As always there has been a lot going on in the social media arena in the past week.  This is a summary of the major (and minor!) developments.

Facebook Questions

On July 28th Facebook announced that it was going to launch Facebook Questions.  The tool is set to allow you to crowdsource the collective intelligence of the 500 million and growing Facebook user base to ask questions and get answers.  Set to compete with tools like Ask, Yahoo Answers and Answerbag, you will be able to ask any question and hopefully get the right answer practically instantaneously.  The functionality isn’t live yet and is only available to a small number of beta testers but to find out more you can read this Mashable  post about the 5 Ways Facebook Questions can be improved.

Google Wave

Google waved bye bye to its Wave product which was launched late last year.  At the time there was much clamoring to get on the communication and collaboration tool which was supposed to allow people to easily work together online.  Unfortunately, Wave didn’t really catch on and today it is no more.  In typical Google fashion though, it would appear that they are turning the failure to their advantage. On a positive note Google yesterday announced that business can now respond to reviews on Google Places.  Not before time.

Twitter Fail

The Twitter fail whale was omnipresent for much of the afternoon which prompted diehards to take to Facebook to voice their complaints and comments and to vent to relieve their anxiety withdrawal.  This leads me to conclude that the Reuters article in today’s Washington Post highlighting a study that found that social media is costing businesses in the UK billions in lost productivity, could in fact be true across the Twitter world!  Twitter is back up much to the disapointment of businesses in North America who saw productivity peak in the last few hours.

Here at Out-Smarts, we often get asked to assess company websites from a search engine perspective, to ascertain why their page isn’t appearing higher on Google.  Often one of the main reasons is because they don’t have enough back links to their website: links from other websites tracking back to their site.

I’ve said it before and I will say it again: links are like gold online, the more your website has the better its ranking will be.  Link building can be extremely time consuming and can seem like a fruitless task but its worth it.  Here are 10 ways that you can easily build links back to your site:

1. Blog Comments – find blogs that are relevant to your industry and business and post appropriate comments with a link back to your website.

2. Directories – there are gazillions of websites that simply list the URL’s of other website (rather like the Yellow pages but online).  Submit a link to your site on the ones that have a good page rank.  Avoid the ones that ask for payment or reciprolinks to save you.

3. Articles – if you blog regularly or write articles then use that great content and submit your articles to online articles sites.  Again, choose articles sites that have a high ranking like Ezine articles.

4. Events – if your business is a service that regularly hosts events then list your events and link back to your site in so doing.  Read this blog post for more.

5.  Social Networks – use your social networking presence to link back to your site.  These links count and are really easy to create.

6. Relationships – ask partners, clients and organisations you are a member of to place a link on their site back to yours.

7. Bookmarking – sites like Delicious or Stumble Upon allow you to submit sites that you like.  Submit your own (carefully) to build valuable links back to your site.  Read this article for more.

8. Press Releases - if your company regularly creates promotional pieces or press releases, use free PR release sites: submit your press releases to these sites with a link back to your website.  Here’s an article all about how to go about doing so.

9.  Content - make sure that the content on your website or blog is great.  The better it is the more likely people will find it and link back to it.

10. Advertising - consider advertising online:  Craigslist can be a valuable way to to this – not only does it bring visitors to your site who might link to your content (see 9 above) but it also gives you the ability to link back to your site from another high ranking site.

Thanks -wink- for the great Flickr image.

When you subscribe to a blog or podcast or use portal like iGoogle the technology that brings the information to you is called RSS. It is a way of publishing information easily making it available to subscribers in a central on-line repository. Just like getting your newspaper delivered to your door, RSS delivers your online content to you.

Why take advantage of RSS? There are many reasons:

1. Pull rather than push – articles come to users rather than them having to hunt them down;
2. Subscribers get the latest and greatest information as its posted;
3. An RSS link encourages traffic to your site;
4. Users can have a bunch of sources of info in one place – much like a newspaper;
5. RSS can be used internally to disseminate information too.

How to set up an RSS feed?

• First get your site set up to support RSS by adding a few short lines of code.
• Place code on your site that the RSS feed readers can find your info.
• Publicise your feed by telling the world and everyone you know in it at every opportunity.
• Add the RSS feed button to your site so visitors know you the can easily subscribe. Feedburner has widgets to support this on their site.
• Submit your feed to syndicators and search engines to make it easier for your audience to find you.

Once that’s done, your good to start publishing your own data feed over the web.

Bookmarking sites are sites on the Internet that allow you to share and save your online discoveries making it easier for you to keep track of those gems you discover online and intend to revisit.  Not only do bookmarking sites allow you to bookmark the sites you like but they also allow you to connect with others who have similar interested and to share sites with them too.  They also have an added benefit in that, if you use them effectively they will increase your online exposure.

Most bookmarking sites allow you to download a widget to your browser allowing you to easily bookmark sites that you like and want to share.  Each time you find a site you like you can click to add it and to organize with appropriate tags.

Some of the most popular bookmarking sites are Reddit, Delicious, Stumble Upon and Digg for a more comprehensive list go to Wikipedia.  These are all social networking sites: online hubs where people connect, build community and communicate and interact online.  Like other types of social networks they can be very effective in driving traffic to your website, building online connections and increasing your online exposure.

If you think bookmarking sites may be a good tool to consider using as part of your Internet marketing strategy, you should take time to take a look at the sites above to ascertain which is most appropriate given your target audience and content (by exploring tags or categories and the type of sites contained therein).  As with any social media marketing activity, to be effective you need to add value, be consistent and to connect and build community with others.

Another Friday Funny from the creator of Being Five.

This month’s new media reasons to be cheerful include:

• A new way to brainstorm online using Mind Meister mind mapping tools.
• Social media demographics from Flowtown – who is using which social networking site.
• Create your own newspaper in 60 seconds.
• Create astonishing presentations both live and on the web with Prezi.
• Location based social networking is currently the in thing – check out Carticipate and Gowalla and check out this list for more.
• Know more about who you know with Gist.

Enjoy!

There are social networks, professional networks, microblogs, video sites, events sites, blogs, photo sites… the list goes on and one thing is for certain, you can’t be on all of them.

It is best, in fact,  to deploy social media marketing strategies that involve using only a select  few of these tools in highly targeted ways.

How to decide which social media tools to use?

In order to ascertain which social media tools are best you need to know a few things – some good old market research is needed:

1. Customer – if you don’t already know this then you should.  Understand who it is you want to do business with and what it is that you do that solves a problem for them.  Take some time to listen to what is being said about your company or industry in these forums.  Doing so will help understand the online habit of your customers.
2. Company – consider your organisation, its products or services and determine which media are most appropriate to showcase these.  Consider too, the resources you have at hand (what are you and your staff great at?) and use these strengths to build your social media campaign.
3. Convenience – where is the best place to reach your audience online?  Which tools  you use will depend on knowing this.  For example, LinkedIn is great to reach business people, Flickr is a great place to showcase art, photography and design companies – you get the gist.
4. Communication – always remember to be consistent with your messaging and branding.  Your online brand and message should be consistent with your overall branding as well so as not to confuse.   The goal here is to build community, so consider ways to communicate and interact online that will add value, encourage interaction and grow your following.

Take these four C’s into account and your social media marketing is more likely to hit the mark.

In a world of never ending SPAM it’s a real challenge to create successful e-mail campaigns but  not impossible. Email can still be a hugely valuable tool to reach your market and should not be dismissed.  Here are some pointers to bear in mind when consider your email campaigns:

Tips For Effective Email Campaigns

1. Avoid the hard sell – People get so much spam these days that if you try to sell to strangers via e, you’ll hit the junk file faster than you can say spam. Newsletters that add value are better than sales letters that harass;
2. Keep in Touch – It is easier to keep an existing customer than to get a new one. Email is a great way to keep in touch with clients; to reinforce your brand; add value, to remind them you are here and to give them special incentives to do more business with you;
3. Email Marketing Tools – use a tool that allows you to easily create and mail your newsletter to contacts.  It is important to choose one that allows you track who opens, when they open, what they click on etc: this will allow you to assess whether your campaigns are working.
4. Action – Use a call to action in the subject line – one that is brief, catchy, intelligent that will entice people to open the mail. I’ve noticed a lot of people use titles that are completely unrelated to the content of the mail – this, to me, is deceptive and not the actions of a company I would do business with;
5. Unsubscribe – Always ensure there is an unsubscribe button or hyperlink in the content so that your mail is perceived as more professional and law abiding – just remember to delete those who unsubscribe from your mailing lists – always.  Also, don’t make people jump through hoops to unsubscribe, just get it done without any annoying “are your sure” messages;
6. Links - Drive them back to your website by including links to related articles or pages – you can then easily track click throughs to make follow up calls more targeted;
7. Keep it simple stupid – The old adage applies here too: don’t add too many fancy images or graphics,  it will just clog people’s mail boxes;
8. Incentives - The body of the text should include some incentive to act, but don’t overdo it with too many calls to action -  this will simply dilute your message and confuse the reader;
9. Keep it Simple – War and Peace just isn’t appropriate in an e-mail. You newsletter should be short and to the point if you want people to read it;
10. Think outside the box- email content should be unique and should tell your audience something they don’t know about your product, company, service, the industry or niche;
11. Build your List -  Encouraging visitors to subscribe online (add a subscribe form to your site); tell people about your newsletters in the real world and give incentives to readers to share with their colleagues;
12. Don’t Over Do It – If you send out newsletters too frequently, there is a good chance that your open rate will decline and that more people will unsubscribe.  Respectthe fact that people are busy and don’t overload their already heaving in boxes with even more stuff.
13. Don’t SPAM – ever, ever. Always use valid e-mails from people you have actually met or who have given you business cards at events and shows. If you don’t its the fastest way to get an unsubscribe.

Facebook is quickly becoming a major challenger to Google when it comes to web traffic. Not only can Facebook drive traffic to your website but the traffic it brings is more targeted, more likely to visit more pages and more likely to stay longer. This, combined with the fact that having a Facebook page can help you reach and communicate with new audiences, means that Facebook should be a major component of your social media strategy (especially if your audience is consumer).

Once you have created a Facebook Page for your organization the challenge becomes attracting an audience and getting people to “like” your page. Here are 10 tips that will help you do so.

Tips To Get More People to Like Your Facebook Page

1. Content - content is key to growing your following. If your content: adds value (by that I mean tells your audience something the didn’t already now) and stimulates conversion, more followers will come.

2. Website widget – add a Facebook widget to your website so that people can click from there to like your page.

3. Invite friends – use the suggest to a friend link to find and send invites to friends but be selective and only invite Facebook friends who might actually be interested.

4. Add your Facebook Page URL to your business cards.  Once you have 25 Facebook “Likes” you can request a vanity URL like ours:  http://www.facebook.com/outsmarts -which is much more concise and easier to fit on your cards.

5. Tell people – when you are networking both online and off, tell people about your page.  If you use Twitter or other social networks, link and tell your followers in those forums too.

6. Update regularly – update your Facebook page regularly (refer to 1. when doing so!).  You should update at least once a day but not so frequently that your posts become intrusive and annoying.

7. Place an ad – Facebook ads are highly targeted. Use them to spread awareness of your page with people who will be interested.  You might be surprised as to how many new “likes” this will generate.  You can also use Google adwords campaigns but this isn’t as effective.

8. Avoid selling – it is not good Facebook etiquette to simply use your Page for promotional purposes.  Use the 20/80 rule and ensure that you only promote your company, products or services 20% of the time (focus the rest of your posts on adding value and building loyalty with your followers).

9. Make your Page Stand Out - use FBML to make your Facebook page more unique and attractive to potential new followers when they first pop by.

10. Promote your Page – make sure your Facebook Page URL is highlighted on all direct marketing and tradtional advertising vehicles, add “Like on Facebook”  information to letters, packaging and shipping materials to spread the word in other media.

In my last blog post about personal branding. which also appeared in the online Entrepreneurial Woman Magazine, I talked about how you can use social media to build your brand online.  This post takes a look at the tools you should use to do so.

Tools To Use to Build Your Personal Brand Online

There are thousands of different social networks and social media tools out there.  As busy people, we cannot have a presence in all of them (or we wouldn’t get any other work done) so its always a good idea to  hone in on a few networks that best represent who you are and your goals from online professional networking perspective.

Who Are You?

The social networks you use to build your personal brand online will depend on who you are and what you are great at.  For example, an artist, photographer or someone who has a visual presence should use a tool like Flickr or YouTube. An accountant looking to build awareness might use a professional network like Xing or Plaxo to spread awareness of what they do.

It is important, when considering which networks to use, to think about your resources and what you like to do. Someone with little time on their hands might choose to build the brand awareness and network on Twitter because you can do so in short burst of activity (140 words to be exact).  Others who love creating videos will enjoy using a video site like YouTube or Vimeo to build their brand.

What are your goals?

Which social networks you use to build your brand will depend also on your goals.  If you have a new business and you want to build awareness surrounding that then a networking tool for entrepreneurs like Biznik might be the best place to start.  Real Estate agents might use ActiveRain whilst marketers might join Melcrum.

If you are making a move to a new location then find out which networks people there use – in the UK and Europe Bebo is one of the most popular social networks so you might want to consider building a presence there if a move across the pond is your goal.

Top Social Networks for Personal Branding

One of the most popular sites from a professional personal branding viewpoint is LinkedIn.  It is the main professional network in North America and is the best forum to present your personal brand in a positive manner.  Over 30 million users have used this tool to tell people more about what they do and to highlight the aspects that differentiate them from peers in their industry.  LinkedIn gives you the opportunity to post your resume online and build communities around the people you have done business with in the past, those in your industry, with clients, partners and competitors.

From a social perspective, Facebook is by far and away the most widely used social network:  practically everyone is on there these days and whilst many are using the forum from a purely social perspective more and more Facebook users are looking to build their professional brand there too.  If you use Facebook purely for social networking, it is important to consider how your professional audience will perceive you there too.

Conclusion

When you have considered the points outlined above and determined which networks are most appropriate for you, refer back to some of the points on our previous blog post and always remember that recruiters, potential partners and clients will check out your profile  – make sure it is appropriate.