Posts Tagged ‘Twitter’

Is your business ready for search engine changes?

November 15th, 2009

Where Interactive Marketing Dollars Are Going

posted by Jason Falls in November 13th, 2009

Forrester Research has released a new report forecasting interactive marketing spend in the U.S. for the next five years. The report, authored by Shar VanBoskirk, is available in its entirety on the Forrester Research website.

The report details how certain industries currently spend, and projects how they will spend, on interactive marketing. It also offers some interesting insights for businesses trying to ensure they are either catching, or keeping up with the Joneses. VanBoskirk talks more about it on the Forrester Research blog for Interactive Marketing Professionals.

Current Interactive Marketing Spend – Courtesy of Forrester Research, Inc. (Click for larger version)

The chart above shows what Forrester estimates brands are currently spending on Interactive Marketing. Display advertising is banner ads and similar, standard ads on websites. The numbers aren’t all that surprising, but think about where the industry is when you think of these insights:

Display ads continue to dominate consumer goods and media and entertainment, among other categories. This despite the fact consumer trends indicate ads simply don’t work as well as other interactive areas.
The industries that have been using the web the longest – travel and hospitality – spend three times as much on search marketing as display ads and almost 30 percent of their overall budget on Interactive. That’s 10 percent more than any other industry.
Social media spend is last or second to last in all categories except business services. Social media consultants and agencies selling social media fall into that category.
Email marketing, the interactive version of cash cow direct marketing, appears to be almost an afterthought across the board.

It doesn’t surprise me that media and entertainment and consumer goods industries continue to buy display ads more than other Interactive media. They’re not only conditioned to buy ads to communicate their message and under the influence of media planning and buying firms who only make money when they buy them, but they’re the final bastion of people who don’t understand consumers have flocked to arenas like social media to get away from the bull horns of traditional marketing. Are they getting better? Probably. Do they have a way to go? Yep.

Travel and hospitality industries have a few years experience on these others and are spending a ton more on search marketing and a ton more total dollars. I’ll give you a hint, GPG folks … they’re onto something.

While the cost of social media essentially equates to labor costs, there should still be more dollars devoted to it across the board. I say this not because I want to make more money (though I won’t turn it away) but because social media — building relationships with your consumers — is the one interactive marketing method that is sustainable and cost efficient in being such. You’re investing in the lifetime of your consumers here. The dollars will go a lot farther.

And if you aren’t taking advantage of good email marketing, you need to stop what you’re doing and figure that piece out fast. Email marketing done right, delivered to the right audience and with the right message is still the best way to consistently reach people in the interactive space.

These are my ideas on how companies and industries should look to change some of these numbers. You’ll have to go purchase the Forrester Report to see if their predictions match up with what I’m recommending. (Warning: Forrester Reports aren’t cheap, but do come with a three-week, money-back guarantee.)

In the meantime, what do the numbers tell you? What surprises you? What seems odd? A penny for your comments …

Posted in Blog, Business, Headline

Tags: Bing, Facebook, Google, Twitter

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Why companies should blog.

August 27th, 2009

Social Media DJ says an excellent post by Jeff Bullas. Very straight forward information…

7 Reasons Why Companies Should Blog

2009 July 10

by jeffbullas

I have this discussion with clients all the time.. ” Why should we have a blog? “. It’s a good question and most customers eyes glaze over. I don’t have the time.. We don’t want to give away our company secrets..Our policy is not to use or allow Social Media… I don’t have anything to write about

Well there are 7 good reasons to start Blogging.

It helps your SEO ( Google loves new content )
You can engage and understand your customers better.
You are seen as an expert in your field, a ” Thought Leader”
Great content gets people a reason to keep coming back to your site.
Blogs are a much more trusted source than companies press releases and official company PR.
It moves customers to a conversion point of trusting and believing enough to buy.
By writing you are learning.

Note: Most importantly it helps you improve your rank on search engines and assists in getting found when people enter those important key words in Google.

So if you are going to start a blog what functions and features should a blog include?

It is better to use a minimalist format ( keep it simple) and preferably a 2 column template design. And have host it on your domain that you have (do not use a wordpress or typepad domain, you want to improve your own website’s domain SEO not Typepads and have control over the site)

1. Menu to include

About us
Home back to your company website

2. Subscription to be via an RSS Feed and Email (and put these in top menu and right side)

3. Search feature for blogs on the site

4. Include the following at the top of each blog post so visitors can add your blog and posts to the following sites

Digg (Over 20 million people visit this site every month)
Reddit (Alexa rank of 664 and a Google page rank of 8.. this means one of the top sites in the world with a large number of inbound links and over 6 million unique visitors a month)
Delicious (nearly 2 Million unique visitors per month)
Stumbleupon (over 5 million unique visitors a month)
Facebook ( over 250 Million subscribers)
Twitter (No 2 Social Media site and is monitored by search engines and becoming more important for SEO)

Note: Providing these functions allows people to post your company’s blog onto sites that have millions of visits every month ( I have included some of the numbers of monthly visitors to these sites each month), also register your Blog with Technorati ( The Blog “Bible” and registry and Search Site) they have over 5 million visitors a month and will help your SEO.

5. 2 text boxes in the right panel to include

A one sentence description of who your company is
Your clients

6. “Connect with us Box” on right panel that includes connecting via the following means

Facebook
Twitter
Subscribe to our Blog RSS

7. Multi User (allows multiple users to add posts to your company Blog)

8. Popular Posts Box

9. Browse by Tag Post Box

10 Browse by Category

As Google’s search alogorithms are in constant evolution with recency and new unique content becoming an important part of the mix, Blogging is something that your company should not ignore.

So do you think your company should be blogging?

Posted in Blog, Business

Tags: Blog, Facebook, SEO, Social Media, Twitter

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Grocery Store using Social Media?

August 25th, 2009

Your Social Media DJ has to say this is a great read by Soren Gordhamer. I would also like to say a great job to Whole Foods. Keep up the awesome job…

5 Social Media Lessons Learned From Whole Foods

August 25th, 2009 | by Soren Gordhamer9 Comments

Soren Gordhamer is the author of Wisdom 2.0: Ancient Secrets for the Creative and Constantly Connected (HarperOne, 2009). His homepage is www.sorengordhamer.com. You can follow him on Twitter ().

As a company, Whole Foods has impressively embraced social media more than most, gathering over 1.2 million followers on Twitter and 123,000 fans on Facebook () in the process. While it is easy to understand why a relatively young company or one started by a tech-savvy founder would so completely embrace social media communication tools, it is quite a bit more remarkable for an almost 30 year old established brick and mortar company with roughly 50,000 employees and over 270 stores worldwide to have done so.

I recently visited the Whole Foods headquarters in Austin, Texas to meet with members of their new media team, including Bill Tolany, the company’s Senior Coordinator of Integrated Media, and Winnie Hsia, who oversees the @wholefoods account. I wanted to know how Whole Foods integrated social media tools into their communications strategy, and what lessons had they learned from doing so. Below are five of the lessons that Whole Foods shared with me during our chat.

1. Make Content Increasingly Relevant

Whole Foods started initially with just the @wholefoods account but as it gathered followers, they realized it had limitations: while it was useful for news with national appeal, it was less so for sharing local information or addressing specific interests of customers. A percentage of their followers, for example, might be interested in an event happening at their New York City store or reviews of certain food items, but many others would not be interested.

To address this, they encouraged all their stores to start their own accounts and tweet about events at their store and news related to that local area. They also created separate accounts for specific issues, such as one for wine and one for cheese, where the head of those departments post and interact with customers. In fact, with over 150 company Twitter accounts and new ones added regularly, they likely have one of the largest corporate presences on Twitter. The goal with so many different accounts is to create increasingly relevant, and often local content.

2. Go Where Your Customers Are

When asked how they initially decided to use Twitter as a platform, which was pre-Oprah and before most other companies their size had done so, they emphasized that their goal has always been to interact with their customers no matter where those customers are. As Twitter gained momentum, they realized that a presence on it made sense, though they never foresaw that they would get over a million followers and how much staff time it would take to manage.

The conversation with customers, however, is essential to the company, whether it happens in person at a store or on a social network. Whole Foods, in fact, is active on numerous social media communication channels, not just Facebook and Twitter: they also have a Flickr page, an actively updated blog with videos on cooking healthy meals, and have employees responding on the customer feedback site Get Satisfaction (). The goal is not just to pick one place and force customers to come to them, but to meet customers “on their home court,” wherever that may be.

3. Loosen Control from the Top

Likely the most difficult task for any large company when embracing social media is learning to let go of control. On one hand, most companies will want millions of followers on sites like Twitter, yet on the other hand, large corporations also tend to be cautious when taking risks. They’re unsure how much control they are willing to relinquish when it comes to governing how social media is used.

Whole Foods seems to really understand that such a top-down approach does not work in the age of social media. In fact, I was initially surprised that several people I interviewed while at the company headquarters that managed different corporate Whole Foods Twitter accounts used them quite differently from each other. Some, for example, shared personal information while others kept posts strictly to business. When I asked Tolany, who oversees the department, about it, he said that it did not surprise him at all. While they encourage some basic guidelines, Whole Foods has learned that for social media to work well, whoever is managing an account needs to be authentic, allow his or her personality to come through, and have fun in the process. If management tries to exercise too much control, the account will be less likely to succeed at engaging people.

4. Decide What Channel to Use for What Purpose

With a presence on so many social networks, Whole Foods tries to figure out how best to use each service. For example, they have found that for customer service, Twitter is much more effective than Facebook. On Twitter people can easily @reply a question and they can quickly respond. On the other hand, for “rich media,” including embedding videos or longer posts or responses, Facebook tends to be better. Likewise, for posting original content, their blog serves as the hub, allowing staff from various departments to share material. The company also created a nifty iPhone application with 2,000 searchable recipes and a store locator, which is a great platform for disseminating static information.

5. Let the Conversation Happen

My visit to the Whole Foods headquarter came at an interesting time. The previous week, Facebook, Twitter, and various blogs were ablaze with (mostly negative) comments in response to Whole Foods CEO, John Mackey’s, Op-Ed in The Wall Street Journal titled “The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare.” We did not dive too much into the Mackey Op-Ed issue, but we did talk about whether having such a strong presence on Facebook and Twitter has allowed people to more easily express anger at them. During our conversation it became clear that Whole Foods realizes that people are going to talk about the company, both positively and negatively, whether they are have a presence on social networks or not. It is helpful, though, to know what people are saying and to be able to respond if necessary.

In fact, when Mackey responded to some of the criticism on his company blog, rather than turn off comments to the post, they encouraged people to express their feedback, and greater than 3,000 people did.

Conclusion

The central take away I got from my visit was the importance of engaging with one’s customers no matter where they spend time. When I asked Tolany and Hsia what advice they would give to companies thinking of using social media channels like Twitter, they seemed to both agree that the first task is to know if your customers (or the potential customers you want to engage) are present there. Then and only then does it make sense to invest time on a site.

I also got that part of what has motivated Whole Foods’ efforts in social media — and what can account for much of their success — is a willingness to be bold and take risks. Such boldness can of course have its dangers (such as when writing Op-Ed articles about delicate social issues) yet this has also helped them plow ahead in social media while other businesses their size waited cautiously in the background to see if it was “safe” or if these sites would gain in popularity.

Of course, any time a company opens up and has a presence on a communication channel like Facebook or Twitter, users can use those sites to criticize as much as to praise. Dealing with negative feedback, however, is better than not having a presence at all. I think Whole Foods is showing that the companies who keep such channels open, and listen to the unpleasant along with the pleasant feedback, will better know what matters to their customers and what company policies may need to change, which is likely to win them support in the end.

Whole Foods, like many other companies, is still finding its way in this age of social media, but they are showing that a non-technology company of their size can engage and innovate in this area.

Posted in Business, Facebook, Grocery Store, Twitter

Tags: Facebook, Grocery, Social Media, Twitter, whole foods

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10 Essential Twitter Tools for Business

August 24th, 2009

Social Media DJ says?
WOW, what a great list of twitter apps and information. Great job Brian Solis’

Do you use Twitter? That’s a hot question these days. With more than 11 million users, the microblogging service is becoming an incredibly popular networking tool.

Still, most people struggle when it comes to using Twitter effectively. This may be especially true for businesses, which tend to feel pressure to join Twitter, but don’t quite know where to begin. If you want to use Twitter, but aren’t sure how to use it well, these process by using these 10 essential Twitter tools for business may help smooth the learning curve:

1. Tweetdeck

This time-saving application operates on your desktop. Through it, you can not only tweet, reply, direct message, and retweet, but create groups of followers, shorten URLs, send pictures, and execute customized searches. You do all this, and more, through Tweetdeck’s dashboard, which offers all the features in one place. See John Jantsch’s video at Duct Tape Marketing for more. Biggest benefits: Saving time and streamlining Twitter functions.

2. Tweetie

Tweetie is kind of like a Tweetdeck for your iPhone. You can tweet, reply, retweet, send direct messages, browse users, post compressed links, view Twitter trends, and more. If you have a Blackberry, try TwitterBerry, which is quite similar. Other mobile phones will have their own Twitter clients, which a simple Google search should help find. Biggest benefit: Having a time-saving Twitter dashboard in your mobile device.

3. Twitt(url)y

Twitt(url)y tracks and ranks URL shared on Twitter by popularity. A quick glance at a Twitt(url)y list will help you peg trends, popular products and reports, and gauge what’s on peoples’ minds. Retweetist and Tweetmeme provide similar services. Choose the software that best fits your personal needs and style. Biggest benefit: At-a-glance access to the hottest Twitter trends helps you keep up with the Zeitgeist.

4. TwitterFriends

If you Twitter frequently, and Twitter is important for your business, this stats tool will help you take the next step towards becoming a master tweeter. TwitterFriends allows you to analyze your Twitter habits–do you only post links? Only conversational replies?–then improve on them. The tool also analyzes how socially relevant you or other people in your extended network. This will help you find new, influential Twitter users to follow, adapt your own tweet style, and get a better grasp of your shortcomings. Biggest benefit: Improving the efficiency and efficacy of your Twitter use.

5. SocialWhoIs

SocialWhoIs helps you find out more about people by entering their nickname and social media service. Find out more about who’s following you–and, conversely, who you want to follow. It helps you find the most relevant people for your inquiry and field, rather than by popularity. Biggest benefit: Finding new, relevant contacts.

6. TweetGrid

You don’t need to be a Twitter user to cull value from TweetGrid, which lets you follow topics, people, groups, events, and more in real-time on a search dashboard. It helps you what products, services, brands, and topics are creating a buzz on Twitter, when, and for how long. This makes it a good monitoring device for reputation management and communications professionals. Coupling TweetGrid with TweetBeep, which sends you email alerts whenever someone mentions your brand, you, or your competitor, makes for a free, complete reputation-management suite. Biggest benefit: Second-by-second reputation and brand awareness.

7. GroupTweet

Allows users to send tweets that only end up inside a designated group. The is a boon to workgroups, communities, and people who need to keep tweets private. Biggest benefit: Keeping potentially confidential tweets within a designated group.

8. OutTwit

Update and listen to Twitter from Microsoft Outlook, or categorize keywords, tweets, and searches into Outlook folders. A handy organizational tool that cuts the application fat from desktops. TwitterMail, a similar service, lets you post tweets and follow replies through Web-based email. Biggest benefit: No need to download, open, or learn a new application to use Twitter.

9. Twellow

Twellow calls itself the Twitter Yellow Pages. Unlike the traditional phone book, however, Twellow lets you search Twitter users by category or keyword, helping you find networking contacts, competitors, and other people to follow. WeFollow, another people-finder app, helps you find popular/most-followed Twitter users by category. Think Lance Armstrong, Guy Kawasaki, Time Magazine, and other big-leaguers. Biggest benefit: Finding people to follow who will inform you, teach you, and help your business grow.

10. Follow Cost

How annoying will it be to follow a certain person on Twitter? Follow Cost answers this question for you. All you have to do is enter the person’s Twitter name into the app, and it spits out a user’s average number of updates, and what percentage of their tweets are replies. Biggest benefit: Headache avoidance.

For rolling updates and good reviews on new Twitter tools, visit Brian Solis’ blog.

Posted in Business, Twitter

Tags: Twitter, twitter apps

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Posts Tagged ‘Twitter’

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Social Media DJ says an excellent post by Jeff Bullas. Very straight forward information…

7 Reasons Why Companies Should Blog

1. Make Content Increasingly Relevant

2. Go Where Your Customers Are

3. Loosen Control from the Top

4. Decide What Channel to Use for What Purpose

5. Let the Conversation Happen

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