Entries Tagged 'social media marketing' ↓

Everyone knows that content marketing is the way to go.

With SEO becoming more social, it’s essential that businesses start to get great information out to their potential customers, to remain visible in the search results.

But what do you do when it’s ‘out there’?

Do you tweet a link and leave it at that?

No, you must engage in smart marketing.

It’s up to you to produce marketing that your customers want – useful information that builds trust and engagement.

Shouting about what you’re doing through social media will help get that information out to a wider audience.

You’ll know if you’ve hit it right because your followers and Facebook fans will then share it.

Why?

If your information is useful, relevant and valuable to them, then they will share it for you. This will get it out to a wider readership who’ll then share it with their friends too. And so it goes on until, before you know it, your audience of a few hundred has transformed into one of thousands.

That’s how the smart marketers do it.

They leverage their own audience to push their message out further.

Pretty cool.

So when you next create a video, podcast, blog or article, make sure it’s:

• Engaging
• Relevant
• Valuable
• Useful

Then share it through your social media channels and watch what happens. Of course, not every piece of content will strike gold, but when one does take a look at why it worked so well and replicate it.

Sally Ormond – copywriter, tweeter and Google+

Let’s get one thing straight.

Content marketing is great. Social media will widen your reach. SEO (search engine optimisation) will boost your visibility. But if you really want to make an impact you must do all 3.

By combining the power of great content, social engagement and search visibility you will become an unstoppable force, pushing aside your competitors.

[Like that image?]

So what should you be doing and how do these 3 elements work together?

Blogging

Blogging is the most popular form of content marketing.

It’s a great way to share your knowledge with the world and promote your business through your expertise.

But if you simply write and publish, you’re limiting your reach.

Make sure your blogs are written with keywords in mind to help their SEO potential. Then, make sure you promote them through your social media outlets to widen your audience.

Newsletters and email marketing

There’s no better way to get your content out to your customers than through newsletters and email marketing.

When you’ve got great content you want to shout about, send it to them, or a snippet with a link back to your blog. And make sure your social media links are clearly shown so people can choose to interact with you through those channels too.

Media

To further your reach and influence, make a list of industry websites, magazine and bloggers and ask if they will consider you as a guest blogger.

Writing your articles with SEO in mind will boost your visibility as will the link you’ll get back from the publication.

To get an extra lift, make sure you shout about your article through your social media channels.

Social networking and social media

Both of these have become part and parcel of everyday life, so your customers will expect you to be using them.

Use them to engage and chat with your audience as well as promote your blogs and articles.

Mobile

Have you noticed how much time you spend on your smart phone?

More and more people are using them to browse the web, so it’s essential your website is mobile friendly to increase your potential audience.

Video

Last but not least.  Video is a very powerful marketing tool and, when coupled with great SEO and social sharing and promotion, can draw shed loads of traffic your way.

There you go – content marketing, SEO and social media have to work together if they are to be effective.

Author:

Sally Ormond – copywriter, blogger, tweeter and Google+

Image courtesy of David Castillo Dominici / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

In the aftermath of Google’s Panda and Penguin algorithm ‘tweaks’, the fact that we all get search results that relate to our location (yup, you’re no longer seeing country-wide results^*) and the prospect of even more changes on the way, is there a future for search engine optimisation?

Let’s face it, small businesses with a national (and international) reach relied heavily on their SEO to get great rankings in the search results. Now, they have no way of knowing who will see their listing because everyone sees different things.

OK, for local search this isn’t too much of an issue, but how are SEO companies dealing with the fact that they can no longer state, with any certainty, where their clients’ websites are ranking?

The changing face of SEO

Once upon a time, SEO could be divided into 2 categories:

1. Internal SEO – relating to your website’s structure
2. External SEO – articles, content, blogs, press releases, links etc.

Of course, the reason for Google’s changes comes down to that small minority who couldn’t be bothered to do things properly and had to find short cuts to make money.

These ‘black hat’ SEOers spoilt the party for all the other legitimate businesses who worked hard to get their rankings playing by the rules.

Now many face an uncertain future, or are being forced to rethink their whole marketing strategy because they can no longer reach out to the wider market place.

Search goes social

The focus behind all these changes is for our search results to become more social and therefore (apparently) more relevant.

The relevancy of your website is now to be dictated by the number of followers, comments, views and shares your content gets.

The problem I can see with this, is that it won’t be long before the cowboys work out a way of faking that too.

Where does that leave us?

For most of the big brands out there these algorithmic changes have little or no effect. But for the smaller businesses they can have a devastating impact.

Google claims that if you have followed their SEO rules your website won’t be affected, but thousands and thousands of sites have seen their rankings plummet because of them.

Online marketing is a fast changing environment. Keeping up with these new techniques is proving to be a major headache for many small businesses out there. They don’t have the budgets needed to get an expert on board to help them and so are left floundering in the wake of the might Google’s whims.

Over to you

Are you an SEO company? How are these changes affecting you and your clients?

Are you a small business struggling to keep pace with it all?

Leave a comment below because, whatever your story, we want to hear from you.

^*If you want to return to national results, simply go to your Google home page,  click ‘settings’ (bottom right), click ‘Search Settings’, click ‘Location’ and then enter UK in the ‘Where are you?’ box.

Author:

Sally Ormond, copywriter and MD at Briar Copywriting Ltd – blogger, cyclist and mum.

Hands up if you’ve made a comment on a Facebook business page you’ve liked, or sent a tweet to a company only never to hear a dickey bird?

I know I have.

It’s a bit like going to a party and chatting to someone only to be blanked by them. Who does that? No one does, because it’s very rude to ignore someone who’s talking to you.

It seems crazy that companies dive into social media to spread the word about how great they are, but don’t understand that it is a two-way street.

Social media isn’t a soapbox that you can shout from. It is a platform through which you can communicate with your customers.

After all, by signing up for it you gave your customers a new way to interact with you, so interact.

Make an impression

Just setting yourself up on social media isn’t good enough. You must also allocate someone to monitor the channels you use and respond on your behalf.

If your fans and followers have taken the time to make contact with you, the least you can do is respond to them because that’s how you start to build relationships. And social media is all about building relationships.

The more you interact with your fans and followers the more likely they are to share your content with their friends, widening your reach and your audience.

Speedy, speedy

One of the benefits of social media is its immediacy.

Within seconds users can respond to someone’s comment, but that does mean your fans and followers will expect to hear from you fairly soon after they post their message.

Taking days or weeks to respond is not good.

For them, your social media channels are like a customer service channel where they can post comments, complaints and compliments. But they will expect a response from you.

That’s why it’s essential you have people on your team whose job it is to respond to any questions that are raised by your customers.

You gave them the option to contact you that way by signing up for Facebook and Twitter, so it’s up to you to make sure they don’t go unheard.

Thank you

These are two simple words that are sadly so often lacking in social media.

It doesn’t take long to say thank you in response to a comment or tweet, especially if someone has taken the time to retweet something you’ve said.

Manners cost nothing, as my mum always used to say – and she was right.

OK, granted nothing here is ground-breakingly new, but considering my experience of dealing with companies thorough social media, it needs to be said.

Remember, social media should be seen as an extension to your customer service, use it well and respond quickly and you’ll go far.

Author:

Sally Ormond, Copywriter and MD at Briar Copywriting Ltd

Twitter – @sallyormond

Facebook

That always seems to be a headache for people.

They spend hours and hours typing away on social media, but struggle to get people to share their ramblings.

This post has been picked from the archives to give you some handy tips on how you can get your content shared.

Social media is all about conversation and sharing.

The premise is simple:

1. Generate great content
2. People pick it up and share it with others
3. You get more followers, fans and comments

That’s all well and good, but what happens when you’ve been using social media for a while and yet no one is sharing your stuff?

Well, you’ve obviously hit a few barriers because before the above can happen, people have to be able to find your content, they have to read it and then they have to want to share it.

Why is your content being ignored?

First of all, don’t panic. If no one is sharing, all you have to do is rethink how you’re using social media.

Below are 5 scenarios that could hold the answer to why your content isn’t being shared.

1. Trust

If you want people to share your stuff, they have to trust you.

Trust is developed through engaging with people, being open and chatting. If you’re merrily throwing stuff ‘out there’ without taking the time to get to know your followers and fans, it’s hardly surprising they don’t trust you.

2. Caring about your brand

People will only share your stuff if they care about your brand.

How do you get them to care about you? Well, for starters, you can’t make them care. Again, this one comes down to building relationships.

If you are generous with your information, tell them about offers, give away tips or even freebies, you will begin to develop a deeper relationship. They will follow you more closely and tell their friends to do the same.

3. Don’t be boring

No one wants to read something that’s boring, so they certainly won’t share it.

If you churn out blog posts, Facebook posts and tweets that are dull, you won’t be engaging with anyone.

Don’t be afraid to inject a bit of humour into your activities. People like to laugh; it makes them feel good. And if you can make someone feel good, guess what? They’ll share your stuff to make their friends feel good too.

4. Passion

Don’t panic, I’m not suggesting you have to get passionate with all your followers and fans.

If you want people to share your information, they have to feel passionate about what you do. This can be done by showing your human side.

Yes, I know that sounds scary, but if they can see you are human, they’ll warm to you. By writing about things you care about, you’ll be sharing your loves with others. And when we write about something we love, our emotion shines through and touches the reader.

5. Building relationships

There’s no getting away from it, if you want to engage people you have to build relationships.

Setting up your social media portfolio one day, and expecting great results the next, isn’t going to work.

Social media is something you have to work at.

You must listen, engage, chat and debate with your fans and followers to find out what they really want. If you put out information they’re not interested in, they’re not going to share it.

Create a strategy

If you’re in business and want to leverage the power of social media, you must have a strategy in place.

‘Doing’ social media properly is going to take time and effort, so you must make sure it pays off.

Your social media strategy should encourage engagement and prevent PR nightmares.

The most important thing to remember is that social media isn’t a form of advertising. Consumers are far cannier these days and won’t easily be fooled by expensive adverts. As a company, you have to use social media to engage with them and provide them with useful information.

The time has come to move on from yesterday’s market methods. Today, you must listen to your customers, find out what they want and provide it for them. In fact, you have to exceed their expectations.

Marketing is tough as there are more companies chasing a diminishing amount of cash. Today you have stand apart from you competitors and social media will help you do that.

Over to you

Are you successfully using social media?

Leave a comment below and share your experiences.