MelvinBlog

A blog that chronicles my journey on online marketing, blogging, social media, technology and life.

Guest Post

Using Social Media to Boost your SEO strategy

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This is a guest post by Charles Hammerman

In this rapidly changing online environment, social media plays a very important part in gaining exposure. News spreads like wildfire throughout the main outlets, and there’s no better way of getting a message across to a large number of new people. It wasn’t long ago that SEO and social media were two pretty different things, but recently they seem to have blended in to one online marketing strategy.

For this reason, utilizing social media is essential for any aspiring business. Nowadays, half of the world’s population is on websites such as Twitter and Facebook, and it hasn’t taken long for the world’s biggest brands to reach out across the globe and gain a whole new customer base. There are countless stories of social media posts from companies going viral.

This is an example of why social media is so important, and why it should not be discounted from a company’s SEO strategy. In fact, more and more companies have now begun to make use of social media in order to bring about an increase in the number of followers, and visibility that their pages get. If you browse Twitter, you’ll find famous companies have their own accounts which provide live updates of what’s happening with the business, and what’s new. This is the kind of thing you should incorporate.

Getting it Right

If you are looking to use social media to your own advantage and boost your SEO strategy, it is important for you to make sure that you follow this few steps.

  • Firstly, it is important for you to create a plan of what you are going to do during your social media campaign. Gaining popularity on a social media website is not necessarily difficult, but making sure that you maintain the level is what’s really important. This is where some companies may fail.
  • It is important for you to make sure that you create accounts on all of the major social media websites such as YouTube, Twitter and Facebook, and create an identity for you and your brand. Whatever you share on one of your pages should also be done so on the other pages, which helps in creating a unified identity for your business.
  • The most important thing that you must keep in mind during your social media campaigns is to always treat your visitors well. The real point of social media is to interact with the people, to talk to them and gauge their reactions and opinion. It would be a poor decision to ignore what your users are saying. Try to interact with your readers and viewers as much as possible.
  • The final thing to make sure you get right is the content itself. It’s all very well posting regular updates, but if you don’t have anything good to say, then nothing is going to get shared, which means that you won’t boost your online presence at all. Be as interesting as possible, and capitalize on breaking news that’s relevant you your industry or niche.

Charles Hammerman is an international SEO and social media marketing specialist based in the UK.

Foretelling the Future? You Don’t Need ESP

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This is a guest post by Amanda Green.

On the surface, it seems like product launches consist of three steps: think up the product, make the product, and launch it to the public. The truth is that there is a lot more work that goes into it than that, which involves anticipating the future, foretelling how a product will be received on the market. It’s not so mystical as say hiring a psychic to predict market fluctuations, although there are companies that actually do this. Realistic foretelling of the future involves thinking and acting precisely. Here are some of the things that you need to do if you want to set your product up to succeed.

Product Research

Here is the sad truth: chances are high that someone has had the same idea you’ve had before. This is why, as soon as you start to take your idea seriously, you need to go into research mode. You don’t just need to find out whether the product already exists. You need to look up patents, trademarks, copyrights, etc. It’s important to do this for every product that even remotely resembles yours. This isn’t just for your protection. It’s to help you figure out how to make your product the absolute best product on the market.

Product Testing

You need to test your product before you start marketing it to the public or attempting to launch it for sales revenue. There are a few phases to this.

1. Prototype testing

Make several different models of the product you want to launch. These are called prototypes. Bring people to, for lack of better word, play with your prototypes and then ask them what they think. Track their responses to each prototype, positive and negative. Use their feedback to inform the next round of product prototypes. Repeat this cycle until you’ve got a single product that is free of bugs, glitches or problems.

2. Product Honing

Once you’ve got a prototype that is functional and without major bugs, create a few variations of this finalized prototype and run through the testing process again. You can help yourself with this process if you bring in groups both from your original prototype testing sessions and brand new eyes.

3. Run the Numbers

Trying to pick a price point can be difficult, particularly with markets being as volatile as they are. You need to do more than just a simple Excel sheet projection to figure out how your product is likely to sell given what you know about your market, the current economy, etc. Profit Stars asset liability management team recommends running a variety of different scenarios to help you get the fullest picture of your product’s projected success…which, unless you’re a mathematician is probably something you’ll want to hire a professional to help you do.

Get It Out There

It’s okay to do a soft launch of a product to get an idea of how it will perform within the real world. Soft launches are a great way to get independent feedback and to test market response. You can also use this time to properly market the product for a “real” and “hard” launch on a future date. This is another area where it is helpful to hire professionals. A marketing firm can help you pick a date and make sure that a good amount of buzz and anticipation is built up for your product so that, when it hard launches, it will bring in a large sum of money. Even better, professional marketers will know how to help you sustain the buzz surrounding your product launch long after the launch has actually taken place.

Unfortunately, as far as we know, nobody is able to accurately predict the future, though as stated before, some companies do test the waters with psychics. The real way to foretell the future is to do your research and testing correctly. If you do, there’s no reason to believe that the product you dream up can’t be launched successfully and profitably.

Get With It – Businesses Need to Be More Eco-Friendly

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This is a guest post by Amanda Green.

Becoming Eco-friendly in the business world is more than just a fad. For many entrepreneurs, it is a way of life, and more businesses need to jump in on the cause. Not only will recycling and saving energy increase profit and lower costs, but it will also serve as an inspiration for employees and work associates. It is just as important, if not more so, that businesses participate in making the planet greener, as it is for anyone else.

Going green for a business can be as simple as switching to energy saving light bulbs, or as complicated as converting the entire office or building to some type of sustainable energy source. There are many cost saving ways a business can participate in making the world more Eco-friendly. Here are few of the more popular ones:

1. Go Paperless 

For a long time, industry leaders have been trying to promote the paperless office; it is more efficient, safer and saves money. Use digital memos, calendars, emails and documents to reduce paper waste.

There are actually several business benefits to going digital: employee efficiency increases and it can create a substantial savings on paper, which can amount to as much as $1,800 a year. Additionally, a company that uses less paper also spends less on file storage, printer ink, toner, copy paper and document shredding.

2. Energy Efficiency 

Save money on energy by replacing regular light bulbs with fluorescent. Turn off unneeded lights at night. Adjust computer power settings so they run on “power saver” mode and replace appliances with energy efficient appliances. You can learn more about getting great rates on electricity at www.Electric.com.

3. Start a Recycling Program 

Recycle as many products as you can. Make recycle bins available for employees. If you are a small business consider combining your recycling efforts with those of other businesses in the building. Most businesses and people already recycle so making this a daily business activity shouldn’t be that difficult. Be the change you wish to see.

4. Promote Telecommuting One or Two Days a Week 

By having some employees work part time from home you can promote better energy efficiency. The fewer computers used in the office on certain days, the more you can save business on energy costs.

5. Sustainable Energy 

Sustainable energy is very popular all across the country right now, so you may be able to find inexpensive solar power or wind energy options that will power your installations at least partially. This can save you a lot of money on energy costs, lowering your overhead and increasing your revenue.

If each one of us takes it upon ourselves to make these practical changes in our personal and professional lives, collectively we can go a long way. Don’t get overwhelmed by the forces of disinformation: your planet is depending on you!

Making the Most Out of Google+ Business Page

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This is a guest post by Amanda Green.

It’s a fact that Google+ is evolving with time and is slowly becoming an integral part of any business’s online reputation and subsequent sales. It makes your Google+ business page really important, since it reflects the online reputation of your brand.

If you’re not making the most out of your Google+ page, then you’re definitely leaving money on the table – money that you could put in the highest interest rate savings account and increase your overall earnings.

Advantages of a Google+ Business Page

  1. Your Customers Are On It: Whether you believe it or not, your target customers are already on Google+ socializing and consuming information. So instead of interrupting them with your advertising, you can use Google+ to connect to them and engage with them.
  2. Create More Direct Relationships: One of the plus points of using Google+ is that the social network gives utmost value to quality content. Content that you can create to establish more direct, personal relationships with your target audience.
  3. Use Video Chat: Google+ Hangouts, the video chat feature is great to hold video talk sessions with your prospects/customers. Getting them involved will help you generate more feedback.

How to Market Your Business with Google+

Creating a Google+ business page is one thing, but marketing your business effectively using it is something else. Unless and until you’re doing your best to market it well, you won’t see results. Here are some ideas to go with:

  1. Create a “Suggested Circles” List: One of the easiest ways to market with Google+ is to create a list of suggested circles, sorted out by priority, which is placed on the top of your profile page’s About tab.
  2. Leverage Google+ Search: When you’re there on Google+, then make some noise. Show the world that you’re there by searching Google+ search for industry keywords, and mentions of your brands. Save these searches and monitor them daily to respond to mentions, reply to comments, etc.
  3. Join Others’ Hangouts: While it’s totally up to you if you want to start your own Google+ hangout, you should definitely participate in others’ to understand how to effectively use it.  This helps you make your own hangouts much more successful when you hold them.

Promoting Your Google+ Page

  • Focus on getting more followers
  • Make use of Google+ badges
  • Add your page to your sitelinks
  • Share really valuable information
  • Use Ripples to connect to Influencers
  • Host hangouts for customers
  • Promote on other social media platforms
  • Enable social extensions in Adwords

Remember, Google+ is not just another social network. It’s a revolution in itself, which is lead by search engine giant. So if you want your business to grow online, then see to it that you’re taking full advantage of Google Plus.

Check Out The Credentials

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This is a guest post by Amanda Green

What do you need to do to get a job? Given that a prospective employer has contacted you about it, you need to send in a resume, then go in for an official interview. Yet, when we contact people about a service or product, we often take corners. We simply go by how cheap it is, or how high up on the hits list of a search engine they are. This is simply inexcusable when it comes to big decisions like who to trust with financial and investment advice.

In order to trust anyone with providing you a service you need, whether it be a builder or investment advice, you need to do some research. One of the best ways to do some preliminary research on someone is to look at any online business profiles that they have. There are no shortage of sites that you can host a profile onto, so they should have at least one.

If you are requesting services of a company and not an individual, look up the information on its president. Let’s look at a Charles Phillips profile on investing.businessweek.com as an example. If we browse through, we would see that he is well connected with people both inside and outside of his industry, owns a profitable company and in general seems to be a very reliable person.

Not everyone has profiles like this though, or perhaps their profile is bare bones enough that you want more information. In this case, dig a little deeper. Search through any online news articles about them. In a lot of cases you will come up blank, but this is usually a good sign.

Positive services get little attention from the public after all. Negative attention though, such as incredibly bad reviews from customers or cases of serious apathy or neglect, do get attention. If the person you are looking into has had a history of anything like this, you should be able to find out with ease. And if they do, needless to say, you should not be doing business with them.

You cannot hand the reigns of your company over to just anyone and expect it to survive. Yet, when you take advice from those we barely even know, that is exactly what you are doing. Ensure that someone has both the knowledge and the credentials before hiring them for advice, otherwise both you and your company will suffer for it.

Getting Your Business to Have a Good Online Reputation from the Start

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This is a guest post by Amanda Green

If you’ve just started a new business, building your online reputation is very important. There are many consumers who now research companies they’re thinking of doing business with before they buy any of their products. Having positive comments posted about your business and its products will help convince many of these consumers that they’re making the right choice by doing business with you.

The key to building a good reputation from the beginning is to start out on the right foot. Ensure that all of your products are of high quality and that your business policies are not only fair, but also clearly posted on your website. This will reduce the likelihood of someone posting complaints about your company because they were dissatisfied with the products and services they’ve received.

You can start building your reputation simply by using your own website. Allow your customers to leave ratings and comments about products they’ve bought from you. Include a discussion forum on your site where people can ask questions, as well as share feedback and tips about the products you have available for sale. These are all things that are used by some of the top online retailers. It will also allow you to catch on to any customer dissatisfaction and resolve the issue proactively before the customer goes and posts negative comments about you on other websites.

As for comments about your business on review sites, personal blogs and industry related discussion forums, these will come naturally as your business grows. If people are satisfied with what you have to offer and found your products to be useful or very well priced, they’re more likely to write about it online to share their opinion with others.

Remember that internet reputation management is an ongoing task. Once you get going, you should monitor review sites, related discussion forums, blogs and social networking groups for any mention of your company. If there are any negative comments posted, you should quickly address the issue to show that you care about your customer satisfaction levels and are willing to correct any problems rapidly.

Remember that building a positive reputation online first involves giving your customers something to be happy about. If they like your business, many of them will leave comments about it online. As your sales numbers grow, so will the amount of positive information about your business, thus helping you build a solid reputation online.

5 Ways to Increase Sales while Decreasing Overhead Costs

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This is a guest post by Amanda Green

Business managers will tell you that organization is what makes a business profitable; marketing professionals will say, it is due to their advertisement campaigns, but in truth, it is the sales team that increases your revenue, especially if you have a team that works together like a well oiled machine.

Here are 6 things you can do to improve your sales while at the same time reducing certain overhead expenses to produce more profit:

1. Consider Working with Distributors or Outsourcing your Sales

A distributor already has a network of retailers or businesses they work with. They have sales reps that cover the entire nation, and some even offer international services. This gives you a better chance of giving your product or service the best visibility.

A company like Cydcor has experienced sales reps with a large portfolio of existing clients. So getting your product to a larger number of customers is easier and can be cheaper if you outsource your sales to someone like this. Check out Cydcor on Facebook.com to learn more about how this business model operates.

Working with a distributor can also help you reduce your overhead costs as you don’t really need to carry large inventories of product. Remember, a company like Cydcor will also want to add products to their existing line that gives them a more varied mix and better sales returns.

2. Expand Your Sales Across the Nation

If you can’t find a representative willing to take your product line on, expand your sales team to cover territories that are closest to you. You can also start a search, looking for online stores that carry similar products. Focus on territories where the most stores carry products like yours.

3. Sell to Department Stores

This is another way to expand your business and save on costs. Work directly with department store buyers. Contact the buying department directly and find out what requirements suppliers must meet to work with that particular chain. All you really need to do is get your foot in one department store door, and your sales will increase dramatically, allowing you to reduce the effort your sales team makes on smaller sales.

4. Specialty Chain Stores

Focus on small specialty stores which have national chains. Identify the stores that have several branches and focus your efforts on these small stores as they can be large buyers but are easier to sell to than the larger department store.

5. Online Service

Find other successful e-commerce websites to showcase your product. Use catalog websites such as Yahoo, Amazon, Shopify, Etsy, Groupon and Shopify to showcase your products.

There are actually many inexpensive ways to increase sales while decreasing your overhead. It’s just a matter of getting out there and talking to consultants, reps and other people that can help distribute your product. The absolute best solution is to outsource some of your sales duties by finding a representative willing to help you with your product.