WHY?

An employee is your ambassador to the world. They represent you beyond the walls of your business. The main concern for a business should not be what your employees are saying but why they say what they say. Deciding the outlet for their frustration is not the best way to manage their opinions.

If your employee is unhappy and they aren’t able to tweet about it, you can be sure they are talking about it to everyone they know. Which is just as detrimental to your business.

Your company’s social media strategy is a great way to include your employees. Inclusion is a great way to build employer/employee relationships:

• Simply ask your employees for help building your networks. If an employee feels needed they will respond positively.
• Build a team through competition. Encourage employees to complete a task, whether it be refer a hundred fans or participate in a fitness competition within the office. Showcase the winners on your networks.
• Offer rewards for referrals. If an employee brings in a new customer, reward them. Give gift certificates, cash bonuses, or anything else that will encourage referrals.

If you follow these simple ideas you’ll be able to show the world and your employees their value to your business’ success. Consumers are more likely to respond to companies with happy employees!!

I highly suggest methodically working through the following questions to evaluate your market…

10 QUESTIONS TO THOROUGHLY EVALUATE YOUR MARKETS.

1. How much of a market is there for the type of product? How many searches are the main keywords receiving?

Use wordtracker or google’s keyword tool

2) How much competition is there in the search engines? Can I make my mark?

Type in your market’s main keywords or phrases into Google’s search with “quotes” surrounding it – like “anti-aging”. This will tell you how many web pages are competing for that exact term, hmmm i bet alot with this topic.

3) Can I be different than the rest of the websites out there? This can be by my site’s image, how professional it is, my sales process, selection I’m able to offer, bonuses or FREE to purchasers, etc.

Surf competing sites in organic (free) not paid ads, search and PPC. Can you differentiate yourself?

4) How ‘entrenched’ are the top sites in the search engines? Are good rankings doable?

Evaluate your SEO potential. How old and big are the sites on the first page of Google? If it’s dominated by Wikipedia, About.com, .gov and .edu listings, you may rethink your chances of getting ranked well.

5) How saturated are article directories with other marketers to this audience?

Do a search for your market’s main keywords at www.ezinearticles.com, www.goarticles.com and others. Are there hundreds of thousands of articles devoted to the topic? Or under 100?

6) How saturate are video sites with videos that are specific to my market?

Perform the same search as above, but with YOUTUBE

7) How tough is the competition and how high are bids in PPC?

Use Adwords to find out how much (relatively) it will take to bid to get your ads on the first page.

Is the market made of buyers or freebie seekers?

Some markets just don’t spend much money, even if the market of searchers is large. Anti-aging no doubt is a great market, the people searching for anti-aging solutions are likely to spend money on products and programs. Some may argue this point, but I’ve found the DIY (do it yourself) market brutal.  There ARE a couple products out there that are doing well (some magic pills), but by and large, this market is made of people that DON’T want to spend money. Which is why they’re called Do It Yourselfers.

9) Is it a ‘trend market’? Meaning, is it here today and gone tomorrow? And if so, is it coming or going?

http://www.google.com/trends

This is a killer tool for seeing what the history of a particular market is, along with any recent upswings in popularity.

10) Do I know anything about the market?

Do you possess any particular knowledge about the market you’re considering?

You’ll notice that I listed if I know anything about the market last. Like I said earlier, intricate knowledge of the market is not needed. Just know WHY the market exists.

 2) Make your blog post.

3) Post social news snippets. okay a snippet is a tiny piece or part of your test, a sampler just so ya know. 

 4) Social bookmark your social news snippets.

5) Ping the bookmark RSS feeds.  In blogging, ping is an XML-RPC-based push mechanism by which a weblog notifies a server that its content has been updated.

The social news snippets give your blog post a couple of strong incoming links. The social bookmarks provide some link juice to your social news snippets. It’s like a Red Bull in Vodka,  5 Nespresso shots , Titanium & Graphite to your Driver… well… you get the idea.

 So it’s important that you do the “social media” promotion right after you posted your blog

 
It’s because spiders (search engines)  get “excited” about finding links from your bookmarks to the social news sites.

They want to find out what all the commotion is about – that you’ve created – and finally arrive at your original blog post, WOOP WOOP!

What happens is the process of ping -> bookmark -> social news -> blog post – acts as ‘RED BULL’  I mean  leverage, a catalyst that will usually boost the original blog post to the top of the rankings.

Finally, to get the maximum search engine benefit, it’s important to do the steps in order

Blog, Social news, Social bookmark, and PING! And it’s best to do them quickly. One right after the other, within minutes of each other.

So you might want to open your text editor and write up your post. Write what you want to say in the snippet pages as well as the the bookmarks. Then just copy and paste in a hurry.

But do keep in mind… Different social media are used for different things. Be careful to understand the type of content that each one wants.

Social news – Propeller, Digg, Reddit
Social hosting – Squidoo, Hubpages, WetPaint
Bookmarking – Diigo, Delicious, Stumbleupon, Mixx
Social networking community – Facebook, mySpace, LinkedIn
Microblogging – Twitter, Tumblr, Friendfeed
Social video & picture - Youtube, Metacafe, Flickr

So the skinny:  Write the blog, ping the feed, take out the garbage, rinse, wash, andREPEAT!

You need to be able to produce quality, relevant content, that attempts to solve the problems that your target audience may have, and distribute it to as many Web 2.0 platforms where you can be found.  To promote your business you need to get into the routine of bookmarking any new content that you create and distribute from your site.  Video, content, blogs, and images are worthy…

Here’s the ’skinny’ on Social Bookmarking

Bookmarks show how a site is perceived, and when these sites allow voting, they also show the engines or whatever classification system which monitors voting, how people feel about the quality of the site. Furthermore, social bookmarking can introduce a site to the search engines, as in some cases, people may find and bookmark a site or a site’s internal pages before a search engine can find those pages via another form of inbound link.

When engaging in Social Media platforms, nobody likes to be sold…  You need to develop conversations in order to attract prospects.

 One of my favorite Bookmarking site is Del.icio.us 

Delicious is an example of a Social Bookmarking service, which means you can save all your bookmarks online, share them with other people, and see what other people are bookmarking.

 Some of the Top Social Bookmarking Sites

There are many bookmarking sites don’t quote me but the numbers are North of 125 sites   Some of the best known are digg, reddit and stumbleupon.  I recommend taking time on some of them and see if there is a fit with your niche.

To promote your business online, you need to get into the routine of bookmarking any new content that you create on as many of them as you can.

Over the last few years, they have become a major and incomparable tool for companies to enhance their Internet presence.

The Benefits of Social Bookmarking

1. Search Engine or Organic Traffic

If you look on a bookmark as a one-way backlink, we know that part of Google’s algorithm is to count the number of backlinks to assess your Page Rank, and will probably help you get higher rankings on the search results pages.  

Google and the other search engines send their robots to the Social Bookmarking sites many times a day, subsequently your new pages are likely to be indexed extremely fast.

2. Direct and Indirect Traffic

Many people use sites like digg and delicious as search engines in their own right, as they can find many links to blogs, videos and other content that is classified by user-generated tags, avoiding what Google decides to serve up.

Social Bookmarking cannot only be used to send traffic to your blog, but also to other content that you have submitted to other Web 2.o platforms.   For example YouTube and other video sharing sites, podcast directories, squidoo lenses, hubpages and many more.

Another important benefit to consider is that the visitors that arrive on your landing pages are highly ‘targeted’, as they find you from tags and keywords that you have selected, and content that you have created.

3. Relationship Building

We’ve established that Social Bookmarking is a great way to announce your fresh content and make your content available to a wider audience, but probably the greatest benefit is that bookmarks (along with micro-blogs) can open the door to building relationships with your prospective clients.

Whether it`s Social Media Marketing, Social Linking, Social Bookmarking, or Social Profile Management.   It’s all SEO.

But it’s SEO on STEROIDS!!!

The results are fast, repeatable, and sustainable.

The Secret is OUT.

‘Well Optimized‘, ‘Quality‘ content, distributed ’far and wide’ is the ONLY Internet marketing method for any business.

The future of your business is creating content that encourages targeted visitors into your sales funnel.

The Question I hear alot: 

 Do I need to pay for Search Engine Optimization as well?

 No, SEO, up to now, has included optimizing static pages with metatags and keyword density, and submission to thousands of “directories” for backlinks, which helped raise your Google PR ranking. These methods are outdated and unnecessary. It is, however, essential to understand the importance of finding “targeted keywords” that lead to conversions. You can undertake the research and testing for yourself  and you don’t need to pay for SEO.

Here’s the JUICE!!!    By optimizing your content with these keywords/keyphrases, and distributing them to as many Social Media sites as you can, you are effectively doing all the SEO you’ll ever need.

 SEO TODAY = KEYWORD RESEARCH + QUALITY CONTENT

In the near future, Search Engines will be “reading” not only your blogs and bookmarks, but your videos and podcasts as well, so sprinkle all your content with your best keyphrases and keywords everytime.  Google will love YA!  Sprinkle daily!!!

This blog is an attempt to clarify just what Web 2.0 is…………………..

don’t make it hard on yourself this is just a SIDEBAR of our sense of Web 2.0 by example and imagery!

okay KISS this will help. period! 

Businesses find blogs as a potential tool to represent their organization in a more personal and positive mode. Many others treat a blog as an efficient tool to communicate with their customers and employees.

The following are some of the reasons for why blogging is necessary for business:

Internal blogging
Blogs created to share information within the employees of the organization are called internal blogs. Internal blogs help management to be in good contact with the employees. Thus, internal blogs help to create a healthy relationship between management and employees.

Influence the visitors
Blogs are visited by millions of readers every day. Thus, blogging has a great potential to help the organizations in educating their customers, employees, or investors and drive them towards some positive environment.

Customer relationships
Blogs are an excellent medium for the businesses to communicate with their customers. Blogging can help businesses to reach their customers efficiently and get feedbacks, tips and reviews from them. This creates a genuine environment for a healthy relationship between the organization and customers. The message it appears direct and personal, rather than a company or advertising brochure.  Nobody wants to be sold anything!  Blogs can also help businesses to engage with candidates who are passionate to work for them.

*****Higher Search Engine Results- That’s RIGHT!  Pay attention
By utilizing blogs, companies can be found much faster in search engine results on Google, Yahoo or MSN. Why is a blog loved by the search engines? Because it is constantly being updated as opposed to a normal static website. By writing quality content, you will have more visitors who will read about what you have to say. GOOGLE loves YOU when you share! 

Many businesses have used blogs successfully in maintaining good communication with the customers and other stake holders. Blogs helped them to build a healthy relationship between management and employees. Corporate blogging is rapidly gaining popularity and the days are not so far for it to become essential as a website for a professional company.

Let me explain.

For a behavior to be classified as procrastination, it must be counterproductive, needless, and delaying. Here are some other examples you may be familiar with:

• putting off an important decision
• leaving a critical task undone
• becoming counterproductive and keeping “busy” on needless work

To start behaving this way it takes real mastery. You’ve got to learn how to procrastinate – it doesn’t just happen. You’ve got to use your physiology, create the right emotions and get it all working perfectly and in the right sequence. And when you get really good at it so you can do it without thinking, then you’ve really mastered it. What an accomplishment!!

Most people don’t look at it this way. They think procrastination is a negative thing. What they don’t realize is that you learned this behavior. If you can learn how to procrastinate and do it well, then you can just as easily learn how to become motivated.

You see, all you’re creating is a result. You’re teaching yourself how to get motivated or how to procrastinate. To get really good at procrastination you had to learn how to use your emotions because your emotions are what drive your behavior.

Here are 2 ways to overcome procrastination:

1. Eliminate Fear
   You see, you’ve got these emotions pulling you back and forth. It’s like an internal tug of war. Some days you’re good and others days – not so good. Positive emotions pull you towards what you want; negative emotions push you away.

   In a sense, procrastination is a form of self-sabotage. If fear didn’t exist then you wouldn’t be putting things off. You just go for it!

   But since you’re putting things off (like we all do at some point) then your negative emotions must be stronger than your positive emotions; or in other words, your fear is winning the tug of war.

   If you want to eliminate procrastination, then eliminate your fear. Just ask yourself: Are you pushing away the things you want? And if you are, are you pushing them away because of your fear of success or your fear of failure?

   Once you get clear on what’s stopping you, you can reframe those fears and empower yourself to take action.

2. Cultivate Desire
Remember, emotions govern your behavior. Fear pushes you away from what you want and desire pulls it towards you.

Your emotions are what drive your behavior. If you keep putting something off, then you don’t have a burning desire to do it.

No desire = no action.

So, how do you cultivate desire?

You start with the end in mind. How will things look when they’re all done? What will you see and how will you feel?

If you can associate strong emotions with the end result, you can cultivate a burning desire. Then watch how fast you jump into action.