, microsoft, objectives, OMMA, OMMA Social, panel, planning, Social media, strategy, tips, transparent, Twitter

Google+ Benefits and Impact on Search | Overdrive Interactive Webinar

April 30, 2012 Leave a Comment

What you need to know about Google+

Google is battling social competitors, and it is responding by increasingly intertwining social media and search. Hence we have Google+ which combines social and search and, thus far, it has been successful mix. From a search marketing perspective, this new wave of search changes carry the moniker “Search Plus Your World” (SPYW).

Without getting too technical about SPYW, OverDrive’s webinar, “How social media is impacting search opportunities,” teaches businesses about Google+ and how to use social and search to increase their visibility and sales.

The panel comprised, Google Agency Relationship Manager Grant Burgess, Overdrive’s Director of Social Media Ja-Nae Duane, and Overdrive’s Director of Search Michael Orlinski.

Google+ is a fast-growing social media platform

90 million people on it
Over 50% of brands got on the Google Plus platform within the first few weeks
The +1 button has become the fastest growing social sharing widget thus far. It appears more than 5 billion times a day!

Google+ Hangouts

What if you could have real conversations with your customers? That’s what Google+ Hangouts are for.
Use Hangouts for research
Enable you to share your desktop
You can have real-time customer conversations, not just comments

Google+ Circles

People are sharing 2-3x more with Circles on Google+ than they are publicly
The Circles that you create and the Circles of people who +1 your brand, can start to be an authority in everyday searches
Circles help you send content to right people

Google Brand Page Checklist

Identify brand ambassadors
Complete your page
Customize circles
Post content
ENGAGE!

Enhance your Google+ presence

Your Google+ page needs to establish a great first impression! What story are you trying to tell?
There are a lot of advantages for search marketing
Think about what keywords you want to include to increase your SEO efforts
Post measurable content
Know what your target audience wants to share, and then craft your campaign
Humanize your brand: People connect with people
Put +1 on your content, it helps recommendations have staying power

According to the pros at this webinar, “social is not a destination, it’s a core human behavior.” Google+ taps into the social nature of the Internet user to enable the world of social and search to combine in a way that allows uninhibited sharing of content between the people of your choosing.

Thank you for participating in the webinar @smitus, @JulieVera, @Icanhazjill, @mkosmicki, @JuliaForsyth, @LouisGadema, @mapdock!