This is probably a relevant topic for anyone who is struggling with the enormous time suck that is social media. Does everybody need a social media strategy? careers facebook Video blogs careers in social media facebook for business Facebook marketing facebook strategy jon loomer Please let me pay you.

If we talk about Social Media ROI in this post, we talk about the return on investment of [.]. Marketing ROI Social business Social CRM Social media marketing Web analytics Jim Lenskold Jim Sterne marketing ROI Olivier Blanchard return on marketing investment ROMI social media measurement social media metrics social media ROI

Measuring influence is the new obsession in the social media world—adding another layer of anxiety to the dark cloud of existential dread that is marketing ROI. Social media present us as individuals seeking status within a community, which is something that humans have been working at since our days as monkeys.

Social Media U: Take a Class in Social Media. Social media. Whether youre socializing on Facebook , updating Twitter , or just adding a new bookmark to Ma.gnolia , social media has become an integral part of our daily lives. Welcome to Social Media U. social networking.

'Customer-centric social media requires a personal approach. Cross-channel Social media marketing Touchpoint marketing brand personality customer-centricity Edelman trust barometer people-centricity It’s about people connecting with people. However, many businesses still look at the tools and channels first.

I’ve worked in social media since 2005, and I knew I needed a tightly controlled message and presence online.   After several months, I consulted with friends, family and people in the social media community, and I decided I needed to go “underground.” A guest post by {grow} community member Leslie Lewis.

In a social world, trapped customers scream loudly enough for everyone to hear. This sort of general point-of-view is actually dangerous for anyone who actually wants to be successful using social media as a marketing platform. Social media is people and not a pit full of vipers. What Fuels Social Media Marketers?

This post is coming into existence purely based on my own personal feelings and positions regarding social media. This is not a treatise on the nature of the social media space. It’s not a predictor of the future of social media. It’s not a rant for or against social media.

No, it won’t cure snakebite or remove warts …although some social media enthusiasts may have left that impression.  B2B Web Strategy Social Media… as a smart marketer, you can [.].

Until I actively engaged in social media, you could not anticipate the type of return I would see. The real results from my social media involvement have nothing to do with numbers. I’m awed by this democratizing power of social media. Social media is social. Find the Unexpected.

Social media definitely pays off, but you’ve got to focus on the approach not the tools. Social Media has hit the mainstream these days but the big concern on every product marketer’s mind has been how to justify the ROI?  If you’re concerned about social media cost justification, you’re not along.  Users.

In our most recent #B2Bchat discussion, we looked at a number of social networks and how B2B marketers can take advantage of them, and once again I was pleased to have the opportunity to moderate the lively discussion. B2B marketers need to stay on top of the market if they are to identify and take advantage of new opportunities.

Click here if you can’t see this interview about  social media influence. don’t often put myself in front of the camera, so it helped a lot when Mike Stelzner of Social Media Examiner made me do it! He did a great job with this interview, which originally appeared this week on his excellent site. Tweet.

Companies should understand that social networks may come and go, but people won't stop being social online. Community marketing Social media marketing Facebook online communities sharing social media social media networks social networks

'In conjunction with the launch of its new Social Inbox tool, Hubspot released an infographic on how companies have lost their way in terms of using social media for marketing and promotion, and also suggest what it might mean to get back on course.

The biggest mistake that I see on a daily basis when it comes to some of the best social media engagement strategies is that folks tend to be afraid to spend any of the good will — the equity — that’s built up, over time. You can’t save social media equity, you can only build it and spend it.

Instead of preaching fear and pontificating about social media as the Second Coming of B2B Marketing, let’s look at this another way. Social media is growing fast, but it’s no longer new. also think it’s difficult to maintain a sustainable competitive advantage based on a social media strategy.

Content is a social object. Content marketing Social media marketing Beth Harte content marketing case MarketingSherpa Serengeti Communications social media marketing strategy tool social media strategy app VocusContent can take many forms.

I loved Amber Naslund’s recent post about the always-on, world of digital media. As she correctly said, The New World of Work Includes Social Media. Actually, three things: You are not a workaholic/addictive personality using social media as an excuse to avoid your family. But here’s the problem.

So, when someone steals your image, your graphic, or your photo, will they associate it with you even if it is disassociated with your sites, blogs, or social media ?  The Geographic could do amazing things with Pinterest if they weren’t so threatened by it, but old media dies hard. Let’s move on. Sorry Jacques.

Engaging with your fans or followers through social media dialogue, polls and interactive competitions are quite popular, but they are not easily discoverable or linked to revenue generation – These online competitions are generally run in isolation through a Facebook page, website or other social media platform.

This has been a pivotal year in the world of B2B social media. More B2B companies are blogging, tweeting, creating online videos, and producing social content than ever before. In fact, 80% of B2B marketers are producing content for the social web according to B-to-B Magazine. We hope you enjoy them.

Prognosticators at the beginning of this century predicted that the communications revolution and increasing use of digital media would slowly diminish participation in face-to-face events such as trade shows and conferences. Identify prospective attendees based on the social content (e.g., In fact, the opposite seems to be true.

So here are the trends he identified with a few of my thoughts on the impact this might have on social media marketing. Owning the newest device contributes to social status. futurist marketing strategy digital generation don tapscott future of social media impact of digital generationCustomization. Scrutiny.

That’s how you feel if you’re busy with social media – month after month – but aren’t getting results. The secret to a killer B2B social media program is to have a content marketing strategy that defines your company’s buyer personas and their buying process. Frustrated. Second, develop a content marketing strategy.

As I wrote earlier this year, the most disruptive event in the development of the social web was the Facebook IPO. Social learning creates crisis for traditional universities. Augmented Reality Content Marketing facebook futurist Google techologies 2013 projections instagram social media futureFacebook Financial Fatigue.

by Jesse Noyes | Tweet this There’s a lot of speculation about whether social media’s explosive growth threatens email marketing. So we decided to look at the data to see whether social referrals are driving more traffic to brands’ websites and landing pages. Does Social Media Deliver More Traffic Than Email?

Why even listen to the masses scream and pound their chests in the social space? The bottom line is that we need to make sure that when we listen, particularly in social media, that we do it with the most discerning of ears. Not every crazed social media user is nearly as important as you think. Why you ask?

Know B2B social media fact from fiction. Fiction: Social media offers limited value to B2B marketers. Fact: 86% of B2B companies are using social media. B2B companies are absolutely using social media to generate leads , connect with customers, and reach business goals. Source ) TWEET THIS.

Lisa is the marketing manager of her husband’s medical practice (and a graduate of my social media marketing class) and she’s developed one of the most interesting and successful social media marketing programs I have seen – under some tough circumstances. Blogging. Even Worse Medicine. eBook. Agree?

Be sure you don’t become so tethered to your Facebook page that you lose sight of the bigger picture of social media–your message, rather than your medium. Internet Marketing Public Relations Social Media Marketing bodhidharma Facebook friendster Initial public offering linkedin MySpace utterz vbulletin

Are you thinking about getting started in social media personally? You are not the last one to drag your feet a bit and jump on the social bandwagon! I talk about building social media into your daily routine in the same way you find the time for email and lunch. Step 3: Setup Your Social Accounts. Have fun!

After my article this week on the tragic riots in India , purportedly fueled my social media and hate sites, my friend Prasant Naidu offered to write a post with a view from inside the country. The Government of India has blamed social media for spreading hate speech and inciting the riots. am an Indian. Tweet.

McKinsey recently learned a difficult lesson about what happens when the world takes your thought leadership marketing seriously—and when you lack the ability to respond in the moment through social media. Despite its prowess in thought leadership—McKinsey is simply the best—the firm is falling dangerously behind in social media.

Our final post in the Driving Social Engagement series will focus on Twitter, and how you can incorporate the appropriate social buttons or social links for your business. Twitter is a social network that allows you to scale followers, amplify conversations, and accelerate engagement with 140 simple characters.

by Joe Chernov | Tweet this You may have noticed that over the past month or so, several influential social media professionals changed their profile pictures to funky avatars of themselves.  If you want to grab your free copy of the Social Media ProBook, you can download the Web version here or the print version here.

According to Forrester’s Social Technographics Ladder only about 24% of people using social are “Creators”. One rung down on the ladder we find the “Conversationalists” who update social site status and tweet. Social media marketing conversationalists creators Forrester joiners lurkers social graph social media spectators

Last week I downloaded and read the new research report, “Social Media Use in the Industrial Sector” published by IHS GlobalSpec. Social Media Marketing Social Networking Google+ Industrial Marketing Lead generation LinkedIn videos YouTubeSome of the findings are consistent with their reports [.].

As we continue to define and quantify the value of social media marketing, small business owners are slowly joining the party. In truth, the number of small business owners who understand, use, and capitalize on social media marketing is minuscule. It’s important to remember that social media marketing is still new.

The media landscape has evolved tremendously over the last quarter century. Consumers have evolved even faster with the advent of high-speed Internet-enabled mobile devices and social media. It was easy for media agencies to find your target, and almost as simple to measure the response. Army Chief of Staff. It shouldn’t.

Social media marketing has gone well beyond the hype stage and is now mainstream business practice. Still, questions remain: how do I use social media most effectively across the enterprise? Which social media monitoring tools should I use? What social media developments and trends should I be watching?

Many B2Bs still think of social media as merely an image/awareness-building vehicle.  But an increasing number are starting to aim at least part of their social-media effort straight at lead generation, as we noted in this earlier post …and you can, too. B2B Web Strategy Lead generation Social Media

'The current catch-all these days for what I do is social media; unfortunately, when what you do is described as social media, people tend to think Facebook , Twitter , Pinterest , and maybe Google+. Blogger outreach is earned media not paid, right? Blogger outreach and engagement is much more than social media.

have been consulting some bouncing social media babies recently and they’re doing it right. Do your best to not allow your burgeoning social media empire to go on autopilot. 'You know how much I am obsessed with “ long-tail blogger outreach ,” right? am a man possessed! That mean, really excited!

Are you always wondering which social network is hot and which is not? And how many social networks can your business really continue to pay attention to? Well here you will see the search growth rates of the 9 major social networks that I think are most important to businesses and our social media marketing efforts.

It’s no secret that social media is an important channel of digital marketing. For B2B marketers, there are endless opportunities for leveraging social media platforms and strategies. Twitter in particular proved to be the strongest performing platform for generating leads through social media.

Right off the bat let me say that this post is not about email marketing versus social media. However, I’ve had conversations with manufacturers and industrial companies where I am asked if email marketing is still relevant and effective since all the talk these days is about social media.

As buzzwords go, “crowdsourcing” may not be as big as ”social-media” or “mobile apps” but new research show it is one of the most rapidly-expanding trends in our field. He will present more of his findings at Social Slam 2012. B2B and social media crowdsourcing david bratvold

An obvious win for companies looking to jump into Social Media is in the Customer Support area. As more and more customers voice their opinions online, the choice is not if you should be responding using Social Media, but when are you going to start responding! Tags: social media Customer Support

Since the upswing of social media we even got a lot more of them and ‘experts’ started giving new meanings to existing acronyms. Blog Connected marketing Social media marketing customer-centric ROI social media Unique Selling Point Unique Selling Proposition unique social proposition USP

When I gave a presentation on Social Media and Revenue at Eloqua Experience recently, I was blown away by the great reaction to it. wanted to dig in a bit into where social media is in most of today’s businesses. In a lot of ways, social media today is like “digital” a decade ago.

Why does every social media strategy seemingly start with a company cajoling people to come “like” their Facebook page? I’ve been honored to be selected to help judge a global company’s internal social media competition. And it would get kind of boring if my friend never came to my house. Tweet.

This time, it’s the Social Media Strategies Summit (#SMSsummit) in New York City where hundreds of social-minded digital marketers are looking to learn top tips and tricks for how to be more effective with social media marketing. My own journey into social was relatively opportunistic. Social Media

It is not easy to tell a story of challenges and failures, but it has made me who I am today and led to what I consider the three components of social media success: Mindful Content + Passionate Engagement + Heartfelt Collaboration. 'By Dr. Amit Nagpal, {grow} Community Member. So how did I learn these lessons? Let’s begin.

by Jason Miller If you are tasked with building a social media dashboard to track your efforts, look no further than this post. That means cutting out the everyday metrics that litter and cloud up the social media manager’s real success story. Referring Traffic from Social. Conversions from Social.

As introduced to us by Business Insider , Buddy Media’s Social Enterprise Software is a suite of products is “designed to help brands build and maintain relationships with consumers to accelerate their business.” Start sharing content and use social media as another channel to amplify it.

The Internet is the most measurable medium ever invented, but the perception that returns on online social interactions can’t be quantified stubbornly persists. That’s a good thing for the rest of us because social media marketing, like PR, has always been challenged by the lack of reliable success metrics. Volume 2.

By outlining changes in the global zeitgeist, Ann will explore what’s driving them and detail how they’re beginning to play out both in society and in social media. summary of tweets: Conferences & Events 2012 trends Ann Mack JWT social media Social Media Week

Now, new data from The Social Habit seems to confirm that Instagram is poised for a breakout. Of the Americans surveyed who currently use a social media platform, only 18 percent currently have a profile on Instagram. Of ALL those social media users surveyed, 48% declared they are using Instagram more often. 

Tweet Do you think social media is better for researching prospects than for attaining face-to-face meetings where deals are won and contracts are signed? In this high-tech world, social media has revealed itself to be a lead generation goldmine. don’t mean to sound trite, but it was a very social experience.”.

Social Media Facebook Online Communities Social network TwitterI take a perverse pleasure in reading my Twitter DMs, 99% of which are of the automated variety, looking for the heartfelt sentiment that goes out to me and thousands of other close personal friends every day from people I’ve started following. hope you enjoy that.”.

Supplement your email list with your contacts’ social network info? Find out if the username or vanity URL you want is still available across dozens of social sites? Display a feed of brand-related comments from a variety of social networks on your website? Promote events through social media? Flowtown.

In a previous post we looked at the top 25 industries using social media , as presented in the NetProspex Fall 2010 Social Business Report.  In that report, there is also a section on social media usage by job function. Percentages range anywhere from 25-40% for social media usage. Wendy Boyce.

Social Media best practices Video blogs guerrilla marketing nathan dubeCan’t see the video above? Click here. If you have attended one of my classes or speeches, you might have heard me tell the story about Nathan Dube and his “Destroy Your Printer Contest.” I think you’ll enjoy it as much as I did!

In one of our recent posts, we identified email and social media as two of the three things that B2Bs need to get right for successful online marketing (the third being search engine optimization, or SEO).  It seems reasonable that email and social working together would be more effective than pursuing both in isolation, and [.].

Amid all of the hype, conferences, and rapid adoption of social media marketing by organizations from sole proprietors to the Fortune 100, there remains an undercurrent of skepticism. This surfaces in posts like Social Media Skepticism , 5 reasons why social media skeptics maybe right and Business social networking: where’s the ROI?

Seems this brutal maxim applies to social media too; big brands crush smaller upstarts in a blizzard of social gimmicks and PR. Even social media’s egalitarian roots can’t vaccinate it against the big brand onslaught.  How Social Tools Level the Competitive Playing Field. Absolutely. Their secret weapon?

Why am I using a picture of a large mouth bass on a blog post about social media and business? business relationships customer acquisition competitive advantage marketing strategy social media business relationshipsSeems a little fishy doesn’t it? Well Well I didn’t use this for the halibut.  Kind of ironic.

Recent research from MarketingProfs shows that 84% of B2B companies use social media marketing in some form, and the figure is likely higher for B2C firms. In fact, another recent study from HubSpot reveals that 63% of B2B companies aren’t generating leads from social media at all. Image credit: The Far Side. Learn.

This week I attended Useful Social Media ‘s Corporate Social Media Summit in New York city where hundreds of practitioners gathered to hear case studies from some of the best in the business. The big takeaways for me: Add real value and have fun with your social media efforts. Social is the new normal.

B2B social media; is it a case of the Emperor’s New Clothes? The social media Emperor is getting dressed, but is still in his underpants. B2B social media has reached the tipping point and in doing so it’s following the classic technology evolution curve. Social media is being used then, but how?

photo credit: me Yesterday I covered the five worst B2B social media screw-ups , so now let’s look at the BEST. recent report showed just 14% of the largest industrial companies have a social media strategy, let alone a good one. Tomorrow, I conclude this short series with some insights on B2B and the use of social media.

That’s far from typical–very few companies have more traffic to any of their social media venues than to their old-fashioned website. Here are 26 social media secrets Skittles knows: 1 out of every 5 minutes people spend online are spent on social networks in 2012; up from 1 out of every 20 minutes in 2007.

When it comes to writing a social media policy , who should decide what goes into it? Social media?! escalating support issues reported through social media, based on specific subject matter and severity). A) Marketing. B) Public Relations. C) Human Resources. D) Information Technology. E) Customer Support.

For this week we look at how admissions offices and potential students utilize social media for giving/getting information. Higher ed Infographics infographic infographic of the week social mediaLook at this great infographic via @stewartfoss at higheredexperts.com. By: Stewart Foss.

Social media is arguably overhyped as a marketing trend: it gets well under 10% of marketing budgets (different surveys have figures from 3% to 8%) and results are questionable (it was rated the least effective content marketing tactic in a recent MarketingProfs study ). But social is clearly growing fast and has great potential.

Many email marketers I speak to are wary of creating a social media presence on Twitter and Facebook since it’s a big step into the unknown. Here I hope to show, if you haven’t taken the plunge already, how social media marketing on two of the main social channels shares much in common with email [.].

Takeaway Are you engaged in social media enough to recognize spam when you see it? As Jay Baer ( @jaybaer ) says, “if you don’t love social media, you probably suck at social media.” Social Media Spam twitterYou can share. You can publish. You can broadcast. You can spam.

Are your B2B social media efforts failing? We know the biggest reasons B2B social media efforts fail and what to do about it. Not Having a Social Strategy: If you don’t know where you’re headed, you’ll neverget there. It’s good to be friendly on the social web. Do Social Media B2B the Right Way.

really believe it’s bad advice to recommend that companies fire their social media consultants, experts and agencies only to bring everything internal. While “everyone” is on Facebook , social media is no longer a land of tinkerers, it’s a land of consumers. Photo credit: edrabbit.

Jeff works as a wealth adviser for a large national company but has been hamstrung in his attempts to use social media. Still, I think they are missing a bigger opportunity by not exploring how social media can be used on a very personal and human level. Social networking is not about B2B or B2C marketing. 

How can marketers make more productive use of their time on social networking sites? How can you make sure your company’s social media policy doesn’t run afoul of employment law? How can you measure (or can you measure) social media ROI ? Social Media Marketing Guides and Tips.

This got me thinking about how it could apply to Social Media and how long it would take to become a Social Media Expert. But 1 hour a day x 5 days a week means you would be a social media master in about 38 years! But wait – I also practice Social Media on the job for a few hours a day. years.

Eric Wittlake (@ wittlake ) was quick to hit one of the main issues in his post earlier this week:  social is not about selling. Do you know anyone who would claim that they made a ten or hundred thousand dollar decision based on social media? 84% using social media sounds like a pretty big number. Social Media

When talking with B2C oraganizations about social media, Facebook and Twitter roll off the tongue fairly easily. Sometimes the conversation steers toward the social darlings based on popularity, or because their customers are living on these social networks. Social Media Plugins For LikedIn. billion in 2012.

To see results using social media, you don’t need a social media strategy. You don’t need to know all the capabilities of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, social apps or how to schedule tweets and posts on multiple social networks all at one time. Photo credit: Search Engine People Blog.

She’s also a contributor the Grande Guide to Social Demand Generation. Too often, different marketing functions operate in their own little silos—demand generation isn’t supposed to play on the social playground and vice versa. Early Stage: Drive traffic to demand gen content via social media.

After my last post on the Media Budget Ratio I got a question out on the Marketing 2.0 community by Scott Zosel about how much should you allocate for Social Media in your budget? The cost of the technology used for social media is rather low. Great question Scott and you inspired me to write this post.

Tweet If you’re struggling with managing social media programs in the B2B marketplace, Zuzia Soldenhoff-Thorpe   (pictured at below) has some news for you: Most of your peers are too. social media is one of the most. Analyze and monitor their social media. Why is she so certain? Know your audience.

Put down that smartphone, stand up, raise your right hand and repeat after me: 1) I promise to listen to -- and talk with -- my customers online , because reciprocity is the foundation for successful engagement when using the online social channel. No one likes or respects social spam! social media promise social media policy

In the past few months, I’ve heard a few generalizations made about social media that have me thinking back several years to when the field was coming alive and we were all trying to figure out this new space. And people  will and should call you out if you step outside social norms. Do you have some buffer zone online?

Time 16:24 Just like a 1960s father complaining about his teenage daughter being on the telephone constantly, social media is entering into its adolescent phase with some growing up to do. Hitting on a single topic in marketing, social media and business communications. Quick and to the point.

As social media is two way communication and offer tremendous opportunities for companies to get in touch with their audience this seem like somebody has not activated the phone or fax while somebody is scared of communication! Here are some simple steps how companies can step into social media conversation! Be authentic!

Note: This is a guest post by Brad Shorr is Director of Content & Social Media for Straight North. Participating in social media is time consuming, so it’s only natural that people look for shortcuts. Fully automatic feeds publish to a social media platform without any human intervention. Redundancy.

With the amount of helpful content about social media marketing growing faster than Facebook’s user base or Lindsay Lohan’s court appearances, it’s tough to keep up. Social Media Marketing Tips, Tactics and Guides. Building Social Bookmarking Networks 101 by Search Engine Journal. 5 stars.

There is not a day that goes by in the life of a marketer that doesn’t have a headline that reads, “marketers struggle to find the ROI of social.” 2011 MarketingSherpa study confirmed this with 62% of CMO’s believing that social media will pay off for them … eventually. Yet, there is an answer.

From WhiteFireSEO, here's an infographic that tries to quantify the sheer volume of content from social media like Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. View Original Article

Aaron Kim had a great post yesterday on our expectations of what social media tools will do for us. That got me  thinking about how social media wasn’t the first tool that we have such outsized expectations for. am not sure that we should expect more out of social media. Credit: Wikipedia. And up.

There are a lot of Social Media myths that I’ve uncovered over the last year or so, and I thought that seven gentlemen from your childhood could do a much better job of presenting these myths than I ever could. So without further delay, the 7 Dwarves present 7 Silly Social Media Myths. It makes you look kind of dopey.

This is a great little video by Ignite Social Media  on the ROI of social media. While it’s quick in nature, it’s a good, high-level look at how social media effects the bottom line in various aspects of business. Transcript (Courtesy of Ignite Social Media). Social Media: 5.32