Google Alerts are email updates that are sent to you for whatever keyword or phrase you decide to set the alert. As soon as your name is mentioned anywhere on the Internet, you are sent an alert and know about it immediately.

Google Alerts can also alert you of a scam. As well as setting up an alert for your name, you should also set one up for your address & phone number. For example, someone could post your phone number [maybe in a forum], asking people to prank call you. If you had the proper Google Alerts set up, you would know about this! [as long as you access you email frequently, but most access it as often as text messages these days].

How to Set Up Google Alerts

• Go to Google’s homepage.

• On the top row on the right side you will see ‘more‘ with a drop down arrow.

• Go to the bottom and click ‘even more‘.

• Scroll down to ‘Specialized Search.’ Click on ‘Alerts.’ Put in your search terms, and be sure to use ‘As-it-happens‘, so you get the email in real time. I have Outlook set up for all alerts to go into a folder. It will give you the time of the alert.

Google Alert Settings

As we all know, the Internet is a huge place, where anything can & as so many have found out, will happen. It is vital that you protect your businesses reputation online. The more you know about what is being said about you, or what isn’t being said about you, the more opportunity you will have to at least try and make it all positive. If you’re interested in learning more about the benefits of Google Alerts, contact us today for a free consultation. I know we can help you!

Blogging is one of the best ways to grow your business online. There are also many things that blogging can do for you and your brand;

• Blogging can increase your audience. These days, everyone is online and trust me, they will find you and read what you have to say. I cannot tell you how many times I have been out and about and have run into someone I know or may not even know in real life that mentions my personal blog [Stiffler's Social Scoop] to me. It’s proof that it works! [It did take me a year and a half to build that blog up to what it is now and I will talk more about that later on].

• Blogging can help you gain links. The more links you have pointing back to your website/blog will build your Google ranking and authority.

• Blogging is a great way to establish yourself as an expert [Don't be afraid, this is what you want!] in your industry and is a great way to answer your audiences’ questions.

• Blogging can be an organic traffic generator. I find that the more I blog the more traffic I receive.  Every blog post gives you the opportunity to target a different set of keywords or phrases.

• Blogging can get you mentioned on another blog  or TV [even better for your business!].

• Blogging gives you content [your own original content] to tweet and share on Facebook, LinkedIn & Google+.

• Blogging gives you a place to send your customers/clients to get more information about your brand/niche/industry.

These are some great advantages, but I know some of you are thinking, “But no one cares what I have to say Meg!”and “I don’t want to put myself out there like that.” and “I don’t want strangers reading my stuff.”Maybe and maybe not, but you won’t know until you try and I am willing to bet you money that if you stick with it, you will see the results you always wanted.

Put aside all of the things you are afraid about when  you think about blogging. Privacy [You don’t really have any these days anyway, so you might as well just let that one go. “But I’m not a writer.” My response to this one is, “If you can think, you can write.” We all enjoy to talk and my tip to people that are really unsure of getting into blogging is to just write the way you talk. When you read someone’s blog, you don’t want to feel as they are just talking AT you in the way you would if you were writing a report for school, right? If you do that, no, you won’t get people to come back and see what you have to say. Blogging isn’t like writing a research paper so don’t panic! Try to think of it as one big long Facebook status update. We can all do that, right? And no matter what, you are always going to offend someone, so you might as well get over that fear. You can’t please everyone… Ever, no matter how middle grounded you try to be.

Blogging does take a serious commitment and nothing is worse than starting a blog and then abandoning it. So set the time and make the commitment. It usually takes about three months of blogging weekly to begin to see the effects, maybe sooner depending on your following.

If you want to talk about getting a blog started for you or your business, or you already have one that you want to get back up and going let us know. We can consult you by helping to generate blog topic ideas and keyword research that will grow an audience and get your blog found by the search engines.

“How do I know that I haven’t hired someone that is going to practice these shady SEO practices?”, you ask. Use a personal recommendation and don’t EVER hire a company that says they can absolutely guarantee you a particular ranking. They can’t. They just want your business and your money. My favorite part is at the bottom of those SEO contracts you will usually see in bold that they can guarantee a particular ranking. SEO is an Internet science and just like anything else in this world that is of any value, it takes time. Remember Rome wasn’t built in a day and neither was the Internet, so be patient! Persistence & patience pay off in the world of SEO. Let me tell you why you should hire Mainely SEO as your Maine SEO Consultant;

• We are active in the Portland, Maine social media scene; Social Media Breakfast Maine, Facebook Maine, Maine Tweetups, & Portland Greendrinks, just to name a few.

• We know your competition.

• We know the lingo. [wicked, etc.] It’s important to know which phrases are searched more than others.

• We know the local keywords.

• We will meet with you face-to-face. [This is invaluable in this day in age].

• Keep your business local if you can.
  

Do you already have an SEO consultant or are you now considering for the first time, a SEO strategy for your business?

• Did you know that Google has a separate index for mobile users? Well it does and it is substantially smaller than Google.com, so by making your website mobile friendly, you will rank higher as far as SEO [search engine optimization] for mobile search.

• Mobile by itself, excluding tablets, is about 10% of search impressions.

• Being mobile friendly is better than having an app [application] for your website. An app can’t always do everything that your website can do. A website is always instant access for your users without any limitations.

• Keep in mind that mobile advertising is on the rise! There has been a huge increase in mobile advertising. It is projected that ads for the mobile web will surpass 6.5 billion by 2012.

• If you’re looking for a way to increase traffic, get your website mobile friendly. If your site is not easily accessible, studies have shown that your traffic will decrease.

• There is a WordPress plugin called Mobify that will make your website mobile friendly, which is just another benefit for using WordPress as your CMS!

If you find yourself thinking “I need to get my website mobile friendly!”, well you’re definitely not alone, but it is something that you want to do sooner rather than later. So give us a call, tweet, email or Facebook message… We’d love to help you get your website mobile friendly. Did you know that the average iPhone user only spends about 45% of their time making calls. The other 55% is spent checking email, using apps & the mobile web! Is your website accessible to the 55% percent of people that have the ability to access it?

Here are 3 ways to help you find related Twitter followers to engage with:

• Twitter Directories - Twitter directories such as Wefollow and Twellow allow you to assign yourself to a specific genre[s] relating to your business. This is also a great place to find similar businesses or other influencers within your industry.

• Twitter Bio Search - Every Twitter profile contains a short bio entered by the user. Followerwonk is a tool that allows you to search the bio of every Twitter profile. It’s helpful to find people interested in specific topics and niches that are related to your business.

• Real-Time Twitter Search - There are many ways to search Twitter in real-time. One of which is search.twitter.com and the other is Topsy. Twitter’s internal search function allows you to search tweets by keyword and location, which is very helpful for finding Twitter followers local to your area. Topsy’s search also shows tweets, trends and other social networking status updates.

Hopefully these three ways will help you find related Twitter followers to engage with. Remember that listening is more important than shouting your brand’s message online. It takes time, patience AND consistency, but by breaking up the time into small chunks, it’s feasible!

Did you know that 20% of all the searches that Google processes are related to local search? This means that at least 20% of users are now adding a location to their search. Since there are so many people that are looking for Google’s recommendation on local services, there is a huge opportunity for those local businesses to increase their online visibility, even if they don’t already have their own website.

There are some things you want to make sure you include when you are doing local SEO for your Maine small business:

• Owner verified listings - Local Yahoo, Yelp, Google Places, Bing Local, plus hundreds more! Add all information – Pics, logos, video, URL, email. You want to make all of the information you have on the Internet about your business the SAME! Also, double check that you selected all possible categories that are related to you business.

• You want to make sure that you have your physical address on your website as text, not an image! This is a common mistake found on many websites.
  

• Verify that the ‘Whois’ information for your domain name matches your business’ address.
  

• You also want to make sure that your BBB [Better Business Bureau] listing and other professional memberships link back to your website. These are a strong indicator to Google about the trust and credibility of your business.

Local SEO for your business is only one piece of the inbound marketing puzzle, but a very important one. Too many business owners over look taking the time to verify their listings across all of the various sites and don’t fill them out completely. If you need assistance with your local SEO efforts, whether you’re not sure if your listings are verified or want to fill them out completely with pictures and video, give Mainely SEO a call today for a free consultation.

You want the same look everywhere. By ‘everywhere’ I mean:

• All thumbnails/avatars, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Flickr icons should be the same [No eggs if you want people to take you even a little bit serious].
• You want to make sure you have a Facebook Welcome Page that matches your website.
• Your Twitter background, website, email template and email signature should all consistently display your brand.
• Set up a blog and become the subject matter expert in your industry. Again, try to be as consistent as possible.
• Protect your name! Make sure have registered all various domains in case someone types in the wrong exchange, they will still get to YOUR brand. As an entrepreneur it may also be a good idea to secure a domain in your name with all of the variations including; .com, .net, and/or .biz.

If you’re looking for consistency with your online brand and need help getting started, talk to me! I KNOW that my Mainely SEO team can get you on the right track to having that strong online brand presence that you absolutely need.

If you have your own business then you know how important it is to get your brand “out there.” By now you also know how important it is to have a strong web/social media presence if you expect your company to survive and thrive amongst your competition. Part of  the strategy to meet your goals and build your brand should be to actively blog comment.You should also be participating in the conversations in and around your brand’s niche. There’s a whole lot going on in cyberspace regarding you company’s specialty, I guarantee it! And why wouldn’t you want to be an active participant? If you aren’t, you are probably missing out on precious dollars that I know you would love to have.

I read a lot of blogs each and every day and I am very thankful to Google Reader for keeping it all organized for me, but I am even more thankful to all of the bloggers out there that keep the original, awesome content coming! If you read other blogs, I guarantee that you will come up with some ideas that could help your future blogging efforts or that may help you to market your brand more effectively. Either way it’s all good stuff.

By blog  commenting you are creating many potential opportunities for yourself, many of which you may have never realized. For example, if you leave a comment on someone one else’s blog, you may get more traffic to your website because someone came along and found what you had to say to be interesting and wanted to see what else you had to provide. This can lead to conversation, that turns into more followers and subscribers, that results is more business for you. Makes sense right?

Some more advantages to blog commenting include:

• Increasing your search engine ranking because you are building links back to your website.

• Getting an idea for a topic for your next blog post. It tends to happen and if it does, go with it!

• Building relationships – If you are leaving positive, thought provoking comments that provide some sort of value or create a conversation you will build up your network which could lead to more opportunities and connections.

• Marketing! The more you comment, the more you are getting your name and/or brand out there for the world to know about. And the more it seems like you know what you’re talking about and/or doing, the more authority you will gain within your industry and we all want more authority, don’t we?

You always want to try and make sure that you respectful when you do comment. You do not have to agree with everything that everyone says, but you should try and be respectful and mindful when making your mark. Also, never ever spam! You only want to produce relevant comments, not ones that are blasting your website domain all over the place, not being relevant to the conversation. This will only get your comments deleted, and potentially banned from commenting in the future.

So get those comments going on the blog posts that you find worth commenting on, because at some point, your business and your brand will be right out in front for everyone to see. Why?  Because you blog commented your way to building your brand just the way you envisioned.

If you aren’t sure where to find the blogs that are related to your industry and/or niche, you may want to check out the following:

• Technorati
• Networked Blogs
• Alexa

Image courtesy of Zazzle

There are many of reasons as to why your business needs social media:

• It reveals your customer/client’s interests
• Introduces your brand
• You learn what your customer/client’s like and don’t like
• You get feedback
• You are able to showcase your company’s personality
• You can share!
• You can create contests or provide coupons/discounts! [Trust me, this is becoming HUGE online].

But the two most important things to keep in mind when using social media effectively for your business is to have, yes I am saying it again, goals & a strategy!

All of your tweets and posts should be coordinated to meet your ultimate goal, which should be to establish trust, build your brand and make money [increase sales]. By incorporating a social media strategy, you will quickly discover what is being said about your business’s industry and from that you will be able to listen and respond to these opinions, criticisms and suggestions about what may or may not be a problem, that YOU could potentially solve!

Trying to dive in & incorporate social media into your brand/company can be a very daunting & time consuming process and to be honest, if you don’t really know what you’re doing or aren’t doing it with any sort of strategy in place, you are more than likely wasting your precious time. If you are thinking of getting your brand/business online, & you know that you need to have a social media strategy in place because you know it will help you to increase sales, but you don’t know where to start… & the thought of tweeting and status updating sends your head spinning? Call me, tweet me, Facebook me, email me, or text me because I will help you to get on the right track to where you will soon be saying to yourself “Why the heck didn’t I do this sooner?!” because how can 700 million people be wrong? [They probably aren't ]