Archive for May, 2007
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, May 24th, 2007
I had the opportunity tonight to attend my first Professional Women’s Network meeting and I must say what a pleasure to meet so many smart ladies doing invaluable work, especially given the typically male dominated events I have been attending of late.
But enough of that, I want to talk about the presentation which was given by AHA Creative Strategies co-founder and CEO, Ruth Atherle called “Maximizing the Power of Web Communication Tools” and specifically the security issue that came up.
Ruth did an excellent job in discussing the advantages to having a corporate blog and the reasons why every company should have one such as establishing your credibility and driving prospects to your web site.
The talk quickly came around to the perceived downsides to blogging and I’d like to provide a brief synopsis of the security issue: how safe and secure is it to blog?
It’s a question that has constantly plagued Internet business innovators and Ruth countered it well by pointing out that the Internet is in many ways safer than the physical world in that you have a barrier between you and potential harm doers:the worst that can be done is to place unwanted comments on your blog and you can counter these by looking on them as an opportunity to address the issue in a positive manner the public forum, choosing to vet all comments before posting or, as a last resort and unlikely to happen you can contact a lawyer.
It was noted that bloggers are in general upstanding members of the community and are loyal, when someone posts inappropriate comments they tend to rally round in support.
As far as I am concerned, I believe that we all have a right to our opinions and if we wish to use blogging as a means to share our knowledge and establish our areas of expertiese we should feel comfortable in doing so. However, anyone who is ready to put up a business blog must accept that it will open their business up to critisicm and counter opinions and they should put in place policy guidelines to help guide contributors and establish limits.
Heres a link to AHAs blog which has some great resources for anyone seriously considering blogging as a means to enhance their marketing efforts.
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, May 17th, 2007
Many companies do great damage to their brand when developing or enhancing their web presence. Avoid these pitfalls by reading the following articles written for FMWalsh and Associates that discuss how to effectively brand your web presence.
Creating A Successful Corporate Internet Brand – Part 1
Creating A Successful Corporate Internet Brand – Part 2
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, May 15th, 2007
Tips to make your email marketing more effective:
- No selling – its better to use email as a means of keeping existing customers happy rather than annoying potential new ones. This has tyhe added advantage of helping avoid the communication being tagged as spam;
- Use an Attention Grabbing title – one that is brief, catchy and intelligent. It will elicit opening of the mail;
- Always make it easy for people to unsubscribe by adding a link in the mail that allows them to do so easily. When someone does unsubscribe, be sure to delete them from the list otherwise you cold risk unwanted negative perceptions;
- Make it easy for readers to do business with by including a link back to your website and full contact information;
- Don’t use too many graphics or animated images – not all users will be able to see them and it could clog recipient email servers;
- Include a compelling reason to follow up – for example: “first ten people to respond receive….” and remember to make the reward worth it;
- Don’t include too much text – no one has time to read endless emails and it risks confusing the issue and dilluting the point you are trying to make;
- Always remember to add value- your email should be informative and unique – tell readers something they don’t already know;
- Make it easy to subscribe – allow users to subscribe to your email newsletters on your website and publicise them on other promotional materials;
- Check your spam rating before sending – use sites like eNetplace and SiteBuildIt! to assess whether your mail will get past the spam checkers
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, May 10th, 2007
To save me time and effort I like to subscribe to information on the web and have it come to me so that I can read and enjoy when I have a moment. Doing so helps me avoid the frustration of sifting through the internet wilderness trying to re-find cool feeds I have enjoyed in the past. My tool of choice to do this is Google Reader.
I recently wrote a blog piece that describes how to easily set up and use this to your advantage. Read The Scoop on Google Reader for a Google Reader How To….
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, May 09th, 2007
Did you know that the Forrester Group estimates that there will be 100 million bloggers worldwide this year and that there are a further 200 million ex bloggers who got bored and gave up the ghost? Did you also know that around 40% of people who write on-line have had their work published in other media?
Its true there is a lot of opinions out there in the blogosphere jostling for attention. Many of them are intelligently presented and many seem to be pure drivel (I guess thats purely subjective) but if you are patient and consistent in your blogging and you have something unique and interesting to say – your blog will draw attention and it will have the added benefit of keeping your customers and prospects up to date with what’s happening at your organisation.
Remember, the key is consistency – if you can’t consistently post a valuable peice (minimum 2 per week) then you may as well not to bother. If that’s a struggle for you then get creative – ask colleagues, customers and employees to write for you or simply link back to articles you’ve found on the web yourself that are relevant and appropriate and introduce them by summarising why you found them interesting.
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, May 08th, 2007
I came upon a good article by Ryan Whelton called Selling With a Blog that discusses the benefits to corporate blogging in terms of increased sales, enhanced market exposure and improved search engine positioning. It gives examples of companies that have implemented this technology and describes the measurable benefits they have seen.
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, May 03rd, 2007
I’ve been exploring Second Life recently to find out if it really has any potential as a marketing vehicle and I have to say, I can’t fathom what all the fuss is about.
Firstly, it took a new computer to actually have the capacity required to run the damn thing and secondly even with a souped up super computer I still find it slow, sporadic and painful to manoeuvre through.
I managed to graduate from the orientation island quite easily and was set free in the Second Life world. The look and feel is pretty cool but so far there seems to be no one out there. Nobody at the church I came upon (even although it was Sunday!), no-one at Club Wildebeast the crazy dance place and no-one at the Second Life Telus store (where are you Sparkle Dale? – where’s the phone for my avatar?).
The most disappointing Second Life aspect of all is that beyond the cool images and environment, Second Life is senseless and by that I mean: you can’t feel, smell, hear etc. Each time I visit I come away with the feeling I have just been wasting my time……
I’ll be keeping a close eye on Second Life but right now the barriers to entry and the time wasted lead me to deduce that it will be a while before Second Life can be considered as a viable medium for effective marketing. And by then the fad crowds may have moved on to the next big thing – or maybe they have already.
It seems I am not the only one with this sentiment read this post from Darren Barefoot for more.
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, May 01st, 2007
Here are some great sites that are currently using new media technologies to expand their reach:
http://www.hawaii-aloha.com – uses regular blog posts to provide useful tips and suggestions to help subsribers plan a trip to Hawaii. They also use podcast technology HawaiiVacationConnection to allow vacationers to listen to regular commentaries on hawaii vacation experiences. Its great way to add value for holiday makers and set themselves apart from the competition.
Another great example of companies using new media technologies is Honey Dew Day Spa here in Vancouver which uses the MySpace social networking platform as a forum to promote their spa services. They network and extend their reach by adding MySpace friends in the Vancouver area who meet their typical spa client demographic. That’s how they found me and next time I am thinking about pampering myself, I am going to go there and find out just how successful their MySpace strategy is whilst I am at it.
