• With social media campaigns like Old Spice’s viral YouTube campaign this past week and marketers prioritizing video in their budgets over search optimization and mobile, it appears that video will continually grow in prominence.
• One expert predicts a shift in which search becomes more social and where social becomes more search-oriented.
• While skeptics predicted Facebook would fall from grace, the social network has only grown by the millions, reaching 500 million users this week, despite being ranked worst in customer satisfaction among businesses.

Old Spice Campaign Generated 35 Million Video Views in Seven Days

ClickZ | Jack Marshall | 7-19-10

In just a week, Old Spice’s video campaign on YouTube amassed 35.7 million individual views. The campaign consisted of 183 videos uploaded to Old Spice’s YouTube channel, in which their mascot (a guy, donning just a towel)  responded to questions from user submissions via Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Led by agency Widen + Kennedy, the campaign lasted only three days, with a 35-person team working 12 hours a day. PRWeek issued an article this week announcing that Old Spice has seen a direct correlation between their social media campaign and sales, with a 107% increase in Old Spice Body Wash sales so far.

Just one week since the campaign’s launch, Old Spice has seen exponential results across the Web’s most popular social networks:
YouTube:

• The Old Spice YouTube channel jumped in the lead last week as the most viewed channel on the network and became the third-ranked channel for highest number of subscriptions (ever) under YouTube’s “Sponsor” category.
• Their channel currently has more than 92 million total upload views.
• Just the final video response accumulated nearly 2.5 million views and more than 5,800 comments.

Twitter:

• Old Spice’s Twitter account increased its followers by more than double, from 32,000 to 94,000, in about five days.
• The company’s Twitter account was included in more than 2,300 Twitter lists.

Facebook:

• Old Spice also uploaded their video replies to their official Facebook Page, some of which have already received approximately 2,000 “likes.”
• Their Facebook Page has grown to more than 630,000 “likes.”

Companies Throw Their Weight Behind Online Video

eMarketer | Paul Verna | 7-20-10

Several recent studies demonstrate the rapid adoption of online video marketing by U.S. marketers either currently or as part of their upcoming agendas, as well as in their budget priorities. In a survey by Multichannel Merchant, 46% of U.S. multichannel retailers reported using video when asked to specify rich media features they’re currently using, making it the top-ranked media feature in the survey. Forty-two percent stated that they plan to incorporate video into their marketing efforts within the next year. Forrester Research’s study found that out of the top 50 U.S. online retailers, 68% provided video on their websites in 2009, as compared to just 18% in 2008. Among the Fortune 500 companies that maintain public blogs, 31% used video blogging in 2009, compared to 21% in 2008, according to the Society for New Communications Research. When asked by Ado-ology where social and traditional media ranked in their 2010 marketing budgets, almost 27% of U.S. marketing executives said they plan to increase their online video budgets for podcasts and viral clips, 41% said their budgets will remain the same, 5.5% said they planned to decrease their budgets and 27% said that they don’t use video at all. The post’s author points out that this survey highlights video as a higher ranking budget priority among U.S. marketing executives in 2010 than search optimization and mobile.

• With the growing accessibility to video anytime and anywhere (i.e. laptops, mobile phones and tablets), consumer expectations for online video content will surely continue to increase. Many businesses have already caught onto this trend and are positioning themselves to meet these growing demands.
• Survey results show video to be a higher 2010 budget priority among U.S. marketing executives than search optimization and mobile.

Search, social marketing begin to converge

BtoB Magazine | Christopher Hosford | 7-14-10

In a Q&A session, “Hands On: Search” spoke with Steve Rubel of Edelman Digital about the merging of social media and search marketing. Rubel said that he expects search to become much more social, as well as for social to become more search-oriented. He points out that Google’s already demonstrating this shift, in that search queries now render real time Web results. We’re already seeing a major overlap between social media and search, Rubel explains, with features like Facebook enabling users to search their friends’ content and Google offering users with accounts the option of filtering their searches by social results, by way of the Google address book. He also anticipates an upcoming partnership between Facebook and Microsoft or Yahoo to further their reach into search, and for Google to capitalize on social as a way to increase their search volume and ads. Rubel explains that the challenge this poses for the B2B marketer is in finding a balance between personal and professional, claiming that over time, we’ll see a shift from business decisions made from a personal standpoint to decisions heavily impacted by a company’s social networking sites.

• Rubel suggests that over time, we’ll begin to see search becoming increasingly social and social moving to become more search-focused.
• He predicts that we’ll see an eventual shift in business decisions from being based in personal opinion to being more focused on the collective customer voice on a company’s social networks.

Facebook Among Web’s Worst in Customer Satisfaction [SURVEY]

Mashable | Samuel Axon | 7-21-10

Source: money.cnn.com

Facebook might have reached 500 million users this week, yet according to the 2010 American Customer Survey Index (led by ForeSeeResults), the social media giant is considered one of the worst in customer satisfaction among other businesses in its category, earning just 64 out of 100 points in a survey assessing customer satisfaction. Among other major social networks, only MySpace ranked lower–by one point. Facebook also earned a lower score than all major news websites included in the survey. Google, one of the other key players in the survey, earned 80 points, followed by Wikipedia and Bing with a score of 77, Yahoo with 76 points and YouTube at 73 points. Despite its prominence in the social media space, Twitter was left off the list of businesses since many of the network’s users frequent Twitter through third party applications, rendering customer opinion (of Twitter specifically) extremely difficult to measure. Larry Freed, CEO of ForeSee Results, attributes constant website changes, increasing use of advertising and privacy issues to Facebook’s low score. Regardless of user complaints and low ratings, Facebook hasn’t experienced a major user-base fallout by any means.

• In a recent customer satisfaction survey, Facebook ranked lowest in customer satisfaction among all other businesses in its category, with a score of 68 out of 100 possible points.
• Despite user dissatisfaction, Facebook hasn’t suffered a hit to their user base, which passed the 500 million mark this week.

What Kind of Impact Can Online Video Marketing Have for the B2B Marketer?

We hope that you’ve enjoyed reading our weekly summary and that you’ll share any feedback and questions you might have with us. To get the weekly summary, or any other Optify updates, follow us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or subscribe to our RSS feed. We’ve listed a few questions below that we’d like to hear your thoughts on:

• It’s a commonly held belief that it’s nearly impossible to directly increase sales through social media marketing efforts. While the Old Spice YouTube campaign is an extreme (and B2C) counterexample to this opinion, the brand did see a visible, immediate increase in sales from their social media campaign. What are some lessons we can take away from their campaign, specifically from a B2B marketing standpoint?
• Can video marketing have the same kind of prominence among B2B marketers as it does for B2C?

Video Marketing’s Rising Prominence, the Future of Social & Search is a post from: B2B Marketing and Lead Generation | Optify

Using Optify, AdReady has significantly increased its overall pool of leads and resulting conversation rates. By prioritizing incoming leads based on Optify’s Lead Scoring capabilities, AdReady has automatically qualified more than 80 percent of its prospects, making it easier to assign the appropriate sales contact to each lead. This level of intelligence about each lead has increased AdReady’s conversion rates by 189 percent. Optify’s Real Time Marketing Software also improves SEO, which delivered a 103 percent increase for Web traffic and 196 percent increase in leads generated.

“With Optify, we grew the number of leads we captured from anonymous visitors in a very short timeframe,” said Jonah-kai Hancock, director of marketing at AdReady. “We saw steady month-over-month growth in the number of visitors and leads we tracked and were able to automatically score and prioritize with Optify, allowing us to better focus our sales efforts and achieve results.”

Using the Optify Lead Scoring application, the AdReady sales team customized its lead scores for various user segments including publishers, agencies and premium leads. By automatically monitoring site visitors, Optify assigned a lead score to each prospect based on the custom criteria outlined by the sales and marketing teams.

The company also used Optify to receive daily e-mail reports, showing exactly who visited the site the previous day, how engaged each visitor was, which pages they viewed and the amount of time spent on the site. This information helped AdReady personalize conversations with each lead and focus on each potential customer’s specific area of interest. Optify also allowed Adready to create that notified sales when visitors from specific companies in the sales pipeline arrived on the AdReady website. This eased the tracking process after a sales call and helped AdReady discover what content was driving customer engagement.

Optify (http://www.optify.net) enables marketing and sales professionals generate qualified leads through Web search and social media with easy-to-use, enterprise SEO and . Optify’s hosted service allows marketers to find and track target keywords, optimize their website for search engines, monitor website visitors, automate Twitter campaigns and track results, and gain insights into which online marketing channels are driving the most qualified leads. Sales teams can automatically qualify and score web leads, focus sales efforts with real time lead scoring and alerts, align marketing and sales, and close more deals by assigning the right leads to the right sales person. Optify is simple to set up and includes free phone, email and Web support.

The full AdReady case study is available to read and download. For more insights on how to market in real time, visit the Optify Lead Generation Blog at http://www.optify.net/blog.

Adready Uncovers Lead Intelligence and Increases Conversion Rates by Nearly 200 Percent Using Optify is a post from: B2B Marketing and Lead Generation | Optify

Create a Staging Page

Don’t release your Facebook Page rebuild until all renovations are complete

• If your company plans to entirely redesign your Facebook Page rather than just make a few small repairs, only issue one official launch of your rebuild instead of revising piece-by-piece.
• Establishing an official launch date allows you to track and measure your success across the board, from pre-launch data to post-launch data for the months succeeding the launch.
• We have measured our current Facebook Page based on specific metrics (e.g. number of fans, traffic volume), using our Marketing Analytics Feature and Facebook’s Insights dashboard. We will compare this data to our post-launch numbers for our Page over the next few months.

Continue maintaining your current Facebook Page, but build an additional staging Page for the renovation process

• Making changes to your current Page instead of a test page is risky.
• So as to keep our renovation process hidden from public view, we researched whether Facebook offered a “Preview” option of changes to our existing Page, in which revisions would remain unpublished until we were prepared to go public.
• We found no such option on Facebook.
• Instead, we created a brand new, public Page with a nonspecific title and no mention of Optify, in order to keep the public Page under wraps until our launch.
• Come official launch time, we will transfer data from our staging Page to our existing Page.

Assign admins to your Facebook Page’s test site

• Facebook Pages allow for multiple admins, so you can easily make all members of your project admins of the staging Page.
• Optify made everyone on the Facebook Rebuild project a staging Page admin, including members of our marketing team, graphic designers and Web developers.

Test out Facebook applications on your staging Page, not publicly

• The social network allows Pages to run various third-party applications, as well as Facebook’s own. It’s important to test each one before deciding whether to incorporate it into your final rebuild.
• Your current fans will have full visibility to these repairs and this may cause confusion, or even drive fans away if your implementation of Facebook applications and other new features don’t work.
• Optify researched countless Facebook applications through user forums and blog posts, but trial and error testing proved to be the most effective assessment.
• Many Facebook applications Optify initially considered contained bugs and/or were found to offer a few, but not all the features we desired.

Launch internally

• Since your staging Page is publicly accessible, it’s easy to share this link with the rest of your team.
• As you make your way through the rebuild process, ask your staff to check in and offer their own unique insights and fresh perspective regarding the Page.
• We sent our staging Page link to our entire team, so as to gather feedback from all of Optify’s teams (Sales, Development, Marketing).

Find Yourself a Skilled Graphic Design, IT Team

Hire a team to assist with your Facebook Page design

• It’s essential that you have a designated team to assist with graphics and Web development for your Facebook Page design .
• While Facebook applications offer some automated, easy-to-use features, more complex and visually pleasing Page options require skilled professionals.
• Facebook applications provide the capacity for a customized Page, but the construction process is entirely on you. Make sure you find experienced individuals who are up to the task of building your Page from scratch.
• We were lucky enough to already have a graphic designer and Web developer on our team, yet our Facebook rebuild was truly novel, experimental for everyone onboard.
• We found it was essential to first research Facebook Page best practices, then to discuss our objectives and vision with our graphic design and IT team.

Research Facebook Page best practices and set your company goals, then delegate

• Once you’ve set your objectives for your Facebook Fan Page, build your Page according to those goals.
• For example, we reconstructed our Facebook Page design based on the following objectives: To increase Optify’s “Like” base, to elevate and drive traffic to Optify’s website, and to provide value to fans and prompt them to share.
• Look at what other brands and your competitors are doing for inspiration only after you’ve focused on your company’s own goals. Realize, not everyone’s core objectives are the same.
• Identify what each navigational tab and graphic on your Page aims to achieve before moving into the design stage.
• Even though you, the marketer, might not be a gifted artist doesn’t mean you can’t lay the foundation for your Page’s rebuild.
• At Optify, we sketched simple layouts that included just text and basic design in order to provide our graphic design/IT team with an idea of our vision for the Page.

Join the Process

This is the third installment of Optify’s Facebook Page Rebuild Series. We hope that you’ll continue to follow our blog updates as we continue to document our Facebook Page’s progress. Share your thoughts with us.

7 Facebook Page Rebuild Tips: Construction, Facebook Page Design is a post from: B2B Marketing and Lead Generation | Optify

• Facebook announced this week that they’re planning to go mobile with their recently launched Open Graph, and that their user volume on mobile devices now reaches beyond 150 million users.
• Facebook surpassed its own traffic record in June, reaching more than 141 million unique visitors nationwide. These numbers help to further support the notion that they’ve become a real competitor to Google (in terms of traffic volume), who saw 179 million unique visitors in May.
• Twitter’s currently supporting 800 million queries a day–a 33% increase since April.
• Even though total media spending worldwide decreased in 2009, online ad spending saw a 2% boost, rising to $55.2 billion.

Facebook’s Open Graph going mobile

CNET | Jessica Dolcourt | 7-13-10

Facebook’s head of mobile products, Eric Tseng announced this week at MobileBeat 2010 that their newly released Open Graph will soon enter the mobile space. He didn’t specify an ETA, though Tseng stated that the release would be an ongoing process. Facebook describes Open Graph as a specified list of metatags that people can implement on their pages, which will allow Facebook to categorize each page by the object type they represent. The article’s author points out that the highly popular Facebook “Like” button, which is widespread across the entire Web (not just on Facebook), is part of the larger plan of Open Graph. An increasing number of Facebook social sharing options (i.e. the “Like” button) will begin to appear in non-Facebook mobile applications that lack social networking options with the release of Open Graph mobile plug-ins, the author claims. Eventually, the author suggests Open Graph may connect geolocation advertising with Facebook friend recommendations within mobile apps.

• Facebook has just announced their plan to go mobile with Open Graph.
• The major social network hopes Open Graph’s mobile move will effectively combine location-based advertising with recommendations from a user’s Facebook network of friends.

Facebook Mobile Usage Surpasses 150 Millions Users

All Facebook | Nick O’Neill | 7-14-10

Facebook has now reached over 150 million users on mobile devices, up from 100 million users in February, announced Eric Tseng of Facebook at MobileBeat 2010. The author of the post points out that while the growth rate of the company’s users via mobile isn’t climbing as rapidly as Facebook’s actual website, the numbers still emphasize the increasing significance of mobile. The author makes a few speculations as to Facebook’s next move based on Tseng’s presentation, stating that the popular social network might very well be developing a Facebook Mobile Platform.

• Facebook recently announced that their user volume on mobile devices is now over 150 million.
• As the social networking giant continues to make their way into the mobile space, the post’s author suggests that we might see developments like a Facebook Mobile Platform surface.

Facebook Hits New Traffic Record

Mashable | Adam Ostrow | 7-13-10

Recently, comScore reported that Facebook beat their own record for site traffic in the month of June, reaching more than 141 million unique visitors in the U.S. alone, an 11 million increase since May. Facebook’s currently experiencing nearly double their unique visitor traffic from a year ago (June 2009), which totaled 77 million. According to comScore, Facebook’s traffic growth rate is climbing much more rapidly than its competitors, including Twitter and MySpace. The article’s author points out that Twitter has defended its traffic growth, expressing that users frequent Twitter through wireless devices and third-party clients versus the actual social network, and that the social network’s still experiencing high traffic volumes. Facebook’s record-breaking traffic, the author says, makes them a real competitor to Google (in relation to traffic volume), who saw 179 million unique visitors in May.

• Facebook beat its own traffic record with 141 million unique visitors in June, signaling an increase of 11 million since May.
• These figures put Facebook on the map with Google; the search engine reached 179 million unique visitors in May.

Twitter search queries up 33 percent from April to 800 million per day

VentureBeat | Kim-Mai Cutler | 7-6-10

Twitter reported this month that they’re currently experiencing 800 million queries a day (or, 24 billion queries a month)–a 33% increase from April when they claimed to receive 600 million queries per day. Daily query numbers are hardly consistent, though. At times, the company claimed to support as many as 750 million queries a day in April. While the most recent worldwide traffic stats for Bing and Yahoo are from December 2009, Comscore released figures stating that Yahoo received 9.4 billion monthly queries and Bing, 4.1 billion monthly queries. Twitter has publicly voiced desire to be perceived as an information network versus a social media network. The author also points out that this rapid search query growth rate will most likely help support Twitter’s current advertising approach: “Sponsored Tweets.”

• Twitter recently stated that they’re supporting 800 million queries a day, which marks a 33% increase since April.
• While the most recent global stats for Bing and Yahoo date all the way back to December, the two search engines saw 4.1 billion and 9.4 billion monthly queries respectively (in December), whereas Twitter’s currently receiving 24 billion monthly queries.

Double-Digit Growth Again for Online Ad Spend

eMarketer | 7-13-10

In their recent report, “Worldwide Ad Spending,” eMarketer states that even though total media spending worldwide decreased in 2009, online ad spending saw a 2% boost, reaching $55.2 billion. They project that in 2010, online ad growth worldwide will reach into the double-digits with an 11.9% increase, amounting to $61.8 billion. Online ad growth will consistently see rates of more than 10% annually through 2014, says the report. While almost 75% of global online ad spending in 2009 was generated in North America and Western Europe, eMarketer estimates that developing countries in Latin America, Asia-Pacific and Eastern Europe will demonstrate more rapid growth rates than these more advanced markets in years to come. Between 2009 and 2014, they predict the Internet’s share of total ad spending globally will increase from 11.9% to 17.2%. eMarketer explains that online ad spending has the capacity to make this leap due to their consistently rapid growth rate and total media’s spending decrease of 10.5% in 2009, as well as the latter’s slow repossession of the market. The report’s author, Jared Jenks says it’s evident why online ad spending’s seeing such growth due to its ever-increasing popularity among the general public, efficacy and measurability.

• While total global media spending decreased in 2009 online ad spending experienced a 2% increase, rising to $55.2 billion.
• eMarketer forecasts an online ad growth of more than 10% each year through 2014 and an increase in the Internet’s share of total ad spending worldwide from 11.9% (in 2009) to 17.2% (in 2014).

Where’s Mobile Going Next?

We hope that you’ve enjoyed reading our weekly update and would like to hear any feedback or questions you might have. To get the weekly summary, or any other Optify updates, follow us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or subscribe to our RSS feed. Here are some questions that we’d like to receive your input on:

• What are your thoughts on Facebook’s mobile expansion using Open Graph?
• While the concept of linking location-based advertising and Facebook friend recommendations in the form of a mobile app is most applicable to the B2C marketer, how could B2B companies leverage this marketing strategy?

Mobile and Social’s Growing Relationship, Real Time Search & Beyond is a post from: B2B Marketing and Lead Generation | Optify

This blog post is the second installment of our Facebook Fan Page Rebuild Series. Even though Optify already maintains a Facebook Page, we felt it pertinent to explore the other presences available on Facebook, especially to account for the possibility that our small fan base could be related to our use of a Page instead of a Group. We looked through several blog posts and found these articles to be the most insightful in our decision-making process: Facebook Pages vs Facebook Groups: What’s the Difference? and Facebook Group vs Facebook Fan Page: What’s Better? Based on our research, we’ve compiled this list of key differences between Facebook Pages and Groups:

1. Main Purpose
2. Collective Voice or the Individual?
3. Applications
4. Insights Dashboard
5. Fan Page Communication & Word of Mouth Marketing
6. No Limit on Fans or Members; Groups Limited on Messaging

Facebook Page or Group? What’s the Difference?

• Facebook Pages are ideal for brands and companies who are looking to interact with their customers or fans, whereas Groups are better for rallying around a cause or campaign on an individual level.
• Pages are typically best for fostering ongoing interactions with fans, visitors or customers; Groups are more often employed for short-term engagement and driving traffic to your company’s Facebook quickly, although for a brief period of time.

Collective Voice or the Individual?

• A Facebook Group administrator’s actions are directly connected to their personal profiles, meaning each post they make on their Group’s site appears as coming from them personally.
• Pages offers the best of both worlds, in that Page administrators can upload content to the site without the action linking to them as the individual, but rather as the voice of the company. At the same time, Page admins can still interact on an individual level (i.e. using the”Like” button on their Page will display and link their personal profile name).
• Pages don’t publicly display the names of admins; Group admins are visible to everyone.

Applications

• Applications are only currently available for Pages and personal profiles. Groups still don’t have this capability.
• Pages can be far more individualized, as well as show more content than Groups through the employment of applications.

Insights Dashboard

• Supplementing our Marketing Analytics Feature, Facebook’s Insights Dashboard allows us to track visitors and our fans’ actions on our Facebook Page.
• The Insights Dashboard is not currently accessible to Groups.

Fan Page Communication & Word of Mouth Marketing

• Content posted by Page admins is considered an “update,” which depending on a fan’s custom settings, can appear in a fan’s News Feed.
• Page fans can share their brand support with their Facebook friends, in that their Page interactions will display on their friends’ News Feeds, which can act as a way to drive users to click through these stories and potentially become a fan of the Page.
• A fan also promotes their Pages through their personal profile under “Likes and Interests.” If a friend is interested to learn more about that Page, they’re able to click through the
  hyperlinked text or Page’s profile photo.

No Limit on Fans or Members; Groups Limited on Messaging

• There’s no maximum number of fans or members a Facebook Page or Group can have.
• Groups can message all of their members at once as long as their member base is fewer than 5,000 people.
• There is no limitation on messaging for Pages–they can send updates to all fans or to a specified subset.
• Pages send updates that appear in the “Updates” tab of a fan’s Inbox.
• Groups send messages that act more like e-mail, in that they appear in members’ Facebook inboxes.

Making a Case for Optify’s Fan Page

Not all the Facebook Group and Page features highlighted in the aforementioned articles were relevant to Optify’s goals and best practices for our Facebook presence. This list, however, outlines the key takeaways we found most essential to our company specifically and as a B2B business. We’ve showcased the features we believe best support our decision to retain our existing Facebook Fan Page instead of creating a Group.

Join the Process

This is the second blog post in Optify’s Facebook Fan Page Rebuild Series. We hope that you’ll continue to read our blog updates as we continue to revamp our Facebook Fan Page. Our next series topic will provide advice on creating a staging page during your rebuild, as well as choosing the best graphic design and IT team for your project.

Facebook Page or Facebook Group? How to Choose for Your Business is a post from: B2B Marketing and Lead Generation | Optify

Since launching our Facebook fan page on September 8, 2009 we’ve noticed a relatively sluggish climb in our fan base over the succeeding months. Admittedly, we’ve dedicated more manpower to our other social media channels, like our Lead Generation Blog, Twitter and LinkedIn. As of this week, we’ll switch gears and begin working on a major rebuild to our Facebook fan page. Using Optify’s Marketing Analytics Features, along with Facebook’s recently launched Insights Dashboard, we’ve analyzed our performance based on specific metrics and found that we have room for improvement.

Optify’s Facebook Fan Page Performance

• Nearly one year after our fan page’s launch, only 298 people “Like” our Facebook page.
• While our fan page experienced spikes in traffic during event promotions, we have not seen an upward trend over the months in terms of page views and have maintained a slow climb in our fan base. So, even though people are visiting our page, they’re not necessarily converting into fans.

Facebook for B2B Marketers

Typically, B2B marketers tend to flock to social networks like LinkedIn to drive their social media marketing efforts, and it’s B2C companies who leverage the marketing opportunities of Facebook’s fan pages. While we’re entering this rebuild with a certain amount of skepticism as to whether our target audience has an actual presence on Facebook and recognize that there are particular challenges for a B2B company using Facebook, we’ve identified the goals and best practices for our specific company.

Goals: With the total rebranding of our Facebook page, we’re focused on three main objectives, which we hope to see fulfilled within the first few months of launching our new page. Each social media channel achieves a different set of goals; it’s crucial that you determine your company’s specific intentions before diving into a social network rebuild. 

• To increase Optify’s “Like” base
• To elevate and drive traffic to Optify’s website
• To provide value to fans and prompt them to share

Uses: Facebook (especially Facebook brand pages) has multifaceted uses depending on the user. Whether you’re a B2B or a B2C, an enterprise or an individual, you should evaluate how prospects and customers might approach your Facebook fan page (or group), what kind of value you can deliver to them and at which point in the purchase cycle
they’re presently, so you can align your marketing message.

• Micro-blog: Designed for informal, conversational tone and frequent updates
• Lead nurturing: Provides a means for us to keep prospective customers engaged
• Retention: Acts as a channel for us to continuously interact with our current customers, encourage them to engage with Optify’s product and educate our Facebook user community about Optify
• Create an Optify User Community: Customers can share their product experiences through discussions, wall posts, FAQs, etc.

Join the Process

This blog post marks the first of our Facebook Brand Page Rebuild Series.  We hope that you’ll check back throughout the renovation process for updates and tips. In our next blog post of the series, we’ll focus on which type of Facebook presence is best for your business: Facebook fan page or Facebook group.

Optify’s Facebook Fan Page Rebuild Series: Part 1 is a post from: B2B Marketing and Lead Generation | Optify

Are Your Ears Burning? In Social Networks, One-Third of Consumers Talk Brands Every Week

BrianSolis.com | Brian Solis | 7-6-10

In this post, Solis takes a look at a study by ROI Research, which assessed the interaction between social network users and brands. Solis points out that even though there’s a lot of promise in these stats in suggesting Twitter users to be a major supporter of brands online, the stats still suggest a minor downward trend. Between 2009 and 2010, the study shows a slight decrease in the percentage of Twitter users who claimed they would recommend the company or product, talk about the company or product and purchase the brand/company’s product. The percentage of users surveyed who claimed they would link to an advertisement for the company or product remained the same. Solis revisits his previous hypothesis that companies would eventually start to allocate more resources toward their brand’s presence on Facebook rather than Twitter. He nods at the study’s findings as potential support for his prediction. Between 2009 and 2010, there was a minor increase in the percentage of Facebook users who reported that connecting with companies on Facebook makes them feel like a valued customer, that they enjoy interacting with companies through Facebook and that they believe the social network is a valuable method for finding information about companies and products.

• Between 2009 and 2010, there was a minor downward trend in Twitter users’ support of companies and products on the social network, whereas there was a slight increase in the percentage of users who reported interacting with brands on Facebook.
• Based on this data, we can see the multifaceted uses of Facebook and Twitter. The study further supports the claim that social media has various uses and that different networks support different use cases and should be treated accordingly.

Twitter, Facebook Lack Mobile Influence

Media Post | Laurie Sullivan | 7-8-10
In a recent study by the Pew Internet & American Life Project, out of the 59% of respondents who claim to use wireless devices, only 10% of them reported using their mobile phones and wireless laptops to employ status update services, like Facebook and Twitter. The data demonstrated that users purpose these wireless devices for numerous other activities, however. Fifty-four percent have used their mobile phones to send photos, 23% have visited social networking sites, 20% watched videos and 15% uploaded photos or videos. Non-voice data applications have seen increased usage in the past years, with using a mobile device to take a photo being the most popular. Internet use via mobile has seen continual growth among adults ages 30-49, as well as an increase in the frequency with which they go online throughout the day: 43% of adult users access the Internet several times a day.

• According to the data, users have been relatively slow to adopt Facebook and Twitter status update services into their day-to-day mobile activity.
• Wireless device users are accessing the Internet with increasing frequency, yet mostly for the purpose of sending photos, visiting social networking sites, watching videos and uploading photos or videos.

Almost 65 Million Facebook Users “Like” Things Daily

All Facebook | Nick O’Neill | 7-7-10

Based on Facebook’s self-reported statistics, All Facebook makes the claim that nearly 65 million Facebook users “Like” on Facebook, every day. Therefore, making the “Like” option the most frequented action on Facebook. If Facebook’s claims are accurate, Neill says, that 50% of their active users login to Facebook on any given day and their active user base is nearly 500 million, the data would suggest that about 26% of users “Like” items once they login to Facebook each day. Neill claims that it’s hardly unexpected that Facebook’s concentrating so much effort on the “Like” feature with data like this.

• According to All Facebook, almost 65 million Facebook users “Like” on Facebook daily.
• Based on Facebook’s self-reported statistics, this would mean that approximately 26% of users “Like” things on Facebook every day.

B2Bs Still Struggle to Tie Leads to Marketing Touchpoints

eMarketer | 7-7-10

A 2010 study led by the Lenskold Group found that almost half (44%) of B2B marketers reported that their lead generation measurement only extended as far as the last marketing touchpoint, fewer (21%) claimed that they use more advanced techniques that allow them to measure lead generation across several touchpoints and 20% said they do not track leads to any specific marketing touchpoints. While the number of respondents who claim to calculate a few financial metrics—namely, cost-per-lead and cost-per-sale—has increased significantly between 2008 and 2010 (34% to 43%), the number of marketers who measure ROI or net present value has stayed relatively stagnant over the same time range (26% to 27%). Marketers who measured ROI found it easier to follow leads to marketing touchpoints. Eleven percent claimed they did not employ any tracking, whereas 40% reported using only traditional metrics. Marketers utilizing more sophisticated ROI metrics, found their marketing strategies to be more efficient and successful than marketers overlooking these metrics.

• 44% of B2B marketers worldwide report their lead generation measurement only extended as far as the last marketing touchpoint, 21% measure lead generation across several touchpoints and 20% do not track leads to any marketing touchpoints.
• There appears to be more prospective revenue in lead generation marketing, but only by implementing success metrics, ROI measurement and improved tracking.

Is Facebook Destined to Climb Higher on Marketers’ Social Media Marketing Agendas Than Twitter?

We’re interested to hear your thoughts and comments on this blog post. To receive this weekly summary, or any other Optify updates, follow us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or subscribe to our RSS feed. There are a few questions we’d like to hear your feedback on: Do you agree with Solis’ prediction? Do you think Facebook will increasingly gain the attention of marketers over Twitter in their social media marketing efforts? Do you agree with this statement in respect to B2B companies? Share your thoughts with us.

A Look at Today’s Social Media Trends is a post from: B2B Marketing and Lead Generation | Optify

I needed to buy a new digital camera. Well, I wanted to buy a new digital camera.  My family was visiting relatives on the East Coast last week and I forgot to bring along a camera.  (OK, that’s my story, and I’m sticking to it!)

So, which camera did I buy? If you’re going to buy a second digital camera, or a third one, you probably want to find one that does something new and different than your other cameras.

I’ve been interested in panorama photographs lately. Remembering a television commercial I’d seen, I knew that Sony makes a small snapshot-size camera that can shoot panoramas. So, I searched on Google. In a few moments, I had a model number: Sony DSC-H55. Next, I went to Amazon to see if it sold that model and if there were any reviews. Indeed, they did sell the camera and it had been extensively reviewed.

I scanned the camera’s features and then browsed the reviews. There were 29 reviews posted, and 16 of them were five-star reviews; just four of the reviews had received two stars or fewer. I read all four of the lowest scores and a bunch of the five-star reviews. I learned that the camera works pretty well at things I value and that it seemed to fit my point-and-shoot photography needs.

Next, I turned to Flickr. I found the camera’s user group (which had 28 members and 188 photos so far), and I viewed several panoramic shots. I liked a lot of them. Overall, on Flickr I found over 400 shots taken with the DSC-H55. I checked out some of the posted photos and read comments about both the photos and the camera.

The camera also shoots video, so I headed over to YouTube and searched there too. I checked out a few videos taken with the camera and a few video reviews of the camera. Continuing my search to find out more about this camera, I found discussions about the camera (albeit brief ones) on Twitter.

I went to Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com) and read some of the forums on that site that covered the camera as well as the site’s review of the camera model. By way of comparison, I also scanned reviews of other point-and-shoot cameras and reviewed some of the forum discussions for those cameras.

Lastly, I searched at blogsearch.google.com and found thousands of blog postings that referenced the camera. I scanned a few of these, and though I did not learn much more about the camera or its features, I started to develop an idea of what I might have to pay for the camera.

The above searches took me about an hour in total. After my online research, I decided I wanted to buy the Sony DSC-H55 camera. Because I was traveling, and because the newest family member (the son of a nephew) was arriving the next day, Amazon or other online retailers were not possible. So, I checked Best Buy, Target and a few other websites, and I found a local store that had the camera in stock at a good price. I’m very happy with my purchase.

In all, not counting Google or the retailers, I spent time on five web sites researching my purchase. Curiously, the one web site I never checked out was this one: www.sony.com.

Consumer Generated Media (CGM)

I’m pretty sure if I had gone to look, I could find some information there about the DSC-H55. But frankly, it didn’t occur to me. A lot of current research shows that people trust the opinions of their friends and peers more than they trust traditional marketing messages. My experience is a real-world example of that phenomenon.

In all, I used five types of web sites or networks.

We often lump all of these networks into the social media category. While the various sites are different in many ways they all represent the direct thoughts and feelings of regular people and consumers, as opposed to the views of companies. We might also refer to this broader category as consumer generated media, or CGM. Social networks, including Facebook, LinkedIn and other sites, are all subsets of CGM. I make the distinctions above because what you learn and how you engage will vary by type of consumer generated media.

It’s not that great of a stretch to apply what I found in the above personal case study to how social media strategies can be shaped. Limiting your online marketing strategies around just Facebook or other social networks may cause you to miss valuable conversations taking place in other media such as forums or blogs. I think B2B companies will find this particularly true because professional conversations congregate in blogs and forums more than in purely social networks. An ad network, for example, might be quite savvy about social networks and placing ads there. But the reality is that such an ad network may be more likely to find deeper conversations about advertising on a site like adverblog.com than on Facebook.

So, does this mean that companies like Sony can dump their expensive web sites? Not at all. It does mean that companies need to view consumer generated media, including social networks, as companions to the information and messages that they directly promote. I’ll go further and suggest that for some people, good product pages are a great addition to consumer generated media. The Sony page surely fed some of the initial interest in the new camera that seeded the reviews, forums and online conversations. No doubt, having a great product helped too.

When approaching the start (or continuation) of a social media campaign a great question to ask is: What can Sony or other brands do to foster strong consumer generated media about their products? There seems to be a consensus that people who engage in CGM are skeptical about top-down, traditional and company-driven messages. I know I am a bit myself. In a future post or posts, I’d like to touch upon strategies that brands can use to engage in consumer generated media in authentic ways, as well as strategies they can use to measure results.

Consumer generated media is so large that there are likely to be thousands, if not millions, of online conversations taking place for even niche products. This is true for B2B as well as B2C brands. The consumers have voted with their typing fingers and they want to get information from their friends and peers. Wise brands will find ways to participate in these conversations, learn and to profit from them.

Bill Baker
Bill is a technical advisor to Optify. Bill has been involved in the BI industry longer than the term “Business Intelligence.” In the early 90s, Bill was Sr. VP of Product Development at IRI Software, where he led the development of the Express multi-dimensional database. His tenure at IRI included Express’s Windows-based user interface and porting to a wide variety of server platforms.

Beginning in 1996, Bill spent over twelve years at Microsoft where he started the BI team within the SQL Server product unit. Bill and his team delivered three releases of Analysis Services, Reporting Services, Integration Services and the SQL Server Management Studio. During that period, Bill was a frequent spokesperson for BI at Microsoft.

Most recently Bill was CTO at Visible Technologies, a Bellevue, WA company that produces software to measure and analyze brand perceptions and performance in social media.

Why Consumer Generated Media (aka Social Media) Matters to Brands: A Real-World Case Study is a post from: B2B Marketing and Lead Generation | Optify

Dashboard

Last month we released the new Dashboard infrastructure, and it’s already proving value in providing “at-a-glance” access to what’s working, what’s not and how customers are tracking to their marketing and sales goals.  This week we’ve not only added the rest of the widgets for our default reports, but also enabled full personalization.  That means the user can decide what to show, how to format the data and how prominent it should be. Any of the reports in the application can be displayed as a chart or summary widget on the dashboard and in various different sizes.  That means each user can have a customized dashboard based on their goals and preferences!

Optify Labs: Link Advisor

Anyone who runs SEO campaigns knows how important link building is to SEO success. So, we’ve decided to share an early version of our own link tool: Link Building Advisor. It’s the first of many more cool apps that we’ll be showcasing in our new Optify Labs to get early feedback before launching into our core product. The Optify Link Building Advisor helps you quickly identify the most highly ranked websites for your target keywords, as well as the top Tweeters. You can use this information to create strong inbound links that will increase your web presence and also enhance your search engine performance. We’ll tell you which links are highest priority and even let you know which inbound links you already have.

As always, we’d love to hear your feedback on these or any other Optify features.

What’s New: Dashboard Widgets, Link Building Advisor is a post from: B2B Marketing and Lead Generation | Optify

• Most online users merely skim content, rather than reading it word-for-word. In order to appeal to readers in the social media space, it’s important to structure and style your content in a digestible, accessible format.
• Risk reversal strategies don’t just apply to B2C; they have relevancy in B2B marketing efforts as well.
• Three-word queries appear to be the magic number for driving traffic from search engines.
• E-mails containing social sharing options produce 30% higher click-through rates than those without.
• There are numerous advertising opportunities available on LinkedIn that go a step beyond the network’s standard marketing offerings.

How to Prep Content for Social Media

Search Engine Land | Jordan Kasteler | 6-29-10

It’s well known that the average user on the Web skims rather than reads content. When developing content for your social media networks, it’s essential to keep this in mind and to realize that users will be looking for even more quick, accessible content in the social media space. While it’s important to focus on publishing high quality writing, this author argues that employing an easy-to-navigate, user-friendly structure and style is critical. In terms of structure, the author suggests using short sentences and paragraphs, focusing on one topic per paragraph. Also, he recommends including a table of contents, bullet points and a clear hierarchy of content. For the purpose of SEO, the author also highlights the importance of properly coding your content.

• The majority of users on social networking sites will skip over dense, difficult-to-skim content.
• It’s essential that you structure and style your content in an accessible format, if you want a shot at attracting and retaining readers.

SEO Sweet Spot – Three-Word Searches

Chitika | 6-25-10

This article looks at a recent study by Chitika (an online ad network), which determined that three-word queries yield the highest return on traffic from search engines. Queries with more than five words showed greatly diminished numbers in traffic, suggesting that three-to-five word queries are ideal for driving traffic and conversion. The study also looked at ad click rates, which were highest for queries of five, six, then four words (in that order). The article concludes that this latter finding suggests that the more complex the search query, the greater the chances are for publisher profit, to a certain extent.

• Three-to-five word queries produce the highest traffic from search engines.
• Ad click rates are highest for queries containing four to six words.

Study: E-mail click-throughs boosted with social sharing

BtoB Magazine | Christopher Hosford | 6-21-10

In a study conducted by GetResponse (an e-mail marketing provider), it was found that e-mails containing social sharing options produced 30% higher click-through rates than e-mails without these options. E-mails that included three or more sharing options saw a 55% click-through rate. Out of the social networks included in the study, Twitter saw the highest preference at 67.2%, and Facebook was runner-up at 62.7%.

• E-mails with social sharing options yield 30% more click-throughs than e-mails without sharing options.
• The most popular sharing options are through Twitter and Facebook.

8 Interesting Media Offerings on LinkedIn

ClickZ | Harry Gold | 6-22-10

In this post, the author details eight specific advertising opportunities available on LinkedIn that go beyond the network’s basic marketing offerings. Recently, this largely B2B social network added a new feature (much like Facebook and Twitter), which allows you to add a follow button to your company profile, so that your followers will receive updates from your page. Additionally, marketers can use LinkedIn Direct Ads and InMail to reach their target audience through display ads and direct messages to their inboxes. Other features include customized groups, which allow a business to create, moderate and control the advertising of their own group, and LinkedIn Polls, which you can generate and equip with questions for your target audience. Also available are LinkedIn Answers category sponsorships, enabling businesses to advertise on a custom-built page, as well as “audience roadblocks,” which allow a company to manage their target audience’s homepage ads.

• LinkedIn offers many unique marketing opportunities, including: Upgraded company profiles, Custom groups, Audience roadblock, Answers category sponsorship, DirectAds, InMail, Polls and a White paper program.
• The social network recently began allowing companies to include a follow button on their profile pages.

Six Risk Reversal Tactics For B2B Lead Generation

Search Engine Land | Brian Massey | 6-30-10

The author proposes that B2B companies can use risk reversal strategies for lead generation much like B2C companies do, just with an alternate approach. He suggests that while consumers stand to lose money when making a purchase, business people have an even greater opposition to such risks because their jobs and reputation are at stake, which, he claims is why risk reversal is most relevant in B2B interactions. Some of the risk reversals that he recommends include: offering your webinar, video or white paper for free; asking for a limited amount or no contact information upfront; making forms optional; and, telling visitors what to expect when they’re asked to click on buttons or links. Most importantly, make sure that you’re as good as your word. For instance, if you offer prospects an opt-out option on e-mail lists, make sure you live up to that promise.

• Risk reversal strategies don’t just apply to B2C; they can be used quite effectively for B2Bs when correctly executed.
• Just implementing these tactics isn’t enough; you must ensure that you’re following through on your promises, so as to not lose potential customers.

Share Your Thoughts

We hope that you enjoyed this blog post, and that you’ll share any comments or questions you might have. To get the weekly summary, or any other Optify updates, follow us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or subscribe to our RSS feed.

LinkedIn marketing tips, how to structure social media content & more is a post from: B2B Marketing and Lead Generation | Optify