For the travel industry, at least, social media is seen as more valuable than pay-per-click advertising. The World Travel Market 2011 report says that travel professionals see social media as one of the key revenue-generating channels over the next five years. As proof of this, the study found that eight out of ten travel-related businesses use some form of social media. Not only that: the World Travel Market 2011 also expects that in five years, half of all travel-related companies would be generating income and bookings on social media, rising from the current 22%. Out of those using social media marketing, around 50% do not even invest in PPC advertising, while 1 out of 5 of those who do use PPC aim to stop or reduce their spending in the next few years. It is very apparent that the travel industry loves social media. So if you are in the travel business, it is time to amp up your social media activities. Blogs – Read the full article
There are ways to monitor changes and updates to your favorite websites, blogs, social networks, classifieds, and local business listings (including Google Places pages) – without having to watch the Web 24/7 or pressing the Refresh button every minute. And while RSS is today’s most popular way of syndicating content automatically, not all websites have it. (And not all users prefer it.) That’s where this list comes in: to be able keep up with what’s happening (in real-time) on any place across the entire Web; to monitor what customers and competitors alike are doing and saying; and to listen and respond to reviews and feedback as they are generated. Here are some of today’s best tools for monitoring changes to any website. Page2RSS Page2RSS is a free service that lets you create feeds for web pages you wish to follow or monitor – pages, specifically, that are static or don’t offer any RSS/Atom feeds. Page2RSS also serves as a way – Read the full article
Businesses have come to accept the fact that social media plays a big role in the Internet marketing campaign of a company. Promoting through the various social networking sites is usually free, and it provides a good platform for communicating with and building positive relationships with a business’s existing clients and prospective customers. This is the reason why most, if not all, companies have accounts on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Digg, LinkedIn, etc. – and they use these extensively to promote their business. But let us admit it. Managing these different social networking accounts can be time-consuming and can be a real headache. For any business, every minute is important: one should therefore find an effective way of properly managing all social media marketing efforts. Here are a few tips: As you begin to create accounts in these different social networking sites, it will be beneficial to create a file with all your information on your various social networking accounts: usernames, – Read the full article
As the digital marketing and tech world become more important to businesses, trends and tools are constantly being developed in an effort to make life easier for both employees and customers alike. Overall, analytics is swinging towards improvement for the user experience, bringing tools that aim to make management and analysis easier for organizations. The user experience trend has grown by leaps and bounds recently as businesses aim to give their customers a better experience. With the increase in the presence of social media, businesses have also been able to make the gap between buyer and seller. Because so many companies are just now starting to value social media as a major marketing tool, they are also experiencing other types of analytics and marketing tools for the first time. The presence of social media in companies’ marketing plans has pushed the value of a good connection between users and the company. The analytics of social media have really started to – Read the full article
Congratulations, blogosphere. It seems that we have reached the point where 90% of the blogs out there have put either an E-mail address or a contact form onto the site. Gone, finally, are the days where readers or media would spend hours scouring the site to find out how to contact the writer or blog editor. A contact form isn’t enough, though. You need to offer readers a bigger glimpse into who you are and give them a few different ways to contact you. Bloggers are starting to realize this and you’re seeing more and more buttons and links to profiles on Twitter, LinkedIn, About.Me, Facebook, and other sites. No, you don’t have to stick a link in your “about” page to your old photo album from Greek Week, but letting others know where to find you elsewhere online is a great way to promote your blog and personal brand. The communication barrier is a lot less significant in the – Read the full article
Starting an online marketing campaign can be a difficult and confusing proposition for many small companies. Which sites should you have a presence on? Is a “group” better than a “page”? Should you take support requests via social networking sites, or keep them all funneled through your website? These questions could be answered easily if you were to enlist the help of an online marketing company or social media agency. It’s easy to make the mistake of assuming that all an online marketing company does is throw up a few pages and produce flow charts with pretty buzz-words on them. In truth, an Internet marketing company or social media agency does a lot more than that, and can help you to make sure that your promotion efforts are not wasted. What will an online marketing company do that I can’t do myself? While it’s true that setting up accounts and making a few friends on social networking sites is easy – Read the full article
Creating a social media presence for your car dealer website can bolster the credibility of your business in numerous ways. Given the increasing popularity of social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook, there is every likelihood that all your existing and prospective customers are on these sites. Social media would enable you to portray your dealership to your customers and prospects in the best light possible and create an intimate system of engagement that would enhance interactivity and establish your dealership as a formidable player in the automotive industry. Here are some ways through which social media can enhance the credibility of your car dealer website. Establishes your brand – Registering your dealership for a social media profile would ensure that your brand has arrived on the social scene. This would give your car dealer website a phenomenal online presence and make your brand appear authentic and trustworthy to your fans. Professionalism – The popular adage “pictures speak a thousand words” holds – Read the full article
It’s great to drive traffic – online and offline – from all corners of the world. But if you’re a smart marketer, you’ll realize you don’t have to be so international – at least not when it comes to search engine optimization (SEO). Thanks to local search, businesses don’t have to squander resources on attracting customers and visitors that are beyond their geographic reach anyway. One can instead focus on catering to the heart of the locals. Want to find out how? Here’s a list of 17 great local SEO and local search tips, tricks, and tools to help you get started. Claim. Claim your local listing on Google Places. While you’re at it, go to Bing Local and Yahoo Local and claim your listings there, too. Apply best practices. Read our guide on Google Places to put yourself closer to the center of the map. Submit your info to the online yellow pages. Sign up in online directories and – Read the full article
