I’m a runner and I like to run half marathons. Two years ago, heck 18 months ago, had you asked me about running, those two thoughts would never in a million years have entered my brain. I despised running for 33.5 years. And then I ran my first 5k in June of 2010 and got hooked. [...]
People have been talking about this for a while now. And I’ve seen it in action time and again. Yesterday, a Federal Holiday, our washing machine broke. The only appliance repair place that we knew of neither answered their phone nor had a place for us to leave a message. So I took to [...]
Thanks to this awesome app by Static HTML you can now customize the way tags show up in your posts with ease! AllFacebook.com wrote about the new addition to Facebook tags and then Static HTML went out and made it even simpler with their app. All you do is go to http://fbtagging.thunderpenny.com/ and enter in the [...]
Facebook has altered their insights page once again and now show page owners even more information about who their fans are and how they engage with the page. Once you click on the insights tab you now have: Likes, Reach, Talking About This and Check-ins. The check-ins tab and talking about this tab [...]
Here is a list of 30 Social Media Statistics from the last several months. These were orginally posted by Jeff Esposito, and then reposted to All Facebook.
Yesterday, I attempted to write a blog listing all of the businesses in the Lutherville Timonium zip code that have a presence on Facebook, Foursquare or Twitter. It was a time consuming venture on it’s own, but with the added bonus of my two little girls interjecting every 5 minutes, it proved to be beyond my attention span and time limits for the day.
However, in the time I devoted to it, I came up with about 15 businesses and their listings. Of those businesses, THREE were misusing Facebook!! That’s 20%!! What were they doing wrong?
They were acting as a person on Facebook.
I can see where they made this mistake to begin with (because as a person you can actively solicit people to be your friend) and why they are continuing on this terrible path (because once you acquire all of these friends, what are the chances that every last one of them will like your new business page), but it kills me that they do so! To me, it is as big a faux pas as double dipping. There is a distinct reason that Facebook has created a separation between businesses and people. It’s very simple; receiving friend requests from businesses is more invasive than robo-dialing, direct mail, and spam combined.
That same reasoning is why there are limitations when acting as a business page on Facebook. Facebook allows businesses to comment on and interact with other businesses but unless a person has a completely public profile, a business can not comment on or interact with a personal profile on Facebook, except within the confines of their business page.
And speaking of completely public profiles, many businesses that are misusing personal pages, are misusing them to such an extent that much of the information that they would like to share with the public is kept hidden by Facebook’s privacy settings. That’s because people who don’t know the difference between a personal page and a business page, often don’t know about the control they can exert over their privacy settings (which btw, are set up mostly in favor of protecting people, in my opinion).
Aside from the reason stated above, an actual Facebook business page is far more appealing for businesses than a personal page because of the huge amount of customizations that are available. It’s true, a business can not go out and actively solicit people to like them, but you do have the ability to make your page as useful, if not more useful than your website.
You can add custom tabs to a business page that are just like pages on a web site. There are several free Facebook apps that allow you to set up a shopping cart on your Facebook page. Open Table has a free app that allows you to let people make reservations right on your page. And there are free Fan-gating apps that let you create a landing page directing people to Like your page in order to receive some fan only content/benefit.
To acquire new fans you can use Facebook advertising to solicit people to like your page, at a totally affordable price!
Oh and, as a person on Facebook, you are limited to 5,000 friends, because it’s reasonable to assume that no person has more than 5,000 actual friends. As a business, the sky’s the limit on who likes you!
The thing about social media sites is that they are all about showing the “Great and Powerful Oz”, in other words, they show the person behind the curtain. Who is it that is running or working for businesses that you like on Facebook or follow on Twitter, or whose blog you read?
Is it the business owner herself? Is it a random employee? A person in the marketing department or someone like me, a person outside of the organization who is hired to run the social media? And what’s the real difference?
If the person is doing his or her job correctly, the difference is nill. The voice of the business on social media sites should convey the same tone that has been delivered via their additional marketing efforts.
In the case of small businesses, many times, an owner simply doesn’t have the time to dedicate to the maintenance and development of social media outlets. I on the other hand, am on Facebook ALL day long. I read it from my phone when I’m not in front of my computer and I have the tab on my computer pinned in my Chrome browser.
To run a Facebook page effectively, one must not only update and communicate with their fans, but must also stay up to date an in tune with their vendors, competitors and community and what they are doing on Facebook. It’s good business sense to also go ahead and like those pages personally, as well as on behalf of the business.
For example I work for several businesses in the events and wedding industry. I am happy to say that I have been happily married for more than 7 years. I do however, follow a wide variety of wedding and event blogs, wedding vendors, bridal retailers and brands, and a handful of caterers, photographers, florists and other businesses associated with event planning as well as wedding sites and magazines. They are not only a source of information, but also of inspiration.
I also meet, email and speak with my clients regularly and have acquired a solid feel for the way they conduct themselves in their businesses. Because it is my job to act on their behalf when on Facebook, Twitter or blogging. While I may not be a traditional employee, I am in fact, part of the staff, for my clients. I even had the privilege of attending a client’s wedding this past Spring and was included in the company baseball outing just last week. Just a day’s work for this Social Media Manager 
I run my own business, but I feel like I am part of each of my clients businesses as well. It’s the best of all worlds and I absolutely love what I do.
Courtesy of Business Insider
Having a Facebook business page isn’t the solution to your marketing problems. Nor is it magical. And a Facebook business page alone won’t bring you hoards of new business opportunities.
Facebook should be an egg in your marketing basket, it should not be where you place all of your eggs!
Seems kind of common sensical to make these statements, but for many, Facebook is untested territory. Today, most businesses know about Facebook and they have been told somewhere along the way that they should be on there. But many don’t know anything more than that and the people with whom they’ve spoken, sing such high praises of Facebook, that the perception is that Facebook is a magic pill for your marketing woes.
I love Facebook and what it means for businesses. I believe it can be a super powerful tool and that just about EVERY business out there should have a presence on Facebook. But…..
Facebook alone won’t work! You need to incorporate it into your ENTIRE marketing strategy! Shout your Facebook business page from the rooftops people! Place it on your business cards, in your email correspondence, in your print advertising, and in all other forms of advertising! Got a radio ad, mention Facebook; on TV, add your Facebook contact info; Billboards somewhere, put your Facebook info on there!!
How is anyone going to know that you have a Facebook page if you don’t tell them? And please, when you’re incorporating Facebook into these efforts, give people a reason to take the time to find and like you on Facebook.
I spend a lot of my time reading sites like AllFacebook, InsideFacebook, Social Media Examiner, Social Media Today, and Mari Smith. These sites post multiple items a day, every day of the week and their main focus is Facebook for Businesses. Search any one of them and you will find that they all recommend on some level or another, the use of Facebook Ads. As do I.
Ever notice them on the right hand side of Facebook? They’re little but they’re mighty powerful. Especially when you see them over and over again. Ever wonder why they seem to follow a pattern or seem perfectly suited to you?
It’s because the amount of granular information available to target your audience is Ahhhmazing!!!!
Any page with more than 1,000 fans!?! The possibilities are endless! Have competition in your business? Target their customers! Are you a small business whose customer is likely to be a fan of a Nationally recognized brand? Target that brand! And you can build your list with as many specifics as you’d like.
The icing on the cake is the ability to target friends of fans! Because if you see an ad on the right hand side of Facebook that says that your friend also likes that business, aren’t you more likely to like it too?
Targeting your audience is only half the battle. You also have to come up with an image that is 110×80 pixels big and a 135 character call to action. Not to mention that you then should create a custom landing tab on your Facebook page that is just for the ad. In the landing tab you need give people a reason to like your business. Because once you compel someone to click on your ad, you then need to make them click the like button.
Once you’ve done all that, you can select to run your campaign for a specific period of time or to just run it continuously. If you run it for a set period of time you get to select the budget for the duration of the campaign or set a daily budget. Yup, you spend what you want to spend, and Facebook even helps out by giving you a suggested price per click of the ad. In most cases it’s between 80 cents and $2. The suggested price per click means that that is the absolute most you would pay per click, not what every click will cost. The most expensive clicks occur during the highest traffic times on Facebook.
With your budget selected you’re ready to roll. Let the campaign begin and then watch what the Ad analytics tell you! You’ll be able to see the reach, clicks, impressions and success of your campaign and based upon this newly gained knowledge you can chose to tweak and change you ad at any time!
Want to try it? I’ll hold your hand through the whole process, it’s easy, I promise!
My love of Pinterest makes me think of the opening lines to Ke$ha’s song “Your Love is My Drug”.
Maybe I need some rehab,
Or maybe just need some sleep
I’ve got a sick obsession,
I’m seeing it in my dreams
I’m looking down every alley,
I’m making those desperate calls
Im staying up all night hoping,
Hit my head against the walls
Because, truly, I am addicted to and obsessed with Pinterest. I joined over the weekend and haven’t stopped browsing it’s pages since then. I’d heard about it through sites like Techcrunch and Mashable, and then I started hearing friends on Twitter talk about it. But the tipping point for me was when a friend on Facebook, wrote this status update:
And that sealed the deal for me. I had to see what all the fuss was about. And am I ever happy I did!
So what exactly is Pinterest and why am I so into it?
It’s like browsing an endless supply of magazine’s and catalogues that have been flagged and marked so you only see the best stuff inside. And it’s all grouped together in categories for the easiest browsing possible. To start off, check out the TasteMakers section:
Here you can browse through a variety of people and categories (boards as they are referred to in Pinterest), to get a feel for what’s going on. Once you get comfortable with it, you can then start to pin things yourself. Pinning something is simply adding a visual link to a website. For example I’ve pinned these DIY hanging baskets in my DIY category.
If you were to view this image in Pinterest, you could click on it and be taken to the website that offers the tutorial on how to make these. These, by the way, were the inspiration for my next house project; hanging baskets in my kitchen to hold my cooking magazines! I started a whole DIY board full of projects I would like to undertake, some for the home, some crafty fashion stuff, and some gardening goodies.
There is something for everyone on here and each picture will lead your mind in a whole other direction of browsing and searching. Not to mention that it is a great way to categorize your own stuff too! And of course there’s an iphone app for it!
I’m so into this site that I’ve sent requests to friends that aren’t technically inclined and to many of my clients because I think this could be useful to pretty much everyone. For my friends that enjoy shopping and fashion, this is a great way to find the latest trends. For my clients, this is a useful tool to showcase their products. For my friends who cook, there is endless food porn and inspiration. For crafty people, this is a gold mine of inspiration! Whatever your interest is, there’s something on Pinterest for you.
I’m more than in love with my iPhone, I’m fully addicted to it and couldn’t live without it. Why am I writing about it here? Because without it, I couldn’t do what I do, how I do it!
Here are my top 10 apps:
Calendar
The Facebook app lets me act as all of the pages that I admin, and not only post updates, but also post photos as those pages. This is huge for me!
Email is pretty self explanatory, I use it more than I use the phone, and have to remind myself that checking and responding to email while driving is not safe!!
Lucky for me, I’ve got lots of appointments these days, plus the schedules of my 2 girls to juggle, not to mention my social calendar (insert sarcasm here). Hence, the usefulness of the calendar app.
The Twitter app is my favorite of all the Twitter apps, I like it better than Hootsuite or Tweetdeck or any other Twitter app. And the bonus is that it it’s free. I can manage my own Twitter account, plus all of my clients accounts too, and get notified whenever someone mentions me or a client on Twitter. It’s great!
Foursquare, oh how I love to alert the general public to my whereabouts and exciting life (again with the sarcasm) But honestly, I lurve me some foursquare! I yearn to steal mayorships from my neighborhood foursquare nemesis (this is the first she’s hearing about this). I’m talking about you @RealtorMarney! Marney’s a real estate agent extraordinaire (she runs all her own social media and rocks at it BTW) and that woman is the mayor of my life here in Lutherville! And thanks to Foursquare, I’ve gotten free loot at Aveda, discounts at H&M, and discovered a delicious little lunch spot in a Towson Office building, Crush Cafe. It really is a nifty tool that can be used to discover new places and save money while doing it.
Springpad is my note taking, moleskine replacement, task master, recipe storer, go to for anything not handled by Google (docs) and dropbox. I can take meeting notes here, clip links, store recipes, wine labels, photos of articles, you name it, springpad can do it. And then I can tweet them, share them on facebook, and access them offline if need be. Springpad is magical.
And then there’s camera+, an app that makes the built in camera app look super lame. It takes awesome photos and let’s me edit them, in app, all before storing them to my photo album. I can also share photos to my personal facebook and twitter account right from the app. Thanks to this app, I no longer own a point and shoot camera. This and my DSLR are all I need for vacation, special events, and the day to day photos I like to take.
Combine Camera+ and Instagram and my love for sharing photos is taken to a whole other level! Not to mention that as much as I enjoy sharing photos, I enjoying view other people’s photos even more. Instagram is the perfect app to consume photo content on the go!
Dropbox and Google (docs) let’s me view and edit almost all of my files on the fly. I store everything between these two sites/apps and can set up shop on anyone’s computer for the most part. But used on the iphone, I can access anything, anytime. No computer, no problem!
BONUS 11th app: Google Voice – Google
Were it not for Google Voice, I’d have a much higher phone bill and no way to discern personal from professional incoming phone calls. I can call people from my computer, home phone or cell phone and it always appears to be coming from my business number, 410-775-6187. I have visual voicemail, at no extra charge. And can send texts from my phone or computer, for free. It’s easy to use and indispensable.
So at the end of the day, each of these apps impacts how I work on a daily basis. I don’t know how I did what I do before that glorious day in February when I chased down my UPS driver to retrieve my iphone. The phone I woke up at 3 in the morning to order and tracked it’s progress as it traveled from China. All of my anticipation and excitement have proved more than warranted. This phone let’s me do the best job I can for my clients.
I was talking with a new client, CF Interiors, and she mentioned that almost all of her business comes from referrals, as does mine. There is no greater endorsement of a business than the recommendation of it by a trusted source. Do your job and do it well and people will talk about you; they will recommend you; they will frequent your business.
There are 600 MILLION people on Facebook, the average person has over 100 friends. That’s an incredibly powerful network. If someone were to endorse your business on Facebook, imagine how many referrals you cod get from that one person? Guess what….that’s what happens when someone likes your business on Facebook. They’re endorsing you, saying I like this business and you should too! Because that like shows up in the newsfeeds of their friends and the link to your business page is right there, ready and waiting to be clicked! The only question is…..what’s your business page going to say about you and your business?
Obviously, part of this is based on my business. But most of my actions on Facebook as Molly White (not Molly White Marketing) are driven from a personal perspective.
I “Like” over 500 business pages on Facebook; from musicians to National companies, from National and International news sources, to local retailers and restaurants.
What am I looking for from these pages when I like them? It’s simple really, I want to feel like I have a special connection to the business or brand. I want inside scoop,exclusive content, and the occasional deal,perk, reward, coupon or contest. I want to know the specials at restaurants, to see pictures of new merchandise, and to know the daily goings on of the staff and employees. I also want to know that if I write on their page and ask them a question, that I will get a response. It’s really that simple. When businesses achieve this, I am more likely to frequent their business regardless of price, again and again.
Small businesses have the biggest opportunity to excel at this because they can most easily infuse that intimate feeling into their page; to make it feel like you really know the people behind the page and the business.
Aside from my own clients, of whom I obviously have a biased opinion, here are some businesses that I think excel at these features.
WIIFM, stands for What’s In It For Me? It’s a simple principle that I learned when I was slinging copiers. When you sell something your customer is thinking these 5 words and you need to be able to give them an answer. The same principle applies for your social media sites.
You see and hear it everyday now, like us on Facebook, Follow Us on Twitter, or maybe it’s just a logo, or the simple F and T at the bottom of the ad. More often than not, the brand’s location on these sites isn’t listed and even less often than that do they tell you WHY you should like them or follow them. And after you see these ads, how often are you taking the time to go onto Facebook and Twitter, and find these brands to follow and like them? Seldem, right? Right!
Give people a REASON to like you and to follow you and TELL THEM where to find you! For instance, if I were to use print advertising, I would include, Like me on Facebook at Facebook.com/MollyWhiteMarketing or Follow me on Twitter @MollyWhite for all the latest news and information about social media for businesses!
So Why should people like or follow you? What’s on your Facebook Page? If you were a customer or client what would you want to see?
QR Codes
The most basic description of QR Cdoes is that they are a way to connect the non digital world with the digital world. Using apps for your smartphone like ScanLife, RedLaser and others, your phone reads the quirky square bar code, and translates it to information. It can simply be a link or it can be a complete set of contact information that can be instantly stored on your phone.
Old Navy recently held an in store Easter Egg Hunt, but instead of searching for eggs, you searched for giant QR code posters. Scan them, and they took you to a page where you entered your email address, and then it randomly generated a message to let you know if you had found the “golden” egg. I was at the store (surprise, surprise 
) while the campaign took place and even my 4 year old daughter got into the game and helped me to find all 15 codes.
A quick scan of some of your incoming direct mail pieces and ads in magazines will show that QR codes are becoming more and more common. You can implement them in your marketing too. Instead of listing your website in an ad, include the QR code for it. Do the same with your social media addresses. Use them on your business cards so that people can instantly store your contact info! Have fun with them! The possibilities are endless.
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