Web Design, Development & Online Marketing - Serving the Central and North Texas Markets

Consumer behavior is changing and social media enables companies to keep right up-to-date with their clients' requirements as well as allow satisfied clients to spread the word about their products and services. Social media advertising can be a great asset in the business world for lead generation, brand recognition and real time market research, but it is important that your campaigns are run in an effective manner. Knowing and understanding how these techniques augment communication and provide new ways to build trust in your products and services by enhancing your online reputation is critical to your social media success. In our upcoming webinar "Integrate Social Media with Your Sales Process: 6 Steps to Fill Up Your Sales Funnel" will cover the following topics:

• How social media is enhancing the process of relationship selling

• Why it is important to embrace social techniques to enhance your sales process

• Six steps that should be employed to create an effective online sales process that will convert browsers into buyers

These six steps should be employed to create an effective online sales process that will convert browsers into buyers. Registration details are below:

Topic: Integrate Social Media with Your Sales Process: 6 Steps to Fill Up Your Sales Funnel
Date: Thursday, July 7, 2011 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM EDT
Register: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/453756160

Understanding Social Media strategy is important but if you don’t know where to apply this understanding then it won’t be useful to your company. There are tons of Social Media Networking sites available for any and everyone to join and it can be over whelming when trying to figure out which ones are applicable to you.

Focus.com created a list of the top 50 social sites every business needs to have a presence on. In this post we only list the first 3 in each category.

Social Bookmarking Sites
Reddit: Upload stories and articles on reddit to drive traffic to your site or blog. Submit items often so that you'll gain a more loyal following and increase your presence on the site.
Digg: Digg has a huge following online because of its optimum usability. Visitors can submit and browse articles in categories like technology, business, entertainment, sports and more.
Del.icio.us: Social bookmark your way to better business with sites like del.icio.us, which invite users to organize and publicize interesting items through tagging and networking.

Professional-Networking Sites
LinkedIn: LinkedIn is a popular networking site where alumni, business associates, recent graduates and other professionals connect online.
Ecademy: Ecademy prides itself on "connecting business people" through its online network, blog and message-board chats, as well as its premier BlackStar membership program, which awards exclusive benefits.
Focus: Focus is a business destination where business professionals can help each other with their purchase and other business decisions by accessing research and peer expertise. Most importantly, Focus provides open, quality information for all businesses that is freely available, easily accessible, and community powered

General Social Media Sites
Wikipedia: Besides creating your own business reference page on Wikipedia, you can connect with other users on Wikipedia's Community Portal and at the village pump, where you'll find conscientious professionals enthusiastic about news, business, research and more.
Newsvine: Feature top employees by uploading their articles, studies or other news-related items to this site. A free account will also get you your own column and access to the Newsvine community.
43 Things: This site bills itself as "the world's most popular online goal setting community." By publicizing your company's goals and ambitions, you'll gain a following of customers, investors and promoters who cheer you on as you achieve success.

Job Sites
CareerBuilder.com: Reach millions of candidates by posting jobs on this must-visit site.
The Wall Street Journal's CareerJournal: The Wall Street Journal's CareerJournal attracts well-educated professionals who are at the top of their game. Post a job or search résumés here.
CollegeRecruiter.com: If your firm wants to hire promising entry-level employees, check CollegeRecuriter.com for candidates with college degrees.

Most companies know of the top three social sites Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, but others can be equally, if not more effective for your business based on what you are wanting to accomplish. It’s important to know your goals of using social media for your brand before just jumping in, with that understanding you will be able to pick the right social platforms for maximum results. Still confused? Contact your WSI Consultant today to get your questions answered.

Marketing on Social Media sites is one of the most effective ways to market your products and services to your customers. Considering that Facebook alone has 500 million users; this should show you the importance of having a social media marketing strategy in place for your company. What may be surprising to some is that people actually enjoy interacting with companies and brands because it makes them have sense of control. If a customer can go online and comment about good or bad service (And typically bad) then they feel like they have a voice about your company's services and products.

Establishing a Goal

The first steps you should take when it comes to social media is establishing the goals for your company's online marketing strategy. Are you selling products directly to clients? Focused on managing your brand identity online? Using Social Media to reach new business? Or using Social Media to retain current business?

These are all important questions to consider when setting up your social media goals.

Don't Sell on Social Media

Most people do not want to login to Facebook or Twitter just to see blatant advertisements thrown in their face. After all it's THEIR account and they CHOOSE to follow you. The can easily choose not to.

The best approach is to interact with your fans and followers about your product and let the users take control. If you have a new widget you want to advertise, then ask people about your product. Don't just advertise it and leave it alone. The best way to approach this is by using an interactive tool such as Facebook polls to see what your customers like. For instance when you use a Facebook Poll to introduce a new product, you should create a webpage or video about your product and link to it from your Facebook Poll. This not only informs the user of your new widget, but also lets them interact back with you with opinions about it and allows for some nice feedback and data collection.

Creating Unique Content

One of the most important aspects of your social media strategy is to include content that your audience wants to see. Photos and Videos are key to achieving good results. After all, people join Facebook and Twitter to share their own photos so why not as a brand or company share yours and directly talk to your audience about your content. Never assume just because you post a comment, photo, or video that someone is goign to interact with you. Best approach is to directly interact with them by talking to your audience and asking them questions about what they like.

Building Your Online Community

What's the point of your social media strategy if no one is following you on Twitter or liking your page on Facebook? You can't just create some social media entities and hope people find you. You need to go to them.

Step 1 - Setting Up Social Media Properties

First step of course to create user accounts and pages on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, etc.

You more than likely already have traffic on your website and/or blog, so the most common sense approach is to link to your Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc. properties from your website and blog. Easiest way to do so is add some 'icons' or 'badges' to your site and link to your social media pages. Click here to download a few we have collected. You can also include these badges and link directly in your Outlook signature.

And I highly suggest using a widget like AddThis to add sharing tools to each of your blog posts (Take a look at the bottom of this post!).

Step 2

Have your company 'follow' and 'friend' your Facebook and Twitter accounts.

Start creating content on Facebook and using #hastags on Twitter. Hashtags (a 'tag' or 'topic' about your Tweets, but with a # in front) lets other users find content based upon trending topics and keywords. This will let users stumble across your content.

Social Media Strategy Webinar

Next month on July 7th 12:00PM CST, WSI will be having a free informational webinar regarding Social Media Strategies for your business and brand. Click here to contact us, or here to sign up for the free webinar.

A Facebook Static page

A Facebook Static page adds advanced functionality to your Page using the Facebook Static FBML application. This application will add a box to your Page in which you can render HTML or FBML (Facebook Markup Language) for enhanced Page customization. It will also allow you to create a landing page so your Fans can get a custom message from you before they can navigate through the rest of you Page. The FBML application is only for Facebook Fan Pages, not personal or group pages. You can use this application to set your company’s page apart from your competition. Adding a static page can be a do-it-yourself project if you have some knowledge of HTML.

A detailed Information page

A detailed information page is critical for the success of your company’s Fan page for obvious reasons. When people go to your page, they want to know who you are before they “like” you. It is critical that all the information be complete. A complete page includes your company logo, location and hours or operation (if applicable), a description of who you are and what you do, and other pertinent information about your company. If you are unsure what to put here, use the information from your company website so there is some consistency with your brand.

Facebook is a social platform. So, don’t forget that beyond the technical components, your focus is to engage with your fans. Post pictures, reply to comments, and stay active with them. This will help fuel the fire for your fans to stay active also, which makes a happy camp fire!

A Facebook fan page is a way for businesses to connect to current and potential customers, and engage in conversation related to your business. To set up a Fan page and get your own vanity URL like facebook.com/yourbusiness you must start the process with a standard Facebook URL until you have 25 “likes.” Once you have 25 people who “like” your page you are now eligible to create a customizable URL that fits your business. Congrats!

Getting to the 25 “likes” should take you a week or less; just email everyone in your organization and tell them to like the page. If your organization is smaller than 25 then reach out and email people in your personal network. You can invite people to “like” your page through Facebook or through your normal email client, either way let the people in your network know you have created a new page and start engaging in conversation with them.

A Fan page is great for businesses because Facebook Pages are not subject to a fan limit and can automatically accept fan requests, unlike a personal profile which has to manage friend request. Every time someone becomes a fan, comments, clicks the “like” link, or shares your post, it shows up in that fan’s news feed for all their friends to see. So “viral” is built in which should increase your “likes” as long as your posting regularly which should be included in your company's social media marketing strategy.

Not sure what to post, or how to get started? Contact your WSI consultant to get started with your Facebook Fan page today!

Creating, finding and sharing compelling content can prove to your customer that your business knows its jurisdiction, is a thought leader in its field and wants to help them keep current on important developments. Businesses are placing a greater emphasis on content marketing’s ability to add value for current and potential clients.

Because we are surrounded and bombarded with content from social media, it hasn’t made life easier on content production.  According to Facebook, 30 billion pieces of content (web links, news blogs etc) are shared each month on the social network, with no sign of slowing down. This can be overwhelming for your business because you want to make sure your content is being seen.

In an article on emarketer.com it quotes:
“Content curation is not a low-touch activity, and according to HiveFire the greatest challenges are creating content that is original and compelling, and finding the time to do so. It was much less of a challenge to find quality content from third parties, but still, nearly half of marketers reported that was difficult as well”.http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1008327

Right now it seems that content curation, and curation platforms are going to be an area of growth on the web because it’s easier to search for good content and share it then to create it. One of the single most valuable roles you can play in this uproar of content is to be the one who lends sanity to finding and sharing only the best of the best.

Networking is a long term relationship building activity. We like to trust in the people we buy from. Traditionally networking is face to face. Your elevator speech (60 seconds) for example, is a very brief opportunity at a networking event, where you are the focus of attention.Social media groups such as Facebook, blogs, Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube are great examples of how to take your offline networking online.

Here you must understand the “rules of engagement,” you must always be seen as professional and authentic. This can be a difficult balance to achieve online, when everything is written down or recorded for playback because online you are open to public scrutiny. It is important, therefore, to teach yourself and your staff the importance of acting responsibly online so as not to engage in any controversy. Your WSI Consultant can help you with this.

LinkedIn is the professionals’ choice of social media, and is something that you should consider using in your business if you do not already do so. LinkedIn is a great place where you can show case your testimonials, add videos, share files and so much more. There are huge benefits for uploading videos to video sharing websites like YouTube, and Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is one of them. Keywords play an important part in any SEO campaign, and YouTube is no different. Once you have your video you can embed this onto your website for additional benefits. A video on your website will:

Furthermore, here are some advantages to networking online:

For further reading on this topic more Click here.

Contact WSI today and start effectively building your online relationships.

30% increase in Local Online advertising.  Is your business adapting?

The shift to online is not surprising to us as Internet Marketing Consultants.  We see clients moving their ad and marketing efforts online due to the speed, control and tracking benefits. Some are making the move faster than others, but all are finding some or all of these to be true from their online marketing:

Kind of sounds like the perfect sales person, right?  So it is…or can be if done right.

Advertisers can be frustrated with cost and performance of traditional advertising.  How wasteful is it?
We did a study with one of our contractor client’s print directory ad by tracking and recording phone calls it delivered.  It was proved they got more calls from companies wanting to sell THEM something than they did from prospects looking to buy the product they were marketing.  100% to zero!  That’s horrible!

Most situations are not that drastic, and maybe you are finding some success with traditional marketing.  We don’t suggest going 100% digital.  But times, and channels, are changing so we recommend you consider shifting some of your ad spend before the end of the year or for next year and test it out.  The data will speak loud and clear.

WSI’s unique position is that we can craft an online marketing mix that is custom fit to your needs.  Businesses are overwhelmed with sales pitches and claims about digital marketing from businesses that focus on just one element or a cookie-cutter package.  You might be over sold or undersold.  Either way is a set up for failure.

If you need help, we can help you select some of the best options available and recommend a success template based on our experience with similar companies and set up the analytics that will undeniably prove return-on-investment.

Digital marketing is for Local Businesses wanting to stay in business…..like YOUR business!   Call for a chat today.

When is Exposing Yourself in Public a Good Thing?

Now, behave yourself.  What I am referring to is the urgent need for small business to get with it when it comes to Social Media in order to gain additional visibility into your business offerings and activities….and secure company branding.

Will Exposure Make Me More Popular?

In the case of Social Media it certainly will get you more attention.  But, like any “new” thing some think the jury is still out on the effort vs. rewards balance of working the Face Book, Linked In, Twitter and other popular tools and websites for promoting themselves or their business.

Just like in real life, some have to work harder or more creatively at being popular.  Easy or hard, we at WSI coach businesses in this process and, yes, you can be popular amongst like-minded niche market.  And doing so will pay off.

The Me Focusing on the You.

You have some sort of goal or objective that you want to get out of it, but it will never be successful unless you focus your actions towards delivering valuable content that is impactful to them.  For business, this can be an important announcement, tips that help your audience or even humor, to name a few approaches to messaging within Social Media.

I think one of the top-level goals for business and Social Media is to remain “front of mind” with your connections without being “in your face”.  The goal for Social Media is rarely a direct sale.  It is the constant “courting” of the relationship -  the “getting to know you” and “are we meant for each other” or “let’s hang out…and introduce me to your friends” kind of thing. 

Don’t be Annoying or You Will get Dumped

Find a balance of ongoing communication that doesn’t drive them to “un-friend”  or unsubscribe your connection to them.  Ouch. …The modern “break up”!

What do the Experts and Data Say About Social Media Right Now?

I like to refer to eMarketer because they give nice charts.  A picture is worth a thousand words.  And since no one would read a thousand words on line anyway, here’s the data they share by way of American Express OPEN survey.

What You Must Do Now!

Whether you buy into the mass rush to Social Media or not, you must take steps to secure your brand name online.  If you don’t your competitors or others may register your company name as their own.
It used to be the only thing a business had to secure was a domain name (www.YOURNAME.com) that matched their company name or product brand. 

Who’s in Control of Your Social Exposure?

Social Media sites now make the brand protection issue much more complex.
WSI is ahead of the trend on helping our customers secure a company brand across tens and hundreds of social media sites.   It is too affordable to let your company be at risk of your name being “high-jacked”.   Allow us educate you and assist.  Because you should be in control of how you choose to expose yourself and monitor what others are saying about you online.

Parrot Heads remind me of Successful Internet Marketing

What is a Parrot Head?

If you don’t know, Parrot Heads are the enthusiastic fans of Jimmy Buffett, the artist of favorite songs Margaritaville and Cheeseburger in Paradise. I recently was a guest at my first Jimmy Buffet concert this summer in Dallas.  Well, actually, it was much more than a concert - it was an experience.  These people line up for days in advance just to get the right parking spot so they can set up “camp” and socialize with other like minded JB fans all dressed like it was a beach-themed Halloween event.   It was clear to see they were engaged and interacting with the brand in festive fan frenzy.

So why are Parrot Heads like Internet Marketing?

Businesses of all sorts need to have fans, too.  You need passionate customers who do more than just keep coming back, but those who come back with friends and family and who broadcast their support of their experience with your brand. This is what online Social Media is made for.

How to approach Social Media

Well, just like an artist music style is not made to appeal to all people, your business social media approach cannot take a one “song” fits all approach.  You may not be able to be special to all people, but if you can be something special to some people, it can be a magical and profitable thing.  So try to identify your audience by unique personas and work your social media interactions in a way that speaks to what is relevant or fun to them. 

Facebook , Twitter, Linked In and more

New social media tools like Facebook and Twitter are some of the more common ways of interacting in conversation with your fans.  You might get started using these to ask for comments about how to improve service or announce discounts or special events.  Encourage referrals.  Start simply, but keep with it and momentum will build.

Let the fans sing your praises

Social media helps your fans recommend you and referral business is the best business.  It is advertising that comes with trust and without a price tag.

The magic with the Jimmy Buffet fans may have been enhanced by 2 days of parking lot partying and “assisted” happiness, if you get my drift, but it was a real shared “beach bum” social experience.   I was pulled in by the energy making me want to share this with others.  So, I plan to be there again next year and will bring a crowd of friends.  And, this resembles the process of social media marketing.