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Prioritizing The Right Social Networks For Your Business

social media

As we approach the halfway point of 2013, the question is no longer whether businesses should use social media…it’s how should they use social media for business. Some businesses claim social media is a godsend and have incredible success while others complain that it is a waste of time, money and resources. Both of them are right. I’ve said many times that I don’t believe that every business should be on every social network. In fact, I usually recommend that most businesses only focus on 2-3 sites so they can spend the necessary time to do them well. The trick is picking the right social networks to focus on. Where are your customers spending their time online? 27% of total US Internet time is spent on social networking sites alone (Source), so saying that your customers aren’t using social media is a tough argument to make. Understand Your Target Market The obvious task before prioritizing the right social networks is assessing where your customers are online. You should already know and understand your target market, otherwise you are not ready for this step yet and should be reading another article. A deadly mistake in any social media strategy is making [...]

The History of YouTube [Infographic]

history of youtube

We continue to marvel at the phenomenal growth of social media as if it is unstoppable but when you look at infographics like this one, it certainly seems plausible. The history of YouTube is an incredible example of how social networks are taking over the Internet and our attention with no sign of stopping in the future. The history of YouTube begins in 2005 when three former PayPal employees came together with the hopes of creating a video-sharing website. They envisioned a platform that would allow users to upload, share, search and view videos online…a primitive idea by today’s standards but a daunting challenge in that era of the Internet. The first video was “Me At The Zoo” (shown below), a rather bland kick-off to what would become one of the biggest websites on the Internet. History of YouTube: A Boom For Online Business The history of YouTube for business has been fruitful so far. Studies have shown 46% of people say they’d be more likely to seek out information about a product or service after seeing it in an online video. (Source) In a previous article we outlined 10 great ways businesses can use YouTube to promote themselves online: [...]

Top 5 Social Media Mistakes You Need To Avoid

Everyone learns these new tools for communication at their own pace. Heck, it took me years to finally start text messaging. Aside from the occasional autocorrect slipup, mistakes through text messaging aren’t too detrimental but some social media mistakes can be deadly to your reputation and/or sales depending on the severity. There’s a saying we have in social media…what happens in Vegas, stays on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube! What I mean is, nobody forgets on the web and that can be a painful or blissful realization depending on how you play your cards online. Before one of your valuable customers holds a silent (or not so silent) grudge against you, make sure you aren’t making one of these 5 social media mistakes! Related: Why Tomorrow Is Too Late When It Comes To Social Media Training 1. Not Responding To Customer Tweets/Messages. Make sure you are regularly checking to see if you have messages from customers or prospects on your social media pages. People get pretty upset when they’re ignored, especially by companies that they give money to. Why can’t they just call or email you ask? This is 2012, that’s why. Things have changed ‘round here, partner! 2. Too Much [...]

8 Ways To Improve Your Video Marketing Strategy

Have you made an incredible video to help promote your product or service? Then it’s time to optimize it for YouTube’s search so that your future customers can easily find it. There is no point in producing a quality short as part of your video marketing strategy if no one can find it. 8 Ways To Improve Your Video Marketing Strategy  1. Strive to make a viewer stay with you for at least the first 8 seconds. This is the most important time to grab a viewer, because if they click away before those 8 seconds pass, they do not count towards your # of views total. Save your biography for later. Get their attention first. 2. Make sure you have a Facebook page and post your YouTube videos there also. Also post your videos on your blog and Twitter account. This multiplies your opportunities for exposure and provides cross-channel traffic between the different social sites. Related: 10 Ways To Use YouTube Video Marketing To Promote Your Business 3. Embed your video inside your blog posts. Personally, I like to write a blog post to accompany my new videos so I can gain more traffic to my site as well [...]

Social Media For Job Seekers: Interview With Career Expert Brenda Blackburn

Brenda Blackburn has been a workshop facilitator since 1991 in Vancouver and specializes in career topics with specialties in facilitating career exploration, job search strategies, professional development, and life skills. She’s a regular guest on radio and has been sharing her knowledge with career success radio and many other media outlets for years, so she was a natural selection for me when I decided to do a feature piece on someone with great advice on using social media for job seekers. Full Podcast Interview of Brenda Blackburn: Social Media for Job Seekers Brenda and I connected through a mutual friend on LinkedIn and decided to combine our efforts to address the challenges job seekers face today.  We discussed how they can use the new social media tools that are available to leverage their networks to bring them closer to their goals, aka getting their dream job! This article is the product of our long discussion and has been written in a long-form blog format rather than the common “interview style” so that job seekers can skim through and get the info that is most relevant to their situation. Be sure to listen to the full podcast to get all the [...]

4 Reasons To Add Pinterest Marketing To Your Strategy

I know. We all feel the same way… NOT ANOTHER SOCIAL NETWORK! Sadly, the case is that the fastest growing social networking site, Pinterest has elbowed its way into the area and appears to have no intention of going anywhere. I’ll quickly address what I feel are it’s strong points based and also address some of the concerns and things businesses should be aware of when deciding whether or not they want to implement Pinterest marketing into their overall social media strategy. 1. It’s Great For Products Pinterest is powerful for connecting your products with compatible customers since their interests connect people rather than who they know. Bestselling author Gary Vaynerchuk predicts the “interest graph” becoming a more familiar and increasingly important metric as we progress through the next 5 years. With Pinterest driving more traffic than Google+, YouTube and LinkedIn combined in the month of January, this is something we have to take seriously as entrepreneurs. Adding Pinterest marketing to your strategy is looking more and more like a must for many businesses. 2. It’s Mostly Women But Men Are Catching On In it’s current state, Pinterest hasn’t shown huge promise for a predominant male demographic. Sorry, Old Spice! [...]

What Separates Superstar (6 and 7 Figure) Coaches From the Rest?

Coaching has become an increasingly popular profession Coaching has been dubbed the “second fastest growth industry in the US” after Information Technology. This fact has been quoted often since 2000 and still rings true today. Since coaching has such diverse subjects and skill sets, the top three industries with the fastest growing wage/salary listed in this 2009 list by the Bureau of Labor Statistics could also easily include coaches. The coaching industry certainly has its superstars with folks like private college admissions coach Michele Hernandez, who can charge as much as $40,000 helping a student get admitted into a ivy league college. The self-help icon Tony Robbins earns up to $100,000 for a single breakthrough session. These experts are able to command more money in an hour than the average full-time employee makes in a year. I’ve had the opportunity to work closely with some of the world’s top coaches that are making millions of dollars a year and I can tell you with absolute certainty that, not only can you do the same, you can do it better and FASTER than ever before. Click here to get the complete PDF Report on Social Media Marketing for Coaches & Consultants [...]

Social BOOM! Jeffrey Gitomer Gives The Goods On Social Media

I’ve always been an avid reader but I have to admit that I was never drawn to fiction or novels, almost exclusively reading educational books my entire life. The only books I recall reading that are story-based were Rich Dad, Poor Dad and Life’s Golden Ticket by Brendon Burchard…both motivational parables with very strong, prominent real life themes that resonate with our own experiences. I have spent countless dollars on educational books to help strengthen my entrepreneurial tools and skill set, many of which found a place collecting dust on my bookshelf. Despite this fact, one of the authors that have managed to consistently prevail as a dominant influencer in my business strategies as well as millions of sales professionals and entrepreneurs across the world is Jeffrey Gitomer. His sales strategies have been appreciated and sought after as a corporate sales trainer by some of the world’s most successful companies including BMW, AT&T, Time Warner, GlaxoSmithKline, IBM and Coca-Cola. All of his books have been number one best sellers on Amazon.com including The Sales Bible, Little Red Book of Selling, and most recently, Social BOOM! Gitomer has managed to turn his offline audience into a thriving social media community that [...]

What To Expect In 2012 From Social Media

As we descend into the end of 2011 we creep closer to a dawn of yet another new era in technology and social networking. It’s been over a decade since the first social media site hit the web and it’s safe to say that we haven’t seen a slump in evolution since. Each year, the face of social media seems to completely change and evolve into a beast that becomes indistinguishable from the years that came before it. How can anyone ever manage to stay on top in a sea of never-ending changes? The name of the game is staying ahead of the curve as much as humanly possible. Can you imagine the amount of views you would have now if your videos were on YouTube when it was a startup? On second thought, it might be better to spare yourself the frustration and not think about it. So what’s going to be big in 2012 for social media? Geo-Tagging Is Going To Take Off GPS is very quickly becoming standard in all mobile phones, even those lacking driving navigation systems that initially made the technology popular in the commercial market. By September 2012, wireless providers in the US will [...]

How to Add a Video to Your LinkedIn Profile

With recent updates to the professional network, it is even easier to add a video to your LinkedIn profile to really stand out from all the other profiles. The content of this article is now outdated so please visit this blog to see how it is now done(updated March 2013).  In this article I am going to give you step-by-step instructions on how to do this and you will also find a video tutorial to help you. Currently you’ll need to use either of two web apps: Slideshare or Google Presentation. In the future, adding videos might become a built-in feature on LinkedIn, just like in Facebook. Why add a video to your LinkedIn profile? 1.  It makes your profile more memorable and distinct from the rest—for now, at least. In the future, when majority of LinkedIn profiles contain videos, it’s how you do in your video that will make the difference. 2.  A video shows more about your personal qualities. If a picture is worth a thousand words, a video will allow others to evaluate those ‘words’—how you speak, how you carry yourself, your personality etc.  A video is particularly important if you are a speaker, coach, consultant, author, [...]