4 Ways Marketers Can Use Facebook Hashtags

Have you started using Facebook hashtags for your business?

Are you wondering how to best use a Facebook hashtag?

In this article, I’ll reveal four important benefits of using hashtags on Facebook.

I’ll also explore important considerations when putting together your hashtag strategy.

Why Facebook Hashtags?

As you’ve undoubtedly seen, hashtags are now clickable and useable on Facebook.

Using a hashtag # (or pound symbol) in front of a word or phrase turns the word into a clickable link.

When you click on the link, you’ll see a feed of public posts (or posts that are visible to you due to a friend relationship on Facebook) that include that hashtag.

Here’s how you can use Facebook hashtags:

#1: Expand Your Reach

As hashtags gain momentum on Facebook (they’ve been in use on other platforms such as Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest and Google+), they’ll help you expand your reach to people who are looking at posts in your topic.

Hashtags have been a great way to help people interested in niche topics find each other and find the conversation.

The #WalkingDead hashtag connects people interested in this show.

By including a hashtag in your post, you can possibly get in front of people who may not have seen your post otherwise.  But you’ll have to monitor this in your Facebook Insights.  Make sure you watch your Reach and Engagement Numbers to see if your hashtags are making a difference in your posts.


Click the Reach column in your Facebook insights to see which posts are getting the highest reach.

#2: Amplify Your Brand

Branding your Facebook Page with your own special hashtag can help an idea or new product catch on.  By branding all your posts about a new product, you can break this information out into a separate stream of information and give people an easy way to share information about that product or idea.

Think carefully about what types of things others would also be interested in sharing.  If the posts are too promotional and not valuable, you may have a hard time getting people to share them with their friends.


Home Depot uses #HDHacks to share fun ideas with their audience.

#3: Cross Social Platforms

If you’ve already been using hashtags in your Twitter, Google+, Instagram, LinkedIn or Pinterest posts, it’s now more natural to use hashtags in Facebook.  You can save some time by being able to post the same content across several platforms.

While I don’t recommend doing this for every post in Facebook (some people are annoyed by the hashtags entering into the Facebook realm) it does work to your benefit to occasionally cross platforms with a single post.  Plus many people have already been doing this with their own posts from Twitter and now the hashtags are more searchable in Facebook.


The Starbucks #treatreceipt hashtag has been in use on Twitter in the past and is now searchable on Facebook too.

#4: Promote Specials and Events

You can use a special hashtag in your posts to promote something special.  For example, this can work really well for a #contest.


Use a specially branded hashtag to help promote a contest across several platforms.

Realize that you can’t have people enter your contest on Facebook by including your branded hashtag like you can on Pinterest, Instagram or Twitter.  Because of Facebook contest promotional rules, you can help people find the content across platforms by including the hashtag in your Facebook posts.

If you know some popular hashtags that fit your marketing goals—such as offering a special coupon or deal—then you can include them in your post as well.  I don’t recommend stuffing your posts with tons of hashtags that aren’t relevant because that doesn’t look good and may turn off some of your fans, but a few relevant hashtags are OK.

You can also attach a hashtag at the end of your post that's relevant to people looking for special deals such as #backtoschooldeals.

Important Considerations When Using Facebook Hashtags

1.  Privacy settings are still in effect.

If you’re using hashtags on posts on your personal profile, they’ll still have the privacy settings set up according to how you control your privacy on your profile.  Just because you use a hashtag doesn’t make that post suddenly public.  If you add a hashtag to a post that you only share with a certain group of your friends, only that group will be able to see that post.


Your privacy settings are still in effect even when you add a hashtag to your post.

2.  Hashtags have to be all one word.

If you wanted to use #Facebook Marketing as your hashtag, it will need to be posted as #FacebookMarketing or #facebookmarketing (see the next tip).

3.  Capitalization doesn’t matter.

You can choose whatever capitalization you want in the words themselves and the hashtags will show the same results.  #FacebookMarketing and #facebookmarketing show the same search results.

4.  You can make up whatever hashtags you want.

There’s no “hashtag registration” or “database of approved hashtags”, you can make up whatever hashtags you want to use.  Consider your goals.  If you want to brand your own hashtags, you can, but make them short and easy to use and understand.

A hashtag that’s overly complex or hard to read won’t get much traction.  If you’re abbreviating, make sure it’s clear what point you’re going for – a hashtag like #IKPMTTTRWD won’t mean much to many people.

5.  Research your hashtag before you use it.

There have been some recent embarrassing cases of brands using a hashtag that’s already in use for an entirely different purpose that doesn’t align with their company message at all.  Take a look at the social sites where hashtags are in use such as Pinterest, Twitter, Instagram and Google+ and see if your hashtag is already being used by people.

6.  You can easily look for hashtags on Facebook by URL.

Easily search for hashtags or bookmark their results by using the URL:  www.facebook.com/hashtag/ then just include your keyword on the end.

For example https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/FacebookMarketing shows you the results of posts that include #facebookmarketing or #FacebookMarketing (or any alternate capitalizations).

Conclusion

I strongly recommend you test out hashtags as part of your Facebook marketing strategy and measure your results.  Use them sparingly (not in every single post) and don’t over-stuff hashtags into your posts.

While some people may not be as excited about hashtags on Facebook, they’re firmly entrenched in other social sites and aren’t going away anytime soon.

How about you?  Have you been using hashtags in your posts?  Are you going to give them a try?  Share your thoughts with us in the comments section below!




author: Andrea Vahl
http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/facebook-hashtag-marketing/

How to Find Great Content to Share on Twitter

What content are you sharing on Twitter?

Do you struggle to find interesting, relevant things to tweet about every day?

In this post, I’ll show you how to curate content your followers will love so you can build a loyal community on Twitter.

Why Curate?

Today most marketers understand the need to create informative and relevant content. But it’s equally important to curate informative and relevant content.

In addition to creating great content for your site, the links to the other people’s content that you share on Twitter also matter.

When you share good content on Twitter, the kind your audience loves, it’s easier to build a strong community. And sharing great content will also increase your credibility in your industry.

retweet
When you create and curate relevant content, people are more likely to retweet and share your stuff. Image: iStockPhoto

#1: Know Your Audience

So what content should you share on Twitter? Before you can determine what is the best content to share in your social updates, you need to dig deep and go inside your followers’ heads.

You’ll want to know your social media audience. What keeps your ideal follower up at night? What are his favorite blogs? What’s the first thing that pops into his head when he thinks of you?

If you’ve ever created a buyer persona for a marketing campaign, this is the same exercise.

You want to find the intersection of what interests you and what interests your audience.

You can also ask your followers to find out what they want. You may find general open-ended questions—such as “What would you like me to tweet about?”—too broad to give you the information you need.

Instead, ask your followers a multiple-choice question such as, “Would you like me to tweet about a) social media marketing, b) mobile, c) productivity hacks, d) all of the above?”

You can use their answers as a starting point to plan the content you share and identify what your followers want from you.

Once you identify the content your audience is interested in, commit to this topic. Don’t dilute it.

For example, Social Media Examiner focuses on social media. So you’ll find articles about generating email leads using social media. But you won’t find content devoted to increasing email open rates or the perfect auto-responder series or other topics with no connection to social media.

Find out what topics interest your audience most and share content related to these topics on your social profiles.

#2: Tools to Help You Curate Content

Once you know your audience well, you’ll want to set up a good aggregation tool to find content worth tweeting about.

Here some of the popular news aggregators in the market today. Use the ones you like for your business to find the content you need to provide a valuable stream of daily tweets for your followers.

Feedly – Your News Delivered

Feedly is a tool to help you curate content. Feedly makes it easy for you to look for the articles most relevant for you to share.

One of the best aspects of Feedly is the variety of viewing interfaces available. You can format it to show articles in an email-type layout with headlines or arrange them as image cards or also choose a more traditional magazine layout.

Feedly is a great alternative to Google Reader and offers a variety of layouts to make RSS more enjoyable.

Regardless of the layout you choose, Feedly shows you new content from the blogs and news sources you subscribe to. And it offers a consistent presentation across devices, so you can tweet from your laptop, your tablet or your smartphone.

One of my favorite features is Feedly’s integration with multiple online tools such as Google+, Evernote, Buffer, Instapaper and more. This makes your content curation easier.

You can share and save your favorite articles to multiple social networks and web tools.

Fever – Find Out What’s Hot

Do you want to know how hot the story is that you shared? Fever is a content feed reader that ranks the stories in your feed with a temperature gauge. This allows you to measure how many links and shares a story has within your network.

Fever is a paid service that reads your feeds and picks out the most frequently talked about articles from a customizable time period.

This is a visual way to see how the content you share on Twitter resonates with your audience. It’s an easy way to be sure the content you share matters to your followers.

It is important to note that Fever comes with a one-time price of $30 and you need to host the files on your own server.

The setup is a bit technical, so you may want to ask your IT department to help you get started.

Prismatic – Discover New Content to Share

While RSS readers are great for keeping up with your favorite blogs, Prismatic helps you find new and interesting blogs.

Prismatic delivers socially curated content based on your interests to help you discover new blogs and content sources.

If you like to keep your content curation fresh and interesting, Prismatic does a great job of introducing new blogs and content sources you may never have come across otherwise .

Here’s how to get the most out of Prismatic.

Step 1: Sign up

Sign up for Prismatic using your Facebook, Google+ or Twitter login, or create a stand-alone account on Prismatic.

Sign up at GetPrismatic.com.

Step 2: Choose Your Interests

After you sign up, you can pick the different topics that you and your audience relate to. As you use the service, Prismatic will suggest new topics based on what you share and click.

Find new content by choosing topics your community is interested in.

Step 3: Pick Your Favorite Publishers

You can also use Prismatic as an RSS reader. Under the Favorite Authors section, add your favorite blogs and publishers to Prismatic.

Add your favorite blogs so you won’t miss a thing.

Step 4: Share Your Curated Content

After you’re all set up, share the articles your audience is interested in reading.

It’s easy to share the content you like from Prismatic.

When you share content, remember to include the author’s Twitter handle, so you can introduce your followers to new and interesting people.

And be sure to include relevant hashtags, but don’t overdo it. Buddy Media reports that tweets with one or two hashtags receive higher engagement than those with three or more hashtags.

Prismatic has good sharing features and can help you share great content with your audience.

#3: Analyze and Repeat

One of the most important steps to curating amazing content is to measure the results.

Are there certain articles that get more clicks, retweets and favorites than others? Is a certain topic or interest driving more engagement with your followers?

You can use Buffer to analyze shares, but management tools like HootSuite, SproutSocial and TweetDeck can all provide good analytics on your tweets.

These tools help you analyze metrics such as the number of clicks, retweets, favorites and potential reach each individual tweet receives.

Track who retweets your content and the reach they have.

Use this data to see what really resonates with your audience and A/B test different headlines for your content. Here’s an example of results from two different tweets promoting the same content.

The example above shows how a simple product mention can help spread your content to a greater audience.

Be sure to measure the response to different headlines to see which one interests your audience most and learn from your results.

Share the Content Your Audience Loves

With the wealth of information that exists on the web, marketers have a harder time finding great content to share.

Use these tools and tips and you’ll not only discover content that you enjoy consuming, you’ll also find content that drives greater engagement with your Twitter following.

What do you think? Did I miss any great tools? What are your favorite tips to curate content? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Images from iStockPhoto.


author: Steve Young
http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/how-to-find-great-content-to-share-on-twitter/

How to Use Google+ to Expand Your Business Influence

Are you looking to tap into the power of Google+?

Is your business leveraging all that Google+ has to offer?

Have you created a personal profile or business page on Google+, but want more influence?

Why Google+?

According to GlobalWebIndex, Google+ now has 359 million active users, which puts it ahead of Twitter’s 200 million active users. With that jump in numbers, it’s clear that now is the time to use Google+ to promote your brand.

Here’s an updated guide on all of the things you need to take advantage of Google+ to gain more exposure for your content and your business.

#1: Claim Authorship With Your Personal Google+ Profile

Google uses Authorship to create a visual tie between you and the content you publish. The enhanced search result listings help readers identify your content at a glance and help you build authority and influence.

There are two ways you can claim your Google+ Authorship.

You can either register an email from the domain that you contribute to (you@socialmediaexaminer.com, for example) or you can link your content with your Google+ profile. If you contribute to multiple blogs, I suggest the latter.

Here’s how:

• First, in the author bio of each of your blog posts, include a link to your Google+ profile with a ?rel=author tag attached to the end of it. It should look like this: https://plus.google.com/118321989430962111396?rel=author
• Next, go to the Contributor to section on the About tab of your Google+ profile and add a link to your author page for each blog that you contribute to.

Add contributor links on Google+ personal profiles.

When you’ve claimed your Authorship, your Google+ profile photo will automatically show up next to each of your posts in search results.

An example of how content looks in search results with Google+ Authorship.

As an added bonus, you can look under the Labs section of Google Webmaster Tools to see analytics for all of the posts that are linked to you via Google+ Authorship, including posts that aren’t published on your own website. This is especially helpful for writers who contribute to multiple blogs.

Viewing analytics for all your Google+ Authorship-claimed posts in Google Webmaster Tools.

Google has hinted that they are working on a system to rank content based on the influence of the author and it’s presumable that one of the ways they will do this is through the use of Google+ Authorship.

Claiming your Google+ Authorship will enhance your visibility in search results, create more authority for your content and provide valuable insights into which content receives the most attention from readers.

#2: Make a Direct Connection Between Your Business Website and Your Google+ Page

The Google+ badge allows you to link your Google+ page to your website. Using the badge will help you increase your Google+ audience from your website and from within search results.

Install a Google+ badge on your website to let readers follow you on Google+ without leaving your site.


Social Media Examiner’s Google+ badge in the sidebar.

When you add the Google+ badge for pages to your site, an active Follow widget will show up next to your listing in search results.


Google+ page display in search results.

You can also use the Direct Connect option to link your Google+ page to your website without using the official Follow badge or button. This is simply one line of code that is added to the <em>head</em> element of your website. This code can be found further down on the Google+ badge page.

Much like Authorship for Google+ profiles, this piece of Direct Connect code will help establish your blog as a publisher by tying it to your Google+ page with a rel=“publisher” tag.



Direct Connect your Google+ page to your website.

Once you connect your website to your Google+ page, the latest status update (and timestamp) will show up in search results. Ensure the best first impression to visitors who may come across your Google+ page in search results and keep your page posts up to date.

Use the connection between your website and your Google+ page to increase your followers and establish your business as a source of quality, authoritative content.

#3: Start Using Hashtags

Hashtags are a useful tactic to get added exposure to users beyond your followers and Google+ has recognized them for a long time.

But now they are prominently displayed next to every update.

Hashtags on Google+ updates.

If you don’t voluntarily place hashtags in your updates, Google+ will sometimes suggest hashtags for you. Be sure that what it chooses is in line with the topic of your update.

#4: Express Yourself With Bigger, Better Cover Photos

If you’ve visited your profile or page recently, you’ve likely gotten the message that Google+ cover photos are now bigger. Take advantage of this great visual branding opportunity and upload an impressive design that is 2120 pixels wide by 1192 pixels high.

Social Media Examiner’s cover photo.

You can use your cover photo to showcase your new products, express your brand’s image, share your physical location, show what your average customer looks like and advertise your next major event. With a good photographer or graphics team, the possibilities are endless.

#5: Use Google+ as Your Business Page

Boost followers and exposure on Google+ for your business page instead of your personal profile when you interact with others on Google+ as your page. To make the switch from your personal profile to your page, click the dropdown arrow next to your picture at the top right of your Google+ screen; your page will be listed under your active profile. Simply click on your page and you’re ready to go.

Select your Google+ page to use it throughout the network.

Now, you should see the photo for your page at the top of your Google+ display.

Similar to how you can use your Facebook Page to like and comment on other Facebook Pages, you can use your Google+ page to +1 and comment on other Google+ pages.

A Google+ page’s comment on another Google+ page.

Use your Google+ page when you interact with people in Google+ communities and to interact with the people (personal profiles) who are following your page and people who share public updates, regardless of whether they are following you.

Find the most active Google+ pages, public personal profiles and communities to start interacting with and you will gain more exposure for your Google+ page and your business.

#6: Host Google+ Hangouts

If your business isn’t ready to invest in webinar or online meeting software, Google+ hangouts can be a great, free alternative. While you can only have 10 participants actively on video, you can stream the video to an unlimited number of viewers using YouTube, making it much like a webinar.

Google+ hangout with multiple panelists.

You can use Google+ hangouts for a variety of things including interviews, panel discussions, live webinars (with screen-sharing), private meetings and just about anything else you can think of. Best of all, you can keep the recordings to add to your YouTube channel, boosting your video content.

Head over to the Google+ hangouts page to see all of the live hangouts happening right now. You might find some open invite hangouts that you can jump into to get to know your audience better or you can create an open hangout party in hopes that some members of your Google+ audience are online and want to chat.

#7: Join and Create Communities

Google+ has a large variety of communities to choose from, similar to the selection you might find on Facebook or LinkedIn. If you can’t find the right community for your business, you can create it using your personal profile or your page.

A selection of Google+ communities formed around social media.

Like many other social network groups, Google+ communities attract spam but Google+ has the best spam management system in terms of catching spam and holding it for approval by the moderator instead of making it public. Moderators can also quickly remove and ban users who repeatedly spam.

Google+ community spam notice.

If you want to circumvent spam in your own conversations, create your community as private and invite people of your own choosing. Alternatively, you can set your community as public and moderate all requests to join the community.

#8: Get Local

Google+ has replaced Google Places and customers who are on Google+ leave reviews on your local Google+ places page regardless of whether you are active there.

Why Is Google+ so important for local businesses?

First of all, search results now show the reviews, additional details and photos on your Google+ local places page.

Google+ places page in search results.

Next, Google+ local users receive prompts to review your business if they search for it on Google.

Suggestions for places to review on Google+ from a user’s search history.

Last but not least, Google+ is looking to become an even bigger resource for local through their mobile app for iOS and Android.

The main screen of the Google+ local app.

If you don’t have a Google+ local places page or haven’t claimed yours yet, you can start by going to Create a Page, select Local Business or Place and enter your phone number. Google+ will connect you with your page if it already exists or prompt you to create one.

Your Turn

From claiming Authorship to participating in communities, these Google+ features can do a lot to help you establish authority, increase visibility and grow an audience.

What do you think? Have you used any of these features? What Google+ features do you find most beneficial for your business? Please share in the comments!


author: Kristi Hines
http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/google-plus-for-business/

Research Shows Blogging a Top Focus for Marketers

Do you ever wonder what tactics, tools and strategies other social media marketers are using?

Regardless of how long you’ve been involved in social media, chances are you have some questions that you’d like answered.

Questions such as, “What are the best social management tools?” or “What are the best ways to engage my audience with social media?”

These and many more questions were answered in the 2013 Social Media Marketing Industry Report, which surveyed over 3000 marketers with the goal of understanding how they use social media to grow and promote their businesses.

Here are some interesting findings from the survey:

#1: Marketers Want Most to Learn About Blogging

When asked what social media platform they wanted most to master, 62% of marketers said blogging, putting it in first place slightly ahead of Google+. This answer is consistent with other studies, which show that the appetite for blogging education is growing.

An important trend to consider is that 28% of marketers now have mobile-optimized blogs. This is highly significant when you consider that the number of smartphone subscribers in the world has broken the 1 billion mark.

Blogging takes first place as the social media platform most marketers want to learn about.

Key Consideration:

The power of blogging to reach huge audiences and prospective customers cannot be underestimated. If you want your voice to be heard on the social web, you need to have a blog.

If you’ve just started blogging for business, focus on consistently giving your audience helpful advice that solves their problems. If you’re not 100% sure what kind of content to offer, survey your customers and ask them to tell you. Asking your customers not only gives you valuable insights about what they find useful, but can help to promote your blog as well.

Here are more tips about blogging for business.

#2: Blogging Highly Valued by the Pros

Most marketers (49%) selected Facebook as the single most important social platform for their business, followed by LinkedIn (16%), blogging (14%) and then Twitter (12%). But for the Pros (marketers with three or more years of social media experience), blogging jumped to second place!

Similarly, a recent Technorati report on Digital Influence also indicated that 86% of influential marketers blog consistently, and a majority of them do not produce much content outside of their blogs.

Blogging plays a more important role for experienced marketers, compared to less-experienced marketers.
Key Consideration:

Consumers are looking for “trusted digital friends” to give them advice on what to buy and where to go. Experienced marketers know that offering valuable advice on their blogs generates trust and influences consumers’ buying decisions. If you produce compelling articles and useful advice on your blog, you’ll become a trusted source of information, and people will start to spend more time there, eventually becoming your customers.

#3: Podcasting Finally Growing Up

Marketers were asked to indicate how they plan to change their social media use in the near future. While only 5% are currently using podcasting, a significant 24% plan on getting involved this year. That’s a nearly five-fold increase!

The report shares three reasons why interest in podcasting is growing: Apple’s introduction of a dedicated podcasting mobile app, smartphone subscriptions topping the 1 billion mark, and major car manufacturers such as BMW and Ford starting to integrate podcasting technology into new cars.

Up from 5% to 24%—the numbers show that interest in podcasting is growing rapidly.

Key Consideration:

Marketing expert Seth Godin says it’s not a good idea to try to sell anything to a stranger. It’s true. But when the right people connect with your voice through podcasting, they gradually become engaged and start to pay attention.

Pat Flynn often says that other than meeting face-to-face, podcasting is probably the best way to interact with your prospects. So if you’ve been thinking about breaking into podcasting, here are the technicalities of setting up, as well as some tips for building a successful podcast with a loyal audience.

#4: Only 1 in 4 Marketers Able to Measure Social Media ROI

When asked to rate their agreement with the following statement, “I am able to measure the return on investment for my social media activities,” only 26% of marketers agreed! What’s interesting about this survey is that social media is clearly a core strategy for businesses, yet measuring it remains a mystery.

Measuring social media continues to be a challenge for marketers, as only 26% are able to do so.

Key Consideration:

Research shows that for many businesses, measuring social media ROI is still too basic—focusing on likes, followers and mentions.

During Social Media Marketing World 2013, Nicole Kelly, author of How to Measure Social Media, said business executives and funders of social media campaigns are looking for real business metrics such as sales, revenue and costs. The challenge for marketers is to learn to speak their language by showing how social media fits into the sales funnel and how it impacts the bottom line. Here’s a great piece from Nicole that explains how to measure social media.

#5: Two-Thirds of Marketers Uncertain About Facebook Marketing Effectiveness

Perhaps the most surprising finding in this study was that most marketers don’t really believe in Facebook! Sure they use it, but they don’t really think it is effective. Only 37% agreed with the statement “My Facebook marketing is effective.” Specifically, 44% of B2C marketers agreed with this statement, while only 29% of B2B marketers concurred.

Only 37% of marketers agree that their Facebook marketing efforts have been effective.

Key Consideration:

Make no mistake, Facebook IS an effective marketing platform and there are numerous case studies to prove this. It’s possible that some marketers who participated in this survey hadn’t actually tracked their Facebook marketing campaigns and were uncertain about their own efforts.

However, research also indicates that Facebook seems to work better for B2C than B2B. If you have a B2B brand, don’t be discouraged. Here’s some advice from Marketo, a B2B company that has been very successful on Facebook.

Other Significant Findings

Tactics and engagement are top challenges for marketers.

When asked what top social media challenges they are facing today, marketers said that tactics and engagement strategies were at the top of the list. No matter what kind of company you have or what products you sell, you can improve engagement with your audience on any platform including Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn. Here are some great tips to improve engagement.

Increased exposure and traffic top benefits of social media marketing.

A significant majority (89%) of marketers indicated that their social media efforts have generated more exposure for their businesses, while 75% said that increased website traffic was the second major benefit. Social media is essentially a word-of-mouth tool. It’s where friends discover and share interesting ideas, including the ones on your site! Here are some tips to drive traffic to your site using social media.

More time spent on social media equals greater benefits.

If you’ve ever wondered whether more time invested in social media produces better results, the answer is “yes.” According to the survey, with as little as six hours per week, 92% of marketers indicated their social media efforts increased exposure for their businesses. More than half of marketers who spent 11 hours or more per week saw improved sales. Do you think you could put a little more time into social media marketing every week?

Fascinating differences between B2B and B2C.

As expected, Facebook dominated among B2C brands, though it was interesting to see LinkedIn and Facebook tie for first place among B2B brands. Only 5% of B2C marketers said LinkedIn played an important role for them. Twitter and blogging are also valuable platforms for B2B marketers. Another surprise was that B2B marketers showed zero interest in Pinterest.

Which platforms play the most important role for B2B and B2C marketers?

Your Turn

What do you think? How does your own experience compare to these findings? Please share your comments in the box below.

Image from iStockPhoto.
author: Patricia Redsicker
http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/new-research-shows-blogging-a-top-focus-for-marketers/

5 Mobile Social Media Marketing Ideas to Grow Your Business

Your customers and prospects are using smart phones.

Have you figured out how to connect with them using mobile social media marketing techniques?

Mobile is not as difficult as it may seem, especially when you access it with the social media tools you’re already familiar with.

With that in mind, I’ll reveal 5 ways you can use social media to integrate mobile marketing into your business.

#1: Connect With Prospects On LinkedIn Mobile

The LinkedIn mobile app brings a streamlined version of the desktop site to your smartphone or other mobile device. You’ll have access to all the key LinkedIn features, including updates, your profile, messages and groups.


An example of the LinkedIn home screen on a smartphone.

From your LinkedIn home page, tap on your profile photo to access your profile screen to see who has viewed your profile recently. If someone has viewed your profile, it’s a good indication that they might be interested in hearing from you.

With the mobile app, you can reach out to them from your phone or tablet. Just tap on their profile photo and say hello to them via LinkedIn.

Allowing the app to send you push notifications is a great way to stay in touch with your LinkedIn connections, even when you’re away from your desktop computer.

#2: Build Your Brand on Instagram

Many people think of Instagram as nothing more than a photo-sharing app for personal use, but you can also use it to promote your corporate or personal brand.

In addition to sharing photos of his own travels, Dave Kerpen, author of Likeable Business and CEO of Likeable Media, uses Instagram to build brand awareness by posting pictures of the Likeable foam hand at baseball games around the country.


A picture of the Likeable foam hand from Dave Kerpen’s Instagram feed.
Shelly Kramer, founder of integrated marketing firm V3 uses humor to extend her brand’s personality when she shares Instagram photos with her clients and followers.


Shelly Kramer posted “More evidence of my really bad, terrible, horrible day.”

When you post images from your mobile device to Instagram it can help you form a strong connection with your audience and build a visual representation of your brand. Consider using similar tactics to promote your brand and build awareness through this popular social platform.

#3: Use Promoted Tweets to Target Mobile Users

Did you know that 55% of users who log into Twitter every month do so at least once using a mobile device? You can reach these people by using Promoted Tweets to display your tweet to users who access Twitter from a mobile device.

Sprint uses promoted Tweets to capture the attention of potential customers who are using Twitter from their smartphones with a tweet that offers $100 to people who switch to Sprint as their mobile carrier.


Sprint’s Promoted Tweet is surfaced only to users viewing Twitter on a mobile device.

Mobile targeting on Twitter will let you tailor tweets to appeal to prospects and customers who use smartphones. You’ll want to keep this tactic in mind as mobile usage continues to grow.

#4: Drive Traffic to Mobile Sites With Facebook’s Promoted Posts

Unlike Facebook Ads or Sponsored Stories, which display in the right sidebar, Promoted Posts are visible to mobile users because they display in the Facebook news feed.

Below is an example of a Promoted Post that drives traffic to a landing page on the company’s mobile website. The image on the left shows an ad that’s integrated into a user’s Facebook stream. The ad drives prospects and customers to a landing page on the company’s mobile website, as shown in the image on the right.


Use Facebook’s Promoted Posts to show ads in the news feeds of mobile users.

Retailers, e-commerce sites, mobile app developers and traditional businesses have all used Facebook’s native advertising to acquire new customers cost-effectively.

#5: Use a QR Code to Increase Your Social Audience

Research indicates that 27% of all smartphone owners have scanned a QR code. And, while QR codes aren’t going to be around forever, they’re still a great way to connect with people using social media on their mobile devices.


Use a QR code to grow your Twitter audience.

Here’s a simple technique you can use to get more Twitter followers using QR codes. Copy the URL and visit Mobile-Barcodes. Paste the URL into the QR code generator and hit Submit. Instantly, you’ll have your very own QR code, which can be saved to your desktop.

Now you can add the QR code to any printed materials—business cards, brochures, posters, even T-shirts. People who scan the QR code will be driven to your Twitter page, where they can follow you from their mobile device.

Go on, grab your smartphone and scan the code.

There’s no such thing as social or mobile anymore. There’s just social and mobile.

Today, approximately 40% of all Internet activity happens via mobile devices. It won’t be long before the majority of your prospects will be connecting with your company via mobile.

These five ideas on how to use social media to connect with people on their smartphones are just the beginning.

What do you think? How are you connecting with your customers on mobile devices? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.

Tags: brand awareness, instagram marketing, jamie turner, linkedin connection, linkedin mobile app, mobile, mobile marketing, mobile strategy, promoted post, promoted tweet, qr code, smartphone, social media marketing



Author: Jamie Turner
http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/5-mobile-social-media-marketing-ideas-to-grow-your-business/

Tony Robbins on How to Turn Business Obstacles into Opportunities

Do you have a Cash flow business problem? Watch Tony Robbins help Shane turn his business obstacle into a business opportunity.

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5 Creative Ways to Use LinkedIn Company Pages

Does your business have a LinkedIn company page?

Have you noticed how other businesses are using LinkedIn lately?

A number of larger brands are creatively using their LinkedIn company pages, and some of them are doing some cool things.

Here are five brands using their LinkedIn company pages creatively.

Check out what they are doing to learn how you can tell your story, generate leads and engage your communities through your LinkedIn page.

#1: LinkedIn—Develop a Campaign

Let’s start with LinkedIn. Why not learn from the source itself? LinkedIn’s own company page offers some insight into what works for effectively engaging your target audience.

In many cases, LinkedIn’s company page status updates are tied to an ongoing, larger campaign. Most recently, LinkedIn posed a question to its identified “influencers” who contribute their unique thought leadership content to the site. The question asked of these thought leaders was, “What’s the best advice you’ve ever received?”

 

LinkedIn shared updates to create community dialogue.

Seventy LinkedIn influencers contributed their answers to this question. LinkedIn posted many of the responses to their LinkedIn company page as status updates in order to share the content with followers and build engagement.

What was great about this idea was that it has provided LinkedIn with a series of ongoing, fresh and interesting status updates for their company page. Not only did LinkedIn share the answers from various influencers, they asked followers to also answer the question to create community dialogue.

Developing a campaign that drives a related series of status updates on your company page can increase engagement and keep the conversation going and expand your company’s visibility as followers share and like your content.

Here’s how to develop a campaign on your LinkedIn company page.

Create a campaign that poses an interesting question to a group of influential bloggers in your industry who can respond via their own blog post.

Not only can you highlight each of these contributors on your own company blog, you can also create a series of shareable and engaging status updates for your page!

Remember to ask your followers to answer your question as well.

#2: HubSpot—Create Leads

It’s tough to find a company with a presence on LinkedIn making better use of the LinkedIn company page than HubSpot. HubSpot has been quite successful in generating a consistent flow of leads for their software product through their LinkedIn company page!

What HubSpot has done so well is determine which types of marketing offers work best to generate business leads from their LinkedIn company page.

For example, under the Products/Services tab, you’ll find marketing offers for a free demo of the software and some free educational materials (ebooks) related to utilizing the software.

 

HubSpot shares lead generating updates on their LinkedIn page.

HubSpot has also done a tremendous job of gathering recommendations for their software product with almost 200 individuals weighing in.

 

HubSpot has many recommendations on their company page.

This “social proof” can be very powerful in encouraging a prospective customer to take that next step.

Here’s how to create leads with your LinkedIn company page.

Regardless of what products and services your company sells, create marketing offers such as free demos, a free consultation or free ebooks or special reports, and share information on these to generate leads from your LinkedIn company page.

Also, consider sending a LinkedIn message to your existing customers through your company page asking them to write a recommendation. These recommendations can easily be published directly to your page!

#3: CNBC—Cross-Promote Other Social Channels

CNBC is a global financial media brand with a fairly robust presence on LinkedIn. In fact, the company was named as one of the top LinkedIn company pages for 2012.

Aside from sharing timely financial and economic news on their page, CNBC is using their LinkedIn presence as an opportunity to promote their other social channels.

 

CNBC uses the LinkedIn company page banner to promote their other social networks.

In the first banner image, CNBC has a call to action to join them on Facebook. The second image as you scroll through is a call to action to join them on Twitter and the third is a call to action for a free trial demo of the CNBC Pro Product.

Using this real estate to blatantly cross-promote additional social media communities for CNBC is a great idea.

Here’s how to cross-promote your other social channels on your LinkedIn company page.

You are allowed to have up to 3 rotating banner images under the Products/Services tab. Within each banner, you can embed a link so the viewer can click through to an outside web page or to another social media profile.

Develop banner images and embed links for your company page’s Products/Services tab to cross-promote your other social media communities.

Keep in mind that businesses can run targeted ads on LinkedIn that lead directly to the Products/Services tab. (Running ads on LinkedIn is a paid feature.) Consider ways to use this to your advantage.

#4: Facebook—Find New Talent

Facebook is utilizing its LinkedIn presence primarily to attract and recruit talent on the world’s largest professional online network.

The Careers tab is a paid feature on LinkedIn, but many brands are successfully leveraging it to announce job openings and find new talent.

 

The Facebook LinkedIn page appeals to new talent.

Facebook showcases a compelling banner image and tagline: “Making the world more open & connected” at the top of their Careers page tab. They also provide a simple yet motivating description of what it means to work at Facebook: “Working at Facebook means doing what you love.”

Facebook links directly to its other Facebook web properties further down on the page, and provides a short video overview that gives potential candidates an inside view of what it’s like to work at the company.

Overall, Facebook’s Career tab is an excellent example of providing a compelling and attractive value proposition for drawing in potential candidates for employment.

Here’s how to implement this tactic on your LinkedIn company page.

If you’re in the market for sourcing and recruiting talent, a paid Careers tab on your LinkedIn company page might make a lot of sense.

Through the numerous features available on this page, you will be able to showcase your company story and job openings effectively.

#5: American Airlines—Engage Your Audience

American Airlines is doing a couple of things well on their LinkedIn company page.

First, the main company page banner is a big, beautiful American Airlines airplane flying through the sky. This is a captivating visual that grabs your attention as soon as you land on the page.

 

The American Airlines LinkedIn page banner captures your attention.

Why is a captivating visual important? Without a strong banner image at the top of your LinkedIn company page, the page just doesn’t look complete or attractive. It is doubtful that a visitor will want to further explore the page if it doesn’t have any visual appeal. Unfortunately, many large and popular brands still don’t have a banner image.

The other thing that American Airlines is doing well is that they are utilizing company page status updates to offer followers an opportunity to enter and qualify for a unique travel experience!

 

American Airlines posts updates to engage their audience on LinkedIn.

In order to enter the contest above, the visitor has to guess the landmark from an aerial view image that American Airlines has posted on the update.

These are exactly the kinds of status updates that have the potential to go viral!

How to engage your audience on your LinkedIn company page.

Make sure to create a banner image to insert at the top of your LinkedIn company page to make it more visually appealing.

Next, consider creating a series of contests or sweepstakes promotions that are relevant to your company and can be shared as status updates. This is a great way to generate buzz and build followers for your page.

Develop Your LinkedIn Company Page

LinkedIn company pages continue to evolve with newly added features and functionality.

These pages can help grow the visibility of your company and further engage with clients, prospects and advocates. Additionally, your LinkedIn company page can serve as a credible extension of your digital brand!

You don’t have to be a big brand to take advantage of and benefit from some of these same strategies on your page. It doesn’t matter if you’re just beginning to build a LinkedIn company page, or if you already have a few thousand followers on your existing page.

You can learn from the brands that are being smart and creative with their company pages.

Be sure to check out the new LinkedIn resource for Company Page managers.

What do you think? Do these creative ways brands are using LinkedIn company pages trigger some ideas for your own page? Are there other brands or businesses that you think are doing creative things on their pages? Please share in the comments section!

author:Stephanie Sammons

http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/5-creative-ways-to-use-linkedin-company-pages/