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Social Media Revolution 2011

Griff — Fri, 05 Aug 2011 17:31:05 +0000

Social Media Revolution 2011
Let’s take a couple of moments and revisit the relative impact that Social Media has on the world today. Imagine that at the rate we’re going before long Facebook will have over 1 Billion members. Each member lists from basic amounts to fully developed personal profiles containing all of their preference, likes and dislikes. Please forgive the pun. Their activities are harmlessly tracked and data stored and accumulated. Servers are added to manage the increased amount of activity.

Now step into the world of targeted advertising using Facebook. Criteria can be fine tuned to locate the most reliable of criteria for qualifying potential clients. One can select keywords, locations, ages, genders and a myriad of other criteria to better efficiently and effectively target the group of people they want to reach. Each setting demonstrates an immediate number of the number of Facebook users that will be reached by the advertisement when done this way. Adjust and adjust. Terms are set and advertisements are launched. It is just that simple.

Within an instant the two meet on the right hand column of the profile page. Not only are the advertisements found there remarkably similar to the profile users own preferences, in fact exactly so, but friends of the profile user are cited as having liked the product. In fact they did. Is this type of marketing intrusive? On the contrary it is with permission and it serves a very useful purpose. No longer do people need to wade through distracting and annoying advertisements about things that they do have interest in, want or need. Only the things we want, by having defined them ourselves are presented in front of us. As time goes on and more people join and more information is shared and collected it will become better still.

Facebook is but one channel of the Social Media Revolution. Besides it there are literally hundreds of other channels from the well know and largest platforms from resources using websites and blogs like Blogger, WordPress Tumblr and Posterous to Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Google+, Yelp, etc…, and a long tail of other platforms, groups and forums. There is a platform or a group or a place where anyone with access to an internet connection can go and find others of similar interest or need, locally or globally.

Please note I said the the process was simple and that I did not say it was easy. The distinction being that good sound experience can help to maximize your results. Experts, who in this case simply refer to someone that can help you to accelerate your process are very valuable indeed. For best results social media marketing consulting can help you to bake better use of your well earned dollars. This is an area where we at Social Media University can be of great help.

Social Media Revolution 2011 is a post from: Social Media University

Where are my Prospects? Sales & Marketing’s Social Movement

Sparky Powell — Sun, 10 Jul 2011 19:13:15 +0000

Are people taking your cold calls to them? Is your direct mail generating enough response to make it profitable to do? Are you steadily getting in front of new prospects on a regular basis? If you are like most companies, the answer is a big “NO”. It’s not just the economy though; it is also the movement of change. The change that social media is bringing.

Here are some interesting statistics

Statistics on Social Media Users

33% visit social media sites to engage in product research before making a purchasing decision.
47% say social media sites influence their decision to purchase specific companies, services and brands.
26% of respondents changed their minds about purchasing a product after reading about it on a social media site.

Statistics on Online Users

91% say consumer reviews are the #1 aid to buying decisions.
87% trust a friend’s recommendation over a critic’s review.
They are 3 times more likely to trust peer opinions over advertising for purchasing decisions.
They feel that 1 word-of-mouth conversation has the impact of 200 TV ads.

IN SUMMARY
People are not listening to what you have to say without first listening to their trusted networks.

Social Media isn’t just for social fun

There has been a tremendous surge of businesses moving online to social media over the past several months. The advancements that Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn have made, along with the continuous release of new add-ons and plug-ins to enhance business performance and trackability is further testimony to the movement. Here is a breakdown of activities and how companies have been using social media.

81% Generated exposure for their business
61% Increased subscriber/traffic/opt-in list
56% Resulted in new business partnerships
52% Increased search engine rankings
48% Generated qualified leads
45% Reduced overall marketing expenses
35% Closed more business

It’s not surprising that the largest use, 81%, is to gain additional exposure (also known as impressions). That seems like an obvious use. But what are very surprising are the percentages that follow and the real business value they offer.

Where are my Prospects? Sales & Marketing’s Social Movement is a post from: Social Media University

WARNING: Your Transparency is See Through

Griff — Thu, 05 Aug 2010 12:17:02 +0000

Every time I get into a conversation with people about the use of social media for marketing themselves, their businesses or organizations, I seem to get the same questions.

How often should I blog? How many people should I follow on Twitter? How many friends or members or fans should I have on Facebook? How often and when should I tweet or update? How often should I broadcast, how often should I provide information and how often should I engage in conversation? How much is too much and how much is just self promotion?

Interestingly enough these are all HOW questions. Nearly unfailingly, the most important questions overlooked are the WHAT and WHY questions. After that the next most important is determining the WHERE. The last question they need ask, if necessary at all, should be the HOW. In fact, once the why, what, and where are known, the how almost becomes obvious.

Before even caring to consider the how one need first carefully ask what their initial strategy for using social media is? What is the goal they’ve set out in advance to achieve? What is it that they want to accomplish? Why are specific channels chosen in preference over others? Where are the people you want to find going to be? Without knowing what they want to accomplish and why they are doing it, and where they are doing it, then no matter how they are doing it, it will likely lead to no good or sustainable result.

If they do not know what they want to achieve there is no metric available to determine if they achieve it. If the why is not clear then there will be little chance of establishing any clear or meaningful communication and without searching out where people are it is going to be pretty much like shouting into the wind.

Before undertaking entry into the use of social media at all they must first also take a step back and ask the question. What do people want? The Millennium survey done by Gallop in 1998 indicates that people want trust and respect, and to be valued and appreciated. It is largely accepted that there is a requirement to be authentic, and transparent in order to respond and deliver to these needs. This is why determining the what, the why and the where are so crucial. Without this the how takes precedence, and trust and respect are abused and people are neither valued nor appreciated.

Authenticity, what’s real and true, is lost and everything is reduced to a tactic instead of a principle. As much as people know, according to the Gallop survey, what they want, then they are very likely to recognize what they do not want as well. People can generally access when something is being done to them instead of with or for them. This too is transparent.

Remember, there is no shortcut to forming personal relationships. There are no fixed algorithms or formulas to use. If anyone tells you that they have definite methods or answers, without first spending any time looking at goals and the issues in getting to them, then a healthy skeptic’s early warning system should go off repeating loudly…

WARNING: Your Transparency is See Through

WARNING: Your Transparency is See Through is a post from: Social Media University

Social Media Revolution 2011

So What Exactly is All of the Buzz Regarding Social Media all About?

Griff — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 01:47:58 +0000

Well, it didn’t just start overnight and it’s not going away anytime soon.

I moved to the Netherlands in late 1989. Upon getting settled in Amsterdam one of the very first things I did was to ride a late night train to Berlin. Together with a group of college students and backpackers standing alongside Berliners and in the midst of military and police, I wielded a sledge hammer and broke off massive chunks of the Berlin Wall. I still have pieces of it in my office today.

The Soviet Union crumbled, East and West German reunified, the maps of central and eastern Europe were rewritten daily. The countries of the European Union opened up their borders to one another. The whole world changed. Then it happened.

First twenty four hour news, and then the Internet arrived. Hypertext Mark-up Language (HTML) became the native language of the World Wide Web (WWW). Internet Service Providers (ISP), domains, hosts and serving computers came into place. Websites were born. Email was introduced and has quickly become the largest form of communication ever known.

Suddenly information traveled faster and to more people than ever before in history. A world that was starved for information now had access to it. A new Information Era had emerged.

We’ve now grown from Bulletin Board Systems (BBS), Usenet newsgroups and Internet relay chat (IRC) to websites, online forums, instant messaging (IM) and blogs to social networking, communities and micro blogs. LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter are busily active and growing rapidly.

People today not only have access to information, they respond and contribute to it. The days where it was possible to tell people what to think, what to do and what to buy has passed away into the night. They (We) are no longer willing to have marketing and advertising pushed at them and business done to them. What people want is to have a voice and to be a part of the conversation.

Today’s tools for social media provide a means to engage one another and are the hottest innovations in internet marketing since search. Trends indicate this medium is poised for continued and exponential growth for years to come.

Let’s face it, social media is not a question of “if”, but rather of “when” you will get involved.

Social media is an integral part of life today. Let’s get onboard and see where it takes us. Better still, let’s join in the conversation, even lead in it, and a have a say so in creating the future ourselves.

So What Exactly is All of the Buzz Regarding Social Media all About? is a post from: Social Media University