Autospeak-Straight Talk contains articles covering digital and social media marketing social communities and events marketing
Link building, done correctly, is hard work. It's laborious and filled with lots of rejection. In many ways, it's like telemarketing – nobody likes it, but it pays off. In fact, link building still works better than anything else to boost organic rankings.
Google's Matt Cutts recently confirmed the continuing value of links here and here. The key quotes:
...backlinks…are a really, really big win in terms of quality for search results ... backlink relevance still really, really helps in making sure we return the best, most relevant, most topical set of search results.
...backlinks still have many, many years left in them ... over time backlinks will become a little less important ... we will continue to use links in order to assess the basic reputation of pages and websites.
So what are the takeaways from these videos? Most commenters picked up on natural language processing and authorship, as probable ranking factors moving forward, without acknowledging the core message of the videos – links still matter a lot. And they will continue to matter for many years.
I don't blame anyone for chalking these videos up to Google FUD (fear, uncertainty, and doubt), but the evidence doesn't stop there. I'm sure that you're familiar with the Penguin algorithm. How about manual penalties, for unnatural links? If links didn't matter, would there be an entire industry dedicated to link audits and sanitizing backlink profiles? Would Google spend so much time and resources battling spammy links? Of course not.
Still, there is a whole contingency of "link deniers" proclaiming that "link building is dead." These folks are just as fervent in their beliefs as the "truthers" and "birthers" despite factual evidence that runs to the contrary. (There's a pretty good chance you will read their comments, below.)
So why are so many people running away from the single most important task in building organic rankings? The answer is pretty simple. Not only is link building hard, but if done improperly, it can result in a penalty and in the most extreme cases can even get you sued!
Can you blame SEO professionals for running away from that hot mess? Of course you can – and you should.
Every marketing campaign focused on building organic rankings needs a link building component. Thousands, if not millions, of pages of great content are published on the web daily – most will never be seen by human eyes. Great content alone, in a competitive niche, rarely ranks without links.
There's a big difference between link building (baiting, earning) and link spamming. The kinds of links that matter are the ones that are editorially given. Links with innate value, not necessarily SEO value. These links require human intervention for placement. A link that can be dropped automatically by anyone has little value and often leads to abuse and trouble.
So, what are some effective techniques for building links in 2014? Actually, the same strategies advised by Cutts way back on March 4, 2010 still hold up today:
- Create controversy:Â Use it sparingly like spice. The occasional rant is best and if over-used, loses its effectiveness.
- Use humor: Offered as a "softer" alternative to controversy. Can be equally effective – especially if original. (The Oatmeal has built a franchise on funny)
- Participate in blog and forum communities:Â Not as a spammer, but as an interested community member who gives back to the community by answering questions that help people. This builds credibility and opens up opportunities to attract links.
- Publish original research:Â Doing a little work to dig into a subject can get a lot of links.
- Use social media:Â Think about where your target audience spends their time. Is it Facebook, Twitter, Instagram? You need to be there as well. Like blog and forum communities, getting to know people via social media opens up link opportunities.
- Create a "Top X List":Â Like controversy, this is best used sparingly or it can get old fast
- Blog frequently and establish yourself as an authority in your field: If authorship had been in place when this video was produced, I'm sure that would have been mentioned, as well.
- Create how-tos and tutorials: They may not attract a ton of links, but a few good links can have a huge impact – especially on the long tail. These are also a natural for video.
- Create a useful product and give it away for free: Firefox extensions, Chrome extensions, WordPress plugins, anything open source.
Editorial link building is alive and well and more powerful than ever before. Getting position one for a keyword is no longer the only KPI to measure, but it's still an important metric to pay attention to as a means to drive organic traffic to your website.
By Chuck Price
Most people admit that they use social media in their business to “increase awarenessâ€. Yet you can increase awareness as much as you like – unless it makes money, what’s the point? Sales are what matters to people in business, yet the way that social media works it focuses our minds on “awarenessâ€. Being aware of a product or brand is not the same as buying it. Business owners want you to buy, not just be aware. Hence all the data about “numbers of followers†or “engagement through likes†is all tosh. It is meaningless, pandering only to our business ego. What matters in business is the profit we derive from sales. If you don’t have enough sales, you don’t generate enough profit. The hapless search for “increased awareness†or “greater traffic†alone is nonsense
The study found that the two main reasons people used social media as part of their marketing was to “increase awareness†and “gain followersâ€. Both of these are easy to measure in terms of “followers†or “likes†and so these targets can provide marketers with so-called “data†which can be used to prove that their work is successful.
Bottom of the list – yes BOTTOM – was using social media to generate sales. Even though the point of being in business is to generate profit from sales, it turns out that those people doing social media marketing rated sales as the least important benefit.
But turn a page or two on and you find that the report reveals a stark difference between the majority of social media marketers and those who are actually generating leads and sales using social networks. The people making real money using social media marketing are the ones putting in the most hours of work.
It turns out that 74% of those who spend more than 40 hours a week on social media are the ones making money. Yet almost two-thirds of business are spending less than 11 hours a week on social media – a quarter of what they need to do.
The figures make it clear – the more time a business spends on social media, the more likely it is to generate sales.
Most businesses are having to focus on meaningless statistics revolving around “awareness†as that provides some logic behind their investment in social media activity. But what this really reveals is that the majority of businesses are not investing anywhere near enough time and money on social media activity.
If you put more time and effort into the world of social media, you will be able to generate more sales – providing a business with a greater reason for using the social web. Rather than trying to work out how to spend less time on social media, your business ought to be considering how it can spend more time on it. The result of that, it seems, will be more sales.
By Graham Jones
Image courtesy:Â Statista
Online Social Media: Why Marketers Must Join the Conversations
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(Posted on May 30, 2014 at 12:19PM )
I had the pleasure of participating on a panel with Mel Carson of Delightful Communications at ClickZ Live Toronto. The session, Hand in Hand: Combining Social and Content to Earn Visibility and $, focused on how marketers can meld social and content to drive visibility and ROI.
Preparing for the talk got me thinking about the "paid" vs. "earned" media challenge. That is, the ongoing tension for marketers between investing in paid vs. earned media.
Paid media may produce a more rapid return than earned media. However, like Sisyphus, the Greek tragic who pushed a boulder uphill only to have it repeatedly roll back down, it also requires a continued deposit of funds to continue functioning.
On the earned side, the returns can be many multiples that of paid, but it does require more rigor than depositing coins in the AdWords or Twitter ad machine.
For many marketers this tension – do I invest in the immediate ROI paid offers or make the longer term commitment but greater return earned media offers--is both an ongoing one, and one that spans channels, vexing marketers across search and social channels alike.
In my part of the session, I explored the paid vs. earned media question as it relates to social, and I want to recap some of the findings here. But, before exploring the paid vs. earned media question, any question of which of the two to invest in on social must be preceded by a discussion of the degree to which social has impacted consumer behavior. Understanding this will inform us as to the size of the opportunity for marketers, and the degree to which they should be giving mindshare to the channel.
Social Media Adoption Exceeds the Population of Nearly Every Continent
Even accounting for the fact that Google has rolled Gmail and YouTube users into their Google+ user count, the total number of social network users is greater than the population of every individual continent but one. Facebook has become so globally pervasive that analysts talk about it approaching a saturation point for the worldwide addressable market of users with social capable phones.
Preparing for the talk got me thinking about the "paid" vs. "earned" media challenge. That is, the ongoing tension for marketers between investing in paid vs. earned media.
Paid media may produce a more rapid return than earned media. However, like Sisyphus, the Greek tragic who pushed a boulder uphill only to have it repeatedly roll back down, it also requires a continued deposit of funds to continue functioning.
On the earned side, the returns can be many multiples that of paid, but it does require more rigor than depositing coins in the AdWords or Twitter ad machine.
For many marketers this tension – do I invest in the immediate ROI paid offers or make the longer term commitment but greater return earned media offers--is both an ongoing one, and one that spans channels, vexing marketers across search and social channels alike.
In my part of the session, I explored the paid vs. earned media question as it relates to social, and I want to recap some of the findings here. But, before exploring the paid vs. earned media question, any question of which of the two to invest in on social must be preceded by a discussion of the degree to which social has impacted consumer behavior. Understanding this will inform us as to the size of the opportunity for marketers, and the degree to which they should be giving mindshare to the channel.
Social Media Adoption Exceeds the Population of Nearly Every Continent
Even accounting for the fact that Google has rolled Gmail and YouTube users into their Google+ user count, the total number of social network users is greater than the population of every individual continent but one. Facebook has become so globally pervasive that analysts talk about it approaching a saturation point for the worldwide addressable market of users with social capable phones.
You might be thinking "that's the market size, that doesn't tell us how users do or do not use social networks." Research from Forrester tells us that social networks have become a critical discovery platform and is now the second most popular channel for website discovery, behind only organic search.
The above tells us that social has become a critical website/content discovery method for users. But, the extent to which it has impacted consumer consumption habits was illustrated in a recently leaked New York Times internal report (hence the poor image quality below). The report showed the dramatic decline in visitors to their home page (nytimes.com, not the site overall) over time.
The reason for the decline is due, in large part, to how social has changed our content consumption behaviors. Pre-social's influence, we navigated directly to our favorite content site's home page and clicked into content from there.
Now, specific content pieces are discovered on our social networks, and this has the effect of driving visitors to specific pieces of content rather than the home page.
Now, specific content pieces are discovered on our social networks, and this has the effect of driving visitors to specific pieces of content rather than the home page.
Social has changed content consumption dynamics and it has also contributed to changes in how we consume news. Pew Research data shows consumer news consumption has shifted from checking news at regular times to getting news "from time to time".
The data is clear about the opportunity for marketers in social: market size is calculated in the billions and at least when it comes to content consumption, it has fundamentally changed online behaviors. Conversations are happening on social networks and brands need to be a part of them.
Now that we have established the size of the opportunity, let's return to the paid vs. earned media question.
Consider the following statistics:
- Less than 1 percent of Twitter clicks go to ads
- 44 percent of Facebook users will never click on ads
- You're more likely to survive a plane crash than click on a banner ad
- Half of online users don't trust advertisements
Take Steps to Join the Conversation
The opportunity to reach your customers on social networks is enormous. What should Marketers who are overly dependent on paid media in social do to break their dependence and reach users where they are more engaged?
Start by taking the following steps.
1. Start With Content
Content and social media are intertwined. To reach consumers on social media start by reviewing your content strategy.
Ask yourself if you are developing content users would find interesting/useful/funny – in other words, engaging. If the answer is no, develop a content plan that will allow you to emphatically answer "yes!" to that question.
And, consider devoting part of your editorial calendar to content that lends itself to social sharing and engagement such as video. Your social strategy will naturally follow a sweet content plan.
2. Figure Out Which Conversations You Should Join
To start to diversify beyond paid media, you'll need to figure out what conversations your audience is having that you should be a part of organically. Keyword research you have already done for search will help, as will a careful review of question sites like Quora.
3. Get Involved in the Conversations Your Competitors Have Joined
Like competitive analysis in search, which can reveal a great deal about competitors" strategy, careful analysis of the social conversations in which competitors are involved can reveal a great deal about both the what and the how of their social strategies.
It's a simple way to see what conversations they deem important. The way they engage in these conversations (voice, tactics...) will tell you how they do so. This can spark ideas for how you can start to engage with your audience.
Summary
To be sure, paid social media has a place in the marketer's toolbox. And, there is no one-size-fits-all strategy, marketers must evaluate the right mix for themselves based on their vertical, budget, and a host of other factors.
But, given the growing consumer inattention and mistrust of paid media, you would be well served to step back from the day to day to ask yourself if you're at all uncomfortable with the degree to which you are dependent on paid media on your social networks. If the answer is "yes", consider starting with some of the strategies outlined above to join the conversations on social networks where they are happening: in organic social media.
By Nathan Safran Director of Research for Conductor, Inc.
5 Reasons to include Polling in Your Social Media Strategy
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(Posted on May 29, 2014 at 12:03PM )
Polling is one of the most powerful tools brands can incorporate into a social strategy. Below are a few reasons why you should consider incorporating polling into your next marketing campaign. The five key points are followed by a few recommendations for tools to use for polling.
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1. Free Product Feedback
Brands often pay a lot of money to have outside services and companies survey customers to get product feedback. Others use social listening tools to see what people are saying about their products.
Why not be more direct and just ask the customers on a social media channel?
If a person has followed your brand on a social network, there's a good chance that they think very highly of your brand. These are the people that are going to provide some of the most honest and lengthy feedback, and they will gladly do it for free.
Polling on social channels will improve your product and site by helping you identify shortcomings to fix.
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Brands often pay a lot of money to have outside services and companies survey customers to get product feedback. Others use social listening tools to see what people are saying about their products.
Why not be more direct and just ask the customers on a social media channel?
If a person has followed your brand on a social network, there's a good chance that they think very highly of your brand. These are the people that are going to provide some of the most honest and lengthy feedback, and they will gladly do it for free.
Polling on social channels will improve your product and site by helping you identify shortcomings to fix.
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2. Gain Deep Understanding of Customers and Community in Real-Time
Soliciting opinions in real-time can help you better understand the community and the types of things they enjoy.
Polling provides deep insight into your readers and customers, and it can improve the development of marketing and advertising campaigns.
Are your customers fans of the World Cup? Then maybe we should run a campaign that has a soccer theme.
Do your customers like Apple more than Samsung? Then maybe we should develop our app on iOS before Android.
3. Community Building
Porter Haney, CEO of social polling company Wedgies, says that polls are a "unique way" to spark conversation and engagement. Polling shows your customers that the communication channel isn't a one-way street, and it invites them to join the fun.
Seeking input from the community also tells them that you are listening and that you want to make your products and websites better.
Broadcasting the results demonstrates that you want the world to know what your community thinks about a certain topic. Also, if the product feedback is used to build a better site/product, customers will be happy.
Doesn't everyone want happy customers to tell friends about their amazing community and product?
4. Content Generation
Another beauty of social media polling is that it creates two pieces of content. The first is the actual poll itself, and the second is when you showcase the results. Imagine if every article you wrote multiplied into two articles. That's what polls can do.
Soliciting opinions in real-time can help you better understand the community and the types of things they enjoy.
Polling provides deep insight into your readers and customers, and it can improve the development of marketing and advertising campaigns.
Are your customers fans of the World Cup? Then maybe we should run a campaign that has a soccer theme.
Do your customers like Apple more than Samsung? Then maybe we should develop our app on iOS before Android.
3. Community Building
Porter Haney, CEO of social polling company Wedgies, says that polls are a "unique way" to spark conversation and engagement. Polling shows your customers that the communication channel isn't a one-way street, and it invites them to join the fun.
Seeking input from the community also tells them that you are listening and that you want to make your products and websites better.
Broadcasting the results demonstrates that you want the world to know what your community thinks about a certain topic. Also, if the product feedback is used to build a better site/product, customers will be happy.
Doesn't everyone want happy customers to tell friends about their amazing community and product?
4. Content Generation
Another beauty of social media polling is that it creates two pieces of content. The first is the actual poll itself, and the second is when you showcase the results. Imagine if every article you wrote multiplied into two articles. That's what polls can do.
5. Traffic Lift
By having two pieces of content from one poll and encouraging users to share the poll, you might also experience an increase in traffic to your blog.
Porter Haney says that social polling is a "really good way for marketers to drive extra traffic." He mentions that "the flow (on average) is something like this: 20 percent of readers vote on the poll, 15 percent of those voters share the poll, resulting in a 2-3 percent share rate of the page."
Each of the social shares incrementally increases the traffic to the page, so you could end up with a 20 percent boost in traffic to a page with a poll.
Polling Tools
Polling is a great way to get product feedback, gain a deep understanding of customers and community in real-time, build a community, generate content, and boost traffic. Before you start implementing polling, what tools should you use?
The easiest way to do social polling is simply posting an open or closed-ended question to Facebook or Twitter. This is free to do, but it can sometimes be hard to curate a large set of responses and have users share the results.
Fortunately a number of great tools can take your social polling to the next level. I recommend looking at:
- POLL: The POLL app works well within Facebook, and it's great for sharing results. It's free to use, but the non-ad version will cost a small fee.
- Wedgies: Wedgies is a beautiful and interactive polling tool that can be embedded into a blog or Tumblr post. The poll and the results "cards" make for a fun and shareable piece of content. Wedgies works best for close-ended questions, but it also helps spark discussion within the comments section of a blog posts. It's relatively inexpensive, and it can be seen in action on sites like Engadget or Joystiq (full disclosure: I work for AOL, which owns Engadget and Joystiq).
- Poptip: Another great polling tool that's being used by E! Online and the NHL is Poptip. If you want to use open-ended questions, Poptip does a great job organizing the unstructured conversation into more formal categories. Similar to Wedgies, Poptip also has a shareable "results card."
Social Media Analytics and Strategy Specialist AOL
Whether you’re a solopreneur or a Fortune 500 company, you have the same goal for your business: getting paying clients. Lead generation is the process for gathering leads in hopes that some (or all!) become paying clients. As well as being the first stage of the sales process, lead generation is probably the most essential part. Having leads in your pipeline ensures you have potential clients – and business survival – down the road.Lead generation occurs in one of two ways:
Outbound:Â People become leads as a result of being contacted by someone from your company. Examples of outbound marketing include engaging on phone calls; appearing at events, tradeshows, or other live events; sending printed company collateral through the mail; conducting face-to-face meetings.
Inbound:Â People become leads as a result of finding your business online and indicating their interest through online means. Examples of inbound marketing include using SEO (Search Engine Optimization) to optimize your website(s); creating content in the form of blogs, images, and/or web videos; building a following, then engaging them on social media; or emailing content about your company.
Your business may prefer using one or both of these lead generation methods as a way to gather quality leads. Which one is better? Only you can answer that question, and your final decision doesn’t have to be set in stone. Factors such as budget and staffing resources, as well as personal preferences, usually weigh into these decisions. And sometimes a little old-fashioned trial-and-error helps, too.
Have you hit a lull in your business or maybe just need more clients? If so, it’s time for your business to start bringing in more leads. These are 5 of the latest trends companies of all sizes are using for accomplishing successful lead generation – inbound, outbound, or both.
Inbound Lead Generation Trends1) Content creation and distribution…they’re still ruling as “kingâ€Â and “queenâ€The content marketing trend isn’t new, but content strategy changes regularly due to activities such as Google algorithmic updates.
“Content Marketing is an emerging trend that’s utilized by 78% of B2B marketers. This practice of creating and distributing relevant and valuable content such as blog posts, whitepapers, case studies, and infographics to attract, acquire, and engage new customers is seen as the future of B2B marketing.â€
http://www.mediahorizons.com/blog/item/260-b2b-lead-generation-trends-for-2014
Content creators need to generate high-quality articles and posts which make their blogs stand out from the millions already out there. To top it off, they must also create quality content that search engines love. It’s not easy, but certainly worth it when your efforts pay off in the form of lead generation.
2) Don’t rule out social media for lead generation…yet92% of marketers in a recent Social Media Examiner report think social media is important for their business. With this high of a percentage, it’s probably safe to say that most marketers want to get better at using social media.
Within the same survey, 89% of the marketers indicated they wanted to master social media skills so they can best engage with potential clients through the platforms.
3) Why Using Marketing Automation Software Isn’t a Bad IdeaMore businesses have started using marketing automation for their more mundane sales-related tasks, such as email. Once businesses begin automating, they realize how efficient – and effective – marketing automation can be for lead generation. As well, when they automate those mundane tasks, they have more time to focus on those activities which require human engagement.
The following stats, as originally listed in a recent article for the Callbox blog, show promising data for using marketing automation for lead generation:
- Companies using marketing automation source 45% more pipeline than those who don’t use marketing automation – Marketo
- 70% companies declare that marketing automation met or exceeded ROI expectations – Focus
- Full deployment of marketing automation reduces close rates from 1:221 to 1:20 – Marketo
- 350% return on investment and 100% annual revenue growth while saving $400K and generating $2MM in incremental gross revenue – Acteva
- Marketing automation provides 225% increase in prospect volume that convert to sales opportunities – ShipServ
- Using marketing automation causes 3x more leads passed to sales after one month – Marketo
- Marketing automation reduces ignored leads from 80% to 25% – Bulldog Solutions
- Companies that automate lead management see over 10% increase in revenue in 6-9 months – Gartner Research
- Marketing automation-generated personalized emails improve click-through rates by 14% and conversion rates over 10% – The Aberdeen Group
For real-world events, companies are seeing easier and faster lead generation through innovative, new technologies such as NFC (near field communication). Remember the old-fashioned fishbowl approach, where you dropped your business card into it for a chance to win a prize? On the flip side, someone had to go through each of those cards and either call or email each person in hopes of generating a lead.
NFC simplifies and speeds up the process…with the swipe of the attendee’s wrist, you gather the data they provide at registration in a matter of seconds. You know right away whether you have a quality lead and prospective client. And attendees still walk away with plenty of swag.
5) Cold calling and telemarketing are still hot ways to generate leadsNot many people enjoy making cold calls, but no one has died from it. An even better argument for picking up the phone? Results prove that phone calls and telemarketing are among the most effective means of lead generation.
Tips for cold calling include the following:
- Study and rehearse your scripts; improvise when necessary
- Know rejections aren’t personal
- When possible, research prospects before calling them
Which lead generation trends do you think are here to stay? I would love to hear your ideas and suggestions. Feel free to leave your comments below.
Image courtesy of Stuart Miles / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
BYÂ JENNIFER HANFORD
Also Read Social Networking At Its Best
By far the top way small business owners engage with customers is their websites, cited by more than 80 percent of entrepreneurs. Next is the Yellow Pages, cited by more than 65 percent, followed by social media, used by nearly 55 percent.
Attracting new customers means nothing, of course, if they don’t buy anything, so the study also asked small business owners where most of their sales come from. Repeat customers were by far the biggest source of revenue for more than 43 percent of entrepreneurs, while new customers accounted for about 19 percent of revenues.
Interestingly, “word-of-mouth†was cited by 36.39 percent. In other words, new customers driven by existing customers’ recommendations are the second-biggest source of revenue—more than new customers who come to a business from other sources.
Along the same lines, when asked what marketing method is most successful for them, a whopping 52.22 percent of small business owners cited “friend referrals.†In comparison, just 33.23 percent say advertising is their most effective marketing method.
Clearly, most small business owners have a baseline online presence (that is, a website), and most are also using social media (although there’s definitely room for improvement there). But few are taking their online presence to the next level by using tools such as customer loyalty programs and mobile apps to their fullest extent. These can be great ways to increase word-of-mouth, retain existing customers and drive new ones.
So why aren’t small businesses using them? Primarily, they don’t have the budget (42 percent) or time (27 percent) to deal with expanding their online presence. In addition, about 18 percent admit to confusion about mobile apps, loyalty programs and social media—they’re either “overwhelmed†by the idea of doing more digitally or “don’t know where to start.â€
Small business owners in the study are clearly aware that mobility is the hottest trend going right now. If they had the budget and time to make a change, more than 40 percent would like to add a mobile ad campaign while 21 percent would optimize their websites for mobile use. In reality, optimizing your website for mobile users doesn’t have to be costly. Finally, consider adding a loyalty program of some kind. With so much of the average small business’s revenue dependent on existing customers, it only makes sense to reach out to your customer base with rewards. There are more options than ever before for loyalty programs, from simple punch cards to sophisticated (yet affordable) mobile apps that make it easy to track customers’ shopping habits.
By Rieva Lesonsky is CEO of GrowBiz Media
Also Read Social Networking At Its Best
Using your own social channel (community) on your website to connect with your offsite social channels can make for a winning social media marketing strategy.Not only can it provide a multitude of benefits that cannot be realized through any other marketing initiative, you will not be subject or impacted as much by the constant flux of other's changing marketing policies and popularity.
There is no more transparent way of connecting with your customers and employees than having an onsite social network. An onsite social network allows you to partner with your customers and employees to bolster your marketing initiatives and project your customer and employee centric culture across all your social channels.
By building your own brand community of fans and followers you will have a central location with an organic reach of 100 percent on your real estate with which to form lasting relationships and a community of fans and followers who can help you broadcast your message organically across the internet.
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Although it is important to maintain a presence on other social networks an onsite social network gives you the opportunity to market better, smarter, more economically and more secure.
Your onsite community provides the means for Socialcasting of which community plays a key role that in its many forms can boost page ranking and drive traffic in ways that no other form of media can. This can provide a base from which to launch all of your marketing efforts to positively impact your overall marketing efforts. Technology is constantly providing us with new and creative ways of centralizing our marketing to make it more efficient and cost effective.
By taking advantage of your existing customer and employee base you can easily and cost effectively have a powerful platform of brand advocates from which to build on. New customers can automatically become members of the community as part of the benefit of doing business with your company and site visitors can be invited to join to enjoy member benefits as a way of nurturing new business.
Give community members discounts on extended warranties, maintenance Contracts and/or Services and provide drawings and special offer to keep them engaged and you will have an army of devoted customers who will help you broadcast your customer centric culture and drive more traffic to draw many more devoted customers to your business.
All of this will have many positive effects including bolstering your SERP and feed on itself to give you a platform from which to launch all your marketing initiatives.
“While the idea is still new and new ideas often take time to be fully shaped inside organizations, in the future it is quite likely that consumer-facing companies will no longer outsource social platforms, but rather look to integrate, partner, and build their own niched platforms that are tailored specifically to what their consumers want.†Jennifer Wolfe stated in her recent article Think It’s Too Costly to Build Your Own Social Platform? Think Again
William Cosgrove
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Award winning OneBigBroadcast (OBB) has just finished the successful pre- launch, of ComproCoches, a first to market car classified and social community site built to culturally reach the fastest growing and most connected segment of the US population.
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The Hispanic Segment of the population in this country represents the 13th Largest Economy in the World and is the youngest, fastest growing segment of the US population representing 60 % of overall population growth with a per cap income of $39,730 with 25% of this segment at $75,000. See Slide Show at http://comprocoches.us/dealerpresentacion
5 reasons that make ComproCoches a significant addition to your marketing strategy
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1. Proven Reach:
 ComproCoches offers a proven platform design to deliver your message to this important  market to provide a new source of revenue now and into the future. Since the pre-launch on December 4th of this year, ComproCoches has had over 250,000 page views substantiating the potential reach of a unique site of this kind.
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2. Existing Market : *Percent of total population ( Call for your Geographic Area)
Central PA- Â As of April 12th, 2012 according to The US Census Bueau had over
127,512 Hispanics within Harrisburg*18%-York- Lebanon*32.1%-Lancaster
39.3%- Reading*58.2% and increasing at 60% of overall population growth.
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Lehigh Valley-Philadelphia – Total Hispanics over 284,118. Allentown*42.8%-Bethlehem*24.4%-Easton*19.9%-Hazleton*37.3%-Philadelphia-12.3%-Norristown-28.3%
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3. Marketing:
ComproCoches and PhotoRep are built with OBB’s award winning proprietary and fully mobile marketing platform technology that provides you with some of the most advanced analytic and marketing tools  (including OBB’s Banner Ads & “Splash†Events plugins) available in the marketplace today.
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4. Leads:
All leads are the sole property of the dealer. ComproCoches does not market or send your leads to other Automotive Dealers.
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5. Significance
The Hispanic Segment of the population in this country represents the 13th Largest Economy in the World and is the youngest, fastest growing segment of the US population representing 60 % of overall population growth with a per cap income of $39,730 with 25% of this segment at $75,000.
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Michael Sebastian AdAge Media News "Publishing companies realized they had to do a specific product for Hispanic consumers," he said. "It was not just about adding a couple of pages in their main book to reach these consumers."
                            See Slide Show and our Special Introductory Special at http://comprocoches.us/dealerpresentacion
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Award winning OneBigBroadcast (OBB) has just finished the successful pre- launch, of ComproCoches, a first to market car classified and social community site built to culturally reach the fastest growing and most connected segment of the US population.Â
The Hispanic Segment of the population in this country represents the 13th Largest Economy in the World and is the youngest, fastest growing segment of the US population representing 60 % of overall population growth with a per cap income of $39,730 with 25% of this segment at $75,000. See Slide Show at http://comprocoches.us/dealerpresentacion
5 reasons that make ComproCoches a significant addition to your marketing strategy
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1. Proven Reach:
 ComproCoches offers a proven platform design to deliver your message to this important  market to provide a new source of revenue now and into the future. Since the pre-launch on December 4th of this year, ComproCoches has had over 250,000 page views substantiating the potential reach of a unique site of this kind.
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2. Existing Market : *Percent of total population ( Call for your Geographic Area)
Central PA- Â As of April 12th, 2012 according to The US Census Bueau had over
127,512 Hispanics within Harrisburg*18%-York- Lebanon*32.1%-Lancaster
39.3%- Reading*58.2% and increasing at 60% of overall population growth.
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Lehigh Valley-Philadelphia – Total Hispanics over 284,118. Allentown*42.8%-Bethlehem*24.4%-Easton*19.9%-Hazleton*37.3%-Philadelphia-12.3%-Norristown-28.3%
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3. Marketing:
ComproCoches and PhotoRep are built with OBB’s award winning proprietary and fully mobile marketing platform technology that provides you with some of the most advanced analytic and marketing tools  (including OBB’s Banner Ads & “Splash†Events plugins) available in the marketplace today.
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4. Leads:
All leads are the sole property of the dealer. ComproCoches does not market or send your leads to other Automotive Dealers.
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5. Significance
The Hispanic Segment of the population in this country represents the 13th Largest Economy in the World and is the youngest, fastest growing segment of the US population representing 60 % of overall population growth with a per cap income of $39,730 with 25% of this segment at $75,000.
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Michael Sebastian AdAge Media News "Publishing companies realized they had to do a specific product for Hispanic consumers," he said. "It was not just about adding a couple of pages in their main book to reach these consumers."
Mario Carrasco partner at ThinkNow Research says "Language is and will always be a factor.
Cultural relevancy and the appropriate use of language in your marketing messages to the Hispanic market can make or break your attempts to attract their attention.
And specifically, if you want to advertise to Hispanic Millennials, then you better be prepared to communicate (TV, radio, internet, magazines) in both English and Spanish because, according to our study, 35% of them consume their media mostly or exclusively in English, 25% in Spanish, and 40% claimed English and Spanish equally.
Key takeaway?Â
U.S. Hispanic Millennials have their own distinct traits. Take the time to learn what they are and get in early while everyone else is still trying to figure it out."
                            See Slide Show and our Special Introductory Special at http://comprocoches.us/dealerpresentacion
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Social Organic Reach Is Trending Towards Zero-How to meet The Challenge
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(Posted on May 24, 2014 at 01:31PM )
Social networks are maturing and evolving by answering the need to monetize the value they are creating. Brands need to mature and evolve, too.For years now, Facebook and other social platforms have been encouraging brands to build brand communities of fans and followers, and advocating, with good reason, the value of reaching those fans organically with timely and socially savvy messages in the News Feed.
Fast-forward to 2014. According to a report last week from Social@Ogilvy, organic reach through Facebook is now down by as much as 49 percent, with the average number of fans reached by brand posts hovering around 6 percent - even lower for brands with larger fan bases. And future expectations are more of the same for Twitter, Pinterest, and Instagram. The result is a challenging landscape for brand marketing on social.
So how should brands be dealing with this?
Organic reach - as defined on Facebook's own site - is no longer guaranteed. But that doesn't mean there aren't hugely powerful, and creative, opportunities for brand marketing on social. Brands need to take a strategic, decisive, and holistic approach to social marketing - and plenty are doing this very successfully.
Because here's the reality: the social networks own their social platforms. Not the brand. Those channels are not traditional "owned" channels. They are "leased" channels, where the audience has to be qualified, targeted, and managed, just as they are everywhere else.
Just as brands had to evolve from their early thinking of the Internet as "free," they're going to have to do the same thing for social. Marketing on social isn't going away. It remains an incredibly powerful platform. But it's evolving, and brands have to evolve, too.
Here are some pointers for how to think about these changes:
Earn Impressions "Through" Fans, Not "at" Fans
Brands should not be relying solely on posting to the News Feed and promoting those posts through paid media. In addition, brands should be giving fans something to do - answer questions, participate in promotions, contribute content through social apps - and deliver those activities in a way that encourages their fans to share their participation to their own network. This creates new earned impressions. Yes, brands will need to promote that initial touch point through media, but each purchased media impression earns more impressions if the social app is designed to maximize sharing.
Leverage Crowdsourced Social Content
Crowdsourcing, and curating, content on social offers a huge value to brands. Brands that call out for content on all social wavelengths - Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube, Tumblr, etc. - through paid media, can then bring that crowdsourced content together for further browsing and sharing. And bringing all that fantastic content together in an organized way becomes an opportunity to socialize where brands have the most control - on their (fully owned) brand website.
Spread Across All Social Touch Points
It's clear to everyone now that social doesn't begin and end with Facebook. Running cross-social promotions allows brands to cumulate engagement. If a brand gets a 10 percent reach on Facebook, and another 10 percent on Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest, that adds up to meaningful numbers of cumulative fans and followers who have opted in to engage with the brand.
Find and Engage Evangelists and Influencers
Back when blogging was new (pre-social platform days!), engaging blogger-influencers was a big focus for savvy brand marketers. Well, it's still is. Or should be. Engaging those fans and followers who have influence as brand "ambassadors" will help brands earn new media reach, and works well for brands that foster loyalty and passion, and/or are part of a highly specialized or special-interest community.
Socialize the Corporate Website
Which brings us onto the corporate website. Brands need to bring their corporate websites back to life, and back up to date with social content and social participation. The corporate website is 100 percent owned. So brands should do all they can to reflect the energy and enthusiasm - and content - from the social world on their corporate website.
Combine Social With Lead Generation
There are all kinds of ways through social apps and social participation to have fans and followers opt in to connect directly with the brand. Asking for emails sounds very retro, but it works. It allows brands to pull leads into a CRM system, where they can then be encouraged and incentivized to head over to their owned world - the corporate website.
Bottom line:Â The sky isn't falling because social platforms are answering the need to monetize the incredible value they are creating by building networks of engaged, connected consumers. Social is maturing and evolving, and brands will do the same, too.
By Roger Katz is the CEO and founder of Friend2Friend
Engage Hispanics:A Quick Review Of What You Need To Know About Marketing To Millennials
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(Posted on May 23, 2014 at 01:39PM )
As a whole, Millennials are quickly stealing the spotlight from its predecessors, Gen X and Baby Boomers. Why? Because there are over 80 million of them now coming of age and moving into the workforce. This increased buying power is influencing their purchase decisions and driving major trends within the economy.
Of all Millennials nationwide, Hispanics comprise 21%, a statistic expected to rise to 23% by 2020. And within the U.S. Hispanic community itself, Millennials represent 25% of the population and make up the majority of all Millennials in cities like Los Angeles, Miami-Ft. Lauderdale and San Antonio.
But reaching this market isn’t just about the numbers, and relying on volume and skimping on value is still the worse possible way to reach them. I’ll tell you why.
Hispanics are a unique and diverse group.
I’ll concede that trying to understanding Hispanic Millennials is tough because while they share some similarities with the rest of their generation, they are a unique group, even when compared to other Hispanic segments and sub-groups.
Let’s look at the stats. Early results from the Hispanic Millennial Project, co-sponsored by ThinkNow Research and Sensis, shows that when compared to older Hispanics (35-64 years of age):
- Hispanic Millennials are more positive in their overall outlook
- 61% of Hispanic Millennials are satisfied with where they are in life, compared to only 47% for 35-64 year olds
- “My quality of life is better than my parentsâ€â€¦ 65% vs. 55%
- On being optimistic about the future… a whopping 70% vs. 49%
- Interestingly, they are more aligned with their Hispanic heritage
- 67% of Hispanic Millennials said they want to stand out as a Latino, compared to 52% for the older group
- On “feeling closer to the Latino cultureâ€â€¦ it’s 47% vs. 30%
Hispanic Millennials also differ significantly from Non-Hispanic Millennials…
- They are more optimistic
- 63% of Hispanic Millennials said they were satisfied with the direction of the U.S., compared to just 39% for non-Hispanics.
- On being “extremely optimistic about the futureâ€â€¦ it was 70% vs. 52%
- On their belief in the “American Dreamâ€â€¦ Hispanic Millennials 71%, non-Hispanic Millennials 55%
- And as part of their “American Dreamâ€â€¦
- 48% of Hispanic Millennials have a goal of owning their own business, compared to just 29% for non-Hispanics
- Graduating from college? 46% vs. 31%
In contrast with Non-Hispanic Millennials, today’s Hispanic Millennials strive for the more traditional markers of success such as owning a home, buying a nice car and going to college.
And when U.S.-born and foreign-born Hispanic Millennials were compared, across the board, foreign-born Millennials seem to have what might be referred to as a more “traditional†or “conservativeâ€Â belief system, showing in some cases as much as a 20% variance in their opinions toward topics like same-sex marriage and religion.
Language is and will always be a factor.
Cultural relevancy and the appropriate use of language in your marketing messages to the Hispanic market can make or break your attempts to attract their attention.
And specifically, if you want to advertise to Hispanic Millennials, then you better be prepared to communicate (TV, radio, internet, magazines) in both English and Spanish because, according to our study, 35% of them consume their media mostly or exclusively in English, 25% in Spanish, and 40% claimed English and Spanish equally.
Key takeaway?Â
U.S. Hispanic Millennials have their own distinct traits. Take the time to learn what they are and get in early while everyone else is still trying to figure it out.
By Mario Carrasco
See Slide Show Click Here
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