Tag Archives: Social Media

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PM360 Online Social Media Think Tank Article: What’s Hot, What’s Next in Social Media

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PM360 Logo In the April 2010 Issue of PM360, I'm featured as a contributing author to PM360's Social Media Think Tank Article: What's Hot, What's Next in Social Media.  I was both thrilled and humbled when they asked me to participate in providing some observations on the use of social media in the pharmceutical industry. 

In the article, I described Johnson & Johnson's extensive participation in social media channels and opinions from their communications leaders on what's driving their success.  Also, I provided my personal opinions on potential audience engagement metrics to help an organization in prioritizing time invested in social media.

This is the first time I've been asked to provide opinions on social media to an industry publication so I cannot begin to express my gratitude for this opportunity.

If you have a few moments, please check out the PM60 article.  Eight (8) additional contributing authors are featured (and trust me they're all a lot smarther than I am).  I wrote the second article listed on the website. 

I hope you don't mind me sharing this quick post.  Really, a short post from Tony Faustino – Yeah, Right …

 

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Successful Social Media Marketing Is Neither Free Nor Easy

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 Gasoline for FreeThis article, "Entrepreneurs Question Value of Social Media," from the Wall Street Journal caught my eye (and I'm sure several other readers' eyes) with it's clever headline and additionally provocative phrases:

* "Marketing Via Facebook, Twitter Yields Results for Some, Others Say It's Overrated" and "Hype Right Now Exceeds the Reality"

The WSJ article quotes findings from 2,000 small business owners surveyed by the University of Maryland's Smith School of Business and Network Solutions LLC.  Among the survey's findings included:

* Most users of social media – 58% – find the medium "just met expectations for success.  For the remainder, twice as many feel the medium fell short of expectations (26%) than exceeded expectations (12%) for success.

* 50% of small business users of social media have found that it has taken up more time than they expected.

So does this mean social media really doesn't work?  Is all that blogging, tweeting, friending, videoing, and updating of statuses to engage a specific target audience or buyer persona a complete waste of time?

  

Of course not.  But, I think these findings should "recalibrate" our expectations about how quickly social media and inbound marketing can impact overall business success.  Here are some thoughts in putting the achievement of business success via social media into perspective:

 

1. Social Media Success Stories Like Chris Brogan and HubSpot Didn't Happen Overnight


In my opinion, two of the most successful social media success stories demonstrating the time, dedication, and commitment required are Chris Brogan and HubSpot.  Both have invested years and countless hours to build their brands and business success via social media and inbound marketing. 

And their level of commitment continues …

Chris Brogan.  Brogan has been an online practitioner and social media evangelist for more than a decade, and in the last few years he's finally receiving more mainstream recognition and credit.  His book, Trust Agents, about how organizations can use social media to personally engage consumers, is a New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller. 

But, this success and recognition did not occur overnight.  In fact, Brogan says it took him eight years (8) to acquire 100 subscribers when he started his blog.  Check out his video series called "Overnight Success" so you can see first-hand how social media success is hard-earned.

HubSpot. This organization literally created and proliferated the phrase "inbound marketing." They've published a best-selling book called Inbound Marketing: Get Found Using Google, Social Media, and Blogs describing the online strategies and tactics driving their current business success (along with the success of other small to medium-sized businesses).   

And yes, they've also been diligently implementing and practicing those social media and inbound marketing strategies from their book for years.  As a point of reference, I looked at two data points regarding their popular Internet Marketing Blog.  These numbers illustrate the significant time and dedication required (and blogging is just one important channel of their multi-channel social media strategy):

(A) Years Invested in Blogging: ~3.5 years; Their first blog post was written in August 2006.  During a HubSpot webinar I attended this week, Brian Halligan (one of HubSpot's co-founders) said they initially started blogging once per week.  Now, they publish almost 3 blog posts daily.

(B) Number of Blog Posts Published by HubSpot: ~1000+ as of March 31, 2010.  This is my "back-of-the-envelope" analysis based on the number of posts I found on the HubSpot Website.

 

 

2. Long Term Commitment, Patience, and Flexibility: Social Media and Inbound Marketing are No Exception


This post by John McTigue of Kuno Creative, "Disappointed By Your Inbound Marketing Results," provides realistic and practical advice when managing expectations about social media and inbound marketing.  He emphasizes four (4) points (which I've paraphrased here).  Read John's entire post because it's great: 

(A) You shouldn't expect instant success.  Time and effort are required to reach people and convert them to customers.

(B) You must build relationships, not numbers.  Create interesting content, engage people directly, and reach them with great offers and service.

(C) You must be a chameleon.  Remain flexible and tweak your strategy daily by monitoring your metrics to keep improving.

(D) Be patient.  Invest at least a year before deciding to end the program.

From personal experience, I've only been blogging for 6 months and I can speak to the time and effort required to publish this blog.  For me, John's advice is readily applicable and timely. 

 

Conclusion

Patience, Perseverance, Effort.  Last time I checked, those traits applied to "traditional marketing success" also.  I fail to see why accomplishing social media and inbound marketing success would be any different …

 

Photo Credit: From Flickr by Tony the Misfit 

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The Fortune 500 Favors Twitter and Blogs as Social Media Channels

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Nora Ganim Barnes, Ph.D. and Eric Mattson through the Center for Marketing Research at The University of Massachusetts Dartmouth recently published a study titled, The Fortune 500 and Social Media: A Longitudinal Study of Blogging and Twitter Usage by America's Largest Corporations.  I've reviewed the study, and it contains many findings worth sharing about the 2009 Fortune 500's use of social media:

I. 22% of the Fortune 500 have a Public-Facing Blog
* Represents 108 companies
* Shows a 6% growth relative to 2008 (81 companies)
* Firms in computer software, peripherals, and office equipment had the most blogs in 2009 (e.g., 11 companies) and included firms like H-P, Dell, Microsoft, Apple, Oracle, and Xerox
* Blogging almost doubled in the specialty retail category (i.e., Home Depot, Best Buy, Toys "R" Us) from 4 blogs in 2008 to 7 in 2009

II. The Inc. 500 has Adopted Blogging 2x Faster than the Fortune 500
* 45% of The Inc. 500 have a blog.  This is not surprising since the Inc. 500 represents entrepreneurial, fast-growing, private companies in the US
* The Inc. 500 doesn't have marketing budgets to support costly media campaigns (i.e., Super Bowl ads, regular television campaigns)
* The study points out that the difference may be due to "corporate philosophy regarding open communication with its stakeholders."  I think there's a lot of truth to this point because the larger, established companies are concerned with "losing control" of their corporate message.

III. 35% of the Fortune 500 Use Twitter
* Represents 173 companies; The authors noted the growth of Twitter as "explosive"
* The insurance industry had the most Twitter accounts in 2009 (e.g., 13 companies); I find this very interesting and will have to do some self-research on how this industry is using Twitter
* The researchers deemed Twitter interactivity as having "consistent interactions with other users and on-going discussions that are easy to follow"
* A measure of the interactivity — 69% of the companies consistently responded with @replies or retweets (i.e., RTs) in the past 30 days

IV. The Fortune 500 are Integrating Other Social Media with Their Blogs
* 86% of the corporate blogs are linked to a corporate Twitter account
* 19% incorporate podcasts; 31% use video on their blog sites
* This usage represents increases in comparison to 2008 (i.e., 16% for podcasting and 21% for video)
* Shows an attempt to integrate different social media efforts

Conclusions — The Positive
* Shows there is a continued and steady adoption of social media by the largest US corporations
* The Fortune 500 participating in social media is a big step because these organizations achieved their success through traditional "outbound marketing" such as traditional print and television advertising campaigns (with maybe the exception of Google)

Conclusions — Lots of Room for Improvement
* There is still a long way to go – the other way to interpret the data is that 78% of the Fortune 500 do not blog and 65% do not use Twitter
* This blog post by Dr. Leslie Gaines-Ross titled The Fortune 500 and Social Media presents a similar view of this conclusion and a review of the same study

Additional and Related Resources
* A previous blog post titled: 5 Insights from Hubspot's The State of Inbound Marketing 2010 Webinar

* HubSpot's State of Inbound Marketing 2010 Report (in PDF)

* Hubspot's Webinar Slides on State of Inbound Marketing 2010:  I've embedded them here

The State of Inbound Marketing 2010

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5 Insights from HubSpot’s The State of Inbound Marketing 2010 Webinar

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Number 5 

HubSpot conducted a webinar on February 18th titled: The State of Inbound Marketing 2010. The webinar focused on key trends in inbound and outbound marketing uncovered from a survey HubSpot conducted in early 2010.  Hubspot's analysis reveals many insights on how businesses are using inbound marketing to reinvent and improve their marketing strategies. This is great content so I've posted the slides in case you didn't have the opportunity to attend the webinar.

The State of Inbound Marketing 2010

Mike Volpe (VP Marketing @HubSpot) and Adam Blake (MIT-Sloan MBA Student) presented many thoughtful insights.  Here are some golden nuggets that really hit home:

Insight 1 – Cost Per Lead for Inbound Marketing Channels is Significantly Lower Versus Outbound Marketing Channels
(Slide 5) Inbound marketing channels (i.e., social media, blogs, SEO – organic / natural search, PPC – paid search / Adwords) cost per lead averaged around $134.  Outbound marketing channels (i.e., telemarketing, trade shows, direct mail) cost per lead averaged around $332 per lead.  Thus, inbound marketing lowered costs per lead by 60%.

Insight 2 – Almost All Inbound Marketing Channels Generate Lower Costs Compared to Any Outbound Channel
(Slides 6, 7) 63% rated social media and blogs as "below average cost" for generating leads.  43% rated SEO as "below average cost."  In addition, these three inbound marketing channels performed better than all outbound marketing channels.  In slide 7, Mike observed that the outbound channel 2010 results for "below average cost" were better than 2009 for all categories.  He noted customers are probably negotiating better terms due to current economic conditions (e.g., a short-term benefit).

Insight 3 - Social Media is One Component of a Healthy Inbound Marketing Mix
(Slide 8) The lesson here: Don't put all your eggs in one basket.  Although respondents rated social media as their most important source of leads, SEO and blogs rated second and third respectively.  In fact, SEO was rated only 1% lower than social media (i.e., 59% to 60%). 

Successful Google results via organic search will continue to be important.  The eMarketer article, Organic Search Still Reigns, reinforces why landing on the first page results of Google, Yahoo!, and Bing is huge.  The rationale: 95% of search-referred traffic comes from first-page results.  Less than 2% of search-referred traffic comes from visitors willing to keep looking after the second page of results.

Insight 4 - Blog Post Frequency Significantly Impacts Customer Acquisition
(Slides 16, 17) Most respondents said they blog primarily once per week.  However, the firms most successful at customer acquisition were those who blogged more (i.e., two to three times per week, daily, multiple times per day). 
Mike and Adam think this is a result of gaining more experience in blogging.  When a firm blogs more frequently, it gets better at writing.  This yields better content which attracts more site traffic (and firms begin investing more time in their company blog).  When HubSpot was a smaller firm, Mike noted it blogged once per week.  When the firm started growing, their blogging frequency increased and they now create blog posts on a daily basis.

Insight 5 - Smaller Companies Implement Inbound Marketing (Larger Firms Not So Much)
(Slide 13) 44% of smaller firms utilize inbound marketing (versus 32% for larger firms).  Mike and Adam cited how smaller firms have more limited marketing budgets (i.e., many are start-ups).  In addition, the larger firms are more established, and they probably achieved their status through outbound marketing.
Insight #5 doesn't surprise me.  It makes sense why smaller firms would look to blogging, social media, and organic search as natural marketing vehicles.  The biggest expense is the investment and prioritization of time to inbound activities.  For the larger firms, I think they look at inbound marketing as additional channels to augment traditional marketing activity.
Check out this blog post: The Fortune 500 and Social Media by Dr. Leslie Gaines-Ross from reputationXchange.com.  It provides some great statistics and data on social media adoption (or lack therof) by the largest US corporations.
What do you think of these findings?  Do these results surprise you?  Please comment and let me know what you think.

Photo Credit: By psd via Flickr

 

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Inbound Marketing by Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah Levels the Marketing Playing Field

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J0105220[1] I am a huge fan of HubSpot and its founders, Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah.  Their team members, Mike Volpe and Rebecca Corliss, generously share outstanding content and services (i.e., Inbound Marketing University) to help all marketing professionals continuously improve and reinvent their marketing skills.  This organization is the epitome of a social media core value: “It is always better to give than to receive.”

 Inbound Marketing Book Cover Inbound Marketing: Get Found Using Google, Social Media, and Blogs is an outstanding and practical marketing strategy guide targeted to small and startup businesses.  Halligan and Shah have written this book with small and startup businesses in mind because their book shares numerous insights from their own experiences as entrepreneurs (i.e., Tips from the Trenches).

The Value of This Book.  Inbound Marketing makes a convincing case that marketing success is not limited by the size of our respective marketing budgets.  Instead, these limits are now a function of our own creativity and investment of time.  Inbound Marketing practically explains how small or startup businesses can practically and effectively compete with larger competitors by executing:

* Social media strategy via channels such as Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.
* A lead nurturing and conversion process
* A sales marketing funnel process to measure campaign ROI


Inbound Marketing Versus Outbound Marketing

What’s Inbound Marketing?   Halligan explains the differences between Inbound Marketing and Outbound Marketing in this blog post: Inbound Marketing vs. Outbound Marketing.

Outbound Marketing = Traditional, “Push / Interruption-Based” Marketing.  The marketer pushes the message out far and wide hoping that it resonates far and wide with the target consumer.

Outbound Marketing tactics include:

  • Trade shows
  • Seminar series
  • Email blasts to purchased lists
  • Internal cold calling
  • Outsourced telemarketing
  • Advertising

Inbound Marketing = “Pull” Marketing Leveraging the Internet.  Any marketing tactic that relies on earning people’s interest instead of buying it.  Inbound marketing focuses on helping yourself “get found” by people already learning about and shopping in your industry. 

Inbound Marketing tactics include: 

  • Search engines
  • Blogs
  • Social media sites

The Inbound Marketing Process Transformation.  Three (3) business activities provide foundation for marketing transformation:

  1. Getting found online
  2. Converting visitors and leads
  3. Analyzing and improving

 

The 6 Practical Benefits of Studying Inbound Marketing

1. Understanding how/why Google plays a signifcant role in your marketing success.  Here, Inbound Marketing explains in non-technical terms why inbound links (e.g., links from other websites that connect to your site or blog) play a vital role in your website’s  “Google Juice” or Google Authority (e.g., the number of inbound links to your web pages and the authority of those pages linking to your site).

2. Executing practical and actionable “to-do” lists at the end of every chapter.  The suggestions are hardly rocket science but they require personal commitment, preseverance, and time.

3. Learning social media marketing tactics for use across all major social media channels.  Halligan and Shah ably provide specific examples on how to effectively deploy blogs, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Digg, StumbleUpon, and YouTube.

4. Measuring the effectiveness of your social media marketing initiatives by channel.  For example, the book guides you on how to compare the effectiveness of a Twitter campaign versus a YouTube campaign.

5. Implementing a lead nurturing process in all marketing campaigns.  Why is this important?  Every prospect is at a different place in the buying cycle for your particular product or service.  Therefore, you want this prospect to have your organization at the “top-of-mind” even when they’re not ready to buy from you (because one day they will be).

6. Informing marketing decisions (e.g., ROI) by creating a sales marketing funnel process.  This process will enable your organization to measure and evaluate campaign yield along with ROI.

 

The 3 Audiences Who Will Benefit from Studying Inbound Marketing 

1. Amateur Bloggers.  You will learn how to build Google Authority for your blog by understanding why you don’t want your blog’s URL address to include the name of your blogging platform.  For example, if your blog’s URL address is www.myblogname.typepad.com or www.myblogname.wordpress.com that’s not good.  Make sure to address this problem — I did and my search engine results are all the better for it.

2. Marketing Professionals (especially CMOs).  You will make better marketing decisions by creating a sales marketing funnel so you can measure campaign effectiveness per channel using campaign yield and ROI measurement techniques.

3. CEOs.  You will learn how to monitor your competitor’s activity and progress by tracking seven (7) attributes.  These attributes can be tracked using free tools on the Internet.  These attributes or tools are:

* Website Grade via WebsiteGrader.com
* Number of Delicious.com bookmarks
* Number of inbound links
* Number of Facebook fans
* Website traffic via Compete.com
* Google Buzz of your brand name relative to a competitor’s brand name

If you’ve read Inbound Marketing, please leave me a comment and let me know what you thought of the book.  I’m curious to know what you found helpful or valuable.

 

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A Great Example of Online Listening & Brand Monitoring: The Ritz-Carlton

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How Many Times Per Day Do We Ask Ourselves These Questions
* Will major companies or brands ever understand the importance of "listening" to online conversations?
* Is this this whole concept of "online listening" just a matter of hype and social media hocus-pocus?
* Does showing online audiences that we're listening really do anything (e.g., start engagement, build goodwill, do anything?)

The Ritz-Carlton Gets It …

J0402585[1]I recently read a great article in Forbes.com: How Ritz-Carlton Stays at the Top.  The article is an interview of its CEO, Simon F. Cooper, who describes a number of the processes and the organization's famous service culture such as:

* Its Famous Service Motto: "We are ladies and gentlemen serving ladies and gentlemen."

* Employee Trust: Every Ritz employee is permitted to spend up to $2000 per guest to make sure a guest is satisfied (and that's per guest incident not per year)

* A Compelling Objective: Create an Absolutely Wonderful Stay for a Guest

The Ritz doesn't just talk-the-talk, they walk-the-walk.  Their organization carries the distinction as the only service company in America to receive the Malcolm S. Baldridge Quality Award twice.  

The Ritz-Carlton's Senior Director of Public Relations, Alison Sitch Demonstrates Online Listening, Engagement, and Brand Monitoring

I tweeted about the Forbes article late Wednesday evening around 9 pm – 10 pm and referenced the $2000 per guest factoid because I thought that was pretty cool.  I learned a lot from reading the article, and thought my Twitter Followers might enjoy reading it too. 

Here's what impresses me about the Ritz-Carlton's online listening engagement by Alison Sitch — Check this out:

Ritz Carlton Example 1* I received a "Mention" in my Twitter stream the following morning from @RitzCarltonPR (Alison Sitch) thanking me for the tweet I sent about the article — Unbelievable!

* Not only did Alison thank me but she also sent out 11 "thank you tweets" acknowledging 60+ people who also tweeted about the Forbes.com article (based on my quick scan of her Twitter stream).

* I have never received any type of "thank you note" or communication from a large or prestigious organization like the Ritz-Carlton for any tweets I send (and I've sent out a lot of tweets).

I just think this is a great example of what Chris Brogan says is "showing others how we can be human at a distance." In a cynical age where there's more mistrust than trust in the business world, isn't it great to hear the words "thank you?" 

* If you received a thank you note like this wouldn't it make you feel good too? 

* Wouldn't it make you feel like there's someone genuinely trying to treat you well and wasn't taking your kindness for granted? 

* Isn't that something important to all of us as human beings (whether we're communicating online or in-person?

Please tell me what you think in your comments.

It made me feel really good, and I'm now following @RitzCarltonPr (aka Alison Sitch) on Twitter.  Here's Alison's Twitter profile in case you'd like to follow her also:

Ritz Carlton Twitter Profile

 

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Part 1: Success in Online Publishing and Social Media Requires Reinvention (Even for a Tina Brown)

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Tina Brown candidly described her first two months in online publishing as bewildering and challenging.  She learned the new vocabulary and terminology of social media "on-the-fly."  To her credit, she invested the time and commitment to "figure it out.".  In addition, she continues learning about social media from her talented employees (particularly the twenty-something employees).

If someone with Tina Brown's experience, savvy, and past achievements is willing to reinvent her thinking to successfully compete online, shouldn't we embrace that solution-oriented attitude also …

In the Online World, We Are All in the Business of Sharing

J0439493[1] The New Media model of freely sharing content took Brown a relatively long time to understand.  According to her, "it took her awhile to get it."  Keep in mind, her previous frame of reference originates from the Old Media print world of dog-eat-dog competition.  The rules of engagement required you to "scoop your competition" and ensure that no one got a piece of your story.

Contrast that attitude with the social media principles of "being in the business of sharing." Brown finds this concept of freely sharing content as "fascinating science," and it's this trait of online publishing that she finds enormously interesting.

Social Media is How You Invite the Audience to Join the Conversation

J0386497[1]Old Media strategy relies on a "push model" or as Brown refers to it "the old binary way of traditional media."  In this model, the news agency writes the story and announces it to complete the communication transaction.  Today, publishers and their organizations must engage with their audience in conversation about topics in news and culture.

Executing inbound marketing and social media is how The Daily Beast invites its audience to interact (e.g., a pull model).  When Brown and the team acquire a story, they immediately decide how to socially market it.  These marketing tactics include:

* Identifying and contacting the Top 25 websites obsessed with the news story
* Tweeting the story on Twitter
* Commenting on influential blogs that are also covering the same story
* Encouraging Facebook Fans of The Daily Beast to post the article on The Daily Beast Fan Page.
* Feeding the Beast: This tactic represents a smart way of inviting audience participation

Participation is the Currency of an Audience-Driven Marketing World

As mentioned earlier, the social media world is about sharing content.  According to Brown, you need to:

* Identify "where your audience lives"
* Pitch them "where they care" and
* Pitch them what interests them

J0442513[1] Engaged audiences actively participate in the conversation and publish her/his won content. Brown emphasized how you have to be inventive, enterprising, and open to the people and places you market to because "the old ways just don't work anymore."  She summarized this observation by saying: "People don't want to participate in passive marketing."

Brown is absolutely correct.  I'm a good example of her insight regarding active versus passive marketing because I:

* Wrote this blog post series about what I learned from Tina Brown and The Daily Beast
* Chose to follow the Daily Beast on Twitter (@thedailybeast)
* Posted a story on The Daily Beast's Facebook Fan Page (the article describing how Paul Shaffer got his job with David Letterman)
* Bookmarked the mobile URL for The Daily Cheat Sheet on my iPhone
* Embedded The Daily Beast Widget in my iGoogle Homepage
* Subscribed to The Daily Beast Email Newsletter

 

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Part 4: What Tina Brown and The Daily Beast Measure to Drive Competitive Advantage and Audience Engagement

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I've been blogging since August 2009.  It's a continuous learning experience that's all about trial and error.  That process goes beyond understanding what content people find interesting and includes figuring out a writing process for ideas, setting weekly writing goals, experimenting with the TypePad blogging interface, registering a domain name for this blog (sometimes to great frustration, but that's the topic of a future blog post), and getting better at promoting my blog to more people than just my wife.

On a daily basis, I study the Google Analytics results that measure traffic for Social Media ReInvention Blog (even though I already know the traffic volume is small — Ha!).  For now, I'm okay with that because my 12 month goal is to continue learning how to improve my blog's content and promotion.

The starting point for all improvement is measurement.  One of my favorite professors in business school, the late Dean Kropp (and a great guy too), passionately shared the following mantra about operational strategy to me and his students: "What Gets Measured is What Gets Done."  Those words continue to have a lasting influence on me.

For Tina Brown, one of the reasons she measures and evaluates The Daily Beast's performance is because her primary investor, Barry Diller, wants to know how his investment is performing.  She didn't go into specific detail about how they measure ROI at The Daily Beast, but it's clear they're implementing metrics.  Here's what I took away from Tina Brown's keynote address regarding performance measurement.

Learning #1 Employ Metrics that Increase Your Organization's Competitive Advantage
J0400509[1] According to Tina Brown, The Daily Beast books ~59 television appearances per month for its contributing writers.  In addition, she estimates that ~30,000 blogs link to The Daily Beast per month!

It's very telling that Brown mentioned her love of working with talented writers. She remarked how so many people have so much to say, but they lack a credible and visible forum to voice their views.  There's no question Tina Brown wants The Daily Beast to become the writer-driven forum of choice.

My rationale for that opinion: The Daily Beast measures and promotes metrics showing why a talented writer professionally benefits from The Daily Beast's reach and exposure.  Tracking and espousing these outcomes gives The Daily Beast a competitive advantage in attracting outstanding writing talent.  If you're a writer searching for an influential and visible forum to expose your ideas/opinions, these metrics demonstrate why The Daily Beast is a compelling professional destination.

Learning #2 Evaluate How Specific Audiences Interact and Engage with Your Content
J0382632[1]It sounded like Tina Brown and The Daily Beast are trying to measure audience engagement via a process similar to BusinessWeek.com's current audience engagement initiative (i.e., ratio of writer output to reader input and segmented by topic, author, etc.).  If you'd like to learn more, here's a link to the August 2009 eConsultancy interview with John Byrne, Editor-in-Chief of BusinessWeek.com. 

Brown believes authentically engaged readers "participate in the day's conversation."  I agree because engaged Web 2.0 participants (or is that now Web 3.0) exhibit engagement through measurable social media behaviors. 

In my opinion, a back-of-the-envelope list of these measurable social media behaviors could include but are not limited to:

* Tweeting or retweeting specific article links on Twitter
* Writing blog posts inspired by a specific topic (like this one)
* Document content links in those blog posts (e.g., inbound links)
* Sharing content through social bookmarking sites like Delicious, Digg, and Stumble Upon
* Uploading and distributing the selected content via YouTube or Vimeo
* Sharing content and cataloging it in URL shortening services like bit.ly
* Posting discussion questions or opinions about the content in LinkedIn Discussion Forums (and the member comments these questions or opinions generate)

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5 Tactics for Optimizing Your Online Visibility in Google Search Results

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Thinking Digital According to the Bloomberg article, Microsoft has Herculean Task in Taking on Google, Americans conducted 65% of their online searches using Google in May 2009. Bing, Microsoft's latest competitive offering, is making some headway and apparently caught the eye of Google co-founder, Sergey Brin (click here for the June 14, 2009 Mashable article). Bing's potential competitive threat benefits all online users because Google will continue improving its core business. This August 10, 2009 Mashable article discusses how Google's engineering team is upgrading the speed, accuracy, size, and comprehensiveness of Google Search. The project is still in beta mode and is code named, Caffeine. In the foreseeable future, Google's online search dominance will continue so understanding its influence and impact on your online visibility is critically important.

Various reputable news sources report signs of an improving U.S. economy, but I'll believe the economic turnaround when I see it. Unfortunately, Corporate America is still conducting layoffs. Therefore, high online visibility to potential networking connections, corporate recruiters, or employers is vitally important. Whenever any of these three contact points researches "your name" on Google, you want to dominate the first and second page search results. If you don't own the majority of the Top 20 Google results, you may as well be invisible.

To boost your online visibility, I suggest the following five tactics. Each tactic is worth your time and effort. Remember that perfection and technical expertise are not a requirement — Just Get Started! The most important critical success factors are your commitment and persistence.

  • Start a Blog
  • Create a Google Profile
  • Participate in the Big Three Social Networking Sites: Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn
  • Post Comments on Other Blogs
  • Register with Frequently Updated Profile Sites (i.e., MyBlogLog, FriendFeed)

Tactic #1: Start a Blog
Blogs rank high in Google search results so this tactic cannot be emphasized enough. The Google algorithm rewards websites with frequently updated content. High ranking blogs are routinely updated on an hourly and daily basis. As a result, blogs garner a distinct advantage in the search engine results pages game (e.g., SERPs). This advantage is exactly why businesses and individuals should implement blogging as the foundation of an online marketing strategy.

For an easy-to-understand primer on how to create and maintain a blog, I highly recommend Dan Schawbel's eBook, Blogging Your Brand: A Complete Guide to Your Success. This well-structured reference literally walks you through a step-by-step process that's accessible to both Beginner and Expert bloggers.

Tactic #2: Create a Google Profile
One of the quickest and easiest ways to achieve a front-page Google search engine result is by creating a Google Profile. Google introduced this service in Spring 2009. For individuals completing a Google Profile, their name and profile is shown as Google search engine result #10 (in a search for that person's name). The Google Profile launch received a lot of press during this time which triggered a "land grab" for individual names. Still, this shouldn't discourage you from filling out an individual profile.

Another important reason for completing a Google Profile is you can use the customized URL created for your Google Profile as a "virtual business card" when posting your comments on other blogs. When you post a blog comment, you want the blog author and other respective commenters to "see who you are." Until I got my blog up and running, I relied on my Google Profile for posting blog comments or other instances when I required a personal web site URL.

If you need more information about Google Profiles, here are some helpful online resources:

Tactic #3: Participate in the Big Three Social Networking Sites: Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn
On June 18, 2009, eMarketer published the article, Facebook Overtakes MySpace. The statistics confirmed Facebook's supremacy as the top social networking site. Additional data I found interesting included how Twitter experienced explosive growth of ~2,700% and LinkedIn grew by 90%. MySpace still ranks as the second largest social networking site, but its traffic and membership are steadily declining. Profiles from these sites rank high in Google Search, but I recommend focusing on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn (especially if you're a social networking newbie). To maximize your online visibility, make sure you consistently employ your real name as your profile username (i.e., www.twitter.com/yourfirstnameyourlastname or www.twitter.com/tonyfaustino or www.facebook.com/tonyfaustino).

Tactic #4: Post Comments on Other Blogs
Commenting on other blogs provides an opportunity to demonstrate your knowledge in a particular subject or industry. In the online world, commenting on another person's blog is the equivalent of attending a face-to-face networking event. Take advantage of this opportunity to make a great impression! Your comments also give Google another means of indexing your name. By consistently posting blog comments, you'll compile a critical mass over time. As a result, Google will display these comments in future search results related to your name.

Also, register with BackType.com so you can maintain an online record of all of your blog comments. You never know when those comments might come in handy for a future blog post.

Tactic #5: Register with Frequently Updated Profile Sites (i.e., MyBlogLog, FriendFeed)
Member profiles in social networks like MyBlogLog.com and FriendFeed rank high in Google Searches because their content is frequently updated. These sites aggregate your activity or updates in other social networking sites such as Twitter or Delicious.com. Therefore, every time you send out a tweet or bookmark an article or website, the activity is automatically recorded as "an information stream." These "information streams" are searchable, indexed, and provide a great opportunity displaying your name in the Top 20 Google Search results.

Photo Credit: By Karl Schneider via Flickr

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LinkedIn Lessons Part 1: Monitoring Your Personal Brand with the Popular Profile Section

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It’s hard to believe I graduated from Washington University twenty-plus years ago.  Since that time, I’ve made many important professional relationships.  “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know” is more than a clever cliché.  Relationships and access to key individuals is vitally important to succeeding in any organization, conducting a job search, executing a strategic plan, or selling a solution.

I started using LinkedIn more than a year ago to build, centralize, and maintain my professional relationships.  LinkedIn is a social networking site targeted to business professionals.  According to its website, LinkedIn counts 43 million+ members in over 200 countries.  In many ways, it’s the business audience version of Facebook.  Similar to growing and keeping in touch with Facebook “friends,” your primary purpose is to grow and maintain your LinkedIn “connections.”

Participation in LinkedIn is Important for Personal Branding and Online Visibility
When I started documenting ideas for The Social Media Reinvention Blog, I naturally thought of writing a LinkedIn-related article, and its importance in personal branding.  Here are some helpful online resources describing the importance of participating in LinkedIn:

·     HOW TO: Build Your Personal Brand on LinkedIn by Dan Schawbel

·     4 Minutes to Optimize a LinkedIn Profile for SEO by HubSpot

·     10 Ways to Use LinkedIn to Find a Job by Guy Kawasaki

Your individual, LinkedIn Profile is a personal branding opportunity that promotes your skills, capabilities, and connections to:

·     Your current employer

·     A prospective employer

·     A prospective connection

Even more importantly, LinkedIn public profiles rank very high in Google Searches which significantly increases your online visibility.  My public LinkedIn profile consistently ranks as my highest Google Search Engine Result when searching for “Tony Faustino.” 

The Popular Profiles Section Measures Your Personal Branding Efforts Within LinkedIn 
LinkedIn Popular Profile Cropped Many LinkedIn features are highly useful in personal branding.  For this post, I will focus on the “Popular Profiles” feature found in the LinkedIn Company Profile Page of a respective company. 

In a LinkedIn Company Profile Page, the top five Popular Profiles are displayed for that respective organization.  According to LinkedIn’s Frequently Asked Questions: Origin of Data for Company Profiles, a Popular Profile is defined as: “These are LinkedIn users who have the most Profile views for the Company Profile page you are viewing.”

Therefore, the Popular Profiles Section measures your LinkedIn Profile’s “findability” or “searchability” to other LinkedIn members.  This is extremely important so I monitor my profile’s popularity on a weekly basis.  This monitoring activity helps me gauge how well I’ve optimized my profile with important keywords and the effectiveness of my comments in various LinkedIn Discussion Group forums.

Note: I checked with LinkedIn Customer Service if the Popular Profile algorithm also factors in the number of views of one’s public profile – it does not (e.g., LinkedIn profiles views resulting from Google Searches).

I’ve Maintained a Popular Profile on my Firm’s LinkedIn Company Page for 22 Consecutive Weeks
Maintaining a Popular Profile on LinkedIn takes significant time and commitment.  When I discovered the Popular Profiles feature, I made it a personal goal to get my profile listed in this section.  Here are the four tactics I employ to continue achieving this result:

·     Optimize Your Profile for Important Keywords (Particularly The Specialties Section)

·     Thoroughly Describe Your Work Experience

·     Frequently Update Your Status with Useful Content

·     Actively Comment in LinkedIn Discussion Group Forums

In LinkedIn Lessons Part 2, I will describe in further detail how I specifically employ these four tactics.