St Louis Web Marketing

Archive for November, 2009

Its official! The Holiday season has begun. Get ready for battling for a parking space, never ending coupon codes and e-mail blasts galore. But, will new trends like smart phones and social media affect the way people shop? Sure, online holiday shopping is nothing new and either is Facebook, Twitter or cell phones, but as these digital forces continue to get stronger, there are sure to be some changes in retail trends.

Facebook and Twitter users are growing at a rapid pace and so are the features that they offer. This year it seems like doing holiday shopping via social media sites is extremely convenient and beneficial to the consumer. Facebook allows you to fan your favorite brands and see what kind of deals they have going on without ever leaving Facebook. Twitter’s trending topics helps you stay in the know, as well as be on top of the hot gift ideas. As published by Emarkter, 27% of online shoppers will turn to social networks for gift ideas and 45% will use social networks to research items, compare prices, and look for offers.

Smart phones really benefit the bargain shopper. With a browser on your cell phone you can be browsing the ads to your favorite store or be holding a product in your hand in one store, but be checking the price of it at another. iPhone has an unbelievable $1.99 application that allows you to scan a product barcode and it will look to find a better price somewhere else.  During the holidays people are always out to get the best deal and smart phones make price research easy on the go.

Whether you do your Holiday shopping online or in-store, digital media provides you with the tools you need to get the best gift ideas and deals.

If you’re a retailer, take this information and run with it. This is not the end of the social media trend. Get your facebook page up to date with custom pages and post deals on a daily basis. Participate in Twitter and blogs, this is how you get your name into those trending topics.  And, make sure your website is capable for all browsers (even cell phones).

Keep an eye out for more posts about social media and search engine marketing during the holidays. If you need any assistance in these areas, contact The Net Impact.

Talking yourself into participating in social media wasn’t too bad, now you’re trying to talk everyone else into it. You should be prepared with some good responses for objections…there will be objections. I already touched on a few protests, so we will continue in Part 2 to discuss how to respond when someone anti-social media raises doubts.
How do you quantify exposure?
Facebook provides its fans pages with insights that allow you to track page views, fan growth, and quality of posts. It also shows demographics of your fans that help you target your facebook campaign. It really is a neat tool to look at when you are developing your social media campaign. For example, you can look back and see that on a certain date you had a huge increase in fan views. I would recommend looking at what you posted that day or what special you were announcing, etc. This was obviously something that your fans liked and you should continue to execute meaningful posts like that one. The same goes for reversed responses. When you see that your page views fall dramatically or your unsubscribed fan numbers are growing, take a look and see what was happening that day and see to it that does not happen again.
There are also sites that provide Twitter statistics, providing insight into tweet impressions. You can see exactly how many people saw a specific tweet as well as your growth of followers.
Your website’s analytics can track exactly where your viewers are coming from. This means you will know when visitors are being sent from Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, or your blog. This can provide you with trending and performance information on customers referred by your social sites.
The same analytics that you have set for your website can be set for your blog. This means that you can see how many views it is getting, how often it is referring visitors to your site, as well as how they are finding your blog. Using blog and website analytics in conjunction can provide you with insight into user interaction with your blog posts, as well as the information they are most interested in.

We want people to come to our store, not our site.
Social media sites do drive a ton of traffic to your site, but that does not mean it isn’t doing what any other form of advertising does. With facebook posts and blogs you are still letting your customers know why they should get off the computer and get into your store. There are different ways of executing this. Its a great idea to give employees the opportunity to become administrators of your social media efforts. Let your individual stores or managers post and tweet about the specials they have going on. Let a passionate salesman tell his story in a blog about why he loves the industry he is in. Encourage employees to be in the YouTube videos that show why your products are the best. Provide your fans with exclusive benefits like coupons to be used in your store. As you can see, advertising done through social media allows for a more casual environment and lets customers feel comfortable and part of your community. Done properly, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, blogging, and web pages can be very beneficial to store traffic as well as online sales.

Remember these objections and answers when you are discussing social media with decision makers. Please feel free to post any concerns or questions in our comments section. We would love to hear your feedback about social media.

You’ve done your research and you know that it’s time for you to integrate social media into your marketing campaign. You’ve got your whole team on board and excited for the new changes, except for that one person. That person is probably a little old fashioned, probably one of those that claimed the internet is just a fad. That person is probably very passionate about their job and doesn’t feel comfortable taking a risk like social media without some proof that it will benefit the company. That person may have some questions that you don’t have the answers to. Here are the answers to some common questions and concerns that an anti-social media employee may have.
How are we even going to get followers?
Adding links from your webpage and to your email template, asking your viewers to “Follow us on Twitter”, “Become a Fan on Facebook”, and “Subscribe to our Blog” is an easy way to let the people that you are already in contact with know they can keep in touch on a more casual level by adding you to their social network.  This will not only increase your number of fans, but it will increase the quality of fans. Also, Facebook’s news feed feature allows friends of followers to see that your company has a  fan page. The more friends your followers have, the more people that are being exposed to your fan page.

Being a part social networking communities increases your brand’s exposure through each outlet. Someone may first come across your blog, which directs them to your site, where they can become a friend on Facebook, and they can then receive a coupon to use in store.

What if someone posts something negative about our company?
Negativity can be out there whether or not you take part in social media. However, by supplying the outlet for negative comments, you are providing a secure and manageable space. You are able to respond to a negative remark and turn it to a positive. It has been proven that negative publicity that has not been addressed tends to remain negative and spread like wildfire. Negative comments that are addressed and mended quickly are appreciated and make for great publicity. Here is a great example of a negative comment turned into a positive.

Without social media, this great publicity would have never been seen and maybe the Zappos would have never been able to address this person complaint in the first place.
There are more questions and concerns that “that person” may have. Check back for Part 2 as I discuss how to quantify exposure and how to create your campaign if you have a brick and mortar store rather than online purchases.

Flickr has become one of the most popular image sharing sites and currently hosts more than 4 billion images. Flickr is such an easy way to store photos, share them with family and friends, and even enhance traffic to your website.

How does Flickr drive traffic to my site?

Just like any other form of social media, Flickr is a great tool that sends traffic exactly where you direct it. Placing images on Flickr can be just as beneficial as uploading videos to YouTube. However, just like your YouTube videos, blogs, and tags, uploading images to Flickr is only beneficial if you optimize your images.

How do you optimize images for Flickr?

• Give your image a descriptive title.
• After you upload your photos, be sure to add tags. Tags are the keywords that describe your image. Be sure to use tags that you think people are searching for.
• Give a quality description with searched keywords. Be sure to always begin the description with your sites URL. This is an easy way to remind viewers where to go next.
• Create thematic sets. Try to organize your photos in to the proper set so there are even more contextual clues provided to the search engine crawlers.

Seems simple right? That’s because it is. Flickr provides you with the space you need to upload your photos and provide the tools for optimization. Be sure to check your Google Analytics Account and see just how many visitors you start getting from Flickr.