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‎"A man is not finished when he is defeated. He is finished when he quits." -- President Richard Nixon (1913-94)

Social Media Advantage For Brands

Social media has become mainstream and as someone said: every media becoming social. I always think some brands and their attitudes to social media, content marketing, management. It is clear from every angle, except from view, that most brands are overlooking the "social" in front of the social media. This is what sets social media apart from other kinds of media. To excel in social media, you begin with cultivating a social media mindset. Most have not understood what this platform offers.

All that we are currently doing is majorly titled toward social media abuse which is based on advertising and shameless ego promotion. This affects corporate brands more though.

Most have concentrated mainly on mainstream traditional media. They have neglected or can we say they are unaware that the only way to survive in this time is a two-way communication media which embraces not only the traditional but online media platform. As we know, the current trend today is for brands to first learn about their brides-customers, get their attention through the use of social media platforms like blogging, Youtube, Xing, Facebook, Del.ici.ous, Bookmarking, RSS, Podcasting, videocasting, Wikis among many other available online media.

The evolution of these new media has opened up opportunity to seek opinion, interact, court, date and offers irresistible proposal that will hook the bride. Today customers are no longer buying one mode fits all offer by the traditional media. Some corporate brands here seem to hinge non-participation in online community building on such excuses that we are not yet online, neither are there recognized consumer fora which have major convergence of consumers online. Also no regulatory authority here pays attention to or gives any attention to whatever they have to say can. They also claim that online forums here have no impacts on corporate performance. Some also claim that social media is alien to us. My answer is that social media is not alien. The fact remains that many things had been part of us only that we do not accurately labeled them until the westerners help us out.

The idea of social media, content marketing is rooted in cultural rituals where a couple gets engaged before they could start dating. The process require that suitor's intention has to be established through family contacts, integrity checked and a cogent promised is made that he is interested in a serous relationship and not flings. Without these background checks, no one officially allows the intending couple to start dating. If this is violated then, the bride to be would be disciplined.

Drawing a parallel in this ancient ritual, the customers want the brand today to show that what matters is her, not money making. The customers want to be sure that out of arrays of suitors-products, services- your brand can take the initiative of starting a conversation, the customer wants to be sure your brand is not just flirting, looking out for short flings but a real relationship that will enhance her lifestyle. Brand through social media, content and social marketing set up a bate by loading the right words in their contents to convince, educate, entertain the bride that they are out to make her life better even before selling anything.

Customer wants to see how much of your intellectual property will be made available without charges. The customer wants to find out you are a giver. One of their love languages is gift sharing. A giver without string attached always takes the show. Social media, content marketing requires a lot of commitment. It takes time before social media and content marketing make huge impact. Any brand that can show high level of commitment in social media will always carry the day.

Typical case studies of brands with efficient use of social media include Tony Hseih. Tony followers in Twitter today is over one forty million. Hseih is the managing Director of Zappos.com. Tony through his 'tweet' has course to meet with customers at a bar while many in his position will rather hide under the guise of busy schedule. Tony uses Twitter to build interaction with customers; he uses twitter to solve problems for clients. The strength of Tony Hseih and Zappos communities has been used to strengthen relationships with Zappo's brand offline. Zappos client freely gives their ideas on what they want. This aids, leads to co- creation of brands products, services.

As busy as Richard Branson of Virgin group is, he also maintains a twitter account. He has used his twitter account to answer questions from angry customers as well as virgin potentials. The virgin group also has an integrated website that allows news update, blog among others. Southwest Airlines has used social media to build strong connection that impacts on the brand's offline interaction

A good example of the use of social media to spread messages and connection was recently demonstrated by Michael Jackson's personal doctor. As we are all aware, it was once insinuated that he killed Michael Jackson through drug overdose. About a week ago, he used Youtube video to spread his part of the case. This video spread across the internet as well as mainstream media. Popularity of virtual community has been soaring high with more people paying attention from academics and marketing communications practitioner discussing it in advance countries, yet Nigeria brands have assumed 'I do not care attitude'. Nations and brands are not considered backward just because of their location but based on attitudes, disposition to the use of technology that will aid progress. Building emotional connection, loyalty with the brand is becoming an easy thing through social media.

Social media has become a great platform to identify with, interact, communicate brand element. This often starts in online forum and lead to offline beneficial relationship. Today, nearly three billion of the seven billion potentials are now connected in social media platforms. Agreed the ratio is still slow here but the number is increasing daily. Through social media brands can ignite confidence in the hearts of the bride, build thought leadership. Your brand competitors may have better product, services but will surely lose out to you if you can build strong connection with them before you ask them to buy through massive advertisement.

If your brand can give away enough information, answers to concerns and prove that you are on the verge of seriously neglecting your own best interest, of tight schedules, in order to serve these greedy, needy brides that desire your brands become more open, honest with them which is the essence of social media. Social media do not allow cover ups, unnecessary protection of corporate brand's failures. I am of the opinion that if our banking industry's Managing Directors have been active in social media, there is possibility of gaining public sympathy instead of this anger, tantrum they are now receiving from various angles. Their followers would have been able to defend them and take appropriate position that may have given them soft landing in this trying period.

Since our brands have concentrated on one form of media, mainstream, tell me why should their brides not block out their useless bragging through advertising? Tell me why is it difficult for brands n our environment to see handwriting on the wall that their brides now desire their authentic voices that are not coloured with jargons of self- serving moneybags? The brands' brides are now also afraid; skeptical of marketing. Why should the brides be loyal when the element of trust is shaking?

Having established that let us now examine proper way of participating in social media which is now being exchanged for web.2.0. For brands to actively participate in social media, brands need to observe, listen, find clients' hibernating medium. In doing this, brand should first define its social media strategy through careful evaluation of brand's resources, analyze the target audience, and identify objectives. Having done this, brand must carefully pick or access platforms that fit their goals. This will inform the decision to run a blog or just to participate in other forums like Twitter, Facebook, discussion board, social media bookmarking, stumbleupon among others. Be sure you know that such platforms are used by your niche audience. Identify the top influencers of your industry online through recognitions given to their opinions, comments, awards etc.

To do this effectively, brand may consider creating the position of community or social media/knowledge management manager or hire consultant who has track records in skills like community management, online reputation management, monitoring, tracking, podcast, video cast, web links etc. These skills do not require a programmer's knowledge and in actual fact, they are used by customer relations, brand, and Public relations experts. The only requirement is passion that is backed with proven results. The said manger or consultant must also understands forum rules, reputation software, know how to distribute contents without creating offense as this may be counter productive. Great ability to create qualitative content for blogs, create profiles and claim such blogs in online directories is also essential. Social media, content marketing, management is seen as collection of open-sourced, interactive and user- controlled online application used to expand the experiences, knowledge and market power of the users as participants in business and social processes, the social media landscape is basically about conversation before any marketing campaign.

Brands must therefore consider Rajesh Setty's suggestion that it must demonstrate that your brand cares, is curious to find out what is the concern of the customers, contribute, make sure the content is worth their attention, clarify issues, build conversation that will lead to strong relationship, bring in a lot of creativity, demonstrate the brand's character and values cherished, build community, tribe, brings change, instill courage and be highly commitment to a cause its believe in.

Let me conclude this piece by highlighting how brand can start participate in social media and content marketing. Content marketing is an art of understanding what your customers' want, need to know and the science of delivering it to them in a useful and compelling way. The content has to be engaging in a useful and compelling way. To start, the brand has to build trust and credibility. This is huge work. This becomes easy if your brand can take time to listen to customers first. By that brand discovers their problems and the content is therefore tailored to provide solution.

Avoid talking too much about your brand or your expertise as much as I do know the fact that your brand need to establish the line that your brand is worth their attentions. This can make your brand's efforts become suspect. Your customers want educational content without initial marketing spin. The content also has to be compelling, entertaining to earn the scarcest entity on the wed- time/patience. Great content must guides, clarifies, enlightened and connect. The language of the content has to be in tune with your industry. Contents that solve problems drive traffic and increases sale rate.

Social media and content marketing make your clients see your brand as unique resource, trusted advisor and a brand that makes them look good. This will make them to gladly exchange their money and loyalties for your commitment to the relationship. When you have so much to give, they will not wait to tell others about your brand. There are some other factors that come into play here but let us conclude today's piece by saying that brand has several opportunities when it annexes the two way communication of mainstream and evolution of new media.

Yinka olaito is a Brand, Public relations expert and Social media advocate. He has gained over twelve years in the field. He is presently the chief consulting Officer Michael sage consulting, Lagos Nigeria. He authors The branding Gavel-http://www.yinkaolaito.com an award winning blog. This blogs has been rated as one of the Top 100 Branding Blogs in the world among others.

The Complete Novice's Guide to Social Media

Introduction

This article is intended to be a very straightforward guide to Social Media and everything that Social Media encompasses including blogs, social networks and forums etc. It is intended to introduce both newcomers and perhaps even some more experienced people to the world of social media.

So, what is Social Media?

So, what is this social media that has the Internet buzzing with excitement? Well, Wikipedia (an interesting form of social media in itself) describes it as:

"information content created by people using highly accessible and scalable publishing technologies that is intended to facilitate communications, influence and interaction with peers and with public audiences, typically via the Internet and mobile communications networks."

This can encompass not just text and information based services like blogs etc, it can also contain image and video based services such as Flickr and YouTube for example.

Social media instigates a sense of community, making users feel connected with each other through participation and communication via many forms of media. Technorati, a blog submission service, has over 133 million blogs indexed, displaying the staggering rise in popularity of people wanting to be heard and connect to each other.

Social Media and your Business

Social media can benefit any type of business and if approached correctly, can help build relationships with consumers and other companies through networking and raised awareness of your service.

With social media you can easily speak directly to your customers, using Twitter to gather feedback on customer satisfaction, raising awareness of a recently launched product through Digg or using YouTube to promote your move into a new office location for example.

An example of a company using social media in a great way is Starbucks. Starbucks created a whole new website and blog centred around customer suggestions for their service. A user would go onto the website and suggest a way Starbucks could improve, everyone registered on the website would then vote their favorite ideas and then Starbucks would post on their blog regarding which ideas they liked and how they would be actually implemented into the Starbucks service.

Companies are always thinking of better ways to run there service, social media gave Starbucks a way to connect with millions of existing customers and gave those customers an opportunity to build on the Starbucks service in a way only they could know how.

Burger King launched a Facebook application which encouraged users to 'sacrifice' 10 of their facebook friends in return for a free Whopper burger. It was taken down by Facebook not long after launch citing privacy concerns, however in the relatively short space of time the application was live, it gathered over 20,000 users and consequently over 200,000 friends were sacrificed in the name of free burgers. This social media example was well built, was easy to share and gave the user the incentive to network with friends which made it very popular in the short space of time it was available.

These are only two examples of successful social media solutions by companies on the Internet, companies like Sun, Ford, Dell and IBM are all currently reaping the benefits of using blogs, twitter accounts, Facebook pages and other social media tools to connect with customers and make there companies more transparent to consumers. Social media, blogs especially, aren't going to disappear overnight. They now act as invaluable customer service methods with the ability to conduct informal discussion with your customers and let them get to know more about you and your company in an inexpensive way.

Establishing a social media presence for your company gives you the ability to reach potentially millions of new customers through Facebook, Twitter, Digg etc, many of which may have been unreachable without a presence on these networks. Having profiles on the various social networks gives you the maximum potential to raise awareness of your brand, gain more visitors to your website and the capacity to convert those targeted visitors to customers.

Social Media in Numbers

2,000,000,000

searches through the Google search engine every day

1,360,652,987

tweets on Twitter as of March 2009

700,000,000

photos added to Facebook every month

900,000

blog posts every 24 hours

38,040

diggs the most popular bookmark on Digg has received in the last 12 months

412.3

years it would take to watch all of YouTube's content as of March 2008

13

hours of video uploaded to YouTube every minute

Social Media Forms

Although social media can come in many forms, it has its main ones:

Blogs

The most well known of 'obvious' social media forms. Blogs act as a frequently updated hub of contextual information where users can get involved and give their input through comments.

Forums

The oldest form of social media, in use before the term 'social media' was made popular. Internet forums act as areas for online discussion, usually centered around certain topics.

Content Communities

Content communities differ from usual forms of social media in that they allow people to share and use particular kinds of content that blogs and forums don't fully concentrate upon such as images (see Flickr), interesting bookmarks (see Digg and del.icio.us) and of course video (see YouTube).

Micro-blogging

A relevant newcomer in the social media world. Micro-blogging combines blogging and social networking in that it allows people to update small amounts of content online through web-based, desktop and also mobile clients (see Twitter).

Social Networks

Social networks such as Facebook, MySpace, Bebo etc allow the easy creation of personalised web page accounts that facilitates communication between users.

The Distribution of Social Media

People only have a certain amount of time to check their favorite websites, this mightn't even include blogs or social networks. Couple this with the fact that people seem to be working longer hours than ever these days and also using blackberrys and iPhones to work away from the office, and you're faced with a daunting task of attracting people to your blog or website.

One remedy to this has been the introduction of RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds. RSS feeds allow a user to effectively 'subscribe' to a website or blog, meaning they are notified through a newsreader when new content is available.

RSS saves people a lot of time when reading blogs and website updates, meaning communities can grow and become more valuable to both the user and author saving both parties time and money.

Social Networks

Joining a social network usually involves creating your own web page with information about yourself, be it personal, professional or otherwise and you then connect with other people on that network.

Although most of these networks are relatively young in their age, a selection of them are very popular and have changed the shape of the Internet for the near future at the very least.

MySpace

After launching in August 2003, MySpace became the most popular social networking website in the United States in mid 2006, attracting well over 100million account holders.

MySpace has largely built it's popularity based upon its comprehensive music service where bands can upload tracks directly to their profile for fans to listen to, even launching it's own record label to release music from MySpace upon.

Bebo

Bebo is a popular social networking tool with more emphasis on the younger user than its competitors. It is also geared towards colleges, schools and other educational institutes which is where Bebo has found it's niche. It was purchased by AOL in early 2008 for over £400million.

Facebook

First available to University students, facebook was opened up to the public (people over the age of 13) in 2006 and it's userbase has skyrocketed ever since.

The service allows you to join networks and groups of organisations, sports teams, location specific groups etc and also offers developers the chance to write applications for the service at no charge

Facbook currently has over 235million account users.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn has it's own niche in the social networking world in that it is targeted solely toward the working professional.

LinkedIn allows you to create your own career profile and network with past and present workmates and is mainly used for career-orientated networking and job / project searches.

LinkedIn has approximately 40million users.

Friends Reunited

Friends reunited is a social network based upon the theme of reuniting and connecting with former (and current) classmates. It is identified as the first social network to achieve prominence in Britain, surviving the dotcom bust.

Blogs

A blog (standing for web-log) is a type of website maintained by an individual or company that is commonly updated with news on latest events, opinions, reviews and any other material the author deems worth of publishing.

With recent developments in blog hosting technology, it's possible for anyone with a basic knowledge of the internet to create and run their own blog using platforms such as WordPress and blogger.

Topics

The reason blogs are so popular on the Internet is because they act as a hub of information for any given topic. This can include website design articles (see a list apart), celebrity news (see TMZ), politics (see Huffington Post) and technology news (see techcrunch).

Although some blogs contain posts around a number of topics, the most popular ones have a defined theme and user base.

Comments

Almost all blogs have a comments structure in place allowing readers to submit their views on that blog or article. Comments act as a networking tool in itself, with many people growing the reader-base of their own blog or website through the clicks they receive from commenting on other peoples blogs.

Forums

The Internet forum is the relative grandparent of the social media family, evolving from the bulletin board style of networking which was popular in the early years of the Internet.

Like blogs, forums can be about any number of topics and attract people mainly looking for information and discussion around a particular theme or subject. Where the two mediums differ are that whereas blogs are usually the views / news from one individual or company, forums act as a discussion venue where many discussions are ongoing at once in different locations called 'threads'. Also, a blog has a clear owner, again that may be an individual or company depending on the blog itself but a forum is effectively ran by its members.

Many forums have been running from the early days of the Internet and have thus gathered a huge amount of members, Gaia Online has over 16million registered members and is one of the most popular on the Internet.

Content Communities

Content communities don't particularly adhere to typical social network frameworks, as they aren't particularly intended for networking between people using the usual means. Two examples of this are Flickr and YouTube.

Flickr

Flickr is an image and video hosting website where people can create a personal account and upload photos they have taken. It's also used by bloggers and webmasters as an online photo storage system, where they can host all of their images in a searchable database. As of late 2008, it is claimed that Flickr holds more than 3billion images.

The social aspect of Flickr comes into play through the creation of various subject-orientated groups where users can comment on relevant images that have been uploaded.

YouTube

Youtube is the largest video hosting website on the Internet with well over 120million videos currently hosted through its service. Youtube members can upload their own footage, create channels / playlists of their favourite videos and share them with friends.

Youtube has quickly become one of the largest websites in the history of the Internet with more than 6billion videos viewed on the service in January 2009 alone. Before the public launch of YouTube in 2005, there were very few methods of video-orientated social networking available via the Internet, YouTube changed this with the ability for its users to dictate its content through the uploading of personal video.

Microblogging

Microblogging is the latest in the way of social networking, combining blogging, instant messaging and the popular status updates of the Facebook service into one neat package.

Popular microblogging services such as Twitter allow a small (in Twitters case, no more than140 characters) text based 'update' to be published on your twitter page and to those who are 'following' you.

Although it is a web based format, over 90% of 'tweet's published via twitter are by mobile, desktop or instant messaging applications. Twitter is largely used by the web industry as a way of passing useful links to one another, as well as a very quick and easy networking tool between account followers.

It has recently began to attract a lot of press attention due to the amount of well known people using the service. President Obama used Twitter in the run up to the election to keep voters informed of his campaign, connecting to a completely new audience to previous candidates.

Conclusion

Although Social Media is a relatively new factor on the Internet, the advances we have seen in a short space of time have been staggering. Two to three years ago MySpace was the service everyone was using to connect with each other, who would have predicted that within 24 months there would have been a service in Facebook that overtook it as the Internets leading social networking tool.

The future of social media is an exciting one, and we could see some interesting developments even in the short term such as the adoption of the mobile social network. Although a lot of people are using Social Media on mobile phones already, this number is expected to increase significantly in the near future with the development of more and more clients for social networks on mobile phones.

Social media is expected to evolve and grow into exciting new services and shows no signs of dissapearing any time soon. The potential for growth and monetary gain for businesses is too great for them to ignore social media, helping spread news of services and offers to hundreds, if not thousands, of friends in an instant. Some companies aim for that kind of promotion and never reach it, some pay millions to get it, with social media, it is in everyones grasp.

A company that neglects both social media and the benefits of search engine optimisation is shielding its services away from millions of potential customers.

Opening your company up to social media services allows you to connect instantly with new people, couple this with a comprehensive search engine optimisation plan and you are in a perfect position to attract new customers and network inexpensively.

Well that's it for our guide to Social Media, grab yourself a cup of tea (or coffee if you're that way inclined) and relax.

web design newcastle

Simple Tricks to Make Your Site More Social Media Ready

Once thought to be a passing fad, and although still relatively new, social media is now taking a firm hold and warrants attention in many retailers' online marketing efforts.

You can't avoid it. No matter where you turn it seems you hear terms like "fan page", "followers", "tweet", "re-tweet", "blog" and more being used. With all the social media hype, many are questioning what social media actually is and how they can use it to move their business forward.

In this article I am going to explain what social media is, provide some strategies for making your site more social media friendly, touch upon differences between options presented by major social media outlets, and answer the question of whether you should do it yourself, or hire a consultant to do it for you.

Social Media can be time consuming, but when implemented correctly can add a level to your business that helps build brand loyalty, and awareness which in turn can boost your bottom line.

What is Social Media?

Wikipedia defines social media as: media designed to be disseminated through social interaction, created using highly accessible and scalable publishing techniques. Social media uses Internet and web-based technologies to transform broadcast media monologues (one to many) into social media dialogues (many to many). It supports the democratization of knowledge and information, transforming people from content consumers into content producers.

In other words, it is a group of Internet-based applications that utilize new web concepts to promote user generated content.

Examples of some of the major social applications currently online are Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube.

Twitter can be seen as a "micro blog" type service that enables you to post short messages of up to 140 characters that are fed in real time to your followers. Facebook is more of a "publishing" platform which enables you to create a page that integrates multiple media options into one (i.e. discussion boards, blogs, photos, shopping carts, etc...) YouTube is a service that enables you to produce video content to the masses (possibly to demonstrate the use of your product.)

The power and uniqueness of each provides pros and cons. Because Facebook has a little more of a learning curve to it and because it has a number of options to choose from, I'll briefly touch upon that below.

Simple Tricks to Make Your Site More Social Media Friendly

Whether or not you're on social media platforms or not, odds are you're customers are. They're sharing your URL with their friends on social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or MySpace.

If you want to engage in social media marketing, you'll want to be sure to have that presence reflected on your e-commerce site.

Social Sharing

There are dozens of sites you can visit that will provide embeddable code which can be used to create social networking icons on your site. These icons make it easy for visitors to share what they like about your site with their social media friends and followers.

A couple of sites worth checking out are ShareThis. ShareThis is a tool you can install on your site that makes it easier for visitors to share with their network. You've probably seen some form of ShareThis on news sites. There are typically several icons spread out in a horizontal line or grouped together under a header of "Share." Installing this tool lets your visitors easily spread the word via social networking sites about a page or website - yours - they like.

Add This is very similar to ShareThis. Both require site registration and a little publisher information, but both are also easy to use and do basically the same thing.

Show off your Social Media presence

If you're on several social networking sites, it behooves you to display that affiliation somewhere on your site. For the consummate online shopper, these links show you're not just an e-commerce beginner. The more social media sites you're a part of, the more web-knowledgeable you look and the greater brand awareness you can build.

You can display your social media links either in self-created sidebar module or by using sites like Lijit ( http://www.lijit.com ). Lijit is similar to ShareThis; however, rather than pushing people out social networking sites, Lijit pulls them into your other sites.

Facebook Fan Page or Group?

A question that often gets asked when it comes to Facebook and brands is should you build a Facebook Group Page or a Fan Page?

It is a good question and the answer depends mostly on what your plans are for your site. I've broken down the pros and cons of both a fan page versus a group page below.

Facebook Fan Page

Facebook Fan Pages are a great option for brands - including e-commerce sites - that plan on posting information at least once a week.

Facebook Fan Page Pro's:

* Looks polished; closely resembles an individual profile page

* Can include videos, photos, links, events, etc.

* Can be fed into "fans'" update stream similar to an individual profile update

* Can be given a customized url similar to an individual profile

* Hides the name and address of the page creator

* Offers options to add applications such as a Twitter feed

* Includes a "wall" similar to individual profiles that people can post comments on

* Can be paired with a Facebook Fan Page Widget on your site

Facebook Fan Page Con's:

* More difficult to manage conversations between fans

* Conversations are on display for the public to see

* Unable to convert Facebook Groups to Fan Pages if you've already got a Group page set up

* Until you have an adequate number of fans, you'll be posting a lot

* A dismal Fan Page linked to your site can hurt your inbound links in SEO

Facebook Group Page

Facebook Group pages are easy to create and slightly more personal than a Fan Page. Because it is not a constantly fed profile-like page, posts do not need to be as often.

Facebook Group Pro's

* Can be more intimate; people see who created the group

* Still allows for pictures, photos, videos, events, etc. to be posted

* Allows for emails to be sent to all group members

* Pre-dates Fan Pages; more familiarity among early adopters of Facebook

Facebook Group Con's

* Visitors must visit your group page for updates

* Does not allow applications to be added to the group page

* Offers visibility

* Will automatically post related groups to your group page whether you want them or not

* Cannot be linked to your site via widget(s)

The Verdict? Consider a Facebook Fan Page if you want to keep your "fans" up to date on the goings on of your site. Consider a Group if you have a niche within your site that people might want to create conversations about.

Should You Hire a Social Media Consultant for Your Site?

With the hundreds of social sites and applications available, it's easy to get overwhelmed. When you're already trying to keep your e-commerce business afloat, social media can seem unnecessary and time-consuming.

Research has shown, however, that e-commerce retailers are reaping the benefits of this new media channel (i.e., offering better customer service and increased sales) so it pays to use it.

Not everyone is social media savvy nor do they have the time which is why a lot of companies hire consultants to help them with their campaigns.

Do you need a consultant or should you do your own work?

When to hire a social media consultant:

* If you really do not have the time to commit to a social marketing campaign.

* If you don't have the time to learn the ins and outs of social applications.

* If you don't consider yourself a strong writer and/or interactive with your audience.

* If you want to launch a large social media campaign and need experts to help get things off the ground.

* If you tend to defer project work to experts rather than attempt to try it yourself.

When to do your own social media work:

* If you're familiar with social media sites (like YouTube, Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook) and use them on a personal basis.

* If you're a quick-learner and tech-savvy.

* If you're planning a small campaign with only one or two social sites.

* If you have content ready to post on a blog (or Twitter, Facebook, etc.)

Note: Social media consultants tend to pay per project or per hour depending on their rates and availability.

What We've Learned

Social media seems to be here to stay. It most certainly will evolve and change as time goes, but you can be sure that in one form or another social media will continue. It's much like the TV or radio were when they began and the power it harnesses for those who use it will shine through.

It can bring awareness to your product or brand and help you build a stronger relationship with your customers which can lead to greater sales and future growth for your business.

Having said that, keep in mind that social media can be time consuming and integrating a social media marketing campaign into your business should not be taken lightly. Proper planning and implementation is critical to your success-you may even want to consider hiring an expert to handle it for you. This will largely depend on your needs, budget, and time you have to allocate your own resources to getting the job done in-house.

When it comes to Facebook and the choice between creating a Fan Page or a Group, you'll want to consider your objective before you determine which is best for you. Fan Pages are best for pushing brands and for ecommerce sites that can commit to posting at least once per week. Consider a Facebook Group if you want a more personal touch and if you can't commit to posting at least once per week.

Integrating social media into your site is easy. There are sites that provide the code and icons for you to simply paste into your web structure. Once you are utilizing social media make sure you display it on your site so customers know where to find you.

Remember, social media is a tool that can push your business and brand forward. Plan carefully and choose wisely. Like those that harnessed the power of TV and radio, social media adopters will see the benefits with time.

Eric Leuenberger is an ecommerce conversion expert and author of a leading Ecommerce blog at http://www.zencartoptimization.com. His online coaching system, Ecommerce Amplifier http://www.ecommerceamplifier.com, helps you increase your ecommerce sales by walking you through his proven six step process. He has helped store owners generate over $10 Million in revenue and counting. Will you be next?

Social Media As an Investment

In its brief history, Social Media, as called New Media, has traditionally been viewed as a place to meet new friends, reconnect with old friends and interact in an online social environment. In short, social networks were "a cool place to hang out" but held little applicability beyond that. There has been no shortage of funding in Silicon Valley for firms launching new media platforms. With the emergence of sites like MySpace, Facebook and Twitter, there is no question that there is value in the vast amounts of information on people that these platforms have been able to collect; however, there has been no clear monetization strategy beyond bringing in advertising revenue. Arguments have been risen as to the true value of these firms; some would state that their valuations are inflated and artificial, while other claim that the value of their databases alone are enough to justify multi-billion dollar price tags.

The New Value of Social Media and The Social Media Firm

More recently social media has spawned a new value proposition, which is the business applicability of the vast user-bases these social networks have created. Regardless of which side of the valuation fence you sit on, it can be said that social media holds vast utility for businesses looking for a new way to reach out to customers and engage in two-way communications. This has never been done before from a traditional marketing, advertising or public relations perspective, and has given rise to a new business model: The Social Media Firm. This brings forth the argument of whether or not The Social Media Firm is a good investment. Is The Social Media Firm a fad that will die out in the coming years, or is this a long-term, sustainable industry that will one-day drive obsolescence to the traditional methods of advertising, public relations and marketing?

Given the state of the current economy, Venture Capital and angel funding sources have been keeping their portfolio dollars close to their chest, reserving investment only to businesses with a decent operating history, solid revenue streams and unlimited growth potential. Does the Social Media Firm fall into this category? My answer is yes. The bottom line is: social media is not going anywhere. Social media has become a staple of the lives of younger generations, and the fastest growing adopters of new media are people over the age of 30. Since the recognition of the business potential that social networks holds, large Fortune 500 firms are devoting a good portion of their marketing budgets to social networks and new media campaigns. For instance, Pepsi has devoted $20 Million of their marketing budget for a social media program called Pepsi refresh, and many large firms are beginning to follow suit. Needless to say, the earning potential for The New Media Firm is substantial.

Is it sustainable?

As mentioned earlier, new media is not going anywhere. For the most part it has become a standard part of the Internet experience similar to email. The sites that are considered the gorillas in social media may churn; however, there will always be something new to which these Internet-based communities will migrate. For example, the social media migration to-date has gone from MySpace to Facebook to Twitter, and the next major shift and/or addition to this massive online social sphere is likely just around the corner. The long-term sustainability of The Social Media Firm is largely dependent upon these companies' ability to identify and pre-empt the next big shift, and to develop effective methods of leveraging both the old and new platforms for the sake of driving revenue, profitability, sales volume and identity to their clients.

Why Outsource to The Social Media Firm?

One question that may arise is: why would large companies hire a social media agency when they have the monetary resources to do it in-house? The answer to this is the simple fact that it is cheaper to outsource a new media campaign to a firm that has a skilled team already in place that is intimately familiar with navigating the complex world of new media. In the same manner that large companies hire advertising agencies to design traditional media campaigns, this approach can and will be taken for new media. By hiring The New Media Firm companies can eliminate both the administrative burden that comes with hiring a multitude of new employees, as well as the learning curve that will inevitably be present when trying to integrate those employees into their corporate culture. It is more cost effective, in both monetary and administrative respects, to outsource these campaigns to professional teams that are fully adept at leveraging the potential of modern media, navigating the codes of conduct of these online communities and staying ahead of the curve when it comes to identifying the exploiting the latest new media trends.

Closing Remarks

In summary, I do believe that investment in The Social Media Firm holds great potential for many funds; however, it is imperative that when vetting these agencies, Venture Capitalists and Angels need to ensure that the company contains the correct personnel and management team to fully exploit this budding industry. The ditch is full of one-man shops and so-called social media experts that are no more than victims of the recession who happen to be adept at Facebook or Twitter. It is imperative that the architects of new media campaigns are familiar with the intricate details of new media, and the vast array of assets that exist online to for a business to take full advantage of the social media world. Utilization of the lesser known social media outlets such as Digg, BrightKite, hi5, Xanga and countless others could be the difference between a full-scale robust campaign that shows real results, and an ineffective and unorganized attempt at new media that wastes marketing dollars.

Due to the infancy of this industry, there are few companies out there that truly know how to unlock the value of new media for business. The one's that do will quickly rise to the top, and if sufficient due diligence is done, these companies are ripe for investment. A strategic infusion of capital is likely the boost needed to take these companies from a sustainable cash-flow business to the next industry giant with A-list clientele.

Boom Media, Inc. is a new media optimization firm based in San Diego, California. New Media is the culmination of all online assets (such as social networking, blogs, micro-blogs, bookmarking and video sites) and tactics that can be used to drive revenue and identity for businesses. With a proven track record for success, the Boom Media team delivers results with innovative and measurable campaigns. Learn more at http://www.mymediaboom.com

Social Media Marketing - 11 of the Most Critical Words to Use in Social Media in 2009

Conversation.

Yep- that is what the core focus is in Social Media.

Ok- let's get REAL. If Social Media marketing is about conversation, then should there not be words that fit in to what the culture of social media is all about? Should not you paint a picture with your words? Should your words not elicit feelings and emotions?

Of course they should.

Words are a marketer's tool box. Here are 11 you need

1) "YOU."

There is nothing more powerful to a person reading a message or conversation that has the word YOU in it, over and over. Many people have an "I" mentality, and in social media, you are not the deal. The other person or side of the conversation is.

There are 2 forms of conversation in social media::

a) "Contribution" and b) "Distribution."

" Contribution conversations" contribute to the whole, and add Value to the conversation. "Distribution conversation" distributes the message/agenda you want- and has little inclusion of someone else. Contribution words use YOU many times. Distribution words use "I" or 'Me" many times. Use the word YOU and become a Contribution Agent in social media, not a distribution rookie.

2) "A Person's Name."

Duh. There is nothing more beautiful to a person than their name. This is a given. I am surprised how many tweets, notes, and messages i get and also read that do not say the person's name. Use their name at least once in every communication and message as it adds to the conversation.

And also, a person will retain almost 70% more of what a message says, if their name is within the first 3 words. Chris Brogan is a master at this. I have seen and studied him, and every time he tweets or sends a message- usually the name is the first word.

Smart. VERY smart. we all should follow that lead.

3) "Connection."

This word is an indication that you want to connect and start a relationship of some kind and create an ongoing conversation. Many folks use the phrase "get together" or "meet up" or "network." These words are good- but CONNECT has a power within the word.

Electricity us usable when you connect to it. Same thing as a battery in a car which powers the car. And idea is only powerful when you CONNECT to it. The Power is in the Connection-when 2 things come together. It is the same in new relationships- it is all about CONNECTION.

4) "Tribes.'

This is an interesting word. Seth Godin has a cool book called "Tribes." I suggest that you read it. But as far as a word for the social media arena, it is a word that helps define that you are within the culture and understand the community aspects of what social media is about.

In tribes around the world, it is all about community and belonging to that community. It is the same in social media. Recently I described the community we are building within a project as an "empowered tribe" and some people got it- and well, others did not.

Make sure if they do not understand the concept of tribes, then you explain it.

5) "Transparent."

In social media, being REAL is critical. And part of being REAL is being open and transparent. I love it when I read statements like "full disclosure" and people are disclosing that they have an interest or are on some board of a company they are talking about. THAT is so rocking hot. It shows that they are being transparent and nothing to hide and telling the truth.

And that is what social media is about in many respects- TRUTH about you- and what you are and do. THAT is transparency. Use that word when talking about the truth. Just being "transparent" - that says a lot in one word about you.

6) "Strategy."

Social media without a strategy for it, is like building a house without a blueprint. You need to develop, plan, start, and execute a strategy for your social media success. We call it a "Social Media Path." What PATH do you plan on developing for your business, and how will that fit into your current model of business? What will be your Primary social media Platform, and what will be your secondary platforms?

PATH stands for "Purpose- Actions-Tracking-How." what is your PURPOSE for integrating social media into your business? Marketing? Prospecting? Client communication? Customer service? What ACTIONS will it take? Videos? Blogs? Podcasts? Social Networking? What TRACKING system will you use to keep the platforms at maximum pace? And HOW are you going to Execute the Actions? Through employees? Through outsourcing? Through a combination?

Strategy is a word that you just talk about. You need one. And so do others that you know as well.

7) "Branding."

This word has been around for a while. But you still need it in your focus and communication. Branding is a word that you need to utilize not only in your messages, but your focus as well.

YOU are the Brand is a popular way to discuss social media marketplace image making. But that is not totally true. The PERCEPTION of you is the brand you are building- good or not so good. So make sure that if you use this word in social media this year, you realize that PERCEPTION Rules in Branding.

Brand yourself in the marketplace. But make sure that you focus on the VIEW and FEELINGS people have of you and experience when they think of you and what you do- and not just some catchy slogan or icon.

8 "Trust."

You need to be an Agent of Trust. Chris Brogan has a book coming out called "Trust Agents." Should be a rocking hot book. What about you? Are you an Agent of Trust? Just like a Real Estate Agent markets real estate, you market Trust in all you do. That is the real estate of the heart.

I like to get that word out there quickly-as i believe that people i do not know, that is on their mind. "Can I trust this guy?" And I usually message something like, "Our company helps build leaders and businesses through concepts and ideas that people can trust and feel good about."

THAT is using the word Trust- to build trust.

9) "Family."

Some people use "network." Some use "team." Some use the word "community." Some use the word "friends." I like the word "Family." it is personal, powerful, and paints a picture of what social media really is building- a family that can help, be there for each other, educate, equip, and empower for greater good.

One thing that I do- and again- just an idea, I welcome everyone on Facebook or twitter or YouTube or any other social connection with "Welcome to the family!" This says so much more than "thanks for following me" or "appreciate the connection." We ARE family- and I hope and pray it stays that way.

10) "Value."

It is ALL about Value. It is all about the VALUE that YOU bring to the table. It is all about the VALUE of your conversations and contributions.

And it is ALL about the VALUE that you help others see within themselves. Edify. Encourage. Empower. And become a "Carrier of Value" to everyone you meet in social media and GIVE some Value to them.

11) "GIVE."

This is the MOST important word. GIVE. Why? In social media, it is not the same ol business methodology. It is Biblical- if you will. "Give first- and what you give- you reap." Giving is the culture of social Media. Why do you think that people give so much rocking hot info on their blogs?

Giving is a Power. It is something that not only is part of the evolving culture of social media, but also the CATALYST of much of what social media has already become. if you are a marketer, New Marketing can be almost threatening to you as it flies in the face of traditional marketing- or does it?

No- not really. It is simply marketing that puts PEOPLE FIRST- not profits. It put RELATIONSHIPS FIRST- not results. And it puts GIVING FIRST- not grabbing for their checkbook.

These are the 11 Critical words that I believe should be included in 2009 in your:

1) Social Media Philosophy.

2) Social Media Conversations.

3) Social Media Marketing Actions.

4) Social Media Core.

If you do, your Success should be rapid in social media marketing.

blessings... Doug Firebaugh

Doug Firebaugh is one of the Top Social Media strategists, MLM, Network Marketing Home Business Trainers, Speakers and Authors in the world. Over a Million people a month read his training letter. He has helped over 10,000 people worldwide earn in excess of 50,000 a year. He wants to help you do the same. You can subscribe to his Free training letter -which includes 3 Free gifts just for subscribing at http://www.passionfire.com

Social Media Marketing - The Top 10 Mistakes People Will Make in Social Media in 2009

Here we go again! Another year and another great possibility! With the election of Obama to the presidency, there is Hope and all are looking for a great future.

But I am sitting here thinking of all the folks in social Media that are going to be frustrated again in their social Media marketing efforts. wondering why they are not getting the traction or friends that they thought they should. And the main reason is that they continue to make the same mistakes in Social Media as last year.

Are YOU going to do that- I sure hope not. You may not have the power of a Robert Scoble, or the personality of a Gary Vanyerchuck, or the mind of a Chris Brogan, or the networking focus of a Mari Smith or Coach Deb Micek. Or even the amazing writing talent of a Scott Monty.

At least not yet.

But you CAN accelerate your Social Media Success this year by avoiding these top 10 mistakes made by people in Social media in 2009.

Ok...what are they?

1) Lack of Consistent Visibility.

You cannot make a path and create a presence in Social Media, without CONSISTENTLY being SEEN and HEARD with your message. Ask Carrie Wilkerson. Or Timothy Carter. NOT going to happen. That is why that you MUST create a Presence on the web DAILY- and be seen and heard as part of the community. A tree does not grow part time. It must be consistent in it's efforts. It is the same with your Social Media marketing.

2) Focusing too much on being heard.

LISTEN first- THEN talk. Social Media is about Listening to what is being said- by your prospects and customers- and social media in general. You would never enter a party or social event and immediately start yelling out what you wanted to talk about.

Neither should you in Social Media. LISTEN and then LEARN- and then Let your voice be heard- ONLY as a part of the existing conversation. Your time to start the conversation will come.

3) Taking, instead of GIVING to the Social Media Community.

Ahhhhh- lots of takers out in the Web 2,0 world. But NOT YOU. GIVE first. Give Value. Give Suggestions. Give Advice. Give ideas. Give Encouragement. Give News. Give New Possibilities. Give Words of Gratitude. But do NOT take relentlessly. You will be shunned and labeled as such.

If you REALLY want to create powerful influence- GIVE. How does that work?

GIVE = Gain Influence Very Easily. Give FIRST - and you will never come in Second.

4) Not Joining groups.

Groups are where you can have some of the greatest growth and learning. I belong to a ton of groups. Why? Because of 2 reasons: 1) I learn a lot from other people. 2) I CONNECT with the folks in the group.

Groups are a "secret weapon" that you should use on as many social sites as you can. They will not only Enlarge you- but also the possibilities that the group can bring to your life.

5) Not attending Events.

Events ROCK. And you should be attending at least 1 event a week to do 2 things: 1) Become more Visible. 2) To learn from people that know things you do not.

Events are what i call the "Hidden University" of social Media. You can learn a LOT and grow a lot from events.

Look at the events that interest you. And pick on event that mildly interests you. And see if you can learn something even from that event. I have an event journal. and every event that i attend- i keep a log of what was said so i can review it later. You may want to do the same.

6) Not enough VALUE in what they are doing.

Value RULES in Social Media. And we train on what we call "Surprising Value." This is the type of Value that is so great and unexpected that it surprises the person that discovers it. Put More Value in your POSTS. Put more Value in your PODCASTS. Put more Value in your Conversations. Put more Value in your Articles. Put More Value in your Recommendations. Put More Value in YOU and what you bring to the Social Media table.

Value RULES. And the one with the MOST value at the end of the day- reigns.

7) Joining Too Many Social Media sites.

There are about 3,600 Social Media sites. You need maybe 5-7. You read that right. You need 5-7 PRIMARY Social Sites. Then you need maybe 25-30, or even 50 Secondary sites for Link Building and traffic purposes. The main sites that you should be a part of- is up to you. My 'Big 73 are Facebook, Twitter, youTube, LinkedIn, Stumbleupon, Plaxo, and WordPress - along with mashable. These are the CORE of my Social Media Marketing.

Do I belong to more? Heavens yes- a LOT more' but have automated those through ping.fm and other social software.

Do NOT try and be seen on a hundred sites. Facebook alone can keep you busy with over 200 million people. The same with MySpace, or Friendster. Master ONE site while mastering social media and then another, and then another, until you have YOUR "Big 7." And then automate the rest.

8) Focusing too much on Monetizing Social Media.

Nothing wrong with monetization on the internet. We do it a LOT- and daily. But focusing too much on that in social media- is , well...not cool. People do not mind knowing about an offer, or new info product. But how about giving some VALUE first with it- then invite them to an event- and then at the end of the conference call or webinar-give them a chance to purchase your product.

What do I see daily? URLs and messages SELLING SELLING SELLING! Whew- wish that would not happen so blatantly. It has gotten better, but if you have a great content rich info product- here is a novel idea: GIVE part of the info away FIRST and let the person ASK you for the product if they like it.

Hmmm....that just might be an idea worth considering.

9) Thinking that You are Nobody and Social Media Success is for other people.

Ask Chris Brogan. Ask Scott Monty. Ask Alejandro Reyes. Ask Brian Solis. Ask Dave Taylor. Ask Shama Hyder. EVRYONE has a great possibility to becoming SOMEBODY in Social Media. THAT is the beauty of the culture. Everyone who contributes Value and Connection- is more than welcome to achieve whatever they want. Chris Brogan once had 10 readers of his blog. Now he has almost 40,000 people following him on twitter alone. Brian Clark of copyblogger fame once had 10 readers. So did Scoble. So did Monty. So did Shama. And the list is endless.

There is GREATNESS inside of you-and there is NO BETTER place than Social Media to unleash it upon the world. You ARE Somebody- and always have been. YOU are a Social Media Rockstar- in training!

10) Not Branding Yourself Strong Enough.

Branding is a tool that we all use in Social Media. It is WHO YOU ARE- and what people remember about you. It could be a phrase-"Just Do It (TM)"- or a slogan- ""We've Got You Covered." Or even a questions- "Can You Hear me Now?" or just a Name-"Trump."

You need to get a slogan or phrase that you can start wrapping in your messages. You need to get an image that speaks what you want the public to see and know. And you need to decide -what is the ONE THING I want people to think of FIRST- when they think of me and my company? THAT is the start of a good brand build. Do not be just another face in the web 2.0 world. Set yourself apart and above the fray with a brand that rocks. We teach what is called "Connection Branding" and we have saying:

"Do NOT just be known or remembered- become UNFORGETTABLE." "

THAT is what you need to do!

These are the top 10 mistakes people will make in Social Media in 2009. Yes, i Know there are others- but these are the ones that i see as the most prevalent in Social Media marketing.

blessings..doug firebaugh

Doug Firebaugh is one of the Top Social Media strategists, MLM, Network Marketing Home Business Trainers, Speakers and Authors in the world. Over a Million people a month read his training letter.He has helped over 10,000 people worldwide earn in excess of 50,000 a year. He wants to help you do the same. You can subscribe to his FR-ee training letter -which includes 3 FR-ee gifts just for subscribing at http://www.passionfire.com

Tips on Writing an Effective Social Media Marketing Request For Proposal (RFP)

About a year ago, I wrote an article with guidelines on writing a website design and development Request for Proposal (RFP), which received a great response. Now I think it's high time to do the same thing for those wishing to engage an agency for Social Media Marketing and other Online Marketing and Advertising consultation and implementation.

Below are my suggestions of how to prepare an RFP for social media projects, retainers and campaigns. I also suggest doing research online and viewing other Request for Proposals to see what works best for your organization. Keep in mind that whatever format you choose will determine not only how long the responses are, but also what type of focus you are looking for from the respondents. Each section of the RFP is outlined below, along with some explanation and suggested questions. Have fun!

Information about your organization and project

Introduction

The purpose of this section is to give a brief overview of the company issuing the RFP and the social media project or desired work relationship between the company and the vendor. Provide as much information as you feel is necessary to allow vendors to prepare an accurate proposal. If you feel that there is certain proprietary or other information that you do not wish to make public, require a Non Disclosure Agreement be signed before receiving that information. This may limit the participation of vendors, but it is oftentimes necessary to protect private information.

1. Company Overview

Organizational history
Your business objectives
Your company's history using social media or reasons why your organization intends to begin to participate in social media

2. Overview of Project

State the project objectives and how they relate to the business objectives stated above. Explain the type of vendor relationship desired i.e. Project-based, Agency of Record, etc. Explain the current involvement your organization has with social media channels and how they relate to both your organization's primary presence and any related campaigns
Explain the social media channels you wish the campaign to involve, unless you are looking for suggestions of which to use, then please specify that to the vendors
Explain how the project fits into your overall marketing strategy (online and offline) and if there is another vendor involved in other aspects of your Advertising and Marketing initiatives
Explain the measurable outcomes you would like to see
Explain the duration of the work - is it a temporary campaign, or an ongoing organizational marketing platform?

3. Overview of Audiences and Stakeholders

List primary audiences for the company, i.e. demographics, psychographics, etc
List primary information needs of each audience group
Identify if any market or audience research will be necessary in the execution of the campaign

4. Overview of Response

Make it clear the type of response you are looking for:
Are you looking for a hypothetical approach, or an explanation of the vendor's process of how they will come to create your campaign. Many times a hypothetical approach is not the best way to approach an RFP process simply because a vendor will be missing several key pieces of information that might negatively affect their ability to propose a specific solution. We suggest looking for more general responses and weighing the effectiveness of past client work heavily

Guidelines for Proposal Preparation

In order to give all qualified vendors a level playing field, it's important to set up an easy to follow schedule for both when your RFP is issued, when and to whom questions are allowed, and when and in what format responses are required
Specify the date the RFP was issued (Month, Day, Year). If your RFP is publicly listed, it will help those searching for RFPs on Google or by other methods to find relevant Request for Proposals
An optional requirement is to specify that all interested vendors register their intent to submit a proposal by a certain date - usually within 1-2 weeks of the RFP issue. This is a good way to limit the potential number of vendors who respond if you anticipate a large volume of proposals and would rather receive a smaller amount
We recommend allowing a question and answer period that ends at least 1 week before the proposal is due. It is up to you whether to allow questions by email, conference call or individual phone calls. We do recommend that you share all the questions (and answers) with all interested vendors in order to keep things as equal as possible. Always specify which format -phone call, email, and to whom these questions should be addressed. We recommend identifying a single person in your organization to be the point of contact. Just make sure vacation schedules, etc don't interfere with this process, and if there is any other reason why the primary point of contact might need to be out of town during the process, specify a secondary point of contact
Responses from issuer to be sent by 20XX in the following formats (specify whether electronic submissions, hard copies or both must be either emailed, mailed or hand-delivered)
On the basis of the replies to the RFP document, a short list of potential vendors will be selected and this group will be asked to present demonstrations of their capabilities and vision for the project. These meetings will be completed by XXth, 20XX
Awarding of the contract to selected Vendor by XXth, 20XX
Work to commence by 20XX and to last until (if applicable)

Vendor Questions and Qualifications

The following is a series of questions that, if applicable, we suggest you ask the vendors submitting proposals. Some may not apply, but it is a great idea to get as much of an idea of the vendor's approach and philosophy on social media as possible. Compare the responses both among each other, and to the research and reading that you have done to make sure that the vendor is up to date with the latest thinking and best practices.

COMPANY DETAILS

Company name and parent company name
Ownership structure
Years in operation
Mailing address (headquarters)
Other office location(s)
Primary phone
Fax number
Website and blog URL
Primary point of contact (name, title, phone and email address)
Total number of employees
Number of vendor employees whose primary function is social media
Current client list with those engaged in social media work identified
Percentage of total revenue that is social-media related
Three references for social media work including; company name, primary client name, contact details and brief explanation of services provided
Any potential conflicts with existing vendor client base and this RFP
Senior social media staff bios and links to social media profiles where applicable
Please provide a complete list of relevant social media platform and technology partners
References from clients currently engaged in social media work with the vendor

CAPABILITIES & EXPERIENCE

List all social media and online marketing capabilities
Do you have any proprietary tools or products related to social media?
Please list any experience you have with integrating social, paid and/or earned media
Is there a specific industry or type of work your firm specializes in?
Please list and provide links to primary social media communication channels for your company (i.e.company blog,Twitter account, Facebook group, blogs authored by principals, etc.)

SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING STRATEGY

Please outline your social media strategy process
Which stakeholder groups do you typically include in a strategy engagement?
Describe the final deliverable of a strategy engagement
What is your approach to risk management in social media?
How do you incorporate existing applications, websites, microsites and newsletter programs into your overall social media strategy?
How do you ensure compliance with client legal requirements?
Please describe your approach to integrating across client marketing, customer service and corporate communications departments. Please provide an example of your work in this area
How do you approach adapting a traditional brand into a two-way dialogue?
Please provide a case study of your strategy work that resulted in a social media initiative and the business results achieved

REPUTATION MANAGEMENT & SOCIAL MEDIA MONITORING

What is your brand/reputation monitoring process (i.e. proprietary tools used, methodology, etc)?
What is your opinion on automated sentiment analysis?
What technology do you use to assist in online monitoring?
How long (on average) between a potential issue being posted online and being flagged to the client?
What volume of mentions has your organization handled in the past (e.g. 2,500 mentions per week)?
What is your quality assurance process to ensure that the large volumes of data gathered in the monitoring process are handled efficiently and representative of the overall online conversation?
Please detail your methodology for handling online crises
What services do you provide in support of online crisis management?
Please describe the structure of your crisis management team, including bios and relevant experience
How do you assess which mentions require immediate responses and which do not?
Please outline your general approach to sourcing and responding to comments
Please provide a case study detailing your work for the purposes of managing reputation or online crisis management, including outcomes and lessons learned
Please include a sample of your monitoring report format and/or a link to appropriate dashboards (specifics should be removed)

METRICS, MEASUREMENT & REPORTING

What methodology do you use for measuring the success of your social media programs for clients?
Please provide specific examples based on past work
Have you developed any proprietary metrics? How have you applied these for clients?
How have you defined Return on Investment (ROI) from a social media perspective in the past?
How do you take data points generated from various social media channels and measurement tools and combine to give an objective/comprehensive view?
What is your approach to server analytics and community analytics for program measurement?
Do you have the capability to measure cost per lead or cost per acquisition? Please provide an example of a project on which you have done so
What platforms are you unable to measure accurately, or able to provide only limited measurements from?
Please provide a sample of a measurement document or final report (specifics should be removed)
What percentage of the budget do you recommend be dedicated to metrics and measurement?

CLIENT EDUCATION & TRAINING

Do you offer social media training services for clients? If yes, what formats are they available in?
What internal processes do you have in place to ensure that your staff is kept current on social media innovations and best practices?
How do you measure progress and evaluate training effectiveness?
How do you recommend that clients keep up to date on the latest social media innovations and best practices?

SOCIAL MEDIA AND OTHER DIGITAL CHANNELS

What are your design, creative and community management capabilities?
What percentage of your staff is dedicated to building and deploying social media solutions versus management and consulting?
Please describe your experience with the following platforms and tactics:

- YouTube or similar video sharing sites

- Blogs, Podcasts, Vodcasts, Forums

- Content Management System (CMS)

- Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

- E-mail Marketing

- Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Search Engine Marketing(SEM)

- Facebook Pages, Apps, API integration

- Mobile application development

- Twitter

- News sharing sites (i.e. Digg, Reddit, etc.)

- Virtual Worlds and Augmented reality

- Photo sharing (i.e. Flickr) and other content sharing sites (i.e. Scribd, Slideshare, Delicious, etc.)

- Social Media press releases(SMPRs)

- Crowdsourcing or Wikis

- Real world events organized via social media (e.g. Tweetups)

- Ratings/Customer service sites (i.e. Yelp, ePinions, etc.)

Please provide examples of social media channel development work completed within the last two years

COMMUNITY AND INFLUENCER OUTREACH (SOCIAL PR)

What is your process for identifying influencers within various social media channels?
How do you determine and define "influence?"
What is your outreach process for communicating with identified online influencers?
What tools and approaches do you use for Influencer Relationship Management? (Third-party, proprietary,etc.)
How have you integrated Influencer Outreach with traditional communications and/or marketing campaigns?
How do you approach seeding conversations within stakeholder groups?
What is your exit strategy with influencers once the initiative is completed?
How do you ensure authenticity and transparency when conducting outreach on behalf of a client?
Please provide a case study of an online community outreach project

CLIENT SERVICES & PROJECT MANAGEMENT

How is a typical client engagement with your firm structured?
How do you structure your account teams?
Please outline your internal communication structure. If your account staff is separate from your project management staff, please detail how these teams work together
If you are selected to provide social media services, who will be assigned to our business (please provide names, titles and short biographical notes)
What percentage of senior staff involvement is structured in to your projects? What role do they play?
How are your projects priced? Using an hourly rate? Blended agency rate? If the former, please provide a rate card
What change management practices does your agency employ?
What reports will be provided to the client in order to communicate project milestones and overall project health?
What is the frequency of these reports?
What is your process for gathering business requirements?

Writing a Request for Proposal (RFP) is a good first step when considering Online Marketing and Social Media work as it takes thoughtful planning to specify and construct an effective, integrated campaign. A well thought-out, quality RFP is essential to a successful endeavor because it helps you to focus on your goals and exactly how to achieve them.

Greg Kihlstrom is the Chief Creative Officer at Carousel30 Interactive in Washington DC, an award-winning digital agency offering online advertising and marketing services as well as interactive design and development for social media, websites and mobile applications.

Should I Be Using Social Media For My Business?

At Solidus, we get this question all the time from customers and potential customers. The answer: If you're in business, YES! I have heard the sentiment a number of times from our customers: "I don't feel like telling people where I am all the time or what I had for breakfast." While some people use social media to broadcast the mundane details of their lives, for businesses, social media is a platform for providing information about your business and industry, starting conversations, and listening to customers and potential customers.

Why Should I Be Using Social Marketing?

Because that's where people are spending their time. Recent research suggests that "nearly half of Americans use social media." According to a new survey from Arbitron and Edison Research, 8% of teens and 77% of people from 18 to 24 have profile pages; 65% of people from 25 to 34 and 51% of those 35 to 44 also have profile pages. Also, 30% of Americans who have a profile on at least one social networking site visit them "several times a day," which is a significant increase from 18% a year ago. There are currently around 400 million users on Facebook - if it were a country, it would be larger than the United States.

Of course people are using these sites for pleasure and to connect with friends, but they are also following brands and looking for information for purchasing decisions. The "2010 Social Media Report" released by ForeSee Results reports that 69% of online shoppers regularly use social networking sites to interact with their favorite brands. Approximately 56% of respondents reported using Facebook to interact with brands.

We hear a lot of "the type of customers I am looking for are not on Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn." I don't think that this is necessarily true, since the fastest growing users of social media sites are over the age of 45. Also, even if your target customers (in terms of age and demographics) aren't currently part of the social networking craze, they will be - and, probably sooner than you think. "Over half of all consumers say that they have already purchased something - or switched to another brand or retailer - because of a recommendation they got through a social media site," according to Shama Kabani, author of The Zen of Social Marketing.

I Have Doubts about Using Social Networking for My Business

A recent Wall Street Journal (WSJ) article, "Entrepreneurs Question Value of Social Media," as indicated by the name, looks at the pros and cons of entrepreneurs who have engaged social media for their businesses.

A survey released in January by the University of Maryland's Smith School of Business and Network Solutions LLC, reports that last year, social marketing adoption by businesses with fewer than 100 employees doubled to 24% from 12%. The WSJ also article cites stats about entrepreneurs who say they have lost money on their social marketing efforts. I can't believe that this true, and the article does give details regarding how they are losing money. I would argue that the organizations that are being cited here did not plan effectively or have people who don't know what they are doing running their social media efforts.

The article tells the story of a woman who purchased a $1,900 folding kayak after she saw a Tweet on Twitter. Of course this type of result is not typical in that the value of using such sites for business marketing is usually more of a long-term relationship-building activity than a direct sales channel.

Another entrepreneur cited in the article argues that there is a direct correlation between is full-fledged entry into social marketing for his business and increased sales - a 40% increase in online sales in 2009, compared with 2008 when the company was just getting started.

Recommendations for Your Social Media Strategy

? Be strategic - Like any marketing or customer relations efforts, you need to plan effectively to connect with your audience and spark interest. You wouldn't send out a direct mail campaign without carefully crafting the content or determining who the recipients will be; the same applies to social media.

? Tailor your social media content to your audience - What do your customers want to know or learn about? They don't care about you; they want to know what can help them.

? Be careful about what you post - Make sure it makes sense, won't offend people, and is error-free. If something does go awry with social media, you can quickly address or rectify the problem.

? Be consistent - Stay engaged and keep your audiences engaged. If you only log on and post once a month, people know that you're not paying attention.

? Learn from others - Pay attention to industry and customer trends. Listen to what's going on around you. You can learn a lot about your customers and competitors by following their social networking activities. What are they thinking about on a daily basis? What are the customers thinking about? If you follow their social networking activities, you can find out.

The New Face of Marketing Includes Social Media

"Marketing today is the art and science (dare I say the Zen?) of leveraging multiple platforms to get your message across so that you can motivate people to take action. Tools are changing - you need to keep up," argues Kabani. "Your website is the place where you can SELL your products and services. Social media is the place where you introduce a potential customer to your brand."

A recent report titled, "2010 State of Inbound Marketing," released by HubSpot, emphasizes that inbound marketing through social media can double average monthly leads for small and medium-sized businesses; "creating a community of followers through Twitter and a regularly updated stream of content on a blog builds engagement, boosts the company's presence on Google and ultimately bring in more potential customers."

While some of us may feel like it's a given to be engaged with social media, especially if you're in the business of social media and content marketing, for a whole lot of people out there, social media are still foreign, shrouded in mystery, and not completely understood. However, we are almost to the point where not being part of social media is not an option for businesses. It shouldn't be a question of whether or not to do, but how to make it work for you and your organization. Today, the hot social media venues are Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Tomorrow it will likely be something else, but whatever IT is, if you're in business, you need to be involved and part of the conversation.

Emily Trask is a co-founder and managing partner of Solidus Editorial Solutions, a company that provides a multimedia approach to brand enhancement through editing, writing, social media, content marketing, and consulting. http://www.soliduseditorial.com

Top 10 Social Media Blogs - A List of the Top 10 Social Media Blogs Online

In the industry of social networking and online marketing, one of the major components to being successful is your ability to stay up to date with the most current information. By harnessing this knowledge, you place yourself in a position to give back to the community by providing or teaching it back to your prospects, customers and followers.

Sometimes keeping up with the torrential flow of cutting edge information can be difficult, but this is where this list of the Top 10 Social Media Blogs comes in handy. Each and every one of these blogs contains a wealth of knowledge and it's all current. It's not the same jargon being repeated and recycled over and over again. By keeping yourself at the forefront of the social media game and positioning yourself as an authority by contributing to these top 10 social media blogs you are building the foundations - laying the bricks, so to speak - for your eventual and perpetual success online.

The top 10 social media blogs are listed below. Be careful not to get overwhelmed by the vast amount of knowledge contained in them. Remember to take things slow, one step at a time. If you learn something which you can implement straight away, then do it! Don't think after you've just read some crazy new secret "Oh, that's a good idea... I'll apply that to my business tomorrow," and then keep trawling the blogs for the rest of the night. As soon as you learn something, put it into action. Once you're done with that, find another strategy to implement. Step by step you will slowly but surely begin to see concrete results!

So without further ado, I give you... The Top 10 Social Media Blogs!

#1 Mashable.com - If you're looking for the best place to come to for social media news, this is it. It is the worlds largest site dedicated to this purpose. With more than 12 million hits every month, it will definitely boost your inside knowledge on new sites, trends, technologies and services. Come here to find critiques on the newest stuff and get some great tools for your social networking campaigns.

#2 AllFacebook.com - As the name suggests, this blog is all about Facebook. Here you can learn about the newest applications and general news. You can even read predicted trends about the future of Facebook, an excellent way to stay on top of the game. If you need to know anything about Facebook, this should be your first stop.

#3 Twitip.com - Similar to #2, this blog is all about Twitter. There are so many helpful Twitter tips including things like how to get the right followers, how to build relationships and turn them into your real friends, how to build massive followings without getting booted off the system, etc. There is also a wealth of useful marketing information related to Twitter, such as personal branding, effective marketing methods and even useful Twitter tools to help automate your business.

#4 SocialMediaToday.com - This blog is a community made up some of the best social networking and web 2.0 thinkers alive today. There is no limit to what you can learn here! Most importantly, this is a great place to learn how to create an interactive social community. A pretty neat perk: once you have registered on this site, you can begin feeding your existing blog posts (assuming you already have a blog) to the live content flow of SMT and create posts directly on the site, increasing your exposure to a highly valuable community! Now THAT is pretty darn cool.

#5 Techipedia.com - This blog is run by Tamar Weinberg, a social media consultant and techie geek. She truly has some information worth hunting down, and her blog is an amazing resource. One of her recent posts was "How to Create the Perfect Fan Page." Now who in social media wouldn't want to know info like that? For free? She is a freelance writer and author of The New Community Rules: Marketing on the Social Web, who specializes in social media consulting and strategy, blogger outreach, reputation management, and search engine marketing (SEO, link building, and Pay Per Click Marketing). If you're interested in social media, you should be checking out her blog.

#6 CollectiveThoughts.com - Another invaluable blog made up of superstars. Each member of this community is a well-known authority or upcoming figure in their own respective fields, and they all share a passion and thoroughly developed understanding on social media. So thinking collectively, they created Collective Thoughts, a place to share their fantastic knowledge.

#7 BrianSolis.com - Brian is a pioneer as he brings his own unique view to the world of social networking. He takes both approaches of traditional marketing and social media and meshes them together to create one heck of a powerful marketing machine. This blog made the top 1.5% of all blogs tracked by Technorati-which means it really is worth checking out!

#8 DoshDosh.com - This one's a bit different, not what you would call your typical social media blog. But don't let that fool you, because here you will find some amazing resources for cutting edge online marketing and blogging tips, social media and Web 2.0 strategies. I personally like the artistic use of their images and graphics in the various posts.

#9 ScottMonty.com - Scott is the head of social media for the Ford Motor Company. That's right, the big corporations are realising the potential in social media are beginning to stake their claim. On his blog, Scott shares his perspectives on various topics - the convergence of marketing, advertising and PR on the Web - for marketers, agencies, the enterprise and the individual. Not only will learning from him benefit your campaign, you can build your connections as you expand your sources - and Scott is a very good source.

#10 The Viral Garden - Mack Collier is a social media consultant, trainer and speaker. He has been actively immersed in social media since 2005 and is known as a guru in the field. He has some great info on his site where you can learn about the latest tools, tips and trends to enhance your productivity, profitability and online presence.

So there you have it, the Top 10 Social Media Blogs, places where you can hunt down valuable information to help take your business to the next level. Take full advantage of these resources as they will help to brand you as an expert in social media and put you in position to become a top earner in this industry.

Boio Bess Is A Savvy Network Marketer Who Has Seen All The Tricks Of The Trade In The Industry Over The Last Decade. Visit EarnFromSocialMedia.com To Learn The Techniques She Uses To Generate 50+ Leads Daily Using Social Media Sites Such As Facebook, Twitter & YouTube!

Web 2.0 Marketing Made Easy With These Top 10 Social Media Sites!

In the last article we discussed how web 2.0 marketing can be a valuable asset for your business. We talked about web 2.0 marketing, social media services and marketing by social media, how it is the new phenomena of the decade and how you can use it to spread knowledge, gain trust, build relationship and gain more new clients.

Today we're going to talk about the top 10 social media sites, how they play a role in web 2.0 marketing, and how you can easily build accounts with each of them, along with our personal ranking chart and how marketing by social media to these top 10 sites can help you begin expanding your business.

1. Digg.com - After in depth analysis, we decided Digg, in terms of article marketing, social media marketing, and expanding your presence on the internet, to be ranked higher than both Facebook and Twitter. Here's why; Digg is a social bookmarking site that let's you easily setup an account, connect it directly to both your Twitter and Facebook accounts, and bookmark links with embeded urls that direct back to web pages, articles, social sites, videos and blogs. Digg has been around since 1998, and has a page rank of 8. Digg receives millions of visitors every single month. When you are marketing by social media, using Digg as a social media site is crucial to your success.

General posting capabilities - 10

Account setup - 10

Google pagerank - 8

Activity - 9

Spam Friendly - 9

Overall User rating - 9.2

2. Facebook.com - Facebook by far has been the fastest growing full capacity social media site thus far. Currently they have over 400 millions users worldwide with over 50% of them active on a daily basis. Facebook has a fully capable user interface with applications, blogs, comment posting, friend adding, video uploading and more. Adding friends on Facebook is easy. Building lasting relationships is a bit more challenging, but critical. Adding comments each day to your own page can be seen by your friends, which virally transcends out into the community and can eventually be seen by thousands and thousands of potentially interested prospects. But be careful, once you get up towards 5,000 friends, Facebook will prevent you from gaiNing any more friends, and at that point you will need to create a fan page where you can post from and invite friends to give you positive feedback.

General posting capabilities - 10

Account setup - 8

Google pagerank - 10

Activity - 10

Spam Friendly - 7

Overall User rating - 9

3. Twitter.com - Twitter is the newest and fastest growing web 2.0 marketing platform known to date. Twitter doesn't have the expansive user interface and full personal networking platform that Facebook does, but it's simplicity and fast posting capabilities make it a site to be reckoned with. Twitter was developed with a simple idea that asks, "what are you doing?" This idea turned out to be such a gold mine, that now social networks left and right are adding the "what are you doing" feature to their interface. This feature allows you to inform people about what kinds of recipes you offer, products you've tried, websites you read or promote, and so on and so forth. With the url shorteNing services like biturl, you can turn your long website addresses into short links allowing more room to pass along your message to your followers.

General posting capabilities - 10

Account setup - 8

Google pagerank - 9

Activity - 10

Spam Friendly - 6

Overall User rating - 8.6

4. Ning.com - A lot of people don't know about Ning sites, yet even more are learNing about them everyday. If you don't know, Ning is a simplified social network platform that allows you to open your own social network based on any topic of your choice, and build a community of members within the site. Ning allows you to fully customize your user interface and member's pages, connect with Twitter and Facebook, upload blogs, photos, pictures, and add applications to make the network more interactive for your members. For web 2.0 marketing, sigNing up with a Ning site is easy, fast and free. Currently to open your own social network is free, but we believe that by July of 2010 they are planNing to convert all sites into paying sites for the moderators, with plans less than $5 per month and up to $50 per month, still allowing members who sign up to join for free. These Ning sites are customized to your specific target market place, just be careful that you follow all of the moderators rules for that site, because they will ban you at the click of a button if you're off beat, and it's not easy to persuade them to let you back in.

General posting capabilities - 9

Account setup - 8

Google pagerank - 8

Activity - 9

Spam Friendly - 7

Overall User rating - 8.2

5. Delicious.com - Delicious is a social bookmarking site that is excellent for web 2.0 marketing and marketing by social media. Its user interface is simple, easy and elegant. You can insert keywords and descriptions to your liking. Their social media services allow you to bookmark and embed links into keyword phrases which link back to your website helping your organic search ranking in search engines. Delicious is a must-use social media site when marketing by social media.

General posting capabilities - 9

Account setup - 7

Google pagerank - 8

Activity - 8

Spam Friendly - 9

Overall User rating - 8.2

6. Current.com - Current is a wonderful social media platform, capable of helping your website to attract more new visitors through both bookmarking capabilities and article marketing capabilities. When marketing by social media, Current brought some of our articles to the first page of Google within only days after uploading them. Current is great for implementing article marketing into your organic SEO process and web 2.0 process.

General posting capabilities - 9

Account setup - 7

Google pagerank - 7

Activity - 9

Spam Friendly - 8

Overall User rating - 8

7. Propeller.com - Propeller is a full service bookmarking social media site, allowing you to generate backlinks by inserting keyword phrases into your posted urls. Propeller is easy to setup, expansive and extremely active. It is one of the top growing and page rank social media sites out there and definitely falls right into place as one of the top 10 social media sites for marketing by social media and web 2.0 marketing.

General posting capabilities - 9

Account setup - 7

Google pagerank - 8

Activity - 8

Spam Friendly - 8

Overall User rating - 8

8. Ezinearticles.com - Ezinearticles is strictly for article marketing, but it is vitally crucial and powerful for implementing successful web 2.0 marketing tactics. When marketing by social media, and article marketing, ezine articles is a phenomenal website. With many years of experience and a strict posting guideline, they limit their publishers to informative and helpful content only. This allows their site to stand out and attract more interested readers compared to many other article marketing sites. The social media services they offer are free, and with only a few good articles you can have dozens or even hundreds of new visitors within days or weeks reading your articles and visiting your website.

General posting capabilities - 8

Account setup - 7

Google pagerank - 6

Activity - 8

Spam Friendly - 8

Overall User rating - 7.4

9. Stumbleupon.com - Coming in at number nine on our top 10 list is an innovative social media sharing site that allows you to submit favorite pages, articles, videos and so forth into the members area, and when others submit, or "like" the same page, the number of "likers" or "submitters" goes up, which of course that page then gets more exposure. The innovation comes by their downloadable tool bar allowing you to seamlessly browse across the internet and when you see a page you like, you simply click the little Stumbleupon icon and the site then gets added to your favorites.

General posting capabilities - 8

Account setup - 7

Google pagerank - 7

Activity - 7

Spam Friendly - 8

Overall User rating - 7.4

10. Diigo.com - And last but not least, we have Diigo, a social bookmarking site with expansive capacities and an ever growing member base. The user interface is simple and easy to manage. There is a wide range of social media services and capabilities, and though the site is still in beta mode and started in 2005, it seems promising.

General posting capabilities - 8

Account setup - 7

Google pagerank - 6

Activity - 6

Spam Friendly - 8

Overall User rating - 7

With this list of top 10 social media sites, web 2.0 marketing and marketing by social media will be easier and more productive for you. Maintaining your social media sites, and adding fresh new relative content on a continuous basis is the key to successful social media marketing. Good luck!

Sincerely;
Nate Crane
Part of The SaW Team - Saw is a firm that offers advertising and marketing tools, education, vehicle graphics, banner printing, web design and signage for small, medium, and large businesses.
For other articles and resources see:
Vehicle Graphics San Diego, Banner Printing San Diego