Archive for the ‘Social Media’ Category
Facebook Connect Helps Website Owners Create an Online Community August 10, 2009
Zowbie Consulting as a firm, believes in social media and realizes the potential revenue that it can produce for a business when it is used and implemented properly. Facebook Connect is an application that allows website owners the ability to tap into the already existing online community of Facebook users and create their own social network within their own website. Facebook connect allows websites, software, and even mobile devices to integrate with Facebook and send information both ways.
To see Facebook Connect in action, visit Zowbie’s affiliate site, EverythingGeneva.com
A short list of the benefits of Facebook Connect include:
- Build a community with just one click!
- Login using your Facebook account
- Send comments and share articles to Facebook profile feed
- Invite your friends to the website’s community
- See last visitors with a short bio and link to Facebook profile
- Sign up for a website account without having to create an account; instead using your Facebook login info
I really like the idea of building a community within your website and Facebook Connect makes this easy with just one click of a button. An additional feature which I love is the ease of which a website visitor using Facebook Connect is able to promote your website to their Facebook friends by sharing an article with friends on their wall or inviting them to join your site’s online community.
If you would like to have Facebook Connect installed on your website, contact us today!
Some other great ideas, especially pertaining to Facebook Connect and its implications for ecommerce can be found in the presentation from Razorfish embedded below – Portable Social Graphs: Imagining their Potential:
Control and Manage All Your Instant Messenger Accounts from One Screen July 20, 2009
There are so many different instant messenger software services out there…choosing one that enables you to connect with all of your friends is pretty much impossible. No matter what, there is someone who prefers Google Chat over Yahoo or Yahoo over AIM and so on. Thus, staying in touch with people requires you to be signed into multiple instant messaging programs which takes up not only screen space, but your computer’s memory, often slowing down processes.
What if there was a software service that made it possible to manage multiple instant messaging accounts at once? That’d be pretty cool huh?
Well, for the past couple of years I have been doing this. I use a service called Meebo.
About Meebo
Meebo is a new communications and media company that’s re-writing the way people have conversations and communicate on the Web. We provide instant messaging and group chat to over 40 million people at meebo.com and via partner sites across the Web.
At meebo.com, millions of people every month keep in touch with friends on any IM network (AIM, Yahoo!, MSN, Google Talk and Gmail, MySpace IM, Facebook Chat, and more!) and chat with people in Meebo Rooms. Meebo also enables live communication integrated into any website with Meebo Rooms, Meebo Community IM, and Meebo Me. Meebo is the Web’s live communication platform – instant messaging from absolutely anywhere, no downloads or installs required, and free!
Meebo launched in September 2005. Investors include Sequoia Capital, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, JAFCO Ventures, Time Warner Investments, and KTB Ventures. We have over 75 corporate partners, including major record labels, global media companies, social networks, games portals, and some of the world’s most-talented application developers.
We (the Meebo team) are just a fun bunch of people trying to bring IM to the Web!
Click below to find out more…
News agencies and blogs from around the world and all over the internet have written about Meebo. Here’s what they had to say.
Bonus Tip
Not only do I connect with friends, family, vendors, and clients through Meebo…I also use it as a way to try and spark a conversation with future clients.
Take for instance the leads that you get via your website’s submission form. How many of these people leave both their phone number and email? Most people will provide an email and either no phone or a bogus phone number. Success rates for connecting with (and converting) leads providing only an email address is pretty poor.
To enhance your conversions, take note of the email address provided. If the email ends with @yahoo.com, @aol.com, etc. there is a good chance that they are also on instant messenger. Create a group within your buddy list labeled, “Future Clients” and add these people. If you have their first and/or last names rename the contact so it displays this rather than their screenname. Now, when you see someone signed on, send them an instant message. You’ll be amazed at how successful this is.
Social Bookmarking and How You Can Benefit June 16, 2009
What is Social Bookmarking?
What do you do when you find an interesting or comical website? Do you share it with family and friends? Have you ever sent an email with a link to a useful or beneficial website to someone you know? If you answered yes to the above questions then you’ll probably be able to understand the following explanation of social bookmarking. If your answer was no, you have no business being on the world wide web or this website…please leave now (unless you are here to learn and promise you will start interacting and sharing with others). The beauty of the world wide web is that it has brought people closer and made interactions with others extremely easy to do.
Social bookmarking is the act of tagging a website and saving it to view later. Instead of saving them to your favorites in your internet browser you are saving them to the web. Since they are on the web, your bookmarks are online and can be viewed by others or only select friends (depends on the social bookmarking site).
What Social Bookmarking Can Do For You
Bookmarking intriguing and interesting websites to a social bookmarking site enables you to, at a later date, sign in and view your bookmarks. Some social bookmarking sites even let you tag or otherwise categorize your bookmarks. Instead of saving the website to your favorites on your internet browser they are stored online and shared with others, hence the word “social”. I am a big believe in social networking online and offline. Using social bookmarking sites will help you identify others with similar interests and when you locate people with similar interests you can see websites that they’ve found useful or interesting. They can do the same. It is sort of a pay it forward type method of sharing and educating.
Most social bookmarking sites allow you to browse through the bookmarked sites based upon most popular, recently added, or belonging to a certain category like sports, politics, technology, world news, etc. There is even the ability to search through what people have bookmarked by typing in what you are looking for in the search feature of the website….one reason why these sites are being referred to as intelligent search engines” because they are submitted and rated/ranked by humans not the typical search engine’s mysterious algorithm.
What Social Bookmarking Can Do For Your Website
Social bookmarking sites can help drive targeted traffic to your website. In the same way that you would submit your website to an online directory you can submit your website or certain pages or articles to social bookmarking sites. Be careful not to spam…if you submit the same websites over and over again you will be flagged and that site will be blocked. This feature helps keep the integrity of the service. That being said, it is still a great way to promote your website online.
Just like you would any other site, you can bookmark your own website and submit it to specific, targeted categories to share with others who might be interested in your site. It is important to build a network of contacts on the social bookmarking site because if you share your site with them, and they share it with their contacts, and their contacts share it with their contacts…well…you get the idea right? It’s viral. You could submit your website or article to a social bookmarking website and within just a few minutes see your web traffic increase by the hundreds or thousands.
The impact of the added traffic to your site not only builds awareness amongst humans, but the search engines will notice the traffic as well and it will help with your search engine rankings. The process works best when multiple people bookmark the same website or page. Bookmarking is similar to voting and those websites or pages that have the most votes are viewed as the most useful or credible and will be viewed and voted on by others…it can become exponential.
Watch the Video Below for a Great Visual Demonstration:
A Few of My Favorite Social Bookmarking Sites:
Read Also:
May 1st is #LocalDay on Twitter April 21, 2009
May 1, 2009 is #LocalDay when Tweeters will publish their zip codes on Twitter. Hundreds of thousands of twitters will publish in the format #30080. You will be able to use the search.twitter.com application to find and develop your local Twitter network.
Invite and inform others to participate in as it will only help build your local network. This is also a great time to organize or promote a Tweetup or join an existing one to meet the community. (Side note: check out AtlantaTweetups.com) Invite your local chamber of commerce and other business owners to participate.
Use the following local Twitter directories to find and follow your local Twitter community:
http://localtweeps.com
http://chirpcity.com
http://twitterlocal.net
http://citytweets.net
Integrate Your WordPress Blog’s RSS Feed Into Your LinkedIn Profile March 25, 2009
Awhile back I wrote a post about how LinkedIn is the most neglected of all social networks. Let’s face it, LinkedIn just isn’t as much fun as say, Facebook or Twitter. This tip will make it appear like you’re active on your LinkedIn account when really all you’ve done is setup your WordPress blog’s RSS feed to display on your profile.
Connect your virtual lives with the WordPress LinkedIn Application. With the WordPress App, you can sync your WordPress blog posts with your LinkedIn profile, keeping everyone you know in the know. Once added, you can filter your posts with a special LinkedIn tag and even display your personal WordPress Gravatar (global avatar). Updates are automatically sent to your network for instant notifications and gratification.
This should take you less than 5 minutes to complete, but it will most certainly leave a lasting impact on your business and its marketability.
To start, you will need to install the WordPress LinkedIn Application. Click on the button that reads, “Add application”.
Next, type in your blog’s URL. Example below.
That’s it…you’re done! Now click on the “View My Profile” tab and you’ll see how the application has now integrated your WordPress blog feed into your LinkedIn profile.
LinkedIn: The Most Neglected of All Social Networking Sites February 25, 2009
LinkedIn was the only professional business networking site. Today there are many social networking sites which have evolved from their original intent and now are quite useful marketing tools for businesses (The two that come to mind quickly are Facebook and Twitter). Most people view LinkedIn as their online resume and a place to ‘shake hands’ with business colleagues, but it is so much more than that!
Setup your network.
Make sure your network is in place BEFORE you need it. You can do this by revisiting your LinkedIn network at least once a month and search for new connections in two ways: Searching by using the advanced search tool to find past colleagues, and look at your current connections connections. If you have a relationship with someone that is in your 2nd tier, make them a contact in tier 1 so that you can connect with their second tier.
Find yourself on the outside looking in?
Do you work in sales or some other field where cold-calling is prevalent and can’t seem to get past the gatekeeper on the other end? I’ve been in this situation and have used LinkedIn a number of times in order to be put in direct contact with an individual that I would otherwise be unable to reach. Everyone knows someone that knows someone who knows someone. LinkedIn identifies these degrees of separation and makes it easy to be put in touch with someone through and introduction from someone else or through a chain of people.
Move up the career ladder.
Another great use of LinkedIn is to use it as a means to find new employment opportunities. Similar to the example above LinkedIn is a great way to come into contact directly with the persons responsible for hiring at a given company. Be sure that when a potential employer looks at your profile that it is complete and impressive…your profile is your resume, but it is so much more as you’ll soon learn, keep reading.
Word of mouth marketing.
Are you great at what you do and have clients that love and appreciate you for it? For most, if not all, the answer is ‘yes’. Although you may be great at what you do it is often difficult to get testimonials from clients. Email requests for testimonials from clients get lost in the inbox and writing an email as silly as it may sound is time consuming. LinkedIn provides a very easy way to give testimonials as well as to request them. Remember, what goes around comes around so be sure to leave plenty of testimonials if you intend to request them. If you like the information in this post, please provide a testimonial on my profile!
Don’t be a loner.
There are many groups within LinkedIn that are great for connecting with individuals with the same interests and business expertise as yourself. Join these groups and become active. No one person is as powerful as they are when they join a group. Your business will flourish from the interactions you have with group members.
Become Jeeves and answer questions.
There is no better way to show your expertise and knowledge about something than to answer questions related to the subject. Not only will you help someone out, but you will also be demonstrating to other members of LinkedIn that you are an authority on the subject.
Be vocal and sound off.
Post network updates regularly. Letting others know that you are productive and busy is a good thing. People will notice and they will contact you because they will see you as someone who is an authority and one that is knowledgeable about a particular industry.
So there you have it. Did you know you could do all this with LinkedIn? It often gets over shadowed by Facebook, Twitter and others, but it remains the most protected and private, yet beneficial site for business professionals. Is it time you stop neglecting your LinkedIn? Connect with me on LinkedIn, my email is carl@zowbie.com.
Advanced twitter Search February 17, 2009
This tip will be short and sweet. If you’re like me and have been using twitter since its early days you may recall how you use to be able to search for fellow twitterers by their location. This feature has been removed and you are now only able to find people by their username, first or last name using the standard “find people” feature.
Is there a way in twitter to search for people by their location? Yes. You can also search using several other fields as well.
You can search twitter by going to the following URL: http://search.twitter.com
You can conduct an advanced search by going to this URL: http://search.twitter.com/advanced
The advanced search will allow you to find people based on their location, keywords and several other fields…you can even find people who reference a particular person!
Conducting a search to find people based on keywords or location can prove to be very successful for your marketing efforts. For instance, I use the advanced search feature to search by keyword to identify and network with individuals interested in mountain biking to promote and market my website, MTOBikes.com. Likewise, I use the advance search feature to find people based on their location to connect with individuals located in or around the Smyrna Vinings community as a way to increase the exposure and brand awareness of SmyrnaVinings.com.
There you have it…a short and sweet tip that will help you get a jump start in your twitter social networking efforts.
Why Over-Relying on Social Networking Sites Could Jeopardize Your Business February 4, 2009
Many of our clients are Realtors. Most Realtors have a website that is provided by their broker that allows for some customization, some have out-of-the-box real estate specific websites, and a small group have custom sites. When you ask a Realtor if they have a blog a common response is “yes”, then they proceed to tell you about their blog on either ActiveRain or TopProducer. This really bothers me.
When you put your time and effort into something that you don’t own you are at the mercy of the third-party service. Social networking sites like ActiveRain and Facebook are successful because of the users and members whom contribute to these sites. The exposure and rewards that these sites offer to an internet marketer are large. The more a person contributes, the greater the exposure and reward and so too the dependence. If these sites change one component or policy, you could be out of business (or forced to change your business model, which may prove expensive).
You can and should use social networking sites for what they provide, but never invest too much time and attention into one platform or another. You never know what these services may alter.