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Marketing Madness Link Roundup (September 7, 2011)

by Nevin on September 7, 2011

Victoria Web MarketingSummer is over, school has started, and it’s a time for new beginnings. So, we’re launching a new regular series of blog posts featuring useful online marketing links that can help you get ahead of the competition by bringing more traffic to your website and your business.

Is your business mobile ready?

According to Pew Research, nearly 60% of smartphone users use “geosocial” and location-based services to help make purchasing decisions. This could be using Google Maps on a smartphone (typically an iPhone, Blackberry, or Android device) to find a nearby business location, or checking out online reviews of a business before making a purchasing decision.  Google’s own research suggests a far higher number: Google previously found, via survey data, that 90 percent of smartphone owners conduct local searches or local business lookups and an astounding 87 percent thereafter took action.

So, as smartphone adoption increases, it’s becoming more and more important for businesses to be “mobile ready.” Bonus link: Retailers, are you reaching one of your biggest opportunities – mobile users? Yet another bonus link: Google: 44 Percent Of Searches For Last-Minute Holiday Gifts Will Be Mobile

Use Twitter strategically to promote your business

Whenever its name comes up, micro-blogging service Twitter tends to provoke strong (and more often than not, negative)  reactions. While the jargon (tweeting?) can seem cute, and all the hashtags and RT’s somewhat impenetrable, when used effectively and strategically, Twitter can be a great way funnel “traffic” and customers to your site. Research suggests that nearly 90% Of Twitter users follow brands, and just a small minority (10.9%) of these folks find “promoted Tweets” to be annoying. In layman’s terms, more and more businesses are using Twitter to connect with potential clients, customers and consumers. However, like anything else, there is a right way and a wrong way to go about it. Bonus link (for the more technically minded): Yes, You Really Can Build Links With Twitter

LinkedIn is good for connecting with customers, too

LinkedIn, a social networking site for professionals, can also be a great way for businesses to connect with potential customers. Have you filled out a LinkedIn profile of your company? It’s a guaranteed way to show up on the front page of Google results (and in front of customers). Are you answering questions on LinkedIn? It’s a great way to establish yourself as an authority in your market. You can also post slideshow presentations showcasing your business or your product, or post discounts and package deals. Here are  33 ways to use LinkedIn for business. Bonus link: How to use LinkedIn to improve organic visibility

 - Nevin Thompson helps develop and implement Jumpstart Web content strategy for clients.

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Social Media Camp – Wow

by admin on October 4, 2010

What a success Paul and Chris had with yesterday’s Social Media Camp. Had the pleasure of moderating Clayton Stark’s talk and speaking on the Social Media and Tourism panel with Helen Welch and Jeff Ciecko. Check out the buzz on Twitter.

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JumpStart Web Now on Twitter…

by admin on June 5, 2010

Well, it took long enough, but in addition to my personal Twitter, JumpStartWeb is now on Twitter at twitter.com/JumpStartWebCom.

We’ve also added a fairly comprehensive list of businesses in Victoria on Twitter.

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Quick Tip – Twitter Part I – Building a Network of Peers

by admin on April 22, 2010

I get asked often what the big deal about Twitter is in a business context.

Truth be told, for a huge number of Twitter users, it’s of little value as they spend a lot of unfocused time on it with little idea why they are doing it. That said, Twitter definitely has a lot of strategic uses.

One thing you can do with Twitter is build a network of professional peers. If you’re an expert (or aspiring expert) within your industry and want to build a better network here’s how it goes:

  1. A couple times a week make a point of tweeting an interesting link (to your own blog post or to someone else’s insightful blog post or article).
  2. Make sure to make the tweet as interesting and/or provocative as responsibly possible.
  3. Make sure to use a link shortener/tracker like bit.ly so you can track all links (and measure which tweets get more clicks and thus are more compelling).
  4. After tweeting, do a search for folks in the industry who you’ve tweeted for and want to follow you (i.e. a search for “web developer twitter” brings up something like 40,000,000 results).
  5. Follow a few of the folks who you find in your search who are interesting.

Keep in mind that you only want to follow a few folks at a time so your ration of following vs followers doesn’t get out of whack.

What happens in this process is:

  • A certain percentage of people you follow you back (and you may want to purge a few of those who don’t from time to time).
  • A certain percentage of people who follow those who you follow/follow you will become aware of you and follow you.
  • If your tweets are topical enough you’ll get picked up in Twitter/Google search and followed that way.

A couple notes:

  • This will take a while but you’ll end up with a quality network of peers.
  • This will not likely generate thousands of followers, but a network of hundreds of quality followers is WAY more valuable anyhow.
  • Definitely experiment with different type of tweets to see what generates interest/followers.
  • Make sure you have good quality information in your tweets/links – the whole process falls apart if you don’t!

If this is approach that makes sense for you, good luck!

If this is not what you’re looking for, check back as we’ll post on building a local network and also on building a network within a specific vertical.

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