Businesses, brands and personalities that have grasped the concept of social media are experiencing wild success. They receive real-time feedback from their customers and fans about their products and services, while providing their customers with an experiential marketing experience, rather than simply providing a basic service or product. When used correctly, social media can enhance the relationship between businesses and their consumer and enforce brand loyalty.

Which Social Media Application is Right for Your Business?

Once you decide to enter the world of social media, your next decision is to determine your placement. Just the fact that a dozen different applications are available doesn’t necessarily mean you should be involved with all of them. Here are brief descriptions of the most popular social media techniques:

Blogs

Think of a blog as an online diary. Users create written entries filled with their thoughts, comments, expertise and opinions on particular issues and situations. A typical blog combines text, images, and links to other research or other blogs. Most blogs also allow readers to leave feedback and/or comments, becoming involved in the topic on a personal level. Some popular blogging sites include LiveJournal, Open Diary and WordPress.

Social Networking

Perhaps the most popular and widely used form of social media, social networking sites allow users to form, build and develop social relationships online. Within a social networking site, a user generally has a profile that can be shared and viewed by other viewers. Individuals gather and communicate with one another based on their common interests and shared networks. Some of the more popular social networking sites include Facebook, LinkedIn, and MySpace.

Micro-Blogging

Micro-blogging is similar to a regular blog (described above), but the content, size, and scope of a micro-blog is generally much smaller and less detailed. Microblogs may consist of simply a sentence or a few words. Twitter is currently the most popular and highly used micro-blogging site.

Multimedia

Multimedia comprises a number of social media applications, including photograph sharing, video sharing, livecasting, and music- and audio-sharing. Within the sphere of social media, multimedia applications allows users to share personal media files with friends and/or complete strangers. Popular multimedia sites include YouTube, Flicker and Skype.

Different social media applications will be appropriate for some businesses, yet irrelevant for others. Most businesses do not need to be involved in all applications, but rather should identify which applications will help them achieve their goals, based on the customer base that uses each specific application. As a general rule of thumb, a business should begin using a new social media application only if it has valuable, entertaining, timely, or informative details to share with a particular market. Simply filling up online space and sharing “fluff” will not increase the credibility or likeability of a company using social media.

What are the goals of your business’s marketing department? Do you seek to share detailed information with prospects and customers? Do you have outstanding knowledge of a particular subject or topic? If so, then developing a blog will be an effective way to share this information. Users seeking information on a particular topic will be led to your site through search engines and, over time, will begin to trust and rely on you as a valuable resource. Be sure that blog entries always include a link to your website, and publish your blogs on your site.

If your business or brand has frequent updates to share, then participating on Twitter, or “Twittering” may be a good solution. As stated previously, Twitter is a micro-blog. The service allows users to send brief updates and messages out to those users who have subscribed to follow them; they receive these updates either on their computers or phones. Twitter postings can also include links to other websites, which can drive website traffic further. Twitter presents an excellent platform for a political candidate, celebrity or any fast-paced business trying to develop and promote a distinct brand.

On social networking sites like Facebook and LinkedIn, a user creates a free profile which provides a platform for sharing information and/or identifying your business or brand. This profile can be viewed by others, who can become fans or friends of your business. Within your profile, you can provide information, photos, updates and feedback that can be viewed easily by other users. Some businesses use these applications to drive traffic to their site and increase sales, perhaps by posting a sale or giveaway on their social networking site. Other businesses work to build dialogue among their online friends about a new product or service being offered and thereby develop public relations buzz. Social networking sites tend to be a good match for consumer-based products, new product introductions and event-based applications.

Multimedia sites, and particularly YouTube, are fantastic ways for companies to share commercials and videos that viewers may find informative or entertaining. Numerous individuals have begun a successful business simply by posting “how-to” videos that focus on their area of expertise. Their viewer base grew and eventually allowed the individuals to turn their once free videos into a successful income-generating enterprise.

Beginning to use any form of social media requires an initial investment of time, although the requisite length of time will vary based on the particular application. It takes only minutes to open a free account on YouTube and begin uploading videos. However, building a Facebook account requires more time, depending on how much information you plan to share. The critical factor, however, is the amount of time that you’ll commit to the social media applications after you’ve established your initial presence. All social media applications should be used consistently. If you choose to participate in Twitter, share approximately the same number of messages each day; avoid being silent for a week and then bombarding users with hourly messages. If you choose to blog and want to be regarded as an expert in your field, then research and compose a new blog on a weekly or bi-weekly basis so that your readers can rely on finding new material at predictable intervals.

It is also absolutely necessary to inform your customers and clients about your new social media applications and then drive users to them. Be sure to post notifications and links on your site to inform website visitors that you now have a Facebook or LinkedIn page. Vice versa, drive traffic to your website through the use of social media. When entering this arena, take advantage of the free website analysis offered by Design Industries for an evaluation of your complete online marketing strategy and an assessment of how social media application can complement your other marketing efforts.

Social media has proved very effective for companies ranging from sole-proprietorships to giant corporations. It allows businesses to stay current, reach new markets, and develop loyalty among existing customers. With the correct placement and dedication, social media can be an effective piece of your marketing strategy and build on the success of your business or organisation.

Seesaw Design put together a incredible looking design for their own blog system and came to Design Industries to help build the system ensuring that it was developed to easily create blog post and be able to share these blog post to the Social Media communities that Seesaw is Active in.

The blog was built to not only meet Seesaw Design strict design requirements but to share to communities such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Digg, Delicious, MySpace, Google Buzz, StumbleUpon, Reddit amongst many other.

The end result is a visually stunning blog that speaks to the internet community with a touch of a button built on the powerful and easy to use WordPress Platform.

But since Twitter’s introduction, its popularity has spread like wildfire. Millions of users send tweets throughout the day, and although the content of many of those tweets is mundane trivia about what people are doing at the moment, other tweets cover more substantive, newsworthy topics. Some individuals now attract thousands of followers, with tweets being disseminated more broadly than ever before.

Twitter has taken on a life of its own. People are using it in ways that were never foreseen by the individual creators. Some of the new uses are slight modifications that have significant implications. For example, users have begun tagging tweets related to a specific event with the # sign, so that #inauguration allows people to follow messaging threads about inaugural events, and similar tags can be used to discuss conferences, national disasters, and more.

Other users began using the @ symbol to reply to other tweets, directing their response to a particular user. The convention was adopted rapidly, impressively changing Twitter’s isolated tweets into interactive conversations where users can speak directly to one another.
In addition, more than 11,000 applications have been created by developers, taking Twitter in new directions that the original creators never envisioned. Summize created a way to search live streams of Tweets, providing an easy way for anyone to find up-to-the-minute comments on breaking events. SickCity tracks references to illnesses in Twitter, potentially alerting medical professionals to epidemics. Activists in China and Moldova have used Twitter to organise public demonstrations. Each new application adds a new layer of depth and richness to the Twitter experience.

Some people lament the way that users spend hours glued to their cell phones and other mobile devices, tweeting their friends and colleagues. They argue that this type of instant communication deprives people of more meaningful, richer person-to-person interactions. However, the opposite argument can also be made. As people use Twitter to comment on world events, they are actually becoming part of a large audience enjoying a shared experience. A few decades ago, unfolding events were seen on television and discussed among family members. Nowadays, users can discuss those events in real time with a much wider, more diverse group of interested observers.

And, contrary to skeptics’ objections, in reality the conversation is not limited by the 140-character tweet size, because users often use Twitter as a pointing device to direct their followers to other online resources, such as news articles, blog posts, and videos, or even charitable causes. This type of redirection has become so popular that some websites are reporting that the amount of traffic they receive from Twitter, Facebook, and other social networking applications is now greater than what they used to receive from Google search engine results.

Perhaps Twitter’s greatest legacy will be that it allows people to keep up on each other’s lives in an increasingly disconnected world. A typical user is connected to relatives, friends, colleagues, and a few celebrities. Even if there is no actual interaction, people feel connected simply by knowing what is happen in the daily life of others. While some complain about the intrusion of technology in our personal lives, others embrace it as a way to improve communication and interpersonal relationships.

The first step toward increasing sales is to focus on attracting potential customers to your site. Website performance reporting tools such as Google Analytics can help you understand what people are searching for in major search engines and within your product catalogue. You can use the reports to help visitors find products more easily, editing and adding sections or pages as needed. Analyse the keywords and phrases that visitors are typing into your search engine and be sure to incorporate them throughout your site and especially in your product descriptions. If certain products are searched for more frequently than others, feature them in a prominent position on your landing page. You may want to hire an SEO consultant to guide you through the process of identifying and incorporating appropriate keywords.

Another way to attract potential customers to your site is to build in opportunities for interaction. The creative use of blogs, user-generated content, and feedback or review systems can keep your site feeling fresh and engaging. Many potential customers rely on feedback from other customers, preferring to learn about their experiences before deciding to make a purchase. Also, consider adding some inexpensive services that will make your products even more attractive. Free shipping, free gift wrap, and free greeting cards can all help to seal the deal for your customers.

Once you’ve attracted the right potential customers to your site, you need to make the shopping experience as simple and intuitive as possible. Test each and every link and button on your website. If you’re too familiar with the site, ask someone else to do this for you, so that you can benefit from their unbiased assessment of how easy or difficult it is to navigate the checkout process. Test all of your shopping cart functions and complete a sample purchase, making sure that there are no hang-ups. You can also use Google Analytics to analyse common paths through your site. If you see that customers are abandoning their shopping carts after a certain step in the checkout process, focus on improving that particular page or function. Your goal is to make the checkout process as quick and painless as possible.

You should also use the checkout process as an opportunity for up-selling and cross-selling. Ideally, your website should automatically offer a better version of the same product or a complementary product that may interest the customer. You might even consider offering a package discount for purchasing two or more products at the same time. Having these options appear automatically during the checkout process can be a great way to increase sales.

Finally, don’t assume that your work is finished once the transaction has been completed. Shipping the product to the consumer offers a valuable marketing opportunity that is too often overlooked by ecommerce businesses. Consider placing a catalogue, thank-you card, or coupon in every box that you ship out. It won’t cost much in additional shipping, but it could make a big difference in terms of repeat sales.

By following these simple steps, you can maximize your online sales – and profitability.

In these difficult financial times, when marketing budgets have been slashed and customers are less inclined to make purchases, a simple blog can be one of the most cost-effective ways to reach out to your customer base. Blogs are becoming increasingly popular among all types of internet-savvy consumers. According to a 2008 report by Forrester Research, the number of blog readers increased by 50% between 2007 and 2008. Furthermore, half of all surveyed blog readers report that they use the information in blogs when making purchasing decisions.

However, it’s critical to recognize that a blog is not the same as an e-newsletter, press release, or other, more traditional communication tools. Likewise, a blog entry should not be viewed as simply an online advertisement or marketing push. Blog readers are looking for friendly, informative posts that speak directly to their interests. They don’t mind if the information comes from a corporation, but it has to be more than a marketing tool. In most cases, using a blog for ad placement is sure to alienate and offend your readers.

Before you commit to having a corporate blog, you need to make sure that you have the time, energy, and other resources to maintain your blog over time. You’ll want to create at least one entry each week (most blogs have two or three postings each week) and be able to moderate all the comments that are posted by your readers. You can have a small group of writers share the workload, but you’ll want to make sure that they use a consistent voice, tone, and style. If your employees don’t have enough time (or the right skill set) for writing the blog entries, you may want to use a freelancer, but you have to be sure that he or she can match your corporate style without significant editing.

With hard work and dedication, most companies can create an interesting, engaging blog that brings readers back day after day. Over time, they develop a strong sense of loyalty to your company and brand, which translates into higher sales revenues and a greater market share, since existing customers become a great source of referrals. As an added bonus, the discussion around corporate blog entries is keyword-rich and can help your company’s website rise in the search engine rankings.

At Design Industries, our experience has shown us that most companies can benefit from having a corporate blog, regardless of their size or industry. However, the blog must be fully integrated with the company’s existing website, ensuring that there is a consistent look and feel for your business’s online presence. It’s also important to havea simple content-management system in the backend, so that you and your employees can create and manage blog posts and moderate comments with ease, even with little or no knowledge of web programming languages. With a little foresight and careful planning, a blog can become an inexpensive, key component of your business’s strategy for marketing and customer relations.

The late Eighties! Mike and the Mechanics were at the top of the charts, George Bush, Senior had just become President of the US, and a CERN contractor by the name of Tim Berners-Lee was busy writing a little paper entitled Information Management: A Proposal. In it he described a way to simplify the sharing of information among people in different locations. He gave it to his manager, Mike Sendall, who thought it was “vague, but exciting.”

Over the following year, Tim and his colleague, Robert Cailliau, refined the idea and updated the proposal. It described a concept called a “WorldWideWeb” — a simple interface for browsing large quantities of information, using hypertext to link documents. Within just a few years it had grown well beyond CERN and the academic realm, and public use of the Internet exploded thanks to this new, more intuitive interface.

Why the history lesson? Because the date on Tim Berners-Lee’s first paper, arguably the birth of the Web, was March 13th, 1989. That’s twenty years ago last Friday — and to me, that’s a reason to celebrate!

It’s amazing to think about how much the Web’s developed since then. We’ve seen:

• some of the earliest browsers, such as the WorldWideWeb Browser, Cello, and Mosaic
• early debates about the semantic meaning of HTML (where did we go wrong?)
• the first appearance of JavaScript and its amazing new features
• the first steps into ecommerce
• the browser wars (Netscape Now!)
• the dot-com bubble and its subsequent implosion
• some new up-and-comer called Google
• the first blogs
• YouTube
• the beginnings of the social web, with sites like Orkut and Friendster
• the mobile web on phones, handhelds, and tiny laptops

It’s hard to imagine now what life would be like without the Web. Even more obscure to me is this: what would we all be doing if there were no Web, and thus no Web developers, managers, sysadmins, writers, or designers? Twenty years ago I was eight years old and daydreamed about inventing new breakfast cereals; the most excited I’d ever been about a computer was thanks to a game called Granny’s Garden. None of my friends and family — including me — would have predicted that my career would be what it is right now.

What’s next for the Web? In twenty years’ time I’ll be pushing fifty and I’m without a clue as to what could be happening by then. In the shorter term, though, I think we’ll see lots of fun stuff develop. Here are three growing trends that I’m excited to watch over the next few years.

Even more web-based applications: Web-based apps have been around for awhile, so this is a no-brainer, but I think it’ll go gangbusters once popular apps reach the mainstream. Thinking about great web apps like 280 Slides, the Aviary graphics apps, Google Apps, and Photoshop Express, I think it’s fair to say that we’re well on the way to a world where everyone — not just us geeks — find it easy to manipulate and store files online. As these applications become simpler and more enjoyable to use, the more likely Joe Sixpack is to adopt it. Best of all, the ability to create brilliant, useful, and unique apps is increasingly available to web developers like you and me.

Security will become an even bigger deal: It seems as though every week there’s yet another story about a security problem with an online service — whether it’s a malicious Facebook app, private documents exposed to the world, or a compromised online banking service. As we move towards conducting more and more of our personal business online, and as more of us carry around a little web device in our pockets, this issue will have to come to the forefront of everyone’s minds — beyond the security experts, to everyday people too. I think the strongest evidence of change will be a lot more education, and a massive shift in people’s attitudes about security. From a techie perspective, however, the time is right (and the time is right now!) for useful, friendly tools that make it much easier for everyday consumers and businesses to secure their identities and data.

The mainstream media refuses to die: It seems cool lately to proclaim long and loud (and perhaps with a dash of smugness) that the end of the world is nigh for the mainstream media. But this is far from the truth — while the mainstream media as a whole might stumble from time to time with the new way, leaders in the field are now showing that they’re ready to embrace new media and all that it offers. Here’s one recent bit of evidence: UK newspaper, The Guardian, just released an API that exposes their news content, free to mash up and reuse. Developers are already using this data to create geographic visualizations of the news. It’s a great example of mainstream media reaching out to the new media, and I think this trend will keep on growing.

Like I said, it’s impossible for me to predict what will happen in twenty years, but I’m sure of this — in 2029, I hope to be as excited about the Web as I am now. How about you — are you coming along for the ride? What do you think the Web will look like in the next twenty years?

by Raena Jackson-Armitage

Owners of businesses are moving towards marketing by electronic-mail, as a means to stay in contact with their customer base. With paper-based publications proving more expensive to make and issue, the facilities to be known via electronically means become more cost-effective when taking into account the prospective extent of delivery in a series of emails. Providing you have been building up client and customer email addresses, you are well placed. Otherwise, you should look for a method to gather up these electronic details, as it will enable you to maintain awareness with your potential business for a long time.

After you build your collection of email addresses and have designed and created an email template you are ready to establish your presence in the world of digital marketing. Launching your promotion operation, with just a few gathered emails can yield, compared to none otherwise. In case you still haven’t got going with electronic marketing, don’t fret as it’s likely you’re in the majority, however the key is to have that electronic advantage over your competition. Increasingly, potential customers turn to the internet as the first step in their research for a purchase, so it’s important that you continually present yourself to them in order to continue the expansion of your business.

Make that first step as soon as possible to gather your customers’ email address. Set a target of 50 customers and launch your succession of emails. Get in touch with your customers to offer them a reduction on your merchandise or service and see how your small business develops.

In previous years, it was possible to buy a set of email addresses, flood them with emails and you were likely to receive a fair deal of throughput or trade on your business website. It’s a different era today, as using such a strategy simply doesn’t get as many results anymore.

Increasingly, people have been put off intrusive businesses bombarding their mailbox with emails that are of no relevance to them. Owners of email addresses accepted this marketing strategy for a substantial period of time, however they are increasingly less likely to respond today. The marketing operation you employ by mail should consist of very clean and polished emails which are normally delivered to previous customers and email address owners that have opted to receive correspondence from you. If someone gets an email about something that they consented to be informed of on some occasion, it’s likely they will be able to associate with the information they are shown.
Marketing electronically is similar to any method of correspondence, in that it was superb whilst not employed excessively with a change in strategy then becoming necessary.
Assembling your directory of emails naturally via contact with customers is easily the greatest method. Indiscriminate email broadcasts are out of date as they are not effective like they were in previous years. So, learning from this, you have consumed spent time collecting appropriate email addresses.

After you invest in an email campaign system and have had your web developers integrate the design for you it is time to write the content of the newsletter in order to give something valuable to your audience. One of the keys is to consistently be useful with information, allowing the reader to be able to jump to your website and not overwhelming them with attempts at sales, as that rarely reaps rewards but rather causes recipients to deregister their consent for future emails, which is the least desired outcome from your email marketing operation.

The main guideline is to consistently have useful information and as a result your audience will be familiar with what to look forward to when they receive it.