Social Circle Media Blog

Updating Your Facebook Fan Page via Email

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 16:52:00 +0000

By The Social Media Guide

Did you know you can update your Facebook fan page via email?

This can be particularly handy if ...

you are browsing through Twitter on your mobile phone, and see a great tweet (linking to a post) that you would like to share with your fans
you are at work and something pops into your mind that you want to share on your Facebook page
you come across an awesome article while surfing the net
you receive an email from someone that you want to post to your Facebook page's wall
you don’t have time to log in to your Facebook page
you don’t have access to Facebook

It is super easy to update your Facebook page's wall via email, and keep all your fans updated and informed.
Posterous is the service that allows you to do this.

If you are unfamiliar with Posterous, it is basically a hosted micro-blogging platform that allows you to make updates to your own Posterous blog, simply by emailing in content.

Posterous allows you to update your blog by emailing content such as,

links to videos - and have the video automatically displayed
photos (as attachments) - and have the photos automatically displayed
music files (as attachments) - and have the music automatically embedded
links to Google Maps - and have the maps automatically embedded

Posterous also has an autoposting feature that allows you to post (via email) to your other social networks including Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, YouTube, Picasa, WordPress.com, etc.

You can post to one, several or all of your social networks.

One post to Posterous goes everywhere else on the web.

For example, you can email your pics to your Posterous blog, and if you have added your Flickr account, they will appear there as well.

The good thing is Posterous now supports posting to Facebook pages.

Setup

First up you need to create an account with Posterous.. please refer to my post Posterous Guide to Dead Simple Blogging for more information.

Once you have logged in, click on Autopost.. then click on Add a Service;

Then click on Facebook Page,

You now need to connect your Facebook account with Posterous.
Click on the Facebook Connect; button,

Now click on Connect; to allow authorization,

Select your Facebook page from the drop-down menu then click on Add Facebook Page,

Click on Allow; to allow constant authorization,

Click on Allow Publishing;

Done!

You have just setup posting to your Facebook page using Posterous.

You can check that this has been added by clicking on Autopost.. your Facebook page will now be visible,

Autopost Email Address

Now scroll down the page a little and take note of the email address to autopost to Facebook; facebook@posterous.com

Highly recommend >> add this email address as a contact in:

your preferred email client (Gmail, Hotmail, etc)
your mobile phone's email client

Otherwise you are defeating the purpose of being able to post to your Facebook page via email.. as you might forget this email address!

Update Your Facebook Page via Email

Now to test this out.
Find some content you want to post to your Facebook page and then compose a new email message.. ensuring that you are sending to the correct email address - facebook@posterous.com,

Now hit Send ... You have now updated your Posterous blog, AND your Facebook Fan Page,

You will notice that your Facebook profile has NOT been updated.

The reason your Facebook profile was not updated is because it hasn’t been added as a service in Posterous.
If you want to be able to post to both your Facebook Page and Facebook Profile via email.. just add Facebook as a service (following the same instructions above).

Alternatively, you could post to just your profile and not your page.

So there you have it.. posting content via email to your Facebook Page!

The Social Media Guide is a great website with lots of good tips for today's evolving internet landscape. Sign up for their free newsletter and stay up to date and receive daily tips on Social Media tools and strategies.

Original Article Posted: By The Social Media Guide

Social Media Addiction

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 20:44:00 +0000

Original Article Post at The Social Media Guide

Social Media Effects Google Search

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 17:26:00 +0000

I really enjoyed this article. Very easy read and really covers the basics on how Social Media is effecting online search engines - which ultimately effects you! How YOU drive traffic to your site. How YOU can get top placement in Google search results and other search engines.

........................

When people talk about the ways social media has changed the business world, the most common response is the way it has changed marketing and advertising campaigns. No longer is it 'enough' to have TV and print advertisements.

**To be effective, being part of the social media environment is becoming almost mandatory.

Still, one area that social media is slowly becoming more and more relevant in are search results.

Gone are the days of simplicity and in are 'social circles.' If someone within your social circle has written something about what you are searching for, it will most likely show up as one of your results on Google.

What The Future Holds In Social Media

While Google 'results from people within your social circle' are still in BETA, it's only a matter of time before social circles become a permanent part of search results. To some, this is an amazing integration between social media and search engine's, but the signs were there that it was inevitable that the two would eventually cross.

One of the aspects of social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook that scares search engines like Bing and Google is the amount of content that is generated on these platforms.

The advantage of these social media platforms lies in the fresh content that is constantly being updated and added, all of which search engines are trying to get a piece of.

Why Your Social Circle Is On The First Page Of Google Results

For companies and organizations that spend hundreds and thousands of dollars on search engine optimization [SEO], being on the first page for relevant keywords is as good as it gets. By being on the first page, you significantly increase your traffic opportunities. But what does it mean to be on the first page of results?

Google for example doesn't put just any website on their first page of results. They put websites that are relevant and also ones that are trustworthy.

In the same regards, your social circle now shows up on the first page of results because of the trust factor. Even though I may not have more traffic than ESPN, if I wrote an article about the Lakers and my friend is searching for them, I will show up on the first page along side ESPN. Yes, I am relevant to what he is searching, but more importantly he trusts me.

While Google and other search engines have their own secret algorithm to determine how you appear on search results, social media is changing that. How they take into account your social circle will change the way that companies not only approach search engine optimization, but also change the way they become part of your 'social circle.'

Joseph is the Director of Marketing at Viralogy.com & works in social media & sports consulting. Read more about him at http://JosephAYi.com

Tips To Promote Your New Release

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 17:57:00 +0000

You've worked for months on your new single or new album. Now what? Unless you have a major label, experienced management or a generous amount of investor money behind you, the ability to promote your own album is crucial. Besides the talent to make great music, promotional skills are some of the most important skills you can have as an indie artist.

When you don't have the means to hire a PR firm to push the album for you, try these five steps and cover your bases.

Keep in mind that these actions are crucial to your success and the process takes the 3 Ps: planning, persistence, and patience.

1. Target the Right Audience - It is very important to know and understand who your audience is in every aspect. What age group are they? Where do most of them live? What kind of music do they like? Write out lists and target each relevant group.

2. Create a Press Kit and Promo Package. Think about what you need to include so that the media gets to see everything they need to know about you in a concise, yet detailed manner. For example, a press kit could include:

a. A press release about the new album
b. A succinct (one page) bio about the artist and release
c. The Song - have it availabe to listen to (even if just a sample)
d. Quotes pulled from press coverage and/or fellow industry musicians
e. Contact information
f. Artwork for your new release - in color
g. Links to your websites (Myspace, Facebook, etc.)

Some people can get more creative, but the basics are all you really need at the end of the day.

3. Compile a Media List - Getting all your personal and profession contact lists together is one of the most important things to do. Compile a press list and send them a copy of your new release (with or without press kits, but do at least send a bio with contact information noted) to every contact.

4. Plan an Album Release Party to promote the new album. Find a cool venue that you're comfortable at, plan a set, have the release vailable for sale and invite everyone you can-fans, media, family and friends. The bigger the crowd, the better. Invite the media to meet and greet and get a free copy of the release to publish a review.

5. Newsletter Mailings - Identify all the newsletter lists that you can promote your new release through. Reach out through your network and ask your contacts to promote your new release to their lists. Make sure to have the email creatives ready for them so they do not need to do much work. Target these lists with a newsletter creatives all about your new release.

6. Promote through your social networks - put together a strategy to promote the new release through your social networks like MySpace, Facebook, iLike, Imeem and other music sites that you have identified as your target market. Create promotional campaigns and/or contests to get others to viral the release for you.

Abridged: Mona L. Loring

Social Media Strategy Outline Musicians

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 15:27:00 +0000

By Hyperbot.com

Hiring A Professional Social Media Consultant

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 14:55:00 +0000

Social media is more than just one more new method of marketing or advertising online. Social media is a living, breathing, growing organism, and it is based in communities. The fact is, if you're not active in this growing industry, you will be left behind. People are talking about you, whether you're present in those discussions or not.

You can't keep sending out one-way communications in this new business environment. People no longer trust advertising; people trust people. Consumers trust their peers' opinions. So you have to make personal connections.

Social media is about listening to the communities you serve. It is about establishing a rapport with your target audience. Seeking out influencers in your market. And more importantly, not looking at it as a market, but as a community made up of individuals. This isn't one-way PR communications, it's a dialogue--a conversation.

Unfortunately you can't simply build a great blog and expect people to show up. The website itself is only about 20% of the work-there's still a long laundry list of things you'll still need to do to be successful. Many people don't realize the hard work required when they first take their business online--but proper developers and consultants do much more than just give you a front-end web design--they'll provide their expertise when you have questions, coaching through your learning process, promotion of your campaigns, help with your market research and search engine optimization, help measuring the effectiveness of your efforts, and hopefully access to the right connections within their networks.

A good social media consultant pulls some weight online and understands how your community will respond negatively or positively to different tactics . He'll be honest with you when he knows you need to invest some extra work to create a great product. You deserve that, because a great product hardly needs promoting.

With the right consultant, you can set goals, you can learn how to develop your voice and communicate through social media in a personable way, you can identify and establish relationships with the right people in your niche , and you can learn how to use the web as a listening tool and a research tool to understand your market and give your followers what they want.

More importantly, having a consultant who is experienced as a blogger and social media user on your side will help you avoid the pitfalls . The "blogosphere" community is self-policing and sometimes unforgiving. If you don't engage the community properly you may risk a huge loss of rapport. A social media consultant can help you present yourself and your company effectively and transparently. A good social media consultant is someone who has a great reputation in the online community; others speak of him well and trust his opinion; the things he shares are valued in the community, and he thus can provide tremendous value to the clients he represents.

A social media professional will use all the online tools available to spread the word about the organizations or campaigns he represents-much like traditional PR. But, compared with many traditional media, social media marketing is a strong and cost-effective tactic to compliment your other marketing efforts.

Cody McGibbin, contributing writer at SocialMediaMarking.com, is a nomadic entrepreneur & lifestyle designer who helps social changemakers & other remarkable people spread their message on the web.

Artist Tour Schedule - FREE Feed Generator

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 17:46:00 +0000

Are you an artist looking to post your tour schedule on your website and on multiple social networks? Do you have to update your tour schedule all in a variety of places across the web? Well now there's a great tool to help make this process much easier!!

Check out the site MakeDataMakeSense.com! They have some great tools and there is one you definitely should be using call the "MySpace Events Feed Creator". Just update your tour schedule on MySpace and feed it across the web in any place you wish!

The MySpace Events Feed Creator generates RSS or Atom feeds for MySpace events. Just enter the URL for a MySpace profile, and the feed will be created. You can use it to offer your events to people as feeds, or to republish your events on your non-MySpace sites.

Once you have created your feed - then you should use another great free tool called WebRSS. With WebRSS you can take any feed and covert it to display fresh content on your website, blog and social networks.

Here is a live example of one that I created for DJ/Producer ESKMO:
http://www.music2management.com/eskmo_tour_schedule.html

Free Social Media Monitoring Tools

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 02:26:00 +0000

Brand Overviews

HowSociable? - A simple, free, tool that can measure the visibility of your brand on the web across 22 metrics
Addict-o-matic - A nice search engine that aggregates rss feeds, allowing you to quickly see the areas where a brand is lacking in presence
socialmention - A social media search engine offering searches across individual platforms (eg blogs, microblogs) or all, together with a 'social rank' score. Whether or not the score is transparent enough to be meaningful is open to debate.

Blog Search Tools

TECHNORATI Search - Technorati's new search interface. Use it to find top blogs based upon inbound links only.
TECHNORATI Advanced - Technorati's advanced search page allows you to search for blogs (rather than posts) based on tags.
Google Blog Search - Google's index of blog posts. The advanced search tab allows you to search based on additional criteria. Very good for searching between specific dates.
IceRocket - Blog search tool that also graph-ifies!
BlogPulse - Search for blog posts by keyword. Developed by Nielsen BuzzMetrics.

Buzz Tracking

Serph - Track buzz in real time
Google Trends - shows amount of searches and google news stories
Trendpedia - Create charts showing the volume of discussion around multiple topics. Generates cool graphs.
BlogPulse Trends - Compare the mentions of specific keywords and phrases in blog posts (LEFT vs. RIGHT)
Omgili Charts - Omgili Buzz Graphs let you measure and compare the Buzz of any term. Mostly from review sites/forums.
eKstreme - blog data is obtained from Technorati and the social bookmarks come from del.icio.us.

Message Board Search Tools

BoardTracker - tracks words in forums
BoardReader - Search multiple message boards and forums.
Omgili - Omgili is a specialized search engine that focuses on "many to many" user generated content platforms, such as, forums, discussion groups, mailing lists, answer boards and others. Omgili finds consumer opinions, debates, discussions, personal experiences, answers and solutions.
Google Groups - Searches usenet groups.
Yahoo! Groups - Searches all Yahoo! Groups.

Twitter Search Tools

Twitter Search - Search keywords on Twitter which "self-refreshes". See what's happening -- 'right now'.
Twitstat - Twitter Tweitgeist - Tag cloud for last 500 Tweets
TweetScan - search for words on Twitter
Twit(url)y - see what people are talking about on Twitter
Hashtags - Realtime Tracking of Twitter Hashtags
TweetBeep - Track mentions of your brand on Twitter in real time.
Twitrratr - Rates mentions of your search term on Twitter as positive/neutral/negative
TweetMeme - View the most popular Twitter threads occurring now.
TwitScoop - Through an automated algorithm, twitscoop crawls hundreds of tweets every minute and extracts the words which are mentioned more often than usual and creates a tag cloud.
Twilert - Twitter application that lets you receive regular email updates of tweets containing your brand, product, service.

Web Site Traffic

Compete - Competitor site traffic reports. Estimates only of monthly visitor data. Best used on large high-traffic Web sites.
Quantcast - Use this on large high-traffic Websites. It allows you to compare multiple web sites in one handy chart. Estimates only of monthly visitor data.
Alexa - Comparative site traffic reports. Includes estimated reach, rank and page views.
BlogFlux Page Rank - Tells you Google Page Rank for a web page. Use this to compare different websites.

Search Data

Google Trends - Search trends and see search volume by country and region.
Google Insights - Compare search volume patterns across specific regions, categories, and time frames.
Wordtracker Keywords - Displays average daily search volume of a given keyword or phrase.
Yahoo! Keyword Tool - Displays search volumes for specific keywords and phrases for previous month's search data.
FACEBOOK LEXICON - Displays volume of wall postings for specific term(s). Similar to Google Trends. Not great with obscure terms.
Google Keyword Tool - Generate keyword ideas for related keywords and search volumes.

Multimedia Search

YouTube - Search for videos and channels by keyword.
MetaCafe - High-traffic video search engine.
Google Advanced Video Search - Search for videos, what else?
Flickr - Search Flickr for photos, groups or people/users.
Truveo - Aggregate video search engine. Search videos from YouTube, MySpace, and AOL.
Viral Video Chart - Displays top 20 most-viewed video (1, 7, 365 days). Includes view counts and charting.
Guardian's Viral Video Chart - Weekly roundup of what's excellent on the web

Social Bookmarking

Digg - Social Bookmarking, mainly for news, images and videos
StumbleUpon - Social bookmarking - general cool stuff
Delicious - Social bookmarking

Feed Aggregator

Yahoo Pipes - Feed aggregator and manipulator. Set up pipes for news alerts and overviews. Generally Awesome.

URL cruncher

Bit.ly - URL cruncher with dashboard metrics enabling measurement of number of clicks, countries clicked from, conversations around url etc

Specific Social Network Tracking

Adonomics - Facebook analytics and developer application tracking and graphing.

Search Engine rankings

PageRank Checker - Shows Google page ranking

Advertising and Event Tracking

MediaHound - Competitive tracking and analysis; focus on technology B2B space

Free Social Media Monitoring Tools

3 Hot Tips About Social Media Strategies

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 19:39:00 +0000

Companies large and small are rushing to understand and get involved in social media. But most of the agencies and consultants who are being paid to establish social media campaigns for corporations are afraid to tell their clients three things they don't want to hear.

1. Everyone Must Work Together

In most big companies, IT, digital, marketing and sales not only don't work together, they compete with each other. Until they start collaborating as a team, you will not succeed in social media.
For example, I recently handled social media advertising for a major retail chain's holiday microsite. The promotion was conceived by the digital department and involved augmented reality. But the IT department refused to allow a link from the homepage to the microsite because the microsite's design was done by an external agency.

Further, the marketing department refused to allow a dedicated e-mail to go out to the company's mailing list, and when placed in the company's normal promotional e-mail, the link to the microsite was lost in a sea of weekly specials.

These hurdles made it very hard to drive traffic to the microsite.
But more than that, this lack of internal collaboration and contact makes any kind of social media involvement virtually impossible.

A company that hasn't learned to listen to its own employees, and encourage them to collaborate internally, is not likely to succeed in integrating social media tools into its marketing mix, no matter what agency or consultant they hire.

2. Top Management Must Be On Board

If the direction doesn't come from the very top, managers, who have myriad reasons to fear change, will hang on to the status quo.

Despite the best intentions of agencies and consultants, social media integration is bound to meet huge resistance until top management says it's OK to spend time and money to integrate it into the company's marketing and culture.

Example: The marketing team of an international manufacturer of electronics wanted to know how the company could begin to use social media and we discussed the many possibilities.
Listening and responding to what customers are saying about the brand in social media can supply good intelligence and give the company a chance to interact with customers.

"Our management doesn't want to listen to customers," the PR director said. "They want to talk to them."
However, that doesn't work anymore. The status quo is dead. Any company that isn't willing to listen to customers and be nimble and quick enough to respond, and, when necessary, change, will soon be unable to compete with smart, tech-savvy companies that can turn on a dime.

Willingness to change is the new bottom line for every business today. But top management has to buy in before change can begin.

3. Don't Expect Overnight Success

Sure there are videos that go viral, contests that attract a lot of buzz, and Facebook () pages that get a lot of fans. But what comes after those efforts?

After the tools change (and they surely will) how will social media fit into the company's overall strategy and help it reach long-term goals?

With the scissors brand losing market share to foreign knock-offs, the company enlisted several actual crafters to blog, attend events, and represent the brand to customers as part of a new community strategy.
"If you empower your customers to become your evangelists, you'd better be prepared to continue it," says Brains on Fire's Geno Church. "It's permanent when you engage in this type of marketing."

Once you have created the community, listen to it. Fiskars made several changes to its products based on what it discovered through its Fiskateers community. Doing so helped build customer trust and loyalty.

Where Should Your Company Start?

Realizing that employing social media in the marketing mix is a long-term commitment to change, the best way to start is to pick manageable, measurable goals.

Pick a small number of social media goals for the coming year. Some possibilities:

- Turn the company newsletter into an internal blog and give all employees the ability to contribute
- Establish a social media policy for employee participation in social media on company time and beyond
- Let employees vote on the best ideas suggested by other employees
- Resolve to respond to customer service issues within three hours, via social media

Don't try to do all of these things at once. Pick the ones that are most likely to be possible for your company to start and sustain.

B.L. Ochman is a Managing Director of Proof Digital Media; publisher of What's Next Blog, and co-founder of pet site Pawfun.com.

Social Media: Not “One Size Fits All

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 19:22:00 +0000

Most companies are jumping on the social media marketing wagon and understand its role in brand reputation management and customer feedback. And why wouldn't they since it is quickly becoming one of the most intimate and non-invasive means of marketing? The "follow us," "be our fan," and recognizable Facebook and Twitter icons on company marketing materials are growing and marketing professionals have come to understand it is necessary to have a presence in the space... and let people know you are there.

Once companies garner the internal support needed to initiate a social media commitment (and it is a commitment), they begin thinking about strategy, ROI, marketing integration, etc. and realize the depth of this medium can be overwhelming. Companies are learning from others' mistakes and smartly putting an emphasis on careful and effective execution and without proper planning, this is rarely accomplished.

To execute social media the right way, the next question a company should ask is "how do we get started?" and "what should we be doing?" Those questions are paramount when crafting a social media strategy since there is not a "one size fits all" approach.
When planning an approach, there are a few key components to consider:

What is the overall goal for a social media campaign?
Without identifying why a company wants to get into social, a strategy is impossible.
What is important to the brand and to the target customer?
What is the best use of social base on the company goals and current services?
What do customers want to know or share (i.e. comments, images, videos, etc.)?
Do customers simply need a way of informal communication to share opinions or do they need/want more of a service focus?
What type of online presence already exists (if there is a presence, how can it be optimized)? Does the company current have an ad-hoc approach that can be organized to increase effectiveness or does the presence exist only on the customer side?

Carefully thinking about these considerations and crafting honest answers will help determine:

Which social media outlets and accounts will be created and why (i.e. what will be the Twitter account focus?).
How the social efforts will be maintained (updated and monitored). Are there internal resources or does the effort need a combination of internal resources and outsourcing?
The positioning of the accounts, which includes the focus (i.e. which accounts will be used to encourage feedback or manage brand reputation).

After these considerations are evaluated and the questions answered, a comprehensive social media marketing strategy can be created and execution can be planned accordingly.
This will get a company off to a great social media start and encourage success!

Jen Cohen is a social media and marketing maven knocked down many times in 26 yrs. Something Creative http://somethingcreativemarketing.com

New Income Streams For Musicians

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 18:37:00 +0000

The artist music business model has been in flux for years. The record deal dream that most artists sought is no longer the viable alternative that it once was. The leveling of the music distribution playing field by the Internet is virtually complete. Terrestrial radio is on a path towards destruction that even the major labels can’t compete with. People now access and download music from multiple sources, usually for free. D.I.Y. solutions are everywhere, but for many artists hard to integrate into their daily lives.

Where does this leave the average independent artist? At the beginning. Every artist wants to know how they can make music, make money and survive to write and play another day. Here, in no particular order, is a list of possible income streams. Please add anything I missed in the comments section below.

Publishing
Mechanical royalties
Performance Royalties from ASCAP and BMI
Digital Performance Royalties from Sound Exchange
Synch rights TV, Commercials, Movies, Video Games
Digital sales – Individual or by combination

Music (studio & live) Album – Physical & Digital, Single – Digital, Ringtone, Ringback, Podcasts
Instant Post Gig Live Recording via download, mobile streaming or flash drives
Video – Live, concept, personal, – Physical & Digital
Video and Internet Games featuring or about the artist
Photographs
Graphics and art work, screen savers, wall paper
Lyrics
Sheet music
Compilations
Merchandise – Clothes, USB packs, Posters, other things
Live Performances
Live Show – Gig
Live Show – After Party
Meet and Greet
Personal Appearance
Studio Session Work
Sponsorships, and endorsements
Advertising
Artist newsletter emails
Artist marketing and promotion materials
Blog/Website
Videos
Music Player
Fan Clubs
YouTube Subscription channel for more popular artists
Artist programmed internet radio station or specialty playlist. Any artist with a base creates a station or playlist for distribution programming the music he/she/they is/are into including their own. Fans could pay for shout outs and sponsors could pay for blocks of time or ads to support it. It could also be a subscription podcast that people could pay a couple of bucks or more a month for.
Financial Contributions of Support - Tip Jar or direct donations, Sellaband or Kickstarter
Patronage Model - Artist Fan Exclusives - e.g. paying to sing on a song in studio or have artist write a song for you
Mobile Apps
Artist Specific Revenue Stream - unique streams customized to the specific artist, e.g Amanda Palmer
Music Teaching - Lessons and Workshops
Music Employment - orchestras, etc, choir directors, ministers of music, etc.
Music Production - Studio and Live
Any job available to survive and keep making music
Getting Help From Other Artists and Helping Them - Whatever goes around come around. – e.g. gig swapping, songwriting, marketing and promotion

What income streams for musicians can you add?

This guest post by David Sherbow looks at potential artist revenue streams. David is the CEO of LiveMusicMachine.com and blogs MusicBizGuy Speaks.

Original Article on HyperBot

SEO For Your Blog Article Posts

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 18:28:00 +0000

Each time you post new content on your website or blog, you should always adhere to a step-by-step process to ensure you've done everything required by these search engine optimization standards to help you gain a higher ranking on the search engines.

The process should go as follows:

Topic Research
Keyword Research
Title Tags
Meta Description
Meta Keywords
Write the Content or Article
Ensure Keywords are Present in Your Written Content
Include Anchor Tags
Syndicate Content

Lets take a look at these steps to better understand what each one involves to help you start achieving higher search engine rankings.

Topic Research

Most website owners already know what their website will be about when they first set it up. If you know what your target market is, simply provide content on your site that meets the needs of your market, but do the necessary research required to support your content. Doing so provides value to your sites visitors and will ensure your site is accurately providing the information and content they seek. Providing accurate information on your site that is relevant to what your site is about is loved by search engines. The more frequently you do this to ensure your site and the content you are providing is relevant to what your site is about will boost your search engine rankings significantly over time.

Keyword Research

I can't stress enough how important keyword research is to your ability to achieve higher rankings on the search engines. Use free tools such as NicheBot Classic and Google Adwords Keyword Tool to conduct research on the various keywords that are relevant to the content you are writing. Look for a combination of keywords that receive high search usage among the search engines that are relevant to your content. Once you've identified a set of keywords, make sure to write those keywords into your content. For example, this blog post is about search engine rankings… Look through the post and see if you can identify how many times the keywords “search engine” appear in this post. You'll notice they appear quite frequently This is done so search engine spiders know in detail, what the page is about and will give it a higher search engine ranking due to the relevance of the post to its title and topic.

Title Tags

Title tags are extremely important to your search engine ranking. It is well known in the search engine optimization industry that ensuring your title tags contain keywords words relevant to the content on a particular web page that it is describing will grant you a much greater opportunity to achieve higher search engine rankings. Always ensure you write enticing, yet descriptive titles to all your web pages and blog posts.

As an example, the first two words of the title for this post are key words that receive a great number of searches every month on the search engines and are very relevant to this post. You'll also notice the title of this post is displayed in the title bar of your browser which is managed by the title tag of this page. Bottom line, well written, keyword optimized yet descriptive titles for your pages and posts will go a seriously long way to helping you achieve a greater ranking on the search engines.

If you are a blogger and use WordPress, install the All-in-One SEO plugin for WordPress which provides some of more basic title tag and meta tag customization features.

Original Article By Sean Smith, Powerofmore.net

Getting Serious With Social Media

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 21:42:00 +0000

This is the year to buckle down and tackle a social media strategy. It's time to get serious!!

Here's 10 ways to get serious about social media in 2010:

1) Quit counting fans, followers, and blog subscribers like bottle caps. Think, instead, about what you're hoping to achieve with and through the community that actually cares about what you're doing.

2) Learn how to measure your efforts by utilizing reporting and stats. Quit making excuses for why you can't do it - and make this a part of your Social Media strategy.

3) Learn what case studies can do and can't do for you. Stop saying there aren't enough of them and go Google the term "social media case studies" or spend a few minutes on my Delicious links. Then, get busy writing your own.

4) Understand the difference between making a business case for social media and chasing the next and greatest fad. If you don't understand how to explain where social media impacts areas outside the business besides your own, make a concerted effort to learn.

5) Stop lauding social media as the thing that's going to fix it all. Fix your business first.

6) Approach social media methodically, and with the same care that you would any other business investment you make.

7) Quit waiting for the water to be perfect before you get in. It's not going to be, ever. Try something that makes strategic sense for your business.

8 ) Think long term, and commit to it. That doesn't mean some of your experiments can't be finite, but the overall approach has to be for good.

9) Focus on what you're good at. Know the core of your business, and make that the center of your work, especially through the amplifier of social media.

10) Recognize that potential missteps shouldn't paralyze you into inaction. Acknowledge that there are ways to recover from, say, a misguided communication effort. Having a plan to pick yourself up is the key, rather than trying to avoid failure at all costs (including stagnation).

What else would you add? What's your buckle-down strategy this year, and how are you turning your approach from theory into application? Share your ideas, favorite posts, and strategies in the comments.

Abridged: Amber Naslund, Altitudebranding.com

Implementing Social Media Tactics

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 23:56:00 +0000

Check out this SlideShare Presentation on building networks and driving new business.

50 Social Media Tactics for Nonprofits

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 23:53:00 +0000

Check out this great presentation on Social Media strategies and tactics. Even though the presentation is geared towards nonprofit, anyone can learn a few new tips and tricks and apply it to their own business.

Video: The Social Media Guru

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 17:39:00 +0000

So I thought I would share this very entertaining video on Social Media. The reason I found this video interesting enough to share - is because it DOES touch upon some very valid points and "misconceptions" that many have about Social Media and what exactly it is...and why they need it.

Check out the video below, please feel free to share your comments and feedback on this one!! Don't be shy - just Doit!

What is Social Media About?

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 19:10:00 +0000

Social Media is about, sharing and interacting online.

It's about giving value, being social and communicating with everybody who crosses your path through the Internet. Social media is about the people - it's about community building. It gives them a voice and grants them the power to change things and make decisions that can affect your company and brand, either in a profitable or harmful way.

In Social Media, communication is a two-way street, where public and brands interact, storing and distributing content created by all different natures. Social media's content allows you to take part, collaborate and distribute information to all. Social Media strengthens the emotional ties that bind people together, creating fans instead of customers.

Social Media isn't ONLY about creating and sharing content. The best experiences you can achieve with Social Media is by listening, reading, discussing, blogging, commenting, and/or giving feedback to the community.

In short, social media is about building an effective communication channel between brands and their environment, helping them to merge a strategy in each social working area.

Why Social Media?

Using Social Media in business is today's reality in which today's environment demands. We're tired, we need change, we need to have fun, but above all we need brands to be authentic, reliable and truly inspiring. We live in an over-communicated society, where tones of messages try to gain a little of space in our minds, but now the wheel has changed hands. Those traditional advertising methods "I communicate - you receive" are no longer valid, that's water under the bridge.

Social media allows companies to listen, understand and offer content that best meets their needs.

Advantages of using Social Media:

- Tapping into the younger audience to make it easier to predict trends
- Strengthens relationships between customers and brands
- Builds trust and loyalty, turning a customer into a fan
- Differs from other media reaching the audience in a less intrusive way
- Connects the brand with the immediate environment making your brand seem sociable, familiar and popular
- Goes viral: the brand will reach more people in less time.
- Increasing social media efforts raises the level of brand awareness online
- Social media is trustworthy and an efficient reasearch tool

Related Article: What is Social Media?

What is Social Media?

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 18:18:00 +0000

Social media is a phrase being tossed around a lot these days, but it can sometimes be difficult to answer the question of ... what EXACTLY is social media?

If Facebook and MySpace are social media sites, and Digg, reddit, and Newsvine are social media sites, and Wikipedia is a social media site, then just what is social media?

What is Social Media?

The best way to define social media is to break it down. Media is an instrument on communication, like a newspaper or a radio, so social media would be a social instrument of communication.

In Web 2.0 terms, this would be a website that doesn't JUST give you information, but interacts with you while giving you that information. This interaction can be as simple as asking for your comments or letting you vote on an article, or it can be more complex and can make recommendations based on the ratings of other people with similar interests.

Think of regular media as a one-way street where you can read a newspaper or listen to a report on television, but you have very limited ability to give your thoughts on the matter.

Social media is a two-way street that gives you the ability to communicate too.

What Are Some Social Media Websites?

Now that we have answered the question of what is social media, we can move on to social media websites. Because social media is such a broad term, it covers a large range of websites. But the one common link between these websites is that you are able to interact with the website and interact with other visitors.

Here are some examples of social media websites:

Social Bookmarking. (Del.icio.us, Blinklist, Simpy) Interact by tagging websites and searching through websites bookmarked by other people.
Social News. (Digg, Propeller, Reddit) Interact by voting for articles and commenting on them.
Social Networking. (Facebook, Hi5, Last.FM) Interact by adding friends, commenting on profiles, joining groups and having discussions.
Social Photo and Video Sharing. (YouTube, Flickr) Interact by sharing photos or videos and commenting on user submissions.
Wikis. (Wikipedia, Wikia) Interact by adding articles and editing existing articles.

And these websites are not the only social media websites. Any website that invites you to interact with the site and with other visitors falls into the definition of social media.

Related Aticle: What is Social Media All About?

Publish Relevant Content in Directories

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 17:11:00 +0000

One great way to drive traffic to your blog and website is through publishing relevant articles and content in as many article directories as makes sense.

Here are a handful of free article directories to submit to:

Ezine Article (http://www.ezinearticles.com)
Article Dashboard (http://www.articledashboard.com)
Go Article (http://www.goarticles.com)
Search Warp (http://www.searchwarp.com)
Amazines (http://www.amazines.com)
Article Teller (http://www.articleteller.com)
Article Alley (http://www.articlealley.com)
Article OnRamp (http://www.articleonramp.com)
Article-Gems (http://www.article-gems.com)
Easy Articles (http://www.easyarticles.com)

Video Tutorials: Social Media 101

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 16:54:00 +0000

Introduction To Social Media

What The F**K is Social Media?

FREE DOWNLOAD: Twitter Guide Book

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 18:10:00 +0000

"Twitter is a social network used by millions of people, and thousands more are signing up every day to send short messages to groups of friends. But where's the user manual for Twitter? Where do new Twitter users go to learn about Tweeting, retweets, hashtags and customizing your Twitter profile? Where do you go if you want to know all about building a community on Twitter, or using Twitter for business? How can you find advanced tools for using Twitter on your phone or your desktop? To answer all these questions and more, we've assembled The Twitter Guide Book, a complete collection of resources for mastering Twitter. Happy Tweeting!" -- Pete Cashmore, @Mashable

The team at Mashable have done a fantastic job of putting together The Twitter Guide Book.

You can download The Twitter Guide Book here (23mb).

The Twitter Guide Book is a one-stop shop for getting up to speed with everything Twitter, from managing your Twitter stream to promoting a business.

There is an audio introduction to The Twitter Guide Book by Mashable Founder Pete Cashmore.

The Twitter Guide Book is printable and shareable and is split between five chapters:

1. Twitter 101: The Basics

2. Building Your Twitter Community

3. Managing Your Twitter Stream

4. Sharing on Twitter

5. Twitter for Business

This guide is perfect for when someone asks "What's Twitter all about?"

You can download The Twitter Guide Book here (23mb).

Setup a Landing Page on Facebook!

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 15:28:00 +0000

So you have finally gotten around to creating a page for your business or club on Facebook. You have secured a vanity URL and your blog's posts are automatically being pulled into and displayed on your Facebook page.

Now what?

Why not set up your own custom landing page?

If you haven't heard of a landing page before, it is the page on a website that you arrive on.. or land on.
When someone browses to your Facebook fan page for the first time, the landing page is page that is displayed to them.

Facebook allows you to configure landing pages for new visitors (ie non-fans), so that they land on that custom page instead of your wall.

The goal of the landing page is to convert new visitors into fans by providing them with information that makes them want to become a fan.

This guide will show you how to set up a custom landing page.

Add the Static FBML Application

Then click on Browse More Applications,

In the search box type in FBML,

Click on Static FBML,

Click on Add to my Page,

Viral Marketing at it's best! By Jib Jab

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 16:51:00 +0000

Here is a great viral marketing holiday idea created for OfficeMax called Elf Yourself! Great fun..and a great idea!!

Artists Only Need 1000 True Fans

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 18:19:00 +0000

What can an artist do to be successful and make a living at their art?

One solution is to find 1,000 True Fans. While some artists have discovered this path without calling it that, I think it is worth trying to formalize. The gist of 1,000 True Fans can be stated simply:
A creator, such as an artist, musician, photographer, craftsperson, performer, animator, designer, videomaker, or author - in other words, anyone producing works of art - needs to acquire only 1,000 True Fans to make a living.

A True Fan is defined as someone who will purchase anything and everything you produce. They will drive 200 miles to see you sing. They will buy the super deluxe re-issued hi-res box set of your stuff even though they have the low-res version. They have a Google Alert set for your name. They bookmark the eBay page where your out-of-print editions show up. They come to your openings. They have you sign their copies. They buy the t-shirt, and the mug, and the hat. They can't wait till you issue your next work. They are true fans.

To raise your sales out of the flatline of the long tail you need to connect with your True Fans directly. Another way to state this is, you need to convert a thousand Lesser Fans into a thousand True Fans.
Assume conservatively that your True Fans will each spend one day's wages per year in support of what you do. That "one-day-wage" is an average, because of course your truest fans will spend a lot more than that. Let's peg that per diem each True Fan spends at $100 per year. If you have 1,000 fans that sums up to $100,000 per year, which minus some modest expenses, is a living for most folks.

One thousand is a feasible number. You could count to 1,000. If you added one fan a day, it would take only three years. True Fanship is doable. Pleasing a True Fan is pleasurable, and invigorating. It rewards the artist to remain true, to focus on the unique aspects of their work, the qualities that True Fans appreciate.
The key challenge is that you have to maintain direct contact with your 1,000 True Fans. They are giving you their support directly. Maybe they come to your house concerts, or they are buying your DVDs from your website, or they order your prints from Pictopia. As much as possible you retain the full amount of their support. You also benefit from the direct feedback and love.

The technologies of connection and small-time manufacturing make this circle possible. Blogs and RSS feeds trickle out news, and upcoming appearances or new works. Web sites host galleries of your past work, archives of biographical information, and catalogs of paraphernalia. Diskmakers, Blurb, rapid prototyping shops, Myspace, Facebook, and the entire digital domain all conspire to make duplication and dissemination in small quantities fast, cheap and easy. You don't need a million fans to justify producing something new. A mere one thousand is sufficient.

This small circle of diehard fans, which can provide you with a living, is surrounded by concentric circles of Lesser Fans. These folks will not purchase everything you do, and may not seek out direct contact, but they will buy much of what you produce. The processes you develop to feed your True Fans will also nurture Lesser Fans. As you acquire new True Fans, you can also add many more Lesser Fans. If you keep going, you may indeed end up with millions of fans and reach a hit. I don't know of any creator who is not interested in having a million fans.

But the point of this strategy is to say that you don't need a hit to survive. You don't need to aim for the short head of best-sellerdom to escape the long tail. There is a place in the middle, that is not very far away from the tail, where you can at least make a living. That mid-way haven is called 1,000 True Fans. It is an alternate destination for an artist to aim for.

Young artists starting out in this digitally mediated world have another path other than stardom, a path made possible by the very technology that creates the long tail. Instead of trying to reach the narrow and unlikely peaks of platinum hits, bestseller blockbusters, and celebrity status, they can aim for direct connection with 1,000 True Fans. It's a much saner destination to hope for. You make a living instead of a fortune. You are surrounded not by fad and fashionable infatuation, but by True Fans. And you are much more likely to actually arrive there.

A few caveats. This formula - one thousand direct True Fans -- is crafted for one person, the solo artist. What happens in a duet, or quartet, or movie crew? Obviously, you'll need more fans. But the additional fans you'll need are in direct geometric proportion to the increase of your creative group. In other words, if you increase your group size by 33%, you need add only 33% more fans. This linear growth is in contrast to the exponential growth by which many things in the digital domain inflate. I would not be surprise to find that the value of your True Fans network follows the standard network effects rule, and increases as the square of the number of Fans. As your True Fans connect with each other, they will more readily increase their average spending on your works. So while increasing the numbers of artists involved in creation increases the number of True Fans needed, the increase does not explode, but rises gently and in proportion.

A more important caution: Not every artist is cut out, or willing, to be a nurturer of fans. Many musicians just want to play music, or photographers just want to shoot, or painters paint, and they temperamentally don't want to deal with fans, especially True Fans. For these creatives, they need a mediator, a manager, a handler, an agent, a galleryist -- someone to manage their fans. Nonetheless, they can still aim for the same middle destination of 1,000 True Fans. They are just working in a duet.

Third distinction. Direct fans are best. The number of True Fans needed to make a living indirectly inflates fast, but not infinitely. Take blogging as an example. Because fan support for a blogger routes through advertising clicks, more fans are needed for a blogger to make a living. But while this moves the destination towards the left on the long tail curve, it is still far short of blockbuster territory. Same is true in book publishing. When you have corporations involved in taking the majority of the revenue for your work, then it takes many times more True Fans to support you. To the degree an author cultivates direct contact with his/her fans, the smaller the number needed.

Lastly, the actual number may vary depending on the media. Maybe it is 500 True Fans for a painter and 5,000 True Fans for a videomaker. The numbers must surely vary around the world. But in fact the actual number is not critical, because it cannot be determined except by attempting it. Once you are in that mode, the actual number will become evident. That will be the True Fan number that works for you. My formula may be off by an order of magnitude, but even so, its far less than a million.

Original Article here!

Facebook Friend of Small Business

noreply@blogger.com (Lisa Libutti, Social Media Specialist) — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 16:20:00 +0000

Firms are building fan bases on the social networking website and using it to connect with customers.

Charles Nelson, president of Sprinkles Cupcakes, the Beverly Hills baker to the stars, doesn't have a Facebook profile. Nelson, who works seven days a week, has no time for chatting online with Facebook friends.

But Nelson is logged on to Facebook all the time. That's because more than 70,000 people have declared themselves fans of Sprinkles' Facebook page, which has its own "vanity URL" at www.facebook.com /sprinkles.

Each day on the website, Sprinkles announces a secret word, such as "ganache," or "bunny," or "tropical," or "love," and the first 25 or 50 people to show up at any of its five stores and whisper that word get a free cupcake.

"On Facebook, we can ask our customers what's the next location they want," Nelson said. "What do they think of our next flavor? It's an amazing way to communicate with our fans."

Facebook is not just for friends anymore. The free social networking site -- blocked in many workplaces as a potential time-waster -- is increasingly becoming an inexpensive marketing tool for small businesses.

Sprinkles is among a growing number of mom-and-pop businesses taking advantage of a relatively new program on Facebook, one that allows them to claim their name, become visible even to folks who aren't on the site, and stay in close contact with their customers. The business, in effect, can act like any other person on Facebook, posting status updates and seeing what its fans are doing.

Facebook doesn't break out figures for small businesses but says it has 1.4 million business "pages," with an average of 100 fans per page. Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg said in a speech in New York last month that every day, 10 million people become fans of pages. (Many of those pages are for random concepts, such as the beach, or laughter, or even one called "I don't sleep enough because I stay up late for no reason," which has 3.5 million fans.)

Businesses need to go where their customers are, and increasingly these days, that's on Facebook and other social media sites, analysts say. More than 300 million people have signed up for Facebook, and half of them visit the site every day.

"Over the past two years, we've seen this increasing uptick in businesses realizing that their customers are on Facebook," said Tim Kendall, Facebook's director of monetization product marketing. "If they can create a presence in Facebook that allows customers to connect with them, it can be a way to strengthen that connection and also to find new customers."

Plenty of other sites are also wooing small local businesses. The review site Yelp, Citysearch and a host of Yellow Pages sites are all making a push.

And typically, businesses don't stick to one site such as Facebook. Instead, they spread their presence across the social media landscape, including MySpace, Twitter and LinkedIn. Increasingly, these sites connect with one another so that a status update on Facebook becomes a tweet on Twitter, or a blog post could be pushed out to several sites.

"Companies don't have a lot of resources to create their own website," said Jeremiah Owyang, a social media analyst at Altimeter Group. "Using these sites where the customers already are in their communities makes a lot of sense."

Janet Rothstein, who runs a jewelry shop in Beverly Hills, used a company called MerchantCircle as her gateway to the online world, and she has since obtained a Facebook vanity URL for her page, where she has 63 fans. Having an online presence in so many places increases the odds that when someone searches on Google, they will find her.

Facebook is increasingly finding itself a rival of Google. It believes it can offer more relevant search results because the content is coming from people you know and trust, especially in the hotly contested field of local advertising.

"We are naturally really well-positioned to create a lot of value for local businesses," Facebook's Kendall said. "When you think about how you learn in the off-line world about local businesses and services, which cafe, which dentist, you learn a lot of that from the people you trust and are friends with. Facebook is able to streamline that process a bit."

Yet Google remains the king of search, and Facebook says its pages frequently turn up in the Google search results.

That's important, said Avichal Garg, a former Google employee who now owns PrepMe, a Palo Alto company that offers online test preparation.

His Facebook page drives traffic and sales because "it ranks well in search and people use search for companies they haven't done business with before," Garg said in an e-mail, noting how Facebook has brought in about 5% of his new business. "Facebook is a trusted domain so people click on it and when they see the faces behind the company name, they know we're legitimate."

"Having the vanity URL and presence on Facebook and Twitter really help," Garg said.

Social media help companies take control of "the Google resume," said Adrian Lurssen, a vice president at JD Supra, an online legal site based in Marshall, Calif. When people search for your company -- or for what your company sells -- you want your site to turn up in the first 10 results, or the first page Google delivers.

Nelson of Sprinkles agrees. Fans of his cupcakes (actually, his wife, Candace, is the pastry chef) shower Sprinkles with praise -- and word-of-mouth buzz. Their Facebook friends all see when they comment on Sprinkles' page. "You're looking for customers but you're really looking for advocates," Nelson said. "We've never had paid advertising in five years of being open."