Dear friends and family of 3 Elements,

The past year and a half has been a fantastic journey and a learning experience as I opened and ran my social media company, 3 Elements, LLC. Through this time I have built relationships with some of the most amazing businesses and have had the privilege in helping them market their companies online.

As of September 30^th, 2010, 3 Elements will no longer be in business. I have decided to take a position with an innovative and emerging company called SnapRetail where I will be the Director of Social Media.

I am extremely excited about this opportunity and am thankful that 3 Elements was able to help me find this position. If you haven’t heard of them, please visit their website at http://snapretail.com. They have created a fantastic platform to help retailers market to their databases more efficiently through email campaigns and social media; mainstreaming the retailers’ marketing efforts and saving them time.

Words cannot explain what I have been through with 3 Elements and there are definitely bitter sweet feelings about closing, however, I am excited about this opportunity. I had an amazing time getting to know everyone I worked with; learning from them and growing both professionally and personally. I am so thankful for 3 Elements and am excited to start the next chapter in my life with SnapRetail, where I will be relocating to Pittsburgh.

If you have any questions please don’t hesitate to ask. You will still be able to connect with me on Twitter and Facebook, and of course by email and phone (all my contact info will stay the same and/or will be forwarded).

If you ever need help pushing content, a promotion, announcing new products, etc., please don’t hesitate to reach out to me. I’d be more than happy to send info out to my personal networks. Be sure to stay in touch and I encourage everyone to also follow SnapRetail as we will be producing content about social media and email marketing that will be helpful to you and your business.

Thank you for being a part of this journey with me and 3 Elements. I look forward to keeping in touch with you and wish you all the best.

As always, to the future!

Crystal Vilkaitis

HOW TO Measure Your Social Media ROI: Part 4 (If you missed it, check out HOW TO Measure Your Social Media ROI Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4)

Let’s face it, most business owners starting to utilize and leverage social media want to know what the return on investment is with social media.  Honestly, social media lacks easily and clearly measurable characteristics of other investments, but it IS very much possible to see and track the monetized return from engaging in social media.  Every person using and utilizing social media should always remember, however, that social media is most importantly about building relationships; companies that don’t understand this simple fact will likely not feel the full and complete benefits of Social Media.  So how does one actually visualize the effectiveness and ROI of social media campaigns?

Tip #5: Understand Page Rank

As your site draws in increasing traffic, it will apply more effectively to organic search engine algorithms.  Committing to specific keywords with your tweets, posts, and other public communications will help naturally raise your website and social media presence in the rankings, so paying attention to this is a solid step toward managing your ROI for social media.

Other less understood ways to get your website to grow is through interacting with other websites in your niche.  Commenting on blogs almost always provides you with an opportunity to link back to your website; blogging and commenting on blogs is a necessity for strong social media presences.  Commenting on other blogs is also a great way to identify yourself to a targeted group of people as a clear and intelligent voice on topics in your field.

HOW TO Measure Your Social Media ROI: Part 4 (If you missed it, check out HOW TO Measure Your Social Media ROI Part 1, Part 2, Part 3)

Let’s face it, most business owners starting to utilize and leverage social media want to know what the return on investment is with social media.  Honestly, social media lacks easily and clearly measurable characteristics of other investments, but it IS very much possible to see and track the monetized return from engaging in social media.

Tip #4: Use 3^rd Party Tools

Honestly, there are WAY too many different tools for measuring one’s impact (which works hand-in-hand with ROI).  Since there are so many to choose from, I’ll just focus on two very important resources that business owners like you should be investigating.

oneforty.com

For most businesses, a trip to www.oneforty.com might feel intimidating at first due to the hundreds of applications (apps), tools, and resources that it has to offer.  Fear not!  This particular selection of digital treats offers user ratings and sponsored recommendations.  Most of the way down the initial web page you will see a large squared section title, “What’s Essential;” this should be your next stop on the journey of social media enlightenment.  There are 10 ‘essential’ types of resources, but ‘Analytics’ is the destination that you’re looking for; this will bring you to the top six analytical tools for your twitter account.  Read the reviews and choose what best suits your specific fancy.

Alexa

It seems like so few people actually use www.alexa.com to monitor their websites, but there’s no time to start like the present.  Alexa can install a toolbar to your web browser if you want it to; this toolbar will keep you posted as you browse the World Wide Web as to the ‘rank’ of the page that you are looking at.  Ideally, people should want this number to decrease in pursuit of the #1 position (google).  How this affects your social media ROI is by monitoring the “linking” websites that drive traffic to your website.  The higher that social media sites rate in the listing of referring sites, the better the social media campaign.  Ideally, if most of a site’s traffic is coming from social media, then success has been attained.

HOW TO Measure Your Social Media ROI: Part 3 (If you missed it, check out HOW TO Measure Your Social Media ROI Part 1 and Part 2)

Let’s face it, most business owners starting to utilize and leverage social media want to know what the return on investment is with social media.  Honestly, social media lacks easily and clearly measurable characteristics of other investments, but it IS very much possible to see and track the monetized return from engaging in social media.

Tip # 3: Use Special Promotions

If you want to know just how many people really care about your products and services, try doing some free promotional giveaways!  If you sell products online try offering a discount, free shipping, or a bonus product to customers that interact with you digitally.  During the checkout process, use a promotional code like “twitter” which provides the FREE addition to the order (or discount); this will provide information about how many people that you interact with actually want/use your products.  What could make this process even better would be to restart the process using different social mediums to track your value on each of them.

In his book, Crush It, Gary Vaynerchuk provides a wonderful case study about his marketing efforts.  He put up a billboard, purchased a TV spot, and tweeted about free shipping on purchases of wine from his company.  You’ll have to read the book to see how monumentally more successful his social media efforts were compared to more traditional means of marketing.  The best part of the whole case study is the amount that he spent compared to the return on each of them – needless to say, social media is FREE so the ROI on something that didn’t cost a penny is pretty colossal.

HOW TO Measure Your Social Media ROI: Part 2 (If you missed it, check out HOW TO Measure Your Social Media ROI Part 1)

Let’s face it, most business owners starting to utilize and leverage social media want to know what the return on investment is with social media.  Honestly, social media lacks easily and clearly measurable characteristics of other investments, but it IS very much possible to see and track the monetized return from engaging in social media.

Tip #2: Keep Track of Your Interactions

As each year brings new and innovative applications and 3^rd party tools that can interact with our online personas; measuring results is easier than it ever has been before and social media is no different.  There are several tools to measure the influence, clout, and impact of different social media platforms, but a simple spreadsheet managed by a person (rather than an automated system) goes a long way.  Keep track of every single message, @response, interaction, blog comment, and more.

Maintaining good records of how many people are interacting with your social media accounts provides manageable information that clearly shows growth.  This process also helps to clearly indicate who interacts the most – providing extra attention and gratitude to these people embodies what social media is truly about: developing and cultivating relationships.  A well developed online relationship founded in digital interactions has proven time and time again to be a successful practice in business.  Remember, social media doesn’t start overnight, but with some patience, practice and hustle you will see just how effective this investment can be.

3 Elements provides solutions for your social media needs.  Contact us to discuss how we can bring your business into the conversation.

Let’s face it, most business owners starting to utilize and leverage social media want to know what the return on investment is with social media.  Honestly, social media lacks easily and clearly measurable characteristics of other investments, but it IS very much possible to see and track the monetized return from engaging in social media.  Every person using and utilizing social media should always remember, however, that social media is most importantly about building relationships; companies that don’t understand this simple fact will likely not feel the full and complete benefits of Social Media.  So how does one actually visualize the effectiveness and ROI of social media campaigns?

Tip #1: Use Your Analytics

Today, just barely over half of American businesses even have a website.  Your website is your home base where all of your products, services, and information need to be readily available for your potential customer and clients to find.  Websites are the business cards of the 21^st century.  Most hosting companies offer their own analytics tools, but Google Analytics works with just about that you have access to editing.  After inserting a specific HTML code in to the pages of your site, Google Analytics will start providing useful information that can help identify the effectiveness of any campaign.  Most importantly, using any analytics should identify what is driving traffic to your website.  Social media campaigns should include self-promotional information that entices fans, followers, friends, and connections to investigate the company’s website.  As long as a company and the website have remarkable content, products, and services then the money will come.  If social media services become the top referring websites, then the ROI will be clear and evident.

The fastest way to see if your social media accounts are driving traffic to your website is by logging into your Google Analytics account and clicking on Traffic Sources in the left sidebar. From there, click Referring Sites and scroll below the graph to see which sites are driving traffic to your website.

Stay tuned for more.  Tomorrow’s tip: Keep track of your interactions!

When talking about social media, Elvis had it backwards. One of the biggest reasons social media is effective is because you are able to have a conversation with your peers and potential clients. Twitter has often been compared to a room full of people shouting and it is your goal to be heard, however as a business owner, it is important that you are also listening, listening to what your consumers are in need of. One way to do this is by monitoring specific keywords that are related to your industry and following the conversations that are happening around those words.

One way I like to do this is by creating a column within HootSuite.com (which I use to manage most all of my social media accounts) and enter 3-6 keywords; keywords that people would be using to find your product or service. Take a salon for example: if there is a local salon in Denver Colorado trying to monitor keywords that their audience is using, they might watch words and phrases like “salon in Denver” “massage in Denver” “need a hair lady in CO”. You might have to play with what keywords deliver you the best results. Once you see someone post a tweet that has the keywords you are monitoring you can quickly respond introducing yourself and solve their problem by giving them your address, setting an appointment, sending them to your website, etc.

Another way to participate in the conversations is through search.twitter.com. Twitter doesn’t have the best search capabilities, but this site does make it easy to hop into a relative conversation quickly. Just enter the keyword or key phrases that someone would use when looking for you or talking about your product/service and see where it would be appropriate for you to engage.

Finally, Twitter Lists are a fantastic way to filter through all the millions of Twitter users and hundreds to thousands of Twitter users that are following you. You can either create a list or subscribe and follow one that has already been created, but just make sure it is a list where you would find your perfect client. Mashable has a fantastic post about How to Use and Create Twitter Lists, I highly suggest you check this post out.

Remember, social media is about building relationships so make sure you aren’t only talking but also listening, all while jamming to Elvis

I was introduced to Pluggio.com by a good friend of mine and when I received an email from them asking for feedback, I thought I would write a blog about my thoughts and comments.

First off, I recommend this website. One of the biggest things I love about it is the ability to publish what is called “Rolling Tweets” to my networks. A rolling tweet is essentially a bunch of tweets that are titles of articles that others have written that include the link to those articles for my networks to check out. These posts are generated by the RSS feeds I choose to have pulling into my RSS section. This makes it easy for me to push valuable content out to my networks pretty much effortlessly. For me, I picked Twitter and Social Media outlets like TechCrunch and Twitter Alltop to feed into my RSS section since I’m in the social media and internet marketing world, but you can add any type of website to this section as long as they have a RSS feed.

Another thing I liked about Pluggio.com is their suggested follow and unfollow feature. Each day when I login to my account, I am given up to 20 suggestions of people to follow and unfollow based off of my bio and keywords. This makes it easy for me to clean up my followers but also add ones that are in my industry.

I also love that I can have multiple Twitter account synced to one Pluggio account. So all of the above features above, I can do to all of my personal and professional accounts, as well as my clients’ accounts which mainstreams my work and saves me time!

One thing I have come across is the downtime is a little higher than I would prefer. I’ve been on their site daily and probably at least once a day – every other day, their site is down. It is a new site and I think they are making changes daily so I’m patient with them, but it can be annoying.

For more information on Pluggio.com check out the video below are visit their website. Definitely try it out, it’s worth it!

With the growing number of users on Twitter (now at 105 million registered accounts) it’s important to treat your followers the way you would like to be treated…or tweeted J

Here are a few tips to make sure you are being respectful on Twitter:

Never Spam – Many people, especially business owners think Twitter, as well as other free social media platforms, are a place where they can sell their products or services within a week and drive instant traffic to their website. In rare cases this will happen, however if you create a Twitter account and all you do is talk about your product(s) or services, you are spamming your following. Make sure 70% of the content you are tweeting is adding value to your audience. Things like links to industry news, new laws or standards, quotes, tips and advice, and just general networking; talking to other Twitter users. 20% of your posts need to be the sharing piece meaning you are ReTweeting/RTing (reposting) other people’s post and making comments on their posts/blogs. Only 10% of your tweets will be self promotion, so make sure you start following this rule so you aren’t spamming your followers.

Be a Human, Not a Robot – The thing that is beautiful about Twitter, but also overwhelming, is how many applications there are to manage and automate your Twitter account. Even though there are many tools for automation, I strongly urge you to have human participation with your Twitter account, especially if you are using it for business. You have probably seen Twitter accounts that put out several feeds at once linking to blogs or promoting squeeze pages and that can be ok to do, however you must combine your automation with human interaction. Also, I recommend turning off auto Direct Messages (DMs). Since Twitter users have been given the ability to auto-respond to new followers via direct messages, the DM section has become complete spam and I rarely check my DMs due to this issue. I also know of people that will automatically unfollow you if you send them an auto DM. Use DM’s for private conversations, not to sell.

R-E-S-P-E-C-T and Customer Service– Hopefully as a business person, you are already treating your potential clients and peers with respect, but now with advances in technology people get to see a much more insightful look into our lives and businesses. I’ve seen a lot of people on Twitter start fights and arguments and they’re business owners starting arguments under their business accounts! This behavior will put you on the fast track to damaging your credibility and reputation which can take a very long time to rebuild. Think of Twitter as a customer service tool and know that tone is very hard to read via Internet, emails and texting. Be attentive and helpful and if someone is upset with you and challenges you online, think before you type! Make sure you are handling the person with professionalism. There might also be times when it is just not necessary to respond to someone if they are intentionally starting a fight. Remember, people can see what you say and it can be saved to use as proof or to be used against you, tweet wisely.

As you tweet, remember that Twitter is a free brand management and relationship tool, don’t abuse it and always Tweet people how you want to be Tweeted! J

If you are a part of the Twitterverse then you have surely seen #FollowFriday or #FF used before, perhaps you’ve even seen it… every Friday? #Followfriday has become the most popular social convention tool used on Twitter but if you don’t know what it is or how to use it, you might feel a little out of the loop.

If you have a great #followfriday feel free to leave a comment, we’d love to pass it along to our networks!