Understanding your website traffic yields huge benefits for your business and can help you better connect with your audience. Having a web presence on the internet is simply one part of the equation. You need to have a solid comprehension of the way your visitors are interacting with your content. Furthermore it’s important to use such aggregated data for your analysis and monetization. Why? Google Analytics can help you find important information about your website including Traffic Sources, Content, & Goals.
Social Media is one of the best ways to communicate, network, and maintain your brand. Whether you use it for personal or business reasons there’s value in it. Some of the most popular social media platforms out there are Facebook, Twitter, & LinkedIN. In order to manage these individual platforms efficiently and proactively you’ll most likely be using a web application such as HootSuite to manage your activity. Personally I’ve been using this application to manage multiple accounts for some time now and yet to find another one to replace it. Recently HootSuite has introduced a great new feature for managing status updates performed via its application to your social media platforms.
My friend and colleague, Barbara Matteri, approached me a while ago, very excited. “I have a blog now. You should read it.” “Great,” I said, “What are you wanting to accomplish with it?” She didn’t have a clear answer to that question, but promised to think about it. My next questions were: “Where are you promoting it? Have you connected it to your facebook account, and how about in LinkedIn? Do you have a website that can act as a hub for your goals?” “Oh, I haven’t done any of those things,” she replied. Sigh. Since my focus for people using Social Media is on those over 50, I decided right there and then that she would be my case study. I suggested that, and she enthusiastically agreed. So, the next few blogs will follow Barb as she begins to learn how to get her message out to the world via the internet. But first, let me introduce you to her:
One of the most efficient ways to promote yourself or your business on the web is thru the power of social media. Facebook for instance now has over 500 million active users and growing. It’s the perfect marketing channel to network with other like minded individuals and business owners. There are several ways that you can take full advantage of the Facebook experience and bring it to your own website. Now this particular implementation process requires some basic knowledge of HTML, PHP, CSS, & perhaps some FBML (Facebook’s language).
Hello again. One thing I’ve learned to expect is that, just as I get used to a site being one way, it will inevitably change. Twitter has changed its look, and some of the information I gave you last time about the location of featurees, is now out-of-date if you’re using the New Twitter. Your Timeline, Retweets, @Mentions, Searaches and Lists are now at the top of your Home page. One new feature that I like, under Retweets, is that they are now organized by Retweets by you, Retweets by others, and Retweets of Your Retweets.
The internet is a powerful playground for both personal and business relations. Others can talk about you or your business without your awareness and create negative press around your brand. Business owners in particular of various industries should be primarily concerned when it comes to monitoring your brand on the web. Bad feedback about your brand can create a sense of uncertainty with your customers in relation to your products or services that your business offers. In today’s day and age social media remains the #1 communication channel where consumers go for comparison shopping, research, & networking with others.
The craziness and interest in social media continues to rise as most see the potential in this type of marketing. Facebook, Twitter, & LinkedIN – each are gaining more users than ever before as consumers are seeing the need to communicate on the internet. When it comes to managing your social media profiles the process can be rather challenging. While there are several advanced social media profile management tools that will help you better manage and monetize your social media profiles there are only a hand full that are actually worth your time. The best thing about most of the social media management tools available out there is that they’re FREE. No need to dig deep into your pockets for this one Mr. CEO of Big Company America.
There’s a new fan page popping up every second. It seems that way anyway with all the fuss and buzz around Facebook. Now that there are over 500 million users on the social media platform everyone’s trying to make a social media star out of themselves. You can’t blame people for trying though just like the rest of us that are trying to get a piece of the pie. Utilizing your facebook fan page takes a whole lot more activity than just creating the page itself. Frankly flaunting around your Facebook page url doesn’t mean squad if you don’t have anything on the page itself.
Twitterpated? Relax. You Don’t Have to Know Everything.
This is the third installment in my series about using Twitter, aimed primarily at people like myself, living in the “Fine Aged Wine” zone (that is, over 50). I liken my approach to the old radio show “News Read Real Slow”, because I know that there are a lot of people who are just getting started, and the last thing you want me to do is bombard you with new and confusing technical terms. Something happened the other day which highlighted this approach for me. I was chatting with one of my “guru’s”, and he happened to mention a term with which I was unfamiliar. I had to stop and make a decision. Go ahead and admit my ignorance, and maybe learn something new, or ignore it. I realized at that moment that, although I think I’m picking up a lot of information in a short time, that the technologies related to the social media experience just keep racing along. Sometimes I feel that they are leaving me in the dust. So, in response, I did three things:
There are many people offering free Twitter icons. I like this one.
Hi. This is Laurie again. Allow me to digress for just one blog post. In our last conversation, we established that we’re all wonderful “fine aged wines” over here on the better side of 50, and that we’re now a force with which to contend in social media networking. But I know you’re dying to ask me a question. “Why start with Twitter?” you ask. “Isn’t that sort of counter-intuitive for someone whose brain is slowing down—like you, Laurie? For goodness sake, some days you can’t even find your keys. How do you expect to keep up with the mad swirl of activity that a Tweetchat can become?” Yes, I’ll admit you have a point. I’ll have to admit that when I’m in the middle of a chat that’s truly cooking, it sometimes feels as though I’m in the middle of a cocktail party on steroids. It’s like being dragged through a maelstrom, trying to catch and react to as many ideas as possible, before they disappear into the deep dark hole of distant Twitter history, which is about 2 seconds ago. (by the way, that is exactly why I use plug-in’s such as , Tweetchat, which I mentioned in the last blog and Tweetdeck , which I can mention later if you ask me to.) Of course, the simple answer is that it’s my favorite social media format. Period. I do, however, have four reasons that I use to explain (or justify) its fascination for me:
