Social media needs to move from promise, talk to rigor and action soon

admin    Social Media     Action, From, Media, Move, Needs, Promise, rigor, Social, Soon, Talk

Social media needs to move from promise, talk to rigor and action soon

Social media needs to move from promise, talk to rigor and action soon

Social media is the in thing nowadays. There is not a single day that passes without a story on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube or the stars of the social media space making it to the airwaves or the ink. The success of Obama and our very own Pink Chaddi campaign is fresh in our memories and already spoken to death in social media conferences and seminars.  On the other side, every other day, witness a new venture or foray into the space. If one adds up all the hype,  then social media should have already arrived from a brand communication and marketing perspective. Well, not really. Here is my take on what it will take to get social media which I agree is hot and presents profound new ways of touch, communication and engagement, can get there.

Need to go beyond piecemeal and one person service providers

Yes, it is the most democratic medium or platform. Yes, the young are more comfortable with the Orkuts, twitters and facebooks than the old and yes there is no geographical constraint as internet is universal. But let us not forget that brands or the process of branding (except for a few categories) is not something special or separate for social media. Social media needs new ways of adoption and customization to suit its’ unique ecosystem and ways but it is not that the branding process itself, is in for a radical change. This means that successful social media initiatives can be executed consistently over a period of time only with firms or players who have an understanding of how brands and the branding process works and then combine this understanding with social media expertise. While social media is powerful, combined offline and online campaigns will create higher impact.

Need to go beyond tracking or listening

Am not sure how many know this. Software or tools that are meant for listening in social media are growing in abundance and at last count had 18 such URLs or names in my database. Am talking only of players who are visible and this number by itself seems to be growing at a brisk pace. While it is useful, let us understand that it is only the first step in a formal process a brand needs to undergo in social media.

Need to go beyond blogs

There is an urgent need to look beyond blogs, though blogs show a lot of promise, what with mobile blogs, video blogs and more. Am saying this more from the perspective that there are evolved tools like Twitter, Maplib, social bookmarking sites, besides the Facebooks, that truly offer immense potential. For example a friend of mine had done a campaign for a movie using twitter and maplib that was both creative and engaging. I also saw a website which is a wiki with the feeds on YouTube linked. A great idea, simply because these two tools have combined reach which is smartly being utilized. Heard someone recently tell me that Dell extensively uses Twitter for its global customer support.

Need to break the myth of complexity
Social media is not as techie or geekish or complex as many think or make it out to be. There are couple of thumb rules which work fairly well for starters. For example just focus on starting a blog and then use all the social media tools available to promote it. Also social media is not about just getting in but using it smartly to be heard and be visible.

Need to experiment
Let us be clear that all that is happening in social media is experiments and there are bound to be successful and bad experiments. The best is to learn from it and move on, as the space itself is exploding fast and learning is the most precious commodity around in the space. Much like a battle scarred veteran who wears his scars on his sleeve.

Need to be choosy
Not all brands and companies are suited for social media since it is a different world out there.  While it is exciting and great for some, it will be out of bounds for many. A company and its entire organization needs to be ready and be prepared for what social media entails and can assure of a surefire disaster if one is not prepared and goes around thinking it is like advertising which one can control. Even firms who play in the space would be well advised to do the diligence as too many failures or  bad starts is bound to speed derailing enthusiasm, to adopt the media.

There are many more need to do lists and hope what I have said and listed makes for a good start and gets us cracking into a cracker of a space called social media.

(Xavier Prabhu is Director & CEO of PRHUB, a customized communication solutions firm. He can be reached at xavier@prhub.com)

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Things an Online Marketing Company should never Promise

admin    Website Marketing     Company, Marketing, Never, Online, Promise, Should, Things

Things an Online Marketing Company should never Promise

Online marketing, in particular search marketing is one industry that is expected to have double digit growth despite the downward economy. When focused properly the ROI from online marketing can be significant, the premise being that you need to know what to focus on. While search marketing can lead to a lot of excitement and potential, beware of less than reputable professionals.

Red Flag 1 – The Word “Guarantee:” The only thing an online marketing professional can promise you is to put forth a good faith effort and fulfill the obligations of the contract. The results of the efforts are a complete wildcard. Why is this?
– Search engines constantly change their algorithms.
– The agency or professional you are contracting with does not own the search engine, let alone have any authority of natural search results.

What can you do? This is where due diligence in the proposal stage becomes important. Check the company’s references and past clients. Learn about what successes the past client has observed and learn what advantages and try to uncover potential shortcomings of the agency or professional you are considering working with.

Red Flag 2 – a New Website: New sites are exciting, but present many challenges for search marketing professionals. A brand new site, which to a SEO professional may include sites less than a year old, faces an instant uphill battle. At best you’ll be another website with a proposition of why your company performs something better, faster, or cheaper. At worst, you’ll be a website tailoring to a market with no search volume. In the case of the later, it might be easy for an SEO professional to get you ranking well, but it won’t do any good if you rank well for keywords that no one searches on.
– New sites can be more work to rank than established sites that are at least 3 years old.
– New sites will require a significant effort in the area of link building because by definition a new site will have almost no inbound links, a critical component of why websites rank well
– New sites will need other mediums to attract visitors either offline, or online through pay per click, or affiliate marketing.

What can you do? Keyword research – In an ideal world, before you hire a web designer, or consider content strategy you’ll know what keywords your website needs to discuss. Ideally you’ll map out the keywords to be discussed within plans of the website’s architecture.

Red Flag 3 – Not Inquiring about your Call to Actions: The reason online marketing has grown so quickly and been embraced by companies of all different sizes is that the web has the ability to be tracked better than any of marketing medium. You would be surprised how many websites (and professionals) view success online in forms of visits. The metric that any professional needs to start with, and then work backwards, is around calls to action. What is the purpose of your site? Are you an e-commerce site selling goods and services? Are you a brochureware site that is looking to receive inbound leads to hand off to sales? Ask yourself these questions:
– Do you understand what your calls to action need to be?
– Does your contractor understand your business?
– Can your contractor provide reports of benefit of online marketing progress as it relates to your business’s calls to action?

What can you do? This is where experience matters. Having a professional working on your site that understands your business and has ideas around maximizing the efficiency of your calls to action is critical.

Search marketing is a fast expanding industry. The need to services is outpacing the ability to train highly skilled professionals that can have one on one client facing interactions. Look to spot the potential red flags of an inexperienced professional, or one that does not have a good fit for your company. Even within search marketing there are subsets that a professional typically focuses on, including: pay per click (PPC), organic (natural) search, content development, link building, and analytics, among others. Within these concentrations you might find a particular professional focuses on a particular channel such as brochureware, or e-commerce within a B2B, B2C, or C2C environment.

There are a lot of inexperienced online marketing professionals that can do more harm than good. Though typically well intentioned, they either lack the experience to analysis your business or are likely to take shortcuts that go against SEO best practices because they guaranteed a particular result. Before you pick a search marketing professional, ensure you are selecting the professional that understands your business and has the capabilities to bring your website to the next level.

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The Promise Of SEO Marketing

admin    SEO Marketing     Marketing, Promise

SEO is considered the most important aspect of getting a higher page rank even today after Google’s page rank upgrade has been introduced. Most web site owners/administrators either hire SEO experts or do it themselves. SEO has become so common that it seems that everyone from a content writer to a graphic designer knows how to work on SEO and how it can affect the overall ranking of your web site on Google or secondary search engines.

The first and foremost thing that you should look at while hiring an SEO expert is how well they have ranked their own website. There are many web site owners out there who would agree that they have fallen into the trap of big SEO promises at least once. Every SEO firm promises your website a good ranking on Google but how many of them can truly keep the promise is a different story. There are many websites whose targeted phrases are not even ranked forget about the ranking of the entire website or a web page.

So the thumb rule is check their website ranking before you choose to fall for their promise of SEO. There are some SEO firms who are new or don’t have their website yet. For such firms, you can always check their past records and if you get any good references from other website owners/their previous clients then that will hold its weight.

One of the other things you need to do especially in the light of the matter that SEO firms seems to be coming up everywhere is research. Do background research of the individual, the firm and their previous clients and SEO deliveries.

The Promise

If your web site is new, is in a high competition market or industry and if the SEO firm tells you that they can get your website top Google rankings within 60 days, then you should not sign up with the firm. This is simply because either they have no idea whatsoever of SEO or they are saying it to lure you. To avoid wastage of money and time and to avoid the frustration later on, you should avoid such a firm completely.

A straight-forward or top of the line SEO firm will always provide you with realistic expectations that can span over many months and even years depending on your market, the competition and scope. If you have a new web site that is competing in a market with moderate competition then a good ranking in 6 months is sound promise but the same time frame will not be possible in a high competition market.

SEO services

It is necessary that you ask your SEO firm what all will be included in the SEO package before you sign the deal. It is not necessary for you to receive a complete breakdown of each SEO activity but a broad understanding is essential. A SEO firm should ideally inform you about the areas of your website that will be changed to enable SEO and how they will carry on with the process of link building.

Most of the top level or good SEO firms will live their promises and provide ample proof of what they are saying and what they are planning to do. Some of the top level SEO firms even provide a guarantee although not all of them do it. Not providing a written guarantee doesn’t mean that a particular SEO firm is not good. The reputation of a SEO firm in the market is in itself a huge guarantee. So if you are signing up with a top level firm with a reputation to back it then you can be rest assured that they will back up what ever they promise to deliver in the SEO package and within the mentioned time frame.

There are time when you might end up being on the wrong track since it is not always easy to determine if your SEO company is as good as it claims to be. There are some SEO firms who have had a great record but off late their performances have gone down. So if you are not aware of their recent client feedbacks and if you go by their past client feedbacks then you might end up being on the losing side of the deal.

SEO is an important aspect but to deal with it better, you need to first get an understanding of what it really is and how it can actually help your web site. When you are informed enough, you will be able to take the right decision.