There’s a new social media darling in town. And – like Facebook and Twitter – it’s bringing in tons of buzz and millions of new users. (Around 11.7 million users so far, in fact.) Pinterest is what it’s called, and, as the name implies, it’s a pinboard-style social photo sharing website, which, since its launch in March 2010, has taken the Web by storm. We wouldn’t be surprised if you decided to integrate Pinterest as part of your search engine optimization and social media marketing efforts. After all, where the people go to is where the business is. We do hope you do it right, though! That’s why we came up with a list of best practices and fantastic tips for using Pinterest to improve your SEO performance. Enjoy! Using Pinterest for SEO Post fresh, repin-worthy stuff. It doesn’t matter if it’s on Pinterest, Facebook, or Twitter: people will only share your stuff if they think it’s cool and fresh – Read the full article
If you’re an aspiring entrepreneur or someone hoping to break into the world of business, you’re going to have a lot of questions. You can go to school for four years and pick the brains of your professors and spend all night doing homework in the library, but you’re still going to have questions. This is true with any profession, and most will tell you that finding the answers to these questions aren’t always easy. It’s intimidating to ask your boss a question that you may think should be obvious, and Google doesn’t always do the trick. Fortunately, Quora is beginning to take the world of questions by storm. For those who are unfamiliar with it, Quora is a new social networking site that centers around asking and answering questions. These questions go from very specific to simple wonders. And it’s not like your typical Internet-based source of answers: • Google: This works well when you want to know the – Read the full article
Ever heard of Kickstarter? If not, well – you ought to try it out some time. Especially if you’re planning on raising funds for a cause, a project, a product, a service, or a business. Kickstarter, after all, is currently the world’s largest online crowdfunding platform. It has successfully raised funds for endeavors that include indie films, music albums, books, food-related projects, and even solar energy technology. Kickstarter was launched in 2008 and it facilitates crowdfunding based on a “provision point mechanism”. This means that a Kickstarter project owner (“creator”) either gets the funding he has set to raise – or he gets nothing at all. If he meets the target on or before the deadline, he’ll get paid. And those who pledged money will receive prizes, freebies, and goodies from the creator (whatever he offered to entice people to contribute or pledge). If the creator doesn’t meet the target – well, no money changes hands. That’s right: if the – Read the full article
With the boom of the Internet, almost everybody, from businesses to individuals, to the celebrity and even just the ordinary people have established a presence in the World Wide Web by creating their own website. Creating a website is very easy especially now that there are a lot of free and user-friendly content management platforms (like WordPress) where anybody can start a website. But because there are millions of websites that abound, competing to be known in the Internet world by ranking at the top of popular search engine results is difficult and can be a very big challenge for any website owner. This is where Search Engine Optimization or SEO comes into the picture. Website owners can implement SEO strategies to improve their site performance and position themselves to be found online. With WordPress, you can take advantage of the platform’s plugin architecture to enhance your ability to implement your SEO strategies. And there are loads of SEO plug-ins that have been – Read the full article
Ages ago (pre-Internet critical mass, sometime in the 1990s), if a customer had a complaint about a company or service, they called the company and complained. If they were lucky, they were apologized to and given a coupon to save the next time they bought. If they didn’t get the answer they wanted, maybe the customer would call the BBB. Today, if a customer complains, the first place they normally turn is the Internet. Facebook, Twitter, Google+, blog posts and comments make it easy for a customer to vent their frustrations and share their experiences with the world. With the explosive growth of user generated content (UGC), companies must use a variety of tools to monitor their brand and keep their online reputation clean. For this example, let’s look at the online backup service, SugarSync. Find New Content Google Alerts is the easiest way to start monitoring online content for a brand name or other term. Simply enter the search query – Read the full article
We stand in a society incessantly connected to each other through virtual networks. One may wonder why virtual (Web-based) platforms are popular and the reason solely lies in the fact that they offer a variety of applications that help people share and connect with one another, which has always been the core needs of society. With greater technology, speed and living standards, the social networking sites help cater to newer demands and go beyond physical get-togethers. It is this platform that unites people and hence, has immense potential for online marketing and advertising. A brand is a brand because of the support – and recognition – it gets from people. Social Media Interaction and Competition One of the latest methods adopted by marketers is to engage audiences in contests and interactive competitions, giving away their commodities for free. Or, alternatively, these contests may engage people by giving away various other articles, trial offers, commodities, etc. These are becoming increasingly popular – Read the full article
I will be the first to admit that working in a social media department sometimes feels like a workout. You’re responsible for liking and tweeting and connecting and sharing and friending and +ing and stumbling and running and running and running. Did I say running? By the time the day is over, it feels like you were moving a mile a minute and you need a break. Whether you work in a social media department or are simply a company trying to keep up with the social media, enough is enough. What is Pinterest? However, even I will make an exception for the latest social network, Pinterest. Once you get over the groaning, you will find that this new social network is actually quite interesting. Basically, the site is a virtual board where you can “pin” visuals that interest you. Be it an infographic, video, picture, or just a color scheme you like, you can pin it onto your board for – Read the full article
All website owners aim to land on the first few pages of search engine results, and that’s why various search engine optimization strategies are being implemented. After all, SEO is designed to enhance the search rank position of a business or a brand. Last year, however, website owners and SEO professionals received some serious beating no thanks to the Google Panda update. The search engine giant began changing the algorithms that determined a site’s page rank and search performance. The aim was to promote websites with original high-quality content; it also reduced the effectiveness of content farming, thus giving low preference to websites with low-quality content. A number of legitimate, well-meaning sites, however, were also adversely affected by this update. These changes made by Google have made it difficult for website owners to determine which SEO strategy to adopt – or drop – to make their SEO strategies and campaigns successful. But adjust we must, and move forward to align – Read the full article
