The common denominator across mature media channels is that for consumers to pay attention to any marketing messages, they need to derive value from interacting with the brand. Social media is beginning to find its way to this balance. Just a couple years ago, companies could get attention simply by “being social.”

The channel wasn’t cluttered quite yet, so the brands that did invest the time to take part in the conversation were rewarded just for showing up. Now, everyone is on social media, so the result is a flood of information that amounts to nothing more than advertising.

A basic history lesson of the marketing adoption cycle with new media clearly shows this. There normally are five discrete steps:

1. New digital communication channel becomes popular with a mainstream audience.

2. Marketers start using the channel for promotional purposes.

3. The channel becomes cluttered. Consumers adapt their behavior and use technologies in order to tune out the marketing distortion.

4. In response to less channel efficacy, marketers begin to add value to their messaging, not simply to pitch a sale.

5. The target cohort begins selectively paying attention to value-based marketing messages. The ROI of the channel stabilizes.

This pattern has occurred again and again within digital media. For instance, look at banner advertising. Marketers initially seemed to want to compete for being the most intrusive and obnoxious.

Web surfers responded in kind simply by ignoring banner ads. In turn, marketers started using techniques to target ads, giving their target cohort ads that were less annoying and more relevant to their interests. What do you know? The click-through rate rebounded, consumers were less turned off and marketers started making money.

Email wasn’t much of a different situation. Amazon was the first to send emails that said “you may also be interested in this,” and have recipients actually be interested. Amazon started sending these emails about the time Y2K was coming up, and their targeted technology seemed mystical at the time. All the other e-commerce merchants were just sending mass emails, but Amazon was targeting its customers according to their purchases and what they really individually wanted.

So how does a brand “add value” in social media? We’ve talked about how email and ad marketing can add value through increased targeting and promotional offers, but social media doesn’t work exactly the same way. This is because social media is only starting to become segmented: as a brand, every message goes to the entire audience – also known as one-to-many. So targeted messaging is still being developed in this form of media.

While social media is constantly evolving, there are a few tried-and-proven practices that successful brands daily use:

1. Provide exceptional customer support. Customers don’t like being on hold to talk to a representative. Social media makes it possible to impress customers by answering questions a lot more quickly and efficiently than by phone. Brands particularly can stand out by quickly responding.

2. Be an information filter. With an overload of data, research and stories to sift through, brand strategists may curate content to help followers and friends find the most important or useful stuff. This has the added effect of establishing the brand as a trusted source.

3. Provide resources. There’s nothing wrong with simply helping someone in a tangible way without expecting anything in return. A brand has a finger on the pulse of its industry – why not provide white papers or articles to aid consumers’ search?

4. Invite stakeholders to take part in the R&D. Customers really like a company that asks for their input, actually listens to them and adjusts strategies in ways that cater to their needs. Strategists can learn a lot about their customers and their products simply by monitoring what is being said. They then can use this insight to improve offerings and repay customers by providing great experiences. This also will help brands stand out from the about 94 percent of companies that don’t get product/service feedback from stakeholders via social media.

5. Allow customers to step backstage. Be transparent and don’t be reluctant to explain the inner-workings of the company. It instills confidence and trust in important stakeholders.

In order for brands to be singled out among the social sensory overload, they must offer a unique mix for their target cohorts. Find out what customers, prospective customers and advocates want, and then give it to them. They’ll be much more receptive to marketing messages if they are getting something useful from the relationship.

Have you seen results increase by adding value to your social media messages? Tell us what has worked for you on on our Google+, Facebook or Twitter pages.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency UK, Social Media

1. Timing: Timing really is everything. Being sure your content gets to people when they are online is critical to your following.  Using an app like Tweriod lets you know the peak times and when to tweet. Set a schedule and stick with it.
2. Retweet yourself: While this sounds a bit vain, it’s the best way to get your content across to different groups of people and different times of day, especially if you’re an international firm. Just be sure to space it out by a few hours.
3. Don’t Tweet in Batches: Space out your tweets. Sending out three tweets in a row is great, but your followers definitely will not share all three tweets.
4. The 65 Character Rule: When writing headlines for tweets, keep it to 65 characters. Leave enough space for people to write in something when they retweet it.
5. Adjectives: Always use adjectives in the headline. It grabs people’s attention and makes them more likely to read.
6. Question-based Headlines: Using a question can start a conversation on your feed, and people search in question form. Your tweet is more likely to pop up on search results.
7. Research: When writing content for a tweet, see what else is out there. If it’s a popular subject, make sure your opinion or headline is different. Be unique.
8. Lists: People like to skim. They do not like to read lengthy articles. If you can list it, do it!
9. Avoid Errors: Always, check and double check and have your co-worker double check. Sending out a tweet with an error can hurt your brand and authority.
10. Share: Retweet other people. Share their content. It’s a good way of creating social relationships.

What’s your favorite tip?

Share with us on our Google+, Facebook or Twitter pages.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency UK, Social Media

Browse Excel’s online collection of Armani Jeans. The Armani Jeans collection has everything from men’s t-shirts to jackets to women’s knee length boots. Armani Jeans’ line women’s handbags are also part of the collection.

Online there is also a great collection of sandals for women from Tommy Hilfiger. UK summers tend to come late, but be prepared with a great pair of wedges.

Excel also caters for men’s clothing.  Polo Ralph Lauren is always in style. Plaid button down shirts in light colours are great for the summer months. There are plenty of polos to choose from on Excel’s website.

Guys need summer shoes to go with those polos. Oliver Sweeney has a great like of classic shoes. They are all crafted from Italian leather and the light brown colour will go perfect with any summer clothing.

Here at Micrositez, we don’t represent any company we don’t 100% stand behind. We believe that Excel is getting the best products to their customers and in the trendiest way possible.

With social media becoming necessary for connecting with customers, potential customers and other stakeholders, it was inevitable that the world’s biggest brands would turn to social media websites as a tactic for promoting their business. But sometimes in trying to grasp social media, they fail.

It’s easier to make social media mistakes than many brands realize.

This month, Guinness launched a campaign using Quick Response codes on its glasses. QR codes are square barcodes that may be scanned by a smartphone to route the user to a website. The feature supposedly will let the user update his “Guinness pint-drinking status” on Facebook and get discount coupons for the next pint purchase. Theoretically, it seems like a good idea, but we can’t remember the last time we even scanned a QR code, nor did we feel a void in not being able to update our “pint-drinking status.”

Guinness’ scheme looks really gimmicky and probably won’t succeed. We can see where it’s going by looking back at a few of the worst implementations of social media strategies.

Habitat’s trending topics: In June 2008, the British furniture store jumped on the Twitter bandwagon, using the trending topics feature to promote their £1,000 giveaway. Though the majority of the tweets had harmless hashtags such as #AT&T and #TRUEBLOOD, Habitat was called out for using the hashtags #MOUSAVI and #IRAN. Those pertained to the protested 2009 Iranian election.

Habitat issued a swift apology and immediately fired the intern responsible for the faux pas.

Skittles’ search terms: The marketing team at Mars Incorporated, the manufacturer of Skittles candy, apparently thought it would be a brilliant idea to hand over control of the skittles.com homepage to the users of Twitter. They turned it into a list of tweets that had the word “Skittles” in them.

Mars presumably thought this would lead to a swarm of tweets from users talking about how great Skittles were. But the internet quickly caught on to the fact that the website wasn’t being screened by anyone, and they pounced on it.

Instead of tweets about how great Skittles were, the website was bombarded with hundreds of offensive tweets that mentioned “Skittles.”

Snickers’ sponsorship: Another attempt from Mars’ marketing team to bolster their product sales led to a full-blown investigation by the Advertising Standards Agency in 2012, after it surfaced that the company was paying celebrities to tweet about Snickers.

Celebrities such as Katie Price, Ian Botham and Rio Ferdinand posted bizarre “teaser tweets” before finally revealing “You’re not when you when you’re hungry,” which then was followed by a link out to Snickers’ website.

But Twitterers saw right through the ploy. Users responded by asking questions such as “Do you really need money that bad?” and “I’m not here to be advertised at.”

The company was cleared by the Advertising Standards Agency.

Microsoft’s Facebook poll: Late in 2011, Microsoft’s Windows Phone division implemented a poll on Facebook to ascertain, “What was the first feature you loved about the Nokia Lumia 800?” Though to the novice internet user this seems like harmless engagement, a battle-scarred internet veteran would not make the mistake of taking such bait.

Similar to the Skittles campaign, website users quickly realized that they could insert their own voting options into the poll, and immediately added inappropriate options such as “the mickey-mouse PR that thought it would be great to let people make up options.”

Such as these quickly became some of the most popular voted-on answers.

The moral of the story: Social media consumers aren’t stupid and they see a sales ploy a mile away. At best, they won’t get sucked into it, and at worst, they will commandeer it and the gimmick will backfire.

What’s your favorite blunder from the corporate attempt into social media? Share with us on our Google+, Facebook or Twitter pages.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency UK, Social Media

Facebook ads only have an average of a .05% click rate, while Google has a 4% click rate. But guess what? You only pay if a person actually clicks on it. This makes Facebook the best display advertising on the web and it’s free. GM is losing a branding opportunity. Consumers can still see an ad and decide not to click on it, but they saw it. It’s an impression.

Social media is an earned media with a two-step process: 1. Attract and build an audience over time. 2. Then sell to the audience.

GM is missing the big picture and probably measuring the wrong results. Chances are GM is probably looking at sales, clicks and more traffic on their website. But that’s not correct. GM should be looking for how many new followers they have and how many shares and how many people are “talking about” them.

Facebook is long-term asset and the community that’s built must be managed. If GM managed to post more than one time every two days, there might be some results. Facebook ads are also very easy to manage and use and if GM were to use the metrics and tweak the system, it may have worked.

Keep in mind that the $10 million it spent was less than 1% of the budget. Unless an advertising campaign is actually failing and there are metrics to prove, don’t stop it. In the long run, stopping the campaign will do more damage because you’ll need to start over. That will cost more time and more money.

Bottom line: keep it simple. Use money and tweak campaigns until they work for you. Be sure to know what you’re measuring.

Do you think GM was too quick to pull its campaign? Have Facebook ads worked for you?

Tell us about your strategy on our Google+, Facebook or Twitter pages.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency UK, Social Media, Pay per click

No matter what type of business, time is money. There is only have a certain amount of time to seek new opportunities to cultivate relationships, take care of loyal stakeholders, and engage new customers. All these things determine bottom line.

Wasting time is wasting money, and both are easy to do by employing the wrong or insufficient tactics.

If a web strategist’s content-writing strategy is underdeveloped, the result not only is a waste of time, but a detriment to corporate reputation in the social media ethos.

So, how can you know if your content-writing strategy is ineffective?

1. You approach SEO content writing as a temporary project.

If you’re taking the time to publish SEO-oriented content – or paying someone to write it for you – you’re obviously trying to rocket your rankings. But if you think that good SEO amounts to writing a few articles, posting a couple blog posts, or producing a video or two and calling it a day – then you’ve underestimated the need for quality, consistent content.

Though we don’t know much about their secret algorithms, we do know that the search engines favor websites that offer fresh content. All factors being equal, the website that adds new articles at least once a month or publishes at least a weekly blog post likely will outrank the website that hasn’t updated in several months.

Finding a temporary content writer to handle just a handful of assignments, or trying to write them yourself, is a waste of time. Until a consistent, long-term content-writing strategy is established, you’ll never generate as much search engine traffic as you’d like.

2. It’s tough to measure that content is working for you.

No one likes those promises of “passive income” and “autopilot strategies,” but when you publish the right kind of SEO-purposed content, it will work for you.

Hypothetically, if you publish a guest post, you’ll grab readers’ attention. They’ll notice immediately that you really know what you’re talking about. Consequently, they’ll want to read the entire post. When they finish it, they’ll be interested in seeing what else you have to offer – so they’ll browse your website, sign up for your e-newsletter, or even contact you.

If the content is really good, they may even Tweet it, Like it, or link to it, and then their friends and coworkers will wind up reading it, too. The most unique and engaging writing often is the writing that goes viral.

All you did was publish a guest post. Once you hit “Publish” your work was done. Everything that resulted was a result of quality, captivating content working for you.

The moral of the story is, if you are unsure if content is accomplishing anything, it most likely is not having an impact. When it does, you’ll be able to tell.

3. You don’t think that good content writing is very important.

This is one of the biggest mistakes many businesses make when they foray into web marketing. Nothing is more important than coming up with the right content-writing strategy. The internet already is cluttered with nonsense and useless information, and it takes quality to get singled out in the cacophony.

Certainly, great products and services are essential for business to thrive, but with a poor or nonexistent public image, no one will notice yours in the market.

When it comes to digital marketing, the content you publish online is the medium you have to communicate with prospective customers. Unlike brick-and-mortar businesses, you don’t get to have interactions vis à vis. Online, you only have a few seconds to grab someone’s attention and convince them it’s worth their time to keep reading. If you can’t grab someone’s attention, it will always be hard to establish a voice as an expert in your industry and set you apart from the competition.

Have you experimented with different types of content and frequency of when you publish, and noticed different results? Tell us about your strategy on our Google+, Facebook or Twitter pages.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency UK, SEO

Animal kingdom hurting ROI?

Pandas and penguins, oh my!

Take control and tell the fauna “Bye Bye”,

With these helpful suggestions to diversify!

As clever as Forrester may be, he is correct. SEO must always be diversified because experience search engine marketing companies know that Google changes its algorithm pretty regularly. Unfortunately after the panda update, many companies and websites fell apart. They failed to diversify traffic sources.

“You have no more right to rank at Google than the billions of other pages on the web. And yet some people possess a bet-the-farm mentality when they secure a top rank on Google’s search results page than whine when hey lose it,” said Mike Grehan, vice president and global content director of Incisive Media.

Grehan is right. While ranking on the top of Google’s search results is an enormous boost to a company, you have to work to keep it there and roll with Google’s punches.

Forrester offered these tips on his blog:

1. Reality Check: Algorithms change. Rankings change. Competition happens. The fact is, you need to be prepared. Look for other plans to protect from loss in one area; diversify.
2. Forecasting Change: Yes, it’s hard to gaze into the crystal ball and see where things are heading, but if you look back a big, you often see close. Stick your head up and look around every so often.
3. Preventative Work: This section encompasses all of those projects you know should be done, yet linger unfinished.  It even includes things that are less a project and more and ethos for your organization. The bottom line on this is to be successful in search today, we’re so beyond just SEO that most businesses don’t even realize it.
4. Exercise in the Obvious: Pinterest. It didn’t take long for the “Pin It” button to start popping up on websites. Look at what’s obvious.
5. DIVERSIFY: If your business suffers when an algo gets tweaked, insulate yourself from that.  Any first year marketing student will tell you this: having all your business in one basket is bad news. You need to diversify.

Here at Micrositez Digital, we have to agree with Forrester, even if he has a slight vendetta against Google. It’s always best to prepare yourself with the best SEO company you can. Keep yourself informed and always be proactive.

What do you think Google will do next with SEO?

Let us know what you think on our Google+, Facebook or Twitter pages.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency UK, SEO

But the real billion-dollar question is this: What are the implications of Facebook’s going public, for brands?

For one thing, Facebook will have more and better ads. To ensure that its stock price doesn’t plummet and investors stay satisfied, Facebook must experience significant, consistent and continuous revenue growth. The social media platform will focus on bringing in advertising dollars, which translates into a certain aggressive push for Facebook ads. This will be especially necessary for its mobile version, since so many users are increasingly accessing Facebook on their smartphones.

Like its recent logout page ads and sponsored stories, Facebook will continue to innovate advertising with new formats and special targeting capabilities. It’s very helpful for marketers, providing far more expansive reach and hyper-targeting techniques. Marketers now can hone in on a more accurately tailored audience.

Facebook’s floatation has been called a “watershed movement” for the industry, because it truly legitimizes social media as an important tactic for business marketing. Consequently, C-level executives will put more money toward social media marketing. There won’t just be more financial investment in Facebook, but more marketing investment in general, giving brands and marketers more opportunities to correctly leverage social media.

Going hand-in-hand with more advertising will be less organic traction, which means businesses will have less cost-free publicity through status updates and news feeds. Brand managers will have increasing difficulty fueling organic growth. Valuable, engaging content always will be vital. But without content working simultaneously with Facebook advertising, a brand will quickly fall behind in the information inundation found in the social space. The days of brands getting significant traction on Facebook by organic means alone, are finished.

Because of the influx of cash after Facebook’s IPO, the company will be able to continue its spending spree – such as its recent $1B absorption of Instagram – and acquire more tech companies to aid its commitment to sharing. By acquiring such sites, the social media monster will be able to expand features and grant greater opportunities to share content only from Facebook. The advantage of this for marketers is that it potentially will be much easier to streamline social media marketing plans. For instance, advertising may be purchased for Facebook and Instragram together, as well as any other companies Facebook assimilates.

Finally, to the satisfaction of many, Facebook’s IPO probably will avail fewer changes to the site. One of the greatest hurdles for marketers using the Facebook platform has been the need to be resilient, given Facebook’s frequent updates to its products for users as well as brands. As a public company, Facebook may become less inclined to change its products as quickly as it has gotten used to doing – now investors also will weigh in on such changes more often. In the future, brand marketers may be able to create opportunities for its stakeholders using Timeline, for instance, without having to worry about Facebook’s next dramatic modification.

How do you think Facebook’s IPO will affect your brand, other brands you care about, and the marketing world at large? Tell us on our Google+, Facebook or Twitter pages.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency UK, Social Media

With Google privacy policies in the public eye, consumers know they are being tracked online –mainly for the purpose of directed advertisements. Twitter’s new suggestion service wouldn’t cross the line if it stopped tracking you once you left the website. Instead, Twitter continues to track cookies to see where else you go. If there is a “tweet this” or “follow me” button on any web page, Twitter can take information on where you are.

Facebook was accused of the same practice a few months ago. Money tends to be a motivator to collect information from social media users. Worst case scenario Twitter will use sell the information to advertisers who will take over your feed with spam. But, none of this is known for sure.

As a user, you have options to combat this cookie tracking. There is a tool called ‘disconnect’ you can download from https://disconnect.me/tools. You can still be logged into Twitter, but no cookies will be downloaded on your computer from Twitter, Facebook or Google.

Ghostery (http://www.ghostery.com/) is another program that’s an extension for Firefox and Chrome. It gives you control over scripts and cookies as you browse the internet. The program will tell you what’s being tracked and you can choose to block or allow it.

Do Not Track Plus (http://www.abine.com/dntdetail.php) works with Firefox, Chrome, Safari and Internet Explorer. It does almost the same thing as Ghostery but works with more browsers. It alerts you when a page tries to send data to another site or company (like Twitter) and automatically blocks it, unless you opt not to.

With these tools you can protect what data is collected from your computer. Twitter says they will never sell your data to anyone and will obey programs that block cookies. Just beware that everyone who tracks cookies online is an opt-out program, not opt-in.

What do you think about cookie tracking? Tell us on our Google+, Facebook or Twitter pages.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency UK, Social Media

Much has changed in the past 500 years, but London is still one of the most financially relevant cities in the world, with the city host of some of the top companies in Europe. Therefore, those who want to augment their profile in the region as a business aim to occupy offices in London. For many upstart or small-manpower-based businesses, the rental cost of these office buildings can be expensive.

Virtual-office business solutions are a less-expensive alternative and are becoming more popular. You can find virtual office London providers that own various office buildings in the city to choose from.

With a dual offering of address and live communication services, a prestigious business address in London or the city of your choice can be attained at an affordable price, complete with telephone number and access to meeting rooms. By dispensing with the restraint and cost of a physical office, the virtual office has proven to be the ideal solution for countless modern businesses.

As part of the Montague Faber & Mason Group, Your City Office has established a presence as www.yourcityoffice.com. Based in the UK with head offices in Mayfair and Berkley Square, the company’s six-year experience within the industry has attained access to more than 50 virtual office locations around the world. Coupled with its virtual office solutions, City Office’s longstanding office Space Brokering service – with access to more than 100,000 locations worldwide – has facilitated thousands of businesses in meeting their ideal office-space requirements. With principled commitment to sound business practise, City Office endeavour to remain competitively priced has rewarded the company with thousands of satisfied virtual office clients and a turnover of £4M+ in office space contracts alone in 2011.

Please help us welcome Your City Office by contacting them today online.

Telling ordinary, fictional stories isn’t what makes content marketing engaging for customers and especially prospective customers. What is impactful is telling interesting, colorful, true stories that help the target cohort understand a product or service. So, a company might benefit from hiring a brand journalist to unearth real-life success stories from within an organization.

A brand journalist is under the auspices of a company, who scripts and produces videos and podcasts, writes blogs, shoots and finds photos, hosts webinars, maintains social media, assembles graphs, and provides other information that adds depth and dimension to a company’s message.

There are several reasons a brand journalist would be good for business – as one large and renowed company found out.

For one thing, they recognize good stories. Journalists are inundated with information, both useful and useless, and separate the stories that people want to hear. They are especially discerning because each time they set out to produce content, they ask themselves for any good reasons why an audience should read what they’re about to write.

Secondly, brand journalists know how to simplify. Journalists not only spot quality stories but also know how to deconstruct complex subject matter so it is easily digestible. A good brand journalist can tell engaging stories about unwieldy topics, highly regulated industries, and normally uninteresting products.

Finally, like news journalists, brand journalists rely on facts. A company that chooses to hire a brand journalist chooses to produce content that transcends marketing copy or collateral – they are hiring someone who cares more about a bottom-line and is conscientious about the information he/she knows the public will read.

Journalists are trained to investigate the credibility of information, researching to substantiate opinions and assertions with facts, and attributing data to the right sources. All this augments a company’s credibility as a voice in its industry.

However, as brand journalists are employed by organizations, it’s important to understand that they essentially are public relations professionals and not unbiased news media. The Poynter Institute aptly points out that the distinction is still necessary.

Does your company have someone who finds and tells success stories as part of its branding? Tell us on our Google+, Facebook or Twitter pages.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency UK, Social Media

1. Ask for specific recommendations

Stop waiting for people to send you recommendations –they won’t. Don’t be afraid to ask people to help you out, but as always, be courteous.  If you chose to send a recommendation request, LinkedIn already has text to send but you should take that out and write your own personal note. Ask them to specific details like if sales went up or debt went down while you worked there.

2. Don’t ask everyone

Sending out a request to all of your connections is not the way to go. Most of those people aren’t qualified to write you a recommendation, you shouldn’t ask. Keep it to people in the industry you are looking for a job and people that you actually worked with.

3. Don’t ignore a request

Even if it someone you don’t know well, don’t leave the request hanging out in space. Tell them you don’t feel comfortable writing a recommendation, but in the future if the circumstance changes, you’d be happy to write for them. Always answer your requests.

4. Be careful about how you recommend

If you worked as part of team, only have one recommendation from that team. If everyone in your office recommends you it comes off as cheesy and not as genuine.

5. Update recommendations

Recommendations are just as important as your work history. If a recommendation becomes irrelevant, delete it. Be sure to monitor your recommendations as well.

LinkedIn is becoming a great networking site and all businesses should have profiles. It’s a great place to find clients and interact with possible employers. Recommendations are just another aspect of your profile that will help get your name out there.

Tell us what you think: have you ever recommended people before on LinkedIn?

Let us know  on our Google+, Facebook or Twitter pages.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency UK, Social Media

While many businesses are still using old marketing models, often seeing social media as a fad, customers are using social media more and more for different areas of their lives – not just keeping up with friends and family, but getting their news, shopping for products, and discussing their needs and preferences.

Facebook alone has about 900 million active users, half of whom log into Facebook on any given day. Therefore, shouldn’t marketers be engaging them there? In order to stay relevant and top-of-mind with customers, now is the time for businesses to engage in social media. Here are three of the main reasons why your business needs to leverage social media now.

According to eMarketer, advertisers spent more on online marketing than in newspaper ads in 2010. In 2011, the budget for online advertising grew and surpassed newspaper advertising by almost $ billion. Doesn’t that say something? This figure indicates the growing number of mindshare to be captured online.

Social media is an inexpensive marketing tool that businesses can use to enter the online advertising environment. In contrast to traditional paid ad models, the only real cost of social media marketing is the time required to build and maintain a presence.

The real power of social media lies in the potential influence of word-of-mouth by online consumers. If a customer has 7,000 followers on Twitter and tweets something positive about your business, then that tweet is like a free online advertisement with a potential reach of 7,000 new customers, plus any Twitter followers of those 5,000 people, and so forth. This principle also applies for Facebook wall posts and LinkedIn questions and answers, as well as group discussions for business-to-business marketing.

Not only is the base of social media customers growing, but this cohort is increasingly accessing social sites from their smartphones. This month, Facebook had to warn its investors that its ad business is in jeopardy, because more users access via mobile, where not nearly as many ads are available. According to Nielsen, almost 40 percent of social media users access social sites from their mobile devices. This means that many users are interfacing with social media sites 24/7.

Let us know what you think on our Google+, Facebook or Twitter pages.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency UK, Social Media

Have a Blog

The easiest way to help with Google rankings is fresh content. There are many free blogging websites companies can use to host their blogs, we prefer WordPress because we can customize it to your liking.

Keyword Research

Check out search engines and what comes up for your key terms. See what the competition is doing and copy it, to some degree. Find three relevant keywords you want to target.

Onsite Optimisation

Sprinkle your keywords throughout your website. Don’t stuff them all in one place; Google will think your site is spam. It’s good to use your keywords in blogs as well. The best way to optimise is through your websites coding, which is what we do here at Micrositez.

Google Places

Make yourself a free Google Places page. If someone searches your company’s name that will usually be first result. Be sure to have your phone number and location and a picture. It helps direct people to your site.

Back Linking

Going to social media sites and posting about your company can help create traffic to your site. Just don’t post so often that its spam. Facebook is really good at monitoring posts so when you post, make sure it’s relevant and original content and not just a link. This creates a link back to your site which will increase its value to Google and up your rankings.

These methods will help create a Google ranking for a small business. Depending on how popular your keywords are will determine your success rate. But at Micrositez Digital we can help with SEO in a professional way that will get you into the top 10 results. We deliver on our commitment to getting your website there!

Do you think these steps are simple enough for small businesses?

Let us know what you think on our Google+, Facebook or Twitter pages.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency UK, SEO

The first round of countries to get the app include: France, German, Italy, Russia, Spain and the UK. Other countries will be able to get the app later in the year. The app will run on the 900, 800, 710 and 610 Lumia models.

The strategy to being launching in Europe first, and is unique, but Nokia has its motives. Competitors like Amazon took a while to start making versions of the Kindle in languages other than English. Nokia made their strategy clear in a blog post, “While eBooks are becoming a common sight in countries like the US and the UK, they are still in their infancy – or basically unavailable – in many parts of the world.”

Nokia is planning on translating English-written best sellers, too. Books like The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo and The Adventures Of Sherlock Holmes are on the list to be translated. Nokia says the list continues to grow.

Reading is having discoverability problems and Nokia aims to fix it with a few different software options. Nokia has included a “collection” widget to help direct users to most popular books and new releases, organized by genre. The firm has also built in a predictive search and fonts that are particularly small-screen friendly, to ease the difficulty of reading on a smartphone.

Other enhancements like a News Stream and better functionality will be available as free updates.

“We have built a reading service that focuses on how people read on their mobiles,” Nokia’s product manager for the Reading app, Rhidian Williams, wrote in a post. “It’s a service that recognises that people read different kinds of content at different times of the day, and it brings this content together in a reading hub that will encourage readers to come back to it frequently.”

What’s your favourite e-reader app? Do you plan on downloading Nokia’s Reading?

Tell us what you think on our Google+, Facebook or Twitter pages.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency UK, Social Media

Facebook said the new app store will become the new place for finding games, according to the BBC. The new center will help developers get their social web and mobile games discovered by more people, Facebook claims. It will also spotlight free and paid apps that use Facebook’s social graph and it will be on the Facebook website.

“For the over 900 million people that use Facebook, the App Center will be the new, central place to find great apps like Draw Something, Pinterest, Spotify, Battle Pirates, Viddy and Bubble Witch Saga,” Facebook said in a post, reported by the Guardian.

While the App Center isn’t yet live globally, it will be in the coming weeks according to Facebook’s Aaron Brady.

“All developers should start preparing today to make sure their app is included for the launch,” he wrote in a developer’s blog on Facebook.

Brady did note the App Center is not designed to compete with Apple’s App Store and Google Play. It’s designed to grow mobile apps that use Facebook, he said.

All of the news comes after Facebook announced the users of its apps for smartphones and tablets is growing much quicker than the number of advertisements it currently has, according to the Telegraph.

Facebook admits it has not developed a mobile advertising strategy… yet.

“We believe this increased usage of Facebook on mobile devices has contributed to the recent trend of our daily active users increasing more rapidly than the increase in the number of ads delivered,” Facebook said.

More and more people are using the mobile platform to post statuses and pictures to their Facebooks. But Facebook has yet to figure out a way to make money off of it. Analysts say if Facebook doesn’t solve this problem, it will hurt its financial growth.

So the question is, would you use a Facebook App Center? Do you think Facebook is taking on too much?

Let us know on Google+, Facebook or Twitter.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency UK, Social Media

It’s true that most businesses are engaging stakeholders on social media, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they are doing it correctly or that everyone should be doing it. Having no social media presence at all is better than having a bad one or a poorly-managed one.

Here are three questions we need to answer before haphazardly starting social media.

1. 1. What is our measurable business objective?

A lot of people start using social media because they hear about it in the news and others tell them that “it’s a great way to market your business.”

That is true, if it’s executed the right way – but most don’t know why they’re doing it or what to expect from it.

It’s a big problem if we can’t define what success should look like before we begin. Inbound marketing tactics such as social media and contact marketing drastically can improve marketing ROI – as long as we have direction. We don’t need to know the ROI, but we do need to understand how it’s going to increase revenue, decrease costs, or increase customer support.

So we should organize our social media goals before jumping in head-first. Then when we understand it, we’ll appreciate it more and invest more time and effort.

2.  Are our expectations realistic?

Being successful in social media is much more difficult than people realize. Yes, it’s inexpensive, but it’s not a side responsibility that should be taken care of in downtime – it needs planning and consistent attention if it’s going to be effective. On top of all that, social media is constantly evolving and it can be challenging to keep up with trends and changes.

If we’re not prepared to allocate time, effort and manpower to social media, we shouldn’t start it. For instance, there should be a social media manager. The entirety of social media should not be relegated to an intern.

We can’t launch a new website and expect SEO traffic to flood the website the next day.

3. WHY should our target cohort care?

In an age when customers can influence public perception via social media, that dictatorial one-size-fits-all philosophy no longer works. Not only that, but if most businesses try to operate on that, they will get buried alive.

Let’s put ourselves in the shoes of customers or potential customers. What are you interested in when you’re on Facebook or Google+? Why should anyone read our blog posts, Like our Facebook page, or comment and interact with us online?

The key to social media is engagement. Without it, people’s attention won’t be held long enough to buy something. If we want people to interact, then we need to get them to care, which isn’t easy. We need to experiment with different ways to engage them, then observe what they respond to.

Every Tweet should not be a sales pitch. Social media is not about generating transactions – it’s a different beast: it’s about building relationships. There’s nothing wrong with simply engaging people in conversation and let it naturally evolve into a prospective sale – as long as this is not forced.

People don’t interact with marketers because we’re awesome – they do it because there is some sort of benefit to them. Maybe what they see posted makes them laugh, cry or shocks them into taking action. Either way, it’s not about us. To succeed in social media, we must be laser-focused on our audience and their needs and desires.

Have you learned what works and what fails with social media? Tell us about it on Google+, Facebook or Twitter.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency, Social Media

We’d like to share with a few of our favourite blogging tips, when you’ve got writers block.

Lists are a great way to create content that is easy to read. Many people do not read as much as they used to. Lists are easy to attract the eye. Use bullet points when easier than writing sentences. Readers will be able to easily skim your list and see what your company is about.

How-to blogs are always a favourite of readers. It shows what your company knows and helps build credibility in your community.

Be sure to add-in photos and videos. This shows your company’s personality and also catches a reader’s eye. Text-heavy articles aren’t appealing and generally don’t garner clicks. Always have a place for photographs of your office and employees. This gives readers a face to the name and are more likely to remember your company if you provide a concrete image.

Use your past client’s experiences as testimonials on your blogs. Keep in touch with clients so you have something to show to future clients. Create lasting relationships with businesses in your area. This utilizes a larger client base and keeps good spirits in the community.

Reward customers with contests. People love to win things and pick up free goodie bags. Giving away a 10% coupon can do wonders with client retention.

Also, consider the possibility of recording a podcast. Sometimes blogs are too wordy or too complicated, so give recordings a try.

Make sure you are taking the time to update your blog regularly. As with anything on the internet, trends happen quickly and drop off quickly. Staying on top of content can make all the difference.

If you don’t have time for regular blogging, give us a call. Need help or tips?

Contact us on our Enquiry Page, Google+, Facebook or Twitter.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency UK, SEO

After reading the privacy policies, 33 percent of respondents felt less comfortable with how Facebook gathers and stores information about activity, and 47 percent of Google users felt comfortable with its own policies. Consumers have a weak understanding of how Facebook and Google collect and track user information and activity, and how and with whom information is shared.

Seventy percent of respondents correctly answered questions for comprehending government notices and 68 percent of respondents correctly understood credit-card agreements. On a scale of 0 to 100 – a score of 80 indicated good comprehension – respondents respectively scored 39 and 36 for the privacy policies of Facebook and Google.

Despite Google’s recent consolidation of its various privacy policies, users who participated in the study still expressed more discomfort after reading the revised policies.

Key findings for Facebook:

• Users are required to leverage an Application Programming Interface (API) in order to understand how their information is being used. Less than 40 percent of respondents who use Facebook understood how an API can be used to access and view public information.
• Fifteen percent of respondents correctly understood exactly what happens to their Facebook accounts after they’re deleted.
• Twenty percent could accurately identify how to block outside apps and websites from accessing their personal account information on Facebook.

Key findings for Google:

• Twenty-three percent of Google account-holders understood their profiles are visible to anyone online.
• More than half were not aware that the privacy policy also applied to their use of Google Maps, Google Talk, Blogger and YouTube.
• Thirty- eight percent of respondents understood that Google connects search activity to a user’s IP address, regardless whether they sign into a Google account.

Ways the two internet megaliths’ privacy policy documents may be improved:

• They can succinctly convey what information is collected, how user information is tracked, filed and shared, and how account-holders can manage their privacy. Consolidating the policies is not the answer, nor is expecting users to read technical information intended for web developers – which is what Facebook does when it directs users to information about the Graph API. Current policies take even the most dedicated and concerned readers hours to trudge through because of their length, numerous links to related information and complex, detailed wording.
• Users should be allowed to opt-in to share and publicize their information. By setting the default privacy settings at the most conservative and letting users decide to expand how their information is retained, online service providers can meet the stated needs of their users. Between 70 and 80 percent of the survey respondents agreed with the Obama Administration’s plan to streamline online tracking of consumers’ personal information and make it easier to understand exactly what is done with their information.

Do you have concerns about online account privacy policies or how your information is used by companies? Let us know on Google+, Facebook or Twitter.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency, Social Media

Marketing on this site is one of the most popular actions that a lot of businesses have taken advantage of. Everyone knows that Facebook can be very helpful in expanding a customer base, so therefor when you are deciding to start putting up ads, you need to know exactly what should be done. Here are some very simple steps to making sure that your ad makes the proper impact that is intended.

First things first, you need to make sure that there is clarity and design in the message that you are trying to portray. Although Facebook is almost all about socializing, this area of is just for marketing. When setting up your page you need to realize that this is not your ordinary social page, this needs to be all about your business and what it offers. All of your important information like contact information, discounts and coupons needs to be very visible.

Next you will need to make sure that there is something that will catch the readers eye like promoting special memberships, discount codes etc. This is the perfect way to make your future customers take action.

Third, you will need make sure that all of your advertisements need to be easy and simple to understand. No one wants to have to figure out how to retrieve their discount or coupon. Make things very self explanatory when offering products. You want your viewer to be able to be directed towards exactly what you want them to do.

Using images is also another great idea for your marketing ad. Pictures attract more traffic than words do, this happens the most on the internet. A picture should be the first thing the viewer sees other than it being a big patch of text. This will bring a lot of people to your page and keep them coming back. There are a lot of different strategies to making your ad perfect but these steps should help start you off on the right track. Make sure that when you are making these ad’s that you are targeting the right people and keeping up with your own business deals. People want to be a part of the best businesses so if your ad is not appealing, you wont be getting the traffic that you are looking for.

Will you make the right decisions when producing your maketing ad? What else do you think is very important when it comes to making your first marketing ad on Facebook?

Let us know your opinion by finding us on Google+, Facebook or Twitter.

Micrositez: Digital Marketing Agency, Social Media, Pay Per Click