Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah’s SEO-Friendly ‘Bluebird’ and the Betterment of a Google Ranking

December 15, 2014

btssongsouthdisneybacklot_largeAs you all know — I love all things Disney, so how could I pass on a guest post that used a Disney classic to talk about SEO!  Enjoy this post from Lucas Miller.

American actor James Baskett was most famous for his portrayal of Uncle Remus, an extremely deep voice, singing the song “Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah,” and inventing the word “satisfactual.”

However, what many fail to recognize is the prophetic, Nostradamus-like, subliminal message that Baskett originally fed American marketers at the time of his pioneering music video’s release in 1946 — exactly 60 years before Twitter and her globally-recognized bluebird ever became an actual tool for internet fanatics.

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As an SEO professional, if you’re not harnessing the power of the internet’s favorite “bluebird” — Twitter — you’re doing yourself and your client a disservice.

Says Todd Noall, President and Chief Strategy Officer of Fusion 360, an advertising agency in Utah, “How a brand performs in the digital world is based largely upon it’s ability to be found by potential customers.”

While that might seem like a bit of a “No sh*t, Sherlock” statement, continues Todd with the more difficult portion of the task, “… producing relevant content that customers not only want to interact with, but share with their friends.”

Enter Twitter, stage left. One of the most basic rules of the SEO industry is that quality content will, in time, lead to conversation flow.

According to SearchEngineLand.com, “Posting quality content will also encourage people to follow you. Building high numbers of followers will enhance your authority in Google’s eyes, meaning, any links you post will carry more weight.”

Though popular quick fixes like Twitter competitions and mass follow and unfollow sessions might prove beneficial as a temporary remedy, Twitter as an SEO tool becomes helpful when worthwhile blog posts, widgets, discount vouchers and articles are being shared on a larger scale.

The simpleton of SEO thinks he or she knows the entirety of the industry by one term: “keyword.” It should come as a surprise to no one that using appropriate keywords on a Twitter profile can help with Google ranking, but it’s an error made all too often.

By simply adding important keywords to Twitter bios and tweets, Google — however you view this all-encompassing, amorphous entity — will peg your tweets as relevant to your brand’s cause, thus improving page rank.

Lastly, and here’s the fun part: produce tweets in a way that people will want to retweet them. Depending on the client that you represent, this may mean looking beyond the low-lying fruit of YouTube videos containing hysterical groin kicks. There’s definitely more out there and digging into the deepest of the mind’s creative catacombs will, more than likely, be necessary.

Keep in mind that each tweet only allows for 140 characters. When calling upon the powers of wit, humor, sex, human emotion or anything else that us homo sapiens find attractive, remember that you’ll need to leave enough space for people to retweet your videos, links and comments, all while allowing enough room for them to add a thought or two.

Armed with the help of a certain “Mister bluebird” whispering into your ever-attentive ear the secrets of Twitter mastery, your clients, coworkers and boss will soon be joyfully singing, “Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah, Zip-A-Dee-A! My oh my, what a wonderful day!”

They’ll look a little ridiculous, ya know, cause they’re full-grown adults, but what can you expect with a booming Twitter page and Google rank? Answer: nothing less.

Lucas Miller is a young, up-and-coming Wizard of Public Relations. When not writing, running or studying, he’s working tirelessly to perfect what he claims is the “World’s Greatest Pompadour.”

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Use social media to drive traffic to your business’ website

September 14, 2013

Social media is an ever-increasing facet of everyday business. Companies large (Starbucks) and small (your local car shop) are using social media to expand their exposure and reach a broad base of prospective consumers.

B2B marketers are now spending 30% of their budgets on social media programs, trying to reach, among others, the 21 million+ Twitter users  (per eMarketer). There are big audiences on social media for your company, and using some strategies are more effective than others.

Here are five strategies you can employ to promote your business website through social media.

Engage Directly with Consumers

To generate online conversations, businesses can engage customers and fans with photos, links and more from their blog or website. That conversation can lead to new product insights and customer service issues.

Maintain and Develop Visibility Among Your Consumer Base

Be visible with social media. Post links, pictures and video clips on social networks for your current and prospective customers. Your steady use of social media can help keep your business relevant and known, while gradually expanding exposure.

Target specialty audiences online with a microsite, which refers traffic to your main website. Create SEO marketing materials for direct sales through your primary domain via a website like MyHosting VPS hosting.

Generate Sales Referrals Through Social Media Platforms

Provide links to products or other pages that are likely to prompt consumers to make a purchase. The links you use, and the way you present them through your social media profiles, will have an impact on your business’ performance. Helpful tip: send tweets on your company’s various white papers, articles and case studies to encourage consumer interest in your company.

Data Collection and Analysis to Improve Operations Efficiency

When it comes to data, social media is a gold mine. Data analysis informs you of the size of your social media following, its growth rate and levels of engagement. You can also track total referrals to determine which social networks are most effective in generating new business. Look at these numbers for the percentage of referrals that lead to sales.

Use Feedback to Guide Future Efforts

As you gain insights from comments and data analysis, your internal teams should start to identify areas for improvement. Then you can implement solutions in your day-to-day operations.

By establishing a basic social media marketing approach, you can set yourself on the course to increased revenue and a much greater return on the investment into your website.

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Is it time for a website re-design?

June 18, 2013

WebsiteDesignIn today’s marketplace, a company’s website is their first impression with prospects. It’s a rare purchase today that doesn’t begin with some sort of research or due diligence. And as consumers (both B2C and B2B) find themselves more time starved and more web savvy – the research tool of choice is often a Google search.

Long before they’ll set an appointment for a consultation or walk into your retail establishment – they’re scoping you out on the web. It makes sense then, that when it comes to your web presence you’d want to put your best foot forward, doesn’t it?

And yet, if you spend any time on the web – you run into a lot of stale, outdated websites. We just launched a new website for a client and his comment was “phew, now I can actually give people our web address again.” They’d ignored their website for so long – they literally weren’t giving people the URL to avoid embarrassment.

When asked, companies say that they don’t update their website because:

  • They don’t have the time to devote to it
  • They don’t have the budget
  • They don’t want to add interactive elements because they don’t have time to maintain them
  • The last redesign was such a painful process, they can’t think of going there again

But letting a stale or static website be your first “how do” to potential customers is more costly than you might imagine.

If you’ve got dated copy or information (many websites make it pretty obvious they haven’t been updated in years…their latest newsletter issue is from 2008 or the last bit of news in their newsroom is from three years ago) what you’re saying to visitors is that you aren’t so hot will follow up and attention to detail.

If your design is tough to navigate (you know…you just keep adding a page here or there, but there’s no organizational structure) you are going to frustrate that potential customer before they can figure out if you have what they want to buy.

Cheaping out by letting your cousin, neighbor or other amateur build your website says that you aren’t a successful business. You don’t have to build the Taj Mahal of websites but you do want something that speaks to your professionalism and functions the way you want it to.

Are you wondering if your website is working as hard for you as it should? See how your site matches up with these stats.

Websites with blogs get 55% more traffic (Are you sharing your expertise and taking advantage of the organic SEO value of that effort?)

Companies who blog get 79% more followers on Twitter (How does your stale website encourage me to connect with you on social networks like Facebook, Twitter and other interactive spots?)

The #1 attribute people want is a websites that is easy to navigate so they can quickly find the exact information they want. They don’t want to have to click 4 times or guess which heading the information is hiding behind.

People want contact information so they can call, write or drop by. This floors me but many companies do not include offline contact options to their web visitors.

Keep the distractions at a minimum. People want to be able to scan your page and figure out what’s there and where to go next. If you pack every bit of space with information, you actually get in their way. Remember, your goal is not to tell them everything so they don’t have to call. Your goal is to tell them enough to make them want to call.

Your website is your introduction to many of your potential customers Is it the way you want to be introduced or is it time to consider a re-do?

 

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Social Sharing – what and when works

October 28, 2012

Figuring out what is best for your company’s social sharing accounts can be tough. Not only do you have to figure out what to share, but you also need to know how and when to say it. The folks at Compendium crunched the data of over 300 companies’ social sharing statistics, to identify some social sharing best practices.

One additional thing they did was break this data down as a B2B vs. B2C comparison, as they learned while going through the data that there were some significant differences between what works for B2B companies and B2C companies.

Check out this info graphic that outlines some of the findings. If you’d like to review their social sharing guides that looks at some of these results, click here.

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Facebook fun can also equal profits

September 4, 2012

It seems like every business is rushing to build a Facebook Page.  But once they get it built — they’re not too sure what to do with it.

  1. Many just ignore it, publishing once a week or less
  2. Some use it as a sales channel — pushing out deals and wondering why people are ignoring them
  3. Others share the same links that they share on Twitter

But very few organizations actually have a good time on their page.  They don’t trigger conversations with their fans and they sure don’t turn their page over to their customers. But the folks at PostCardMania.com decided to have some fun with their fans.

Early this year, they were trying to come up with some ways to get more of their customers to like their Facebook page.   Their CMO was out doing some shopping (every great idea is not born in a brainstorming session!) and spotted those wax lips and wax mustaches that they sell in the candy section. She bought some and took them back to the office.

She was able to convince her CEO that it would be fun to send the lips and mustaches out to a list of customers who had not placed an order within a year as part of a Valentine’s Day effort.  In the package was the request that they take a picture of themselves wearing the lips or mustache and post it on the PostCardMania Facebook page wall.  Everyone who posted a photo would also get a free book written by the CEO.

500 packages were sent out. They increased their likes by about 50 people and had 20 or so clients add their photos to the wall. They also connected with their customers in a very personal, memorable way that generated a lot of goodwill.

On top of that — within 4-5 days of receiving the package — that list of customers placed over $120,000 worth of orders.

Here’s the takeaways for us in this little case study:

  • They never mentioned postcard or direct mail in their communication
  • They didn’t put together a long list of rules about what kinds of photos could be posted or who had to be in the photo, etc. They just opened the doors
  • There was no coupon, QR code or any sort of offer in the package

This is a great example of creating a love affair with your customer.  PostCardMania simply reached out with something fun and invited their customers to take part.  There was no hype, spin or sell.  They just were having some fun and voila — they sold $120K worth of stuff.

Delight your audience and watch what happens.  I dare you.

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Is your company ready for social media criticism?

July 18, 2012

A vast majority of CEOs agree that a company’s corporate reputation is more important today than it was five years ago. New technology and social networks are reshaping the landscape of how society convenes and campaigns on critical issues.

So you would expect those CEOs would be mindful of the importance of being ready for an unexpected problem online.  But a recent study shows that 72% of companies that have been subject to social media criticism however strong (ranging from a single complaint to a full-scale campaign) rated their preparedness as average or below, with 20% being completely unprepared, according to a July 2012 report by Ethical Corporation and Useful Social Media. Just 15% of companies reported that they were fully engaged with the problem.

This finding follows from research showing that social media users believe that companies are out of step in their use of the social tools. In fact, according to a Allstate/National Journal report from June, 64% of these users want to see an increase in companies using social media to respond to questions and complaints. 73% believe that companies use it chiefly for advertising.

What should those CEOs being doing to ready their companies?

Bottom line — prepare, adapt, respond and take ownership.  Don’t be like the 72% who talk a good game but aren’t ready to respond in the heat of the moment.

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Twitter and Facebook ROI

July 8, 2012

This has to be one of the biggest questions banging around marketing conferences, blogs and social media gatherings.  “How do we measure the return on my investment (ROI) for the time, money and effort we put into Twitter and Facebook?”

To truly answer that question, you need to define your own ROI. If it is a dollar for dollar equation, then you need to be able to quantify/tie a value to the time spent, calculate the dollars invested and then put the proper tracking/measurement tools in place to link your social media contacts/connections to actual sales.

Are sales the only worthy ROI?  Probably not. Like all marketing — you start by knowing what result you want.

  • Are you trying to create a community that will tell the world about your new book, product or ?
  • Do you want people to sign a pledge or commit to a cause?
  • Do you want email addresses because your sales cycle requires a lot of education and time, so you want to create a drip campaign?
  • Do you want to identify like-minded business people so you can create a safe place to generate thought leadership?

I have nothing against sales.  It’s how we all pay our mortgages.  But I just want to remind you, there are many worthy outcomes of any marketing effort.  And that’s certainly true of Twitter and Facebook. As Stephen Covey taught us, begin with the end in mind.

This infographic from InventHelp (click here to check them out) begins to dig at the question and explore potential answers.  Take a look at it and then tell me — what do you want from your social media efforts?

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Social Media Cheat Sheet 2012

March 24, 2012

As I travel the country, teaching people how to integrate social media into their marketing efforts — I often get asked — if I only have time to invest in one social media tool or site — which one is best?

Naturally, my answer is the definitive — it depends.  Accurate but not all that helpful.

Like any marketing tactic — the effectiveness of it is based on what you’re trying to accomplish.  Social is no different.  Which is why tools like the social media cheat sheet that you see to the right are so helpful.  (Originally created by CMO.com back in 2010).

The criteria that they used to “grade” each tool were:

  • Customer communication
  • Brand Exposure
  • Traffic to your site
  • SEO

The cheat sheet has been updated.  I think you’ll find it very valuable as you access where you should spend your resources (time, money, attention) in the coming year.

You can download a full sized PDF by clicking here.

The tools they evaluate include the standards like Facebook and Twitter but the sheet includes 14 different sites including the likes of Pinterest (of course) and Reddit, Digg and Slideshare too.

You can also view the cheat sheet on the CMO site here.

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Social media strategy workbook

March 8, 2012

On Monday, we kicked around the notion that while access to social media tools like Facebook and Twitter may be free — that doesn’t mean they’re cheap.  Especially, if you do it wrong.

I promised you a chance to download the social media strategy workbook that we’ve created at MMG as a guide to thinking through the why, who, how and whats of your social media strategy.

I’m a man of my word….so just fill out the little form below and we’ll get you your own copy (you have to confirm you want the workbook by clicking on the link you’ll be emailed).

After you’ve had a chance to look it over or better yet, begin to apply it to your organization — we’d love to hear from you on how it’s going.

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Free isn’t necessarily cheap

March 5, 2012

I was having a brief conversation with @NealShaffer on Twitter yesterday and the gist of our conversation was:

  • Half of small & medium businesses are using social media for marketing (Neal)
  • Yes…but few are doing it well.  They don’t apply marketing smarts (Drew)
  • True, but huge potential to maximize social business (Neal)
  • No doubt.  But when done wrong, potential for damage is equally large (Drew)
  • I agree completely (Neal)

See — that’s the problem with free.  Business owners (or many so called social media experts) look at the price of entry for having a presence on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest or (fill in the blank for whatever’s hot in SM) and they think….”you can’t beat free!  Even if I suck at it, it didn’t cost me anything.”

Wrong. So wrong.

Would you buy a TV commercial that had misspellings?  Or instruct the announcer to swear or say something off color?  Or better yet…would you buy radio time and then not put anything there…so you basically bought :60 of silence?

Would you promise that your newsletter would be packed with useful information and then blather on about yourself, your sales and your products when you get around to sending it?

I’m sure you’re saying (or at least in my head) “No, Drew of course not.”  So why in the world do you (universal you, not you you) do it on your social media sites?

We see unprofessional behavior on FB pages all the time.  And abandoned blogs, Twitter accounts etc.  And the biggest sin of all — being boring because you can’t stop talking about yourself.

Here’s the thing.  People have gotten a little numb to selfish, self-centered marketing in the traditional marketing space.  It’s not right, but it’s been going on for so long — we accept it as the norm.

But social media is different.  Social media promises real people.  It promises relevance.  It promises a relationship.  It promises timely interaction.

And if you violate any or all of those promises, here’s what happens:

  • The good feelings I had for your brand/company are gone
  • I feel like you lied to me/tricked me
  • I will simply choose to disconnect from you
  • I won’t be interacting with you anymore…which means my feelings for you have no chance at turning more favorable

Keeping those promises takes a lot of time.  And keeping your eye on the big picture. It’s easy to get sucked back into old habits and begin marketing instead of connecting.  If you really want your social media efforts to work, you have to make a big investment.  No, it may not be money (unless you hire some help) but it’s a time crunch.

Maybe this analogy will help.  When you do social media badly — you are basically enticing someone to come close to you with the promise of a gooey, fresh from the oven chocolate chip cookie and when they walk in and reach out their hand for the cookie — you smack them with a ruler, over and over until they leave.

The cost is huge.  The damage is real.  And too many businesses are stumbling over themselves as they rush to a “free” marketing opportunity.

So what does a small business do, Drew? you ask. (again, perhaps it all takes place in my head).  You put together a social media strategy that is built on SMART goals and best customer personas.

How do you do that?  Come back on Thursday and download the absolutely free 18 page e-book that walks you through how to build that strategy, step by step.

It’s a tool we use at MMG with clients every day.  And we’re glad to share it with you.  Really.

And….there’s not a sales pitch or MMG promo in sight.  I promise.  Would I offer you a cookie and then smack you with a ruler?

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