Monday, June 29, 2009
Using Facebook as a business can be an interesting exercise in anger management. Facebook is a powerful tool, especially for individuals, but it can drive an intern batty as she tries to set up new pages or migrate Groups to Pages. (Yes, Crissy, the Boxcar Marketing intern, has spent a lot of time with our friend Facebook.) Let me share our experience.
Earlier this year Facebook changed the way that businesses can network in this social space. They upgraded the Pages functionality to better house business profiles. Pages are not identical to Personal Profiles, but they do give a business more leverage than a Group.
With a Page, people interested in following your organization can become fans of your Page. On your Page, you can host photos, videos, RSS feeds, and custom applications.
Creating a Page
A Page needs to be administered by a person so start by creating a Personal Profile (for a real person because fake accounts are removed by Facebook). The Personal Profile should be of someone in your company who is going to stick around for awhile. Then follow the links to create a Page. You can change and add administrators to your Page after it is set up.
You will be asked to select what type of Page. Choose wisely because you can not change it afterward. By choosing the type of Page, you are choosing a default set of fields to complete. For example, choosing Band gives you opportunities to bring in a playlist. Choosing Public Figure - Government Official asks for your date in office.
Adding Stuff to Your Page
A Page can have all sorts of tabs, including Wall, Info, Photos, Discussions, Events, YouTube, Notes, Boxes.
Wall is where your status feed aggregates. Info is what you want to tell the world about your organization. Photos are, well, photos. Discussions are discussion forums where you can start a topic and have fans discuss it. Events is an aggregated listing of events you are hosting. YouTube is your YouTube channel. You enter your YouTube details and your videos are automatically pulled into Facebook, which is nice because it eliminates the redundancies of uploading videos to two places. Notes is for mini-blog posts or links to things you like. And Boxes is a crazy place where all sorts of things can be pulled into one spot, like videos, RSS feeds, photos, etc.
Editing Stuff on Your Page
Here is another opportunity to lose your mind. To edit most applications (Discussions, YouTube, Notes), you go to the Wall of your Personal Profile and click the “Edit Page” link on the top left. From here, click on the pencil icon in the top right corner of the application box to edit and change its settings.
You can move application boxes to your Wall or to your Boxes tab by clicking on the pencil icon next to the Application name. Applications can be either on your Wall or in your Boxes tab, but cannot be in both places at once.
To move applications around in the Boxes tab, just drag them. That is the easiest part of this whole admin experience.
Claim Your Facebook Username
Visit http://www.facebook.com/username to claim a shortcut name to your Page. Your Facebook Page must meet two requirements: it must have been live on Facebook prior to the May 31, 2009 cut-off date and have had a minimum 1,000 fans at that time.
This limitation was temporary. All Pages created after May 31, 2009 that have more than 100 fans can now claim a username.
http://www.facebook.com/help.php?page=900
Help Us Get 100 Fans so we can learn how to do more things on Facebook.
Please Become a Fan of Boxcar Marketing.
Monday, June 15, 2009
HubSpot recently held a webinar on how to use video for your online marketing campaigns. Here are some of their tips.
Content
There’s a content tradeoff. You can either make an informative video with lots of information for the viewer or an entertaining video that catches viewers’ attention and has the potential to go viral.
Short is sweet. Focus on the first ten seconds of your video and try to do something shocking or entertaining to rope people in.
Use an outline, not a full script. You’ll be much more engaging.
Test your video on friends and coworkers and edit it according to their responses. If they don’t find your joke funny, chances are your online audience won’t either.
Optimization
Publish and promote everywhere. You want your video found!
If you upload your video to either Visible Measures or Tubemogul , they’ll upload it to all of the different video sharing sites for you and provide you with analytics, too.
You need to decide if are you going to optimize your video for SEO (by using straight-forward keywords) or for viral (by using enticing keywords). Tip: start with a viral title to make the video popular and then change it to a more keyword-rich title to make use of its long tail potential.
Post your video on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon, and your blog. Encourage co-workers and friends to post it on their blogs too.
SEO
YouTube
* Use keywords in your title and description. Include a link to your website in the first couple of lines of the description so that viewers see it when the description is collapsed.
* Tags are important. Although they’re not visible on the public video page, they govern what videos your video shows up.
* Encourage people to rate and comment on your video. Controversial content is one way to spark discussion.
iTunes
* Make sure that the title, artist and description are keyword-rich.
* Use an appealing image to stand out on the search page.
* Ask viewers to review your video to increase its popularity.
Analyze
Analytics are crucial! Why make a video if you don’t measure and track its success?
Use YouTube Insights or Blip.tv Stats to see who’s watching your video and what they’re finding engaging about it. You can also use Visible Measures or Tubemogul, to see your analytics across multiple video sites.
For more information watch the full webinar and download the slides.
Looking for related information? Check out Steven Witten’s article Six Degrees of YouTube, a case study of online competitive video dynamics, which looks at how YouTube’s ‘related videos’ list gets built and the effect this list has on a video’s popularity.
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Boxcar Marketing has been out and about on the speaking circuit lately and the following myths keep presenting themselves. Let’s dispel them, shall we?
Myth #1: Social media is a marketing strategy.
Social media is not a marketing function; it’s an overall high-level business strategy that supports your organization’s goals.
Myth #2: It’s all about the online tools.
Social media is not about sending out electronic press releases or setting up a Facebook page. It’s about how we can use the tools to engage with our community. For example, how can we use electronic press releases to capture the attention of a new audience or how we can use Facebook to encourage social interactions that build loyalty and connections to the company and between community members.
Myth #3: Building online communities requires tight control and management.
Nope. You always have people out there talking about you; it’s called word of mouth. In traditional approaches, we make sure that people have a positive experience with us at all levels, from the person who answers the phone to the customer service to the follow-up afterwards.
The same is true with social media strategies. Relinquishing control does not mean abdicating responsibility; it means that you control the things within your control. You set the stage and the conditions that allow for your organization and community members to thrive. That way, people have good things
to say.
Myth #4: Social media is time consuming.
The key here is practice. The first time you do something it takes time. The first press release you ever wrote, the first job description for a new hire, the first report, whatever it was, you were doing something new and you needed to be slow and methodical in your approach. But as you gained experience, things got faster and easier. The same is true with the web. It’s just practice.
Myth #5: Your audience isn’t online.
The average Canadian spends close to 43 hours per month online. And it isn’t just young people who are spending time online. The latest Interactive Advertising Bureau of Canada report (PDF) showed that in May 2007: 29% of age 50+ web users visited a social media site in the last month versus just 8% in September 2006; 72% of 20-29 year olds had visited a social networking website, up from 44% in September 2006.
For more information
Read the Harvard Business Review article Getting Brand Communities Right by Susan Fournier and Lara Lee. The site also includes a great quiz to help you determine if your business is social media ready.
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
In tough times, it is even tougher to secure your marketing budget because most companies see marketing as an expense rather than an investment.
It is easy for managers to slash marketing budgets when they do not understand how marketing affects the health of their organizations. Your job is to build an understanding of what value marketing brings to the organization and how marketing affects the health of the organization.
How do you do this? You need to understand what type of manager you have.
Types of Managers
1. The German Shepherd.
Intent on business, these managers are direct. They defend their territory and state opinion as fact. They are responsible for the pack but can be impatient, demanding and blunt.
Approach: Be brief, be brilliant, be gone. This type of manager likes to win. You have to present alternatives so that he or she can make the choice. That said, you can guide them by presenting the alternatives clearly and the potential value or gain for each. Visuals and graphs work well for presenting the numbers. Show vs. tell, then get out of the way.
2. The Jack Russell Terrier.
Ready for adventure, these managers are friendly, excitable and animated. Entertainment is the key. They do not focus on details. They are more interested in the friendly chatter than getting down to business.
Approach: Schedule time for chatting and let this manager speak. High energy and being upbeat, even when presenting challenges, is key. This type of manager also likes to be the center of attention so show how your marketing ideas will help achieve popularity and recognition.
3. The Basset Hound.
Mild mannered, these managers like safety and status quo. They appear calm and do not get easily excited. New ideas make these managers uncomfortable. They like to blend into the group rather than stand out.
Approach: Ask specific questions to establish this manager’s true needs, then provide support. For those who prefer to endure, stubbornly sticking to the path of least resistance is the natural choice. You must figure out how to change the path and gently coax along other followers. Make sure you listen carefully and ask specific questions.
4. Border Collie.
Sharp as tacks, these managers focus on the details. They ask questions, study the implications and analyze information to the point of perfection. They can be standoffish.
Approach: Provide the facts and plenty of background detail. Avoid personal issues and feeling intimidated. Be calm and measured in your response to questions. These types of managers need all the information before being able to make a decision.
Tuesday, February 03, 2009
According to MarketingCharts.com, Agency Clients Slash Budgets 20% or More, Digital Only Bright Spot.
Digital is always the bright spot!
It is not just agencies that are slashing budgets. Companies large and small are looking for ways to scale back costs and increase efficiencies.
Here are the highlights from the MarketingCharts survey:
- More than two-thirds (70 percent) of global ad agency CEOs say that their clients are cutting back their 2009 budgets, and more than 83 percent
of that group say those cuts are at least by 20 percent, according to the latest Agency CEO Survey by Worldwide Partners Inc (WPI).
- Digital marketing is one of the few bright spots in the survey, WPI said, with half the CEOs citing it as a growth area in 2009.
Among North American CEOs, 62 percent said that they think digital will grow this year, while 39 percent of non-North American CEOs said the same.
Where should you spend your digital time and dollars? Start with the 5 areas below.
5 Online Tips for Weathering the Economic Crisis
- Get Back to the Basics: Write good website copy that resonates with your customers’ needs and desires.
- Understand Search Marketing: Can your customers find you online? People google, and they do not always know your brand or product name. Ensure your site is optimized to appear in results for the words your customers use to describe your product or service offerings.
- Reach Out to Your Fans: Your current customers are your biggest fans. Give them ways to spread the good word about what you are doing. Embed code, email newsletters, RSS feeds: each of these are ways that people can subscribe to your content, stay in touch, and forward on anything that is of value to their friends and family.
- Use the Whole Buffalo: Repurpose your content as many ways as you can. If you create a great whitepaper, use portions in your newsletter or as blog posts. If you write a datasheet for your sales force, re-work it as an end-consumer 1-pager. There are lots of clever ways to build on the materials you have already created.
- Ask for the Sale: Make sure that calls to action are clear on every page of your website. A website is not a sales brochure, it is your Number 1 Sales and Marketing Person. Make the site work hard to generate leads and conversions. Each page should have a purpose and move visitors to accomplishing a measurable goal, even if that goal is sticking around to read the next page.
Sunday, January 04, 2009
Miss604 posted a perfect summary of some really cool twitter tools. Here are my favourites from her list:
Generate a tweet cloud
http://tweetclouds.com/
Create polls
http://strawpollnow.com/
See what’s happening right now based on a search term
http://search.twitter.com/
Compare trends and topics
http://twist.flaptor.com/?tz=-8
Stop Perfuming the Pig: Why “real” marketing is done before the product is created
“No amount of perfume can overcome the stench of a technology product that people don’t need,“ by Steve Johnson.
Peter Drucker makes it clear that marketing isn’t a product promotion strategy; it’s a product definition strategy, that “marketing” is creating a product that sells itself, creating a product that people want to buy; creating an environment that encourages people to buy.
Over the years however, industries and agencies and marketing experts have worn away the original meaning of marketing and cheapened it. Marketing now means many things to many people but apparently not what Drucker meant. For most people nowadays, marketing means t-shirts, coffee mugs, trinkets, trade show trash, and tchotchkes.
Do you promote or do you market?
Johnson’s great article illuminates the problem with marketing is that we don’t focus on the problem. Instead we focus on promotion. And promotion is not marketing.
The first and most important consideration for any business is the market problem. It’s the problem that drives the product decisions, the message for positioning, and the key elements of selling—the placement strategy. Having identified the problem, the other Ps of the marketing mix become obvious.
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