Official Presence on Facebook – Opportunities and Pitfalls
The Internet, as a medium, has opened the doors to a wide range of
communication possibilities with customers. The interactive
characteristic of the medium also makes it possible for a customer to
publish his response to a vast audience. Social networking sites,
particularly Facebook, which is getting increasingly popular around the
world, have given customers an equal opportunity to communicate as
loudly as you about your brand, in a public forum open to the whole
world.
On the brighter side, there is a great opportunity to acquire direct
and unadulterated feedback from customers, without the need of expensive
and time-consuming surveys and research processes. Directly redressing
customer queries on the medium itself can help increase brand loyalty.
However, as a brand owner, you need to realize the speed and potential
of the medium to do good as well as harm.
Facebook Opportunity for Your Brand
There are enough reasons for a brand to be on one of the most
happening mediums. A significant amount of conversation that happens on
Facebook, or for that matter on other social platforms like Twitter,
carries references to brands, with customer’s attitude toward these
clearly seen through them.
The fact is that whether you are there on Facebook, it is very likely
that someone or the other from your customer base may be making a
mention about you. Your brand presence during such a situation is
important to either thank the customer for any accolades or gracefully
respond and address any grievances posted by the customers and win back
their confidence in your brand.
On a proactive note, sustained brand presence on Facebook also helps
you create your own band of customers, including those interested in
you. This gives you one point access to disburse any firsthand brand
information in a single click, without spending a dime more.
Today, brands – both big and small – have a presence on Facebook. Some of them use it with more innovation than the rest.
Brand Pitfalls on Facebook
Traditional marketers are used to broadcast, which is an extremely
formal means of communication, where customers voices are barely heard
back. Coming from this background, many a time, marketers find it
difficult to adjust and converse in the language demanded by social
networking sites, which are much informal in nature.
There have been instances where brand owners trying to enforce rules
and guidelines of discussion on Facebook fan pages have faced the
immediate wrath of users, which had an adverse impact on the brand.
The lesson from this is very clear, the brand must try to avoid any
pitfalls on Facebook; marketers must know the responsiveness and energy
levels of the users and be one among them, rather than one above.
Word of Caution – World of opportunity in Facebook
For every scary story of a brand goof up on Facebook, there are many
cases of success, where even small household brands have grown in
popularity through effective use of the medium.
Two golden rules to be followed while using Facebook, which can yield good results in the long run, are as follows:
Do not be a big brother – be a cheerful friend to your customers. The
big brother attitude, which worked fine in traditional media, can kill
your brand on Facebook. Any showdown of brand arrogance or one-upmanship
is given a bitter response by its customers in the same medium. For a
brand to succeed, it has to be a friend, who is fun to speak with.
Do not advertise, converse – Blatant advertising, or use of social
networks for incessant spamming with interruptive advertising, is a sure
recipe for disaster. You will find your brand page getting isolated on
Facebook.
There are many ethics to be followed on Facebook and social media,
which can be easily grasped through active participation in the medium
itself. A company must ensure that its trained representatives have
marked presence on Facebook and social networking avenues as true online
custodians for the brand. For many companies, it also makes sense to
engage an agency that is experienced in handling brand reputations on
Facebook and online avenues.
Friday, 18 May 2012
Thursday, 17 May 2012
Facebook Applications
Engaging Customers with Facebook Applications
With the rapid advancement in the Internet and its increasing user presence, the medium has become a preferred means of communicating directly with customers. Among the most popular activities on the Internet is the voracious usage of social networking sites.
With its open architecture and wide range of functionalities, Facebook stands as the number one social networking site. There are many reasons for this cult followership of Facebook. The ease of use and dissemination of content, tagging of friends and related users on shared items is yet another great Facebook feature. Facebook also allows creation of secured groups and publicly available fan pages regarding your own brands.
The Facebook applications are its most popular components. Facebook has an open platform for web developers and programmers to create different applications to run applications from within its framework.
What is new about Facebook applications?
Until the option of applications was incorporated, the Facebook features were more about conventional social media usage, such as adding friends and creating groups pertaining to common interests and affiliations.
Applications initiated by Facebook expanded the function of the site toward more interesting features, which included social gaming, where you could include friends and even unknown participants from around the world. The big leap happened when Facebook opened its programming platform to developers around the world, who could develop applications and submit it to Facebook. These applications are made live for public usage once they are certified by Facebook.
How do applications help brand marketing?
On an average, a user would spend no more than a few seconds on the homepage or any other text rich section of a website. Similarly, on Facebook, text-based sections have their own limitations when it comes to holding attention of the users on the same page. That is where rich content and applications come into play.
A game, such as Scrabulous or UNO, on Facebook can engage a user for hours. Social games like Farmville have brought about a new genre of Social Gaming, which is the latest buzzword in gaming circles.
For a brand, a Facebook application can serve as an effective tool to gather and engage captive audience for a longer stretch of time. Users hooked on a particular game or application on Facebook will stay with it until the completion of the game. Brands have smartly used the opportunity to insert their logos and branding very subtly in the game. Subtle messages like these are known to give more brand recall and attitude change compared to intrusive advertisements.
Much to the delight of a marketer, Facebook provides usage stats of subscribers, which gives insight into the profile of users that the brand attracts. This can be compared with the intended target audience of the brand, and campaign modifications can be done based on the findings. Unlike most surveys that are based on sample estimate, what you get to see here is a summary based on each and every user who has added the application.
Developing Applications for Your Brand
Unlike most other participative aspects of social media, developing applications for Facebook requires adequate programming knowledge. Facebook has its own set of guidelines for the creation and submission of applications. Developers working on the Facebook framework must be updated with the guidelines defined by the site for any application to run. Brand owners need to avail services of a developer who knows all the steps that go into the creation of successful Facebook applications to ensure that their brand makes its presence through one of the most engaging options available in online media.
With the rapid advancement in the Internet and its increasing user presence, the medium has become a preferred means of communicating directly with customers. Among the most popular activities on the Internet is the voracious usage of social networking sites.
With its open architecture and wide range of functionalities, Facebook stands as the number one social networking site. There are many reasons for this cult followership of Facebook. The ease of use and dissemination of content, tagging of friends and related users on shared items is yet another great Facebook feature. Facebook also allows creation of secured groups and publicly available fan pages regarding your own brands.
The Facebook applications are its most popular components. Facebook has an open platform for web developers and programmers to create different applications to run applications from within its framework.
What is new about Facebook applications?
Until the option of applications was incorporated, the Facebook features were more about conventional social media usage, such as adding friends and creating groups pertaining to common interests and affiliations.
Applications initiated by Facebook expanded the function of the site toward more interesting features, which included social gaming, where you could include friends and even unknown participants from around the world. The big leap happened when Facebook opened its programming platform to developers around the world, who could develop applications and submit it to Facebook. These applications are made live for public usage once they are certified by Facebook.
How do applications help brand marketing?
On an average, a user would spend no more than a few seconds on the homepage or any other text rich section of a website. Similarly, on Facebook, text-based sections have their own limitations when it comes to holding attention of the users on the same page. That is where rich content and applications come into play.
A game, such as Scrabulous or UNO, on Facebook can engage a user for hours. Social games like Farmville have brought about a new genre of Social Gaming, which is the latest buzzword in gaming circles.
For a brand, a Facebook application can serve as an effective tool to gather and engage captive audience for a longer stretch of time. Users hooked on a particular game or application on Facebook will stay with it until the completion of the game. Brands have smartly used the opportunity to insert their logos and branding very subtly in the game. Subtle messages like these are known to give more brand recall and attitude change compared to intrusive advertisements.
Much to the delight of a marketer, Facebook provides usage stats of subscribers, which gives insight into the profile of users that the brand attracts. This can be compared with the intended target audience of the brand, and campaign modifications can be done based on the findings. Unlike most surveys that are based on sample estimate, what you get to see here is a summary based on each and every user who has added the application.
Developing Applications for Your Brand
Unlike most other participative aspects of social media, developing applications for Facebook requires adequate programming knowledge. Facebook has its own set of guidelines for the creation and submission of applications. Developers working on the Facebook framework must be updated with the guidelines defined by the site for any application to run. Brand owners need to avail services of a developer who knows all the steps that go into the creation of successful Facebook applications to ensure that their brand makes its presence through one of the most engaging options available in online media.
Wednesday, 16 May 2012
Do autoresponders work ??? Check it out!!!
Very few potential customers will ever buy a product or service the
first time they are presented with it, even when they know it’s
something they need. This is why a good autoresponder is a must-have for
marketers; follow-up is a necessity for your sales strategy as most
sales are only made after repeated follow-ups. An autoresponder
simplifies this process greatly and frees-up your time for other tasks.
It’s important to remind your visitors about your product, as most will leave your offer and never return, even if they intended to. Without a series of emails from your autoresponder to remind them, you have lost a potential sale right from the start. It is a well-documented fact that most sales only occur after multiple presentations, the beauty of an autoresponder is this necessary follow-up can be done very easily and automatically. Setup your email campaign and the autoresponder takes care of it for you.
Some of the benefits of using an autoresponder are:
1. Saving lots of time that can be used more productively doing other things, such as generating traffic, writing articles, seo of your website, finding and testing new products, and all the other things necessary for your business.
2. Educating your potential customers by providing more information about your product or service in each email of your campaign.
3. Saving sales that otherwise would be lost, good follow-up is essential for making sales; it’s true that most sales only are made after six or more presentations of the product or service. If you don’t provide that follow-up, you are leaving money on the table.
If you are not using an autoresponder, and you are serious about marketing, it’s time to get started. The benefits far outweigh the expense, and not using one will cost you sales (and profits) that could have been yours. I personally use Social Media List Builderfor my autoresponder service as it includes a ton of other indispensable marketing tools rather than just a plain autoresponder. However there are other good services available and the important thing is to find one you like and start using it, increase your sales and stop leaving money on the table.
It’s important to remind your visitors about your product, as most will leave your offer and never return, even if they intended to. Without a series of emails from your autoresponder to remind them, you have lost a potential sale right from the start. It is a well-documented fact that most sales only occur after multiple presentations, the beauty of an autoresponder is this necessary follow-up can be done very easily and automatically. Setup your email campaign and the autoresponder takes care of it for you.
Some of the benefits of using an autoresponder are:
1. Saving lots of time that can be used more productively doing other things, such as generating traffic, writing articles, seo of your website, finding and testing new products, and all the other things necessary for your business.
2. Educating your potential customers by providing more information about your product or service in each email of your campaign.
3. Saving sales that otherwise would be lost, good follow-up is essential for making sales; it’s true that most sales only are made after six or more presentations of the product or service. If you don’t provide that follow-up, you are leaving money on the table.
If you are not using an autoresponder, and you are serious about marketing, it’s time to get started. The benefits far outweigh the expense, and not using one will cost you sales (and profits) that could have been yours. I personally use Social Media List Builderfor my autoresponder service as it includes a ton of other indispensable marketing tools rather than just a plain autoresponder. However there are other good services available and the important thing is to find one you like and start using it, increase your sales and stop leaving money on the table.
Tuesday, 1 May 2012
Common SEO Mistakes
Think You Are Creating These Popular SEO Mistakes?
SEO is one thing practically every person that has a online business or blog knows about. The actual concept guiding SEO is simple acquiring the strongest rating on search engines like google so that you get the first chance at the preferred potential customers. As easy as the reasoning is, and at the same time straight-forward as the more usual tricks of getting SEO results are, a great deal of website and blog owners are making problematic problems which in turn cost them significantly in energy and time.Tag: You’re It
Tags are many times misunderstood , and simply overlooked entirely by beginner marketers. It’s easy to skip the most uncomplicated of website or blog building elements when computer programs or systems execute the building for you. When it comes to many instances a web page creator may have meta tags hidden inside the menu bar, and drivers don’t take the trouble to re-define them. Considering that the very prevalent among majority of these software programs are WYSIWYG (What You See is What You Get), people start making their blog by using the web page window , and then don’t think to alter the particular name of the saved document let alone all the underlying tag words. Monitor the top bar when you generate the web site. In a case where this tells you “home” you really really are really missing out on plenty of valuable SEO juice. One definitely should adjust the home page name on the site to help reflect your agency or internet site name, plus this moniker must display your primary leading level keyword or phrase in it if at all feasible. Unquestionably the equivalent is definitely valid with respect to blogs, except these items tend to end up being a whole lot less of a pain as you will be asked to pick a web address in almost all cases from the very beginning , plus title the blog. If, perhaps your blog’s hompage consists of “home,” found at the top , or within its actual address, find out strategies about how you has the capability to enhance that to be more SEO friendly.Double Tagging
You would want to modify your current homepage to mirror the firm title that includes search terms , having said that you actually don’t really want each and every single page in your web-site to end up with the very same label. You actually lose your increased SEO benefits associated with variable pages any time they are all the same. You should really also steer clear of letting the webpages to be tagged using common names, like about, links, features etc. For illustration , in the instance that you have a internet site pertaining to your Arabian pony reproduction farm your hompage may well be marked My acclaimed Arabian Horses , but you wish to have your other pages to to mirror your content and articles while having SEO friendly tags at the same time. In place of “about,” utilize Our extraordinary Arabian Mating Tradition , as opposed to Race horses , introducing your stock employ something for example Our acclaimed Arabian Stallions, Arabian Mares. Rather than on sale title your site Arabian show ponies for sale , or something similar.Non-Descript Calls to Action
Definitely one of the fundamental and most frequently found problems might be linking out to somewhat of a universal word like just click here. You might notice it all the time and it happens to be a beneficial inspirational strategy that will get people to press a web link. The actual trouble is in fact this link isn’t actually search engine valuable. Every one of the web page links found on your site would need to bring in search engine juice. In place of marking them using commonly used phrases , place the follow this link within the actual text (bold in cases where you like to be extra aggressive ) as well as connect to a descriptive of exactly what you need these items to be able to navigate to. Like: To get additional information see more at selling procedures that work.The Difficulties with Now
Last of all , subsequent to all of the challenging treatment , together with routinely working your site just about the most regularly occurring error in judgment web marketers make is in fact packing it in too early. We all reside within a “Now” world. It’s been that way for many years , in addition to the impatience , and necessity to obtain exactly what people are looking for promptly is definitely particularly ingrained within your psyche. All the same , the moment the idea relates to SEO, it does take a little bit of time. You have got to make it possible for the spiders to come across you, and so permit every bit of ones hard worked pages, and articles time to reflect in the standings. Don’t count on visitors to pour on your web page the day after you submit it, even when you’ve done every piece right. It can take weeks, and perhaps months before there are real gains from your endeavorsA Government Entrepreneur Grant? Its easier then you Think
When someone plans to put up a business, one of the many worries is cash for the business’ capital. This is true even if you’re putting up an internet business or a physical business office. Many entrepreneurs find raising of funds as an arduous task. Building the inventory, paying for registration fees, renting or purchasing space, and purchasing the needed equipments require working capital. One of the key sources of capital is a government entrepreneur grant.
There are many ways to raise business capital. Since entrepreneurs are hard working individuals, they will not stop until they’re able to raise the needed amount of capital. They can seek assistance from friends and family members, relatives, banks, and personal savings. Most entrepreneurs on the other hand prefer to search for venture capitalists.
Aside from those mentioned earlier, a government entrepreneur grant is one of the most excellent options to raise business capital. The government gives grants to qualified entrepreneurs that would serve as financial assistance. There are different grant making agencies in the country, depending on where you reside.
These agencies have grant programs that you can avail as long as you’re qualified. The US federal government, for example, is willing to spend about $400 billion for the government entrepreneur grants.
The best way to look for entrepreneur grants is through the internet. If you find it hard to do it online because you’re not familiar with it, you can always ask your local government for information regarding the grants.
Grants are given for many purposes and for starting a business you must choose an entrepreneur grant. If you’re lucky enough, you can find grants that offer business consultation, loans, and services for free. Oftentimes, local governments award entrepreneur grants to businesses that can potentially hire more employees.
Economic development is very important for every country. The economic conditions are unpredictable and volatile and so every country needs all the help it can get to improve its overall standing. Businesses are the major contributors to the success of the economy and so the government is always willing to extend the needed financial aid.
Some entrepreneurs are hesitant to get assistance from the government. But if you’re one of those entrepreneurs with capital problems, don’t hesitate to ask help from the government. The government has a huge fund allocation for the grants. If you want to know more about the government grants, you can simply log on to the internet and search for these entrepreneur grants.
Before an entrepreneur decides to put up a business, he conducts a lot of studies to determine if the business is feasible or not. If he can prove the feasibility of his business proposal, the government will immediately provide the needed capital assistance through the entrepreneur grants.
If the working capital that you’ve raised from family, relatives, and friends are insufficient, try to contact the local government and ask for the requirements in order to avail the government entrepreneur grant. You can either do this online or you can visit the physical office of the local government of your state or country.
For those who qualify, you will provide all the important papers and receive the amount that you need. After that, you can already start your business. If the business is successful, you can already earn huge profits.
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