Posts Tagged ‘Search Engines’
Social Media Marketing – Easy and Inexpensive Publicity For Small Non-Profits
If you run a small non-profit agency, you owe it to yourself to learn more about social media marketing. Social media marketing is an effective and easy way to promote and publicize your organization for little or no cost.
Social media marketing takes advantage of the social aspects of the Internet. How? Before we begin that discussion, let’s first start with an overview of the objectives of online marketing in general.
Online marketing has one main goal – attract visitors to your Website. To draw traffic, most organizations focus on improving their ranking on search engines like Google. There are many ways to boost your ranking, with paid listings, search engine optimization, and link building being the main ones:
Paid listings offer fast results but are prohibitively expensive for small non-profits. Search engine optimization (SEO) involves making your site really relevant to the keywords that pertain to your organization’s mission. It has no direct costs, but you may need to pay for the services of a search engine marketing firm to get decent results. TIP: The critical aspects of SEO are keyword research and large quantities of Website content, which makes it an important part of your marketing strategy whether you choose to use social media or not. A Google search on SEO techniques can help you learn how to optimize your site. Link building is a strategy to increase the number of links pointing to your site. The greater the number of links, the more popular and relevant your site is considered to be, and the greater the chance of a high search engine ranking.
Social media marketing goes hand in hand with SEO and link building. It can help you increase the content on your Website and generate tons of links to your site. The synopsis below explains how.
Social media marketing is based on participation in various online communities/meeting places, like blogs, article databases, and social bookmarking and news sites. Each time you participate, you can create a link to your site. You can use blog entries and articles to fill out the content on your site, making it even more relevant in the eyes of the search engines. And you can do all of this for next to nothing, especially if you know some Net-savvy volunteers with a flair for writing.
Here is a quick overview of the main tools used for social media marketing:
Blogs. Each blog posting has a unique URL, or Web page address. This means that if the blog is hosted directly on your site, every blog post will create a new page on your site, giving search engines more to work with when assessing your site’s relevance. To host your own blog you need a domain name, which has a monthly cost. If you host your blog elsewhere, like blogger.com, there is no charge, and you can still take advantage of link building opportunities by pointing to your own site in your posts or adding your posts to social bookmarking and news sites.
Social Bookmarking. Social bookmarking sites allow users to share their favourite Websites with others over the Internet. More bookmarks to a site mean more potential links. In the context of marketing, social bookmarking sites allow your organization to post every blog entry, new Web page and article you write, and create a link to your site for each one. Companies like addthis.com offer buttons for your site that allow visitors to bookmark your site with the click of a single button.
Social News. Social news sites are similar in concept to social bookmarking sites. With a free membership you can start submitting your articles and blog posts to news sites. These sites have a lot of traffic and can lead many users to your Website. Check out services like Digg and Reddit for more information.
Social Networking. Most non-profits and many businesses have a page on MySpace or Facebook. These heavily visited sites give you lots of opportunity to network online with supporters and volunteers, building your “brand” and inspiring people who like what you do to visit your site.
Article Writing. Articles are not a social medium per se, but I like to include them in discussions of social media marketing anyway. Article databases, like EzineArticles.com, give you a forum for posting detailed articles (as opposed to short blog posts) that relate to your organization. Articles allow links, so you can easily connect readers to your site. You can also post your articles on your own Website to increase the content there.
Although social media marketing takes time, it is well worth the effort. If you haven’t considered it before, I advise you to do so now. There is ample research available on the Web about social media marketing. Do some reading, then gather a committee of staff, board members and volunteers to plan a strategy that will allow you to reap the benefits of this no-cost marketing opportunity.
Country Wine
How to Use Social Media Marketing and Video For Online Exposure
One of my favorite ways to get free targeted traffic to my websites is through video marketing. It’s not how many views you get, it’s WHO is watching. This is how you rank well on the search engines and drive traffic to your website.
When adding your “description” to the video, implement these in the following order…
First, type in your capture page address (or whatever website you want them to go to)… http://www.whateversite.com (Your Own Domain or affiliate link recommended.) The http:// and then the www. is very important particularly on YouTube because it turns the domain into a clickable link.
Third, after your description… add your whole related keyword list… this can be as long as it needs to be, as long as it fits. This is a keyword list you might use if you were providing a business opportunity…
MLM, Network marketing, (Top Producers Names so you can piggy-back off their success and popularity), (Other Home Business Company Names), Home Based Business, Entrepreneurs, Multi Level Marketing, Internet Marketing, MLM Training, Saving money on taxes, debt elimination, (your competition’s company names), Your own name, of course. You ARE trying to become your own BRAND, right?)
I’ll will admit that the keyword technique is a bit lazy, but it still works fine. In the future, we’re sure that the algorithms will catch this and you’ll need to make the whole description all real content, which is better anyway. You will hear us preach about this a lot. You should always keep your real name as a tag/keyword(or if you have a normal name, like Eric Green, turn it into a brand-able name, like digitalgangster-there’s a plug for a great guy…love and respect DG). This is how you can establish yourself as a brand on the internet.
Plus, when you end up on the phone with a prospect (What?? Talk on the phone?? You act like this is a legitimate business with work involved!!-duh!) and they don’t seem to know for sure if you’re an expert in your field, tell them to type your name into the Google search engine and see what happens…your name pops up with all kinds of articles, blogposts and videos…don’t worry, it won’t all be from you, either. Other people will pick up your great content and use it for their blogs, etc. I find my videos and content in the craziest places – Korean, Arab, and Polish websites! The main point is that you will be associated with multitudes of sites in your niche market. That looks really good in the eyes of your prospect.
Now back to why you want your competition’s company names as your keywords as well. There are thousands and thousands of people looking online for what you provide, we guarantee it. They may or may not have heard of you yet…They may have heard of your competition before hearing of you. What does any smart consumer do when they’re not sure exactly what they want yet?
They GOOGLE IT!
Let’s have an example: Okay, let’s say you’re an affiliate for the The Free Traffic Formula (congrats! You’re in a good spot!), and we have some really famous competition, like “Traffic Secrets VII”, or “Best Dang Ol’ Traffic Drivin’ Program” (Neither are real and we don’t want to front off our expensive and inferior competition. You know who they are, anyway) You make a title for your video like: “Is Traffic Secrets really the best program for you?” Or how about this one-”Why is that ‘Best Dang ol’ Traffic Drivin’ Program’ so DANG OL’ EXPENSIVE? Are there alternatives?”
Of course, someone will look up one of those programs on Google…what will they find? MY video comparing the two (mine and their’s) side by side.
We’ve used this technique countless times and it is still one of our best sources of people calling us with buying questions. Get creative to make it work for you!
Williger.com
Best Use of Social Media Local Search Marketing
One of the best ways to marketing your products and services online is through social media marketing. Its easy to get lost in all the various personalized methods of marketing, especially in local online marketing.
To get a feel of the local pulse and how they feel about your products and services, your business should use social media. When doing strategic local marketing, you should make use of social media will give you a chance to keep in touch with members of your community.
If the term social media seems a wee bit unfamiliar to you, then how about blogging, Facebook or Twitter? Join the hundreds of community journalists who make their presence felt in their communities through blogging. The only difference is that you will be blogging not only to interact with your community, but also to share with them important information about your business, which will respond to a particular need in the community.
A growing part of our online necessities is social media marketing. Many companies have joined the bandwagon and created fan pages in sites like Facebook.
The reason why social networking sites are effective is the fact that people who befriend you or follow you actually do so willingly. This is an indication that they are interested in your business, and that they could be future customers.
Social networking can be a successful tool when looking to increase strategic local marketing. It doesn’t take much effort or cost to get your business set up with a social networking site. You will be surprised on how quickly you gain “fans” or “followers” of your companies site. You can also target your markets by age, sex, interests, geographic and more.
To get higher ranking in the search engines, and to drive more traffic to your site, social media marketing will help you gain leads without having to spend extra money.
It cost almost nothing (other than a bit of time) to promote your business through social networking. You can definitely hire others for relatively low costs to setup and manage your social media sites if your time is spent better elsewhere in your business.
A company should be responding to a customers need, and the best way to determine those needs (whether its products or services) is through social media marketing. This is a great way to build your business brand that is targeting a specific community.
By using the various social networking sites, it will easier for you to respond to queries about your business, It is also easier to increase brand awareness, build a stronger reputation, and combat any negative issues being hurled against the business.
To better build your online branding and your Local branding, you will need the help of social networks. Tapping into these networks will not only gain greater access to potential customers in Local, but in other parts of the globe and into a market that may be bigger than your imagination.