1) Get executive management buy in and support - much more challenging if you try to develop your strategy and then sell up into the organization.

2) Develop a Social Media Policy and Procedure Doc; this doesn’t need to be a huge document, you should be able to map this out in one or two pages. Don’t get too detailed, this is a creative marketing process.

3) Base budget on Personnel,  Timelines, Platforms, Content Strategy. Much of social media marketing is “free” in the purest sense of the word in terms of advertising expenditures. The cost kicks in when you factor time involved for marketers involved in the process.

4) Define a Content Development and Syndication Strategy; i.e. where is the content coming from (if outsourcing), who is going to develop it in house, what’s your focused strategy for content, how will you repurpose all or part of your content across the social web.

5) What Platforms or Communities do you want to establish a presence on; i.e. Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, YouTube (the top tier), Company Blog; Niche Networks such as LinkedIn, Ning, Plaxo; Customer Service Networks such as: Yelp, Google Maps, et al?  You also have to consider other Vertical Platform Categories including: Events, Music, Wikis, Blog Conversations, Micromedia, Social Bookmarking, Crowdsourcing, Video Aggregation and others.

6) Once you pick your Social Media Platform you can develop a cohesive Content Development and Deployment Schedule – who is going to post and where, how frequently, who will be monitoring the communities and responding and engaging.

7) Select a group of third party applications to help you leverage your Content Syndication processes; HootSuite is an all in one free Application that has a broad suite of Platform Support; Tweetdeck does not have as broad a platform of support but their interface is cleaner and more efficient.

7) Depending on the sophistication of your Social Media Marketing mix you may want to use a listening or monitoring platform. There is an large number of these that can be segmented by feature set and functionality. Two of the best are Radian6 and Trackur – Radian6 provides a broader set of features and collects more data but is more expensive than Trackur.

8) Last but not least, identify some first pass metrics that enable you to measure Return on Investment for your Social Media Marketing processes. This can encompass using Google Analytics for inbound traffic and keyword metrics, “social mentions” using a Social Media Monitoring platform, number of new users via Communities or Platforms: Twitter, Facebook, Yelp Reviews, Comments via Google Maps, etc.

Think about broadcasting and more importantly engagement on these communities as an indication of social media marketing success – you don’t want to get too focused on ROI metrics during your first 60-90 days.

Get your feet wet and then add more sophistication to your Social Media Marketing Strategy in the form of additional communities, tighter controls, more sophisticated ROI analysis,  cross purposing content, utilizing video and podcasts, etc.

1) Budgets are morphing to finally include Social Media Marketing – just look at this week’s Old Spice Social Media Marketing Campaign and you quickly grasp bigger companies and their agencies (nice job Wieden + Kennedy) are jumping on the bandwagon with beau coup bucks.

2) Social Media is getting integrated with traditional marketing campaigns – you can see the PR agencies are starting to blog more and more about Social Media Trends (queue next year’s Social Media Expert).

3) Return on Investment in today’s resources-challenged global economy is starting to rear it’s ugly head.

4) Big brands are embracing “listening” to Social Media Trends - we don’t think Radian6 will last the year through before some behemoth gobbles them up via an acquisition.

5) Twitter is moving from fad status to “how quickly can you build a Follower base for me” discussion in every snazzy meeting room filled with geeks nervously eying their iPhone for that all important Foursquare check in opportunity.

6) Corporate firewalls are no longer an obstacle to Social Media – it’s everywhere you want it to be.

7) More and more vertical social enabled communities and sites are emerging – the market  is fragmenting rapidly.

8) Social Media Rock Stars are not just men – if you really look hard at the digital cognoscenti/movers and shakers we are pleased to report most are women.

Makes sense right? It’s all about conversation and men aren’t exactly known for making small talk around the dinner table. Sport stats maybe – but who cares, that’s so yesterday and Tom Cruise 80’s.

9) Social Media Trends are clearly moving into the Customer Service Realm – companies are listening, engaging and reacting to what is being said.

10) Real Time Search is emerging as much more than a Social Media Trend – you can’t argue with 19B searches per month on Twitter. That’s a lot of real time of anything………….

11) We disagree with many. B2B Lead Generation via Social Media is not hitting on all cylinders yet – the medium is red hot for B2C  but B2B Lead Generation is late on arrival……

12) Marshall was right (we do mean Mcluan) – the medium is the message. Advertising is for better or worse,  being integrated with Social Media and this trend is only going to accelerate. You ought to see those stacks of business plans hitting Andreesen Horowitz from next gen Social Media Companies.

13) The home page for many will shift from MSNBC (that site redesign is awful), Yahoo, et al to their Social Media Profile page.

14) Facebook growth will continue to stall (hint: Privacy policy DOA), assuming Rupert doesn’t buy them and do to them what he did to My Space. It can be a cruel world if your in the sight of an Aussie Media Mogul. Forget his US Citizenship, that’s a flag of convenience if you catch our drift matey.

15) Shopping will be integrated with Social Media -  Groupon and Flash Sales should ring a bell……er cash register if you will.

So we say good by with that traditional salutation from years past – breaker, breaker I’m gone – that’s our report on Social Media Trends. Come back and see us if you enjoyed the muse.

Bu, using and optimizing Google Maps is a foundation marketing process we utilize for any Social Media Marketing or Search Marketing Campaign.

It’s free, takes 1-3 hours to optimize properly, drives significant very targeted traffic and most importantly,  gives your site a powerful immediate presence where GEO targeted locals are searching for information about sites, products and services.

Add Your Business to Google Maps

1) Incorporate a well written Listing, with Complete and Comprehensive Information.

2) Utilize Keywords in your Company Name if this works logically but don’t spam the listing.

3) Utilize the proper City and State Keywords in your Title and Tags; make sure your address is correct.

4) Select the right Category with Keyword driven search terms: i.e. Realtor, Restaurant, Retail Store, etc.

5) Identify your location properly that relates to the center of the city or area.

6) Be Creative with your Listing and convey value: i.e. incorporate Images and Videos (up to five), directions to your place of business and where/how to park, type of credit cards you take if applicable, list coupons to create sense or urgency or seasonality, as these are easy to change, etc.

7) Can also be beneficial to list your address with Directories that offer local addresses including: YellowPages.com, SuperPages.com and similar sites.

8) Solicit Reviews from satisfied clients in a diplomatic manner – the more of these (assuming positive) the better, as this drives credibility and branding. Also, more Stars (reviews) can mean higher listing positioning.

9) Google typically verifies your listing via instant call back (once it is completed) or postcard – phone call is typically the best method for obvious reasons. Make sure you follow through on this or your Google Maps Listing won’t go “live.”

Google’s Streetview is now included with most Google Map listings – another reason why you want to Add Your Business to Google Maps.

Don’t get us wrong, we love Social Media Marketing and believe it is an effective marketing tool. But, this marketing methodology serves business to consumers much better than business to business companies, especially if the former is a larger size business.

Most Social Media traffic hitting a B2B focused site coming in from a Social Media Platform (Twitter or Facebook) is typically going to visit the Blog, as opposed to firing off an inquiry via a Contact Form.

Why? There is no no simple answer. But,  if you contrast Search Engine Traffic as an example versus Social  Media Traffic you’ll find search driven visitors are moving around a site, visiting key pages (Technology, Services, About Us, etc.) and some per centage are filling out inquiry forms; i.e. converting in marketing terms.

This is not usually the case with Social Media traffic – these visitors will click through to a Blog to read more about the company and then click away into the digital ether. They may register for a Newsletter or Blog (engagement) but the vast majority don’t make a request for sales assistance.

So, is Social Media Marketing beneficial for B2B companies. Yes, but should be done in tandem with Search Engine Optimization, Blogging, PR and other marketing methodologies to drive reinforcing brand awareness and lead generation.

Where or how is Social Media most effective for B2B companies? It can be extremely valuable for engaging with customers (Customer Service comes to mind), driving broad brand awareness that compliments other forms of marketing (again SEO, PR, Blogging). But, at the end of the day B2B companies are not going to drive lots of leads via Social Media.

For those of us in the SEO biz, one maxim we’ve used for years is that not all traffic is created equal. When you apply analytics to inbound traffic the source will vary often determine the quality of the traffic. This same maxim holds true for Social Media Traffic versus other types. We’ll talk about B2C and Social Media at a later date – come back for an update.

At least the MSNBC index page is not as bad as the interior pages. The latter have perhaps the greatest mashup of Content we’ve ever seen – Ads, Social Bookmarking and Text and Video Content are all squashed together with (count them!) four rows of Universal Menus at the top of the page and bottom.

And, just to make sure the visitor is overloaded with data they’ve added a “More From MSNBC” Section at the bottom of most major pages. The whole site is sensory overload at it’s worst – it’s the digital version of a Lady Gaga design! Toss this design out and start over!

Yahoo’s Days of Yesteryear

Yahoo’s design is now as ancient as an Atari game console! It’s time for a much needed makeover of Yahoo’s index and interior pages – Yahoo has had this Directory look since the .com days on their index page. It’s crying for a dramatic makeover as befits a portal with this much great digital DNA.

What’s the deal with the links from the index page into other Yahoo properties?  Their is no design continuity at all among most of these island sites.

Your looking at a textual directory site one minute with random images and ads – one click in an your looking at a web property Yahoo has either bought or created. with an entirely different menu, user interface, social media enablers, etc. New meaning for dazed and confused!

Our vote for the worst site from a visitor’s perspective – a dead heat! It’s like comparing being told you have jury duty to getting that postcard from your dentist letting you know it’s time to come in for a checkup…….

1) Social Media Policy will vary widely depending on the size of the company; smaller companies typically are more flexible, as they are more concerned with broad brand awareness,  presence, engagement and not so focused on identifying a strict Social Media Policy.

Bigger companies have more policy and procedural structure – marketing wants to “own” social medi and may not want field sales to be Tweeting about customer wins in the field, new product launches, channel training opportunities, etc.

2) Regardless of the size of company, if using Social Media Marketing  for business you may want to adopt multiple accounts that may focus on different goals and objectives. The  business owner may want to “engage” with Customers, Suppliers and Channel Accounts, while sales may want to Blog or Tweet about “wins” in the marketplace that reflect broader marketing objectives.

Depending on the platform,  individuals who are engaging in social media marketing may want to identify who they are, enabling each person to establish a focused “account personality” and engagement with some subset of the broad social community.

As an example, Zappos has done a wonderful job of creating multiple “personalities” by creating individual Social Media Accounts for Sales, Customer Service, Help Desk, etc.

3) Many of the horror stories you are reading about come into play for anyone on Social Media (regardless of company size) when personal and professional content is commingled indiscriminately.

There’s  a fine line between adding some “personality” to a Social Media Marketing  campaign versus crossing over into too personal; i.e. “uploading racy pictures or videos of the office hot tub party” to Twitter, Flicrk or YouTube is not a good idea.

4) For many companies it may be necessary to require individuals to have Personal and Professional accounts for multiple Social Media Platforms, ensuring personal anecdotes don’t get co-mingled with corporate or business communications.

5) One of the biggest surprises that many don’t anticipate is the realization that keywords used in Social Media Communications processes may or will show up in “real time” search results on Twitter, Google, HuffingtonPost, Yahoo, etc. Social Media Content can have a longer “shelf life” than many anticipate.

6) Companies have to think about their company culture and DNA prior to coming up with a Social Media Policy – Nike is going to have a much more aggressive tendency to push content out onto the Social Web than say Visa, as an example.

Social Media Policy Outline

1) Goals of Social Media Marketing Campaign; i.e. broad brand awareness campaign that may be utilize multiple contributors, tightly focused marketing message that is controlled by one central individual or department, listening to and engaging customers who are commenting on the brand or who may be voicing customer service complaints or issues, identifying a topic brand that you want to dominate via Social Media Marketing, etc.

2) What is your company culture or DNA, which impacts strategy & messaging? If you are a young aggressive start up then you may want to be much more aggressive in terms of building a Social Media Brand as an example.

3) What Platforms do “you” want to Support: Twitter, Facebook, Blog, YouTube, Flickr, LinkedIn?  Each platform has different content needs.

4) What is your content strategy and who is the keeper or originator of the source content ? Everything in Social Media flows from the content initially – whoever controls this determines to a certain extent what is said and how your Social Media Brand is conveyed.

5) Defining Policy and Procedures for New Employees, Contractors, Channel Accounts, Agencies, etc. – this can be a one page document that outlines responsibilities, how to submit permission requests, what to say/not to say, etc.

6) Be aware, the more limitations you put on employees responding to and engaging with the Social Media Community the more you may limit your marketing ROI – a lighter touch in most cases is optimum.

7) Social Media Marketing is moving at warp speed, with new Platforms, Technologies, etc. being developed every day – be flexible with your Social Media Policy and be aware it will need to be updated frequently.

8) Less is more when it comes to a Social Media Policy. You should be able to distill your policy down to a 8-10 bullet points Word doc.

9) Reward employees for using Social Media, even if they make some mistakes – the upside for having employees engage with the community outweighs the potential negatives in most cases.

If you have questions about setting up a Social Media Policy please reach out – we welcome an opportunity to answer any questions you might have or to help you implement a Social Media Policy.

With 60 Million plus members and adding a new member every second of the day, you want to establish as Social Media Marketing and Engagement presence with this high value community. Some tips for effective LinkedIn Marketing:

1) Optimize your profile with Keywords – this community uses LinkedIn’s powerful search tool frequently, so you want to show up in search results. Also, you can now create a profile for yourself as an individual and for a company.

2) Sorry for the pun, but link your other Social Media Marketing activities with LinkedIn, including your personal or corporate Blog, Twitter account; if personal account you can even select books you’ve read recently and/or select from 25 other apps that will give you some lift to your LinkedIn Marketing.

3) LinkedIn is simpatico with Twitter or Facebook or any other social media platform for that matter, you want to engage with the community with comments on updates made from other members of your community, answering/posing questions (as below), sharing ideas, videos, images – be creative!

4) LinkedIn has a thousands of Groups that are growing in size and type every day – you want to join a limited number (15-20) and then contribute to these groups by engaging with your Group Members and Answering and Posting questions.

5) Show LinkedIn Members some digital love by writing recommendations for those that you have bumped into during your career path – this puts a spotlight on them and you, as others read these carefully.

Nothing wrong with nudging a former joint venture partner or customer and asking for a review, it’s done much more frequently than you would realize; but, don’t go overboard.

6) Effective LinkedIn Marketing can also be achieved by Answering Questions in ares of expertise that you have – there are hundreds if not thousands of questions posted each day and you can also get a Green Star/Best Answers for providing same for a question, which makes your profile stand out.

Also, good to add an update to your Network Activity that links to an article or video that you think would be well received by this community.

7) This community is well educated, global in scope and reach and your content strategy should reflect same – this isn’t the place to post office party photos like a Facebook or Flickr account (no offense meant).

Hope these LinkedIn Marketing tips are valuable – connect with us via LinkedIn by clicking here.

Lets face it, telling people you were in the SEO biz was a short cut to either dumbfounded looks (“what’s that?”)  or instant turn off, as they equated your skill set with Kurt Russel’s famous role in Used Cars.

We think the worm has turned and today’s unsung SEO hero or heroine is now morphing to a Search and Social Media Marketing geek.

In today’s Web 3.0 (dare we use the term) world the days of yore where SEO geeks razzled and dazzled the clients with talk of massive “Google Juice” traffic are just gone. The traffic is still there but getting it requires a different blend of marketing skills.

Google’s Caffeine is Game Changer

Google’s Caffeine Update is putting much more reliance on sites that are updated quickly and frequently – we are simplifying a bit for brevity.  Your site can be as pretty as  James Cameron’s Avatar but it still isn’t going to generate much traffic unless you update to a more holistic marketing  plan.

The important number is the caching dates; i.e. how frequently Google finds and indexes or lists your site’s pages. Rapid updates means your site is fresh and should be ranked higher than stale sites – Blogs are rapidly emerging as an essential marketing tool that compliments this new Web 3.0 world.

We are already seeing Keyword optimized Blog posts pop up in Google’s Search Results (SERPs in SEO geek lingo) within 24 hours after the Blog post has been made and augmented with another page of the client’s site right below the Blog post.

And, thank you Google folks (not so sound like sycophants), the pages are even now getting listed above Local Business Listings. This tells us Google has embraced Real Time Search and “likes” new and fresh content.

Social Media Reshaping SEO

So, what are the implications for Search Engine Optimization in this emerging Web 3.0 world? We think it’s incumbent for businesses or anyone that wants traffic to embrace Social Media Marketing.

Meaning, create fresh optimized content and push it out onto the web via any/all Social Sites and Processes – we couldn’t underscore how important Blogging is in this equation. And understand “Real Time Search” caveats – Twitter’s 19B searches per month is something any good marketer wants to latch onto!

Is Search Engine Optimization Dead?

We think traditional SEO as it was once done is dead – call the dogs and pour water on the fire and saddle up the buckaroos…….  What’s replacing SEO is SEO that is Social Media Optimized.

Meaning, you need a holistic marketing plan that recognizes the importance of a web site constructed with SEO Best Practices that also blends Social Media Marketing for Presence, Engagement, Conversation, Real Time Search Ranking, etc.

No brickbats from you SEO geeks please – we still believe in SEO services but are now embracing a broader call to arms……….. Questions:  Tweet or Contact Us – we welcome an opportunity to help you.

Social Media Blurring Lines

You have a “self” that you use on any Social Media Platform, albeit Twitter, Facebook, YouTube or others. Unfortunately, the lines are blurring for all of these platforms, depending on your focus, type of company you work for and how you use them.

But, one way to categorize these Social Media Profiles is by attaching a “self” to each of them and trying to build a presence that is consistent with this focus.

But, it’s not always easy to do this, as your “Friends” on Facebook may start blurring via your personal account. Associates down the hall or across the globe may start throwing things up on your wall that force you to commingle your personal and professional “self” – there are no easy answers, other than to say you need to be aware of the upside, pitfalls, rewards, cool things that may happen (or not) by blurring you Social Media Self!

Social Media Etiquette on Twitter

Twitter is rapidly morphing to a Broadcast and Engagement Platform – it affords a wonderful opportunity for any individual to build a personal presence or business to build strong brand awareness and much more.

Just like Facebook, it’s important at the outset of staring your digital journey on Twitter to decide if your Social Media Strategy is to focus on a personal or business account – or both, many digerati have multiple accounts as well as businesses.

But, you need to integrate some personality to come across as being real on Twitter (like other Social Media Platforms) – throwing in some personal bon mots  is essential to building personality. Again, the lines can easily be blurred – be aware and Tweet accordingly.

Twitter Rules of the Road

• Don’t Direct Message people unless you know them or “DM” them in Twitterspeak
• RTs or ReTweets are the currency of the realm on Twitter – you show someone that you value their communications by RTing their Tweets. But do it judiciously.
• Give credit where credit is due – many people copy URLs from other Tweets and push them out as their own; this is bad Ju Ju as they say on Treme Street in New Orleans – enough said.
• It’s great to use the @LinkedMedia to push a Tweet to someone thanking them for a digital mention or to give them visibility via your Twitter Account.

A big thank you to all of our Readers, speaking of etiquette, we appreciate your following our Digital Muse! If you want to Follow us on Twitter www.Twitter/LinkedMedia

1) Aaron Wall rocks the SEO world and anyone who disagrees with this sentiment would have to be on a distant planet. His Toolbar is one of the best SEO Tools in the world and his integrated training services and community are an excellent resource as well.  He has a freemium model – if you are new to SEO we’d strongly suggest signing up for all of his services.

2) SEOMoz has a suite of some of the Best SEO Tools and we recommend them as well. They have a number of free applications and paid tools and tutorials.

3) Market Samurai has an extremely powerful application and their technology is like jumping into an Aston Martin with a top ten Formula One driver – you better hang on for the ride.

The rivers deep, fast flowing and you have to spend some time getting your arms around this technology – it’s not for the faint of heart or the novice by any means. Calling it a “Best SEO Tool” could be an understatement………advanced Jedi rating only.

4) We would be remiss if we didn’t touch on Google’s Aanlytics Program as one of the Best SEO Tools!  Yes, it’s the defacto industry standard – but 85% of most people who use it for Web Site Analytics have no idea of the raw power available. It’s inherent reporting and analysis tools alone are extremely powerful.

For example, we see far too many clients that worry about a ranking for those “all important” top tier Keywords who don’t understand the significant value and wonderful traffic generation (highly qualified) via Long Tail Keywords that can be found easily running basic reports via Google Analytics.

5) Compete is well worth the modest subscription fee required to really run a competitive analysis on a competitor’s site – their robust feature set has grown the last 12-24 months and we use them on a regular basis to monitor search and traffic rankings for client sites and direct competitors.

6) Get “Real Time Search” savvy!  If you are harvesting information on the web we would strongly recommend understanding how to do real time searches via Twitter and Google that are Keyword and Hashtag driven.

7) While you are looking at Organic Search Engine Rankings you may want to look at Pay Per Click to see what a competitor is doing here as well. SpyFu has a freemium model and their paid services are powerful, insightful and will save you a great deal of time setting up a Pay per Click campaign and monitoring what your competitors are doing.

8) Another everyman/everywoman best of breed SEO Tool is Wordtracker - it’s the Swiss Army Knife of Keyword Research and they’ve recently added Link Builder and Wordtracker Strategizer, two excellent modules that extend the functionality of their SaaS (Software as a Service) services. This UK based company has been around for ten plus years and we couldn’t say enough good things about them – great team of friendly and courteous Keyword Geeks par excellance.

So, that’s eight of our Best SEO Tools that we use and recommend – no animals were harmed during the writing of this blog post………….if you are a Mashable writer in residence feel free to mention us on the front page.