In this post, I talk about the 7 types of marketing experts that you are likely to encounter in today’s digital world.

The Conventional Marketer

These are experts who have the “been-there-done-that” kind of experience in legacy marketing mediums such as print, TV and radio. They have seen marketing change over the years but have still managed to make their mark felt based on their vast experience in conventional marketing techniques.

The Internet Marketer

Internet Marketers are a breed of experts who have mastered the web as a marketing medium. Whether it’s Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Search Engine Marketing (SEM), link building or any other Internet Marketing technique, these are people who have leveraged the web to build awesome marketing campaigns.

The Social Media Marketer

Social Media marketers are experts who have successfully used social media as an effective marketing medium. Whether it’s Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or other emerging social networks such as Pinterest, these marketers know how to use the social web to create compelling marketing campaigns.

The Brand Marketer

These are marketing experts who are best suited to marketing campaigns related to brand building. Their expertise lies in making a brand popular and spinning a web of attraction for the prospect customers. Their ultimate aim is to create brand value for organizations. For these folks, it’s all about the brand.

The Communicator

I have come across several marketing experts who are genius communicators. They are blessed with an ability to communicate so swiftly that customers don’t even feel that they are endorsing any brand, products or services. In other words, marketing and communication comes naturally to them and they are good at it.

The Researcher

These are marketing experts who have gained their hard-earned marketing skills by virtue of research and hard work. They have solved complex marketing problems with their research and know how to apply rule of the thumb marketing principles to any problem.

The Visionary

These are marketers who have a vision beyond the obvious. They don’t ask the customer what they want. Instead, they market their solutions in a way that customers see their products/ services as what they need. These are the folks that inspire me the most and are credited with bringing in innovation in the field of marketing.

What are your thoughts on the seven types of marketing experts? Please share your views by leaving a comment.

As Facebook goes public, who owned the social networking giant before IPO? To help you understand and dissect Facebook before IPO, here’s an interesting infographic from Kissmetrics to help you gain deeper insight into the transfer of shares and many other figures surrounding their recent performance as the social networking king.

Last week, I posted a video about the 3 rules of engagement in the attention economy. In this post, I talk about the 7 levels of influence that you need to be aware of in today’s attention economy.

The Leader

A leader leads by example and influences others around him. However, leadership is also a two-way sword. A leader can influence others to follow/ obey him. On the other hand, it’s easy to get intimidated by a leader’s aura and maintain some distance. Therefore, being a leader can have varying influence on various people.

The Winner

Winners are the been-there-done-that individuals and businesses. They’ve established a name for themselves by sheer virtue of their achievements. In most cases, they’ll have a positive influence on others influencing them to achieve more.

The Innovator

An innovator influences others by the virtue of his out of the box thinking. He’s a person who doesn’t follow run-of-the-mill stuff and somebody whom you can associate with producing the next big game changer in any field. I consider Mark Zuckerberg – Facebook’s CEO as a true digital age innovator.

The Believer

A believer stands firm by what he believes is correct. He’s a person who can make others believe in him by the sheer virtue of his strong thinking. However, a believer must match his beliefs with action.

The Follower

A follower is someone who looks up to others for guidance. He’s more likely to be influenced by others. A follower can in turn influence others by his words or actions.

The Caregiver

A quick look at human history testifies that most people are likely to be influenced by those who care for them. Whether its individuals or a business which cares about its customers, those who take good care of others are likely to be influential.

The Visionary

A visionary is one who thinks beyond the obvious and acts beyond the conventional. He has no fear and influences others with his far-sighted vision. Steve Jobs, the man who turned Apple’s fortunes around and gave us several bestselling products like the iPhone, iPad and iPod will always be remembered as a true modern age visionary.

What are your thoughts on the levels of influence in today’s attention economy? Please share your thoughts by leaving a comment.

Image Credit: Good Wallpapers

To make matters worse, Yahoo hasn’t been able to find an able leader who can turn its fortunes around. When Yahoo instilled Scott Thomson as its new CEO, there were rumors of employee discontent hitting a new high. As things turned out, Thomson claimed to have earned a Computer Science degree while his degree was in accounting.

While it’s possible to get away with such tactics at junior levels, it’s derogatory to indulge in such practices when you are at the helm of a prestigious company such as Yahoo. Therefore, it’s no surprise that Thomson has now been shown the door and Yahoo has appointed Ross Levinsohn as the interim CEO.

I believe this resume controversy (resumegate) offers the following valuable lessons for businesses as well as candidates.

Be Honest

There is no substitute to honesty. If you lie on your resume, you’ll be caught sooner than later. If you have to lie to get a job, it probably means you aren’t good enough for it anyway. If you falsify your academic or professional credentials, you’re putting your career at stake. Similarly, businesses must thoroughly investigate a candidate’s credentials to double check its authenticity.

References

Reference checks are one of the most powerful tools for candidates as well as businesses. On one hand, it lets businesses do background checks on prospect candidates. On the other, it provides word of mouth marketing for the good work done by candidates in their previous stints.

Skill Test

A genuine candidate will never be afraid to get his/ her skills tested. Likewise, a business should emphasize testing a candidate’s skills before making an offer or turning him/ her down.

Trust

At the end of the day, it’s all about the trust between an employer and an employee. If you have to fudge your resume and lie about your credentials, it establishes a sense of distrust. If you’ve lied earlier, it’s never too late to accept it and rectify the situation. An ongoing lie is worse than an honest admission.

What do you think we can learn from Yahoo’s recent resumegate controversy? What impact do you think it will have on Yahoo’s future as a technology company? Please share your opinion by leaving a comment.

Image Credit: Good-wallpapers

Sites like Twitter and Facebook have contributed to the overall popularity of social media. Their growth points to the fact that social media taps into the consumer’s desire to engage with companies on a more personal level. Social media also appeals to the intrinsic need for human connection, which is often unavailable through technology’s cold and scientific demeanor.

But best and foremost for entrepreneurs and small businesses, social media is the great equalizer. You may be competing with larger companies who have an almost unlimited advertising resources, but as long as social media remains free and accessible to all, you have the same potential as they do to compete for customers.

Why not use this trend in the marketplace to your advantage? Go ahead and put your best work to work. You can do this by promoting your portfolio via social media. A few ways to do it:

• Use your social media space to shine a spotlight on your clients. Not only does this strengthen your relationship with a featured client, when you mention how your product or service was involved, these links take on even more importance: They lead to your living, breathing portfolio pieces, plus a kind of 3^rd party validation.
• Periodically “leak” sneak peek information on certain projects you’re working on. Offering previews of your new products, services, or site’s features can help build demand. At the same time, you can capture critical feedback to ensure a smooth launch. Not only are you involving your audience as a free focus group, you’re engaging their minds in what you sell, which certainly can create desire.
• Jump on occasions to link back to media write-ups where you’re mentioned. Someone mentions you in a blog post? Tweet about it. You’ve been mentioned in an article in your local newspaper, or on an industry website? Ditto on Facebook and beyond.

• Because multimedia is so integral to social networking, connecting via video allows you to express your company’s value proposition beyond words. Doing this requires small businesses to wear another new hat, producer, and the results can be well worth the effort.
• Try finding compelling new ways to present your success stories, case stories, and testimonials. Create a prominent place for these influence-building tools in your portfolio sharing mix, too.

In order for small to medium businesses to compete with the big dogs, it’s crucial to optimize all the marketing opportunities at your disposal. With social media providing an excellent forum for leveling the playing field, portfolio sharing this way should be considered essential.

Image Credit: The Big Orange Slide

Why Email Marketing Rules?

I believe that Email Marketing provides massive untapped potential to reach out to prospect customers in a more private and intimate way than most social networks. However, there’s a thin line between effective email marketing and spam marketing.

Email is the ‘tried-and-tested’ technique of online marketing and it will be difficult for any social network (be it Facebook or twitter) to completely eliminate Email Marketing.

Social Media as an Online Marketing Tool

Many detractors of Email Marketing claim that email is not built for socializing and I whole-heartedly agree with them. Email has always been a simple, easy to use and non-glamorous marketing tool. In fact, the rise of social media has been largely built on the email experience by adding more features and throwing in more interactivity.

Contrary to Email, Social Media offers many innovative marketing techniques – online video promotions (YouTube), audio podcasts, Fan Pages (Facebook), tweets and pins (Twitter and Pinterest). It allows reaching out to a large number of people on different networks amidst different walks of life. However, it comes with a greater responsibility as well.

A Statistical Comparison

A study conducted by eMarketer.com indicates that Email is still the king of online sharing and that too by a fair distance as compared to its closest competitors. Further, Email Marketing promises more page views per click when compared with any social networking platform.

Similarly, another report from StrongMail suggests that Email Marketing still ranks as the primary choice of most online marketers.

As many as 69% Marketing Programs indicated a strong preference for Email Marketing as compared to 59% who opted for Social Media.

How About Social Media + Email Marketing Together?

In my opinion, the debate about Social Media vs. Email Marketing is a non-starter. These are two distinct ways of online marketing which can be combined together to achieve maximum benefits. I certainly do not believe that social networks signal the death of email as a marketing channel. Neither am I a strong opponent of continuing to live in the email age despite a plethora of social media networks cropping up on the internet every alternate day.

Many referral campaigns and incentive-based promotions have benefited from the combo of Email + Social Media Marketing. The socialization of Email Marketing is a reality and the sooner this reality is accepted by online marketers, the better it is for their business. Marketers must realize what works best in a specific scenario and then take an educated decision on the appropriate online marketing channel.

Here’s an interesting infographic from VisibleGains that could help you in your decision making process on the subject:

Coming back to the original question – will Social Media destroy Email Marketing? No, I don’t think so. After all, email was the first ever passive social media network itself!  If you think likewise, I’ll be glad to hear from you. If you think otherwise, I’ll be eager to hear from you.

And that’s precisely what Google did earlier this week by introducing Google Hangouts on Air – so now, when you setup a Hangout, it gets broadcasted live on your Google+ stream or your YouTube channel.

How will it work?

To enable real time broadcasting of your Hangouts, you simply need to check the ‘Enable Hangouts on Air’ flag while you create a Hangout. You can see how many viewers are watching your hangout broadcast live and once off air, the Hangout is available as a public recording on your YouTube channel.

How to leverage it for your Business?

The possibilities are endless. I believe Google Hangouts on Air will emerge as a game changer for the webcast industry. Therefore, it’s no surprise that Google Hangouts on Air are already being labeled as the future of engagement. Whether it’s a call for action for your customers or a webcast to promote your products or services, I believe Google Hangouts on Air would be a great asset.

The best part – in addition to your live broadcast audience, millions of people can view the recording either via your Google+ stream or via your YouTube channel. Talk about customer reach and I think Google Hangouts on Air provides an unparalleled experience.

Video Chat + Screen Sharing + Live

I’ve gradually moved several of my business meetings from Skype video calls to Google Hangouts. However, I had a strong case to broadcast my hangouts live in some cases where I was a part of a group discussion that was to be viewed live by a larger audience. I think Google Hangouts on Air have a strong upper hand as compared to Skype as the latter lacks live broadcasting capability.

Google says that people are already using this to broadcast news, town hall meetings, classes, and concerts. Google Hangouts on Air allows people to reaching a global audience from their living room so there’s no reason why your business should miss out on this opportunity.

Have you tried out Google+ Hangouts on Air for your business? If so, did you like the experience? Do you think it transforms Google+ Hangouts into a valuable business tool? Please share your opinion by leaving a comment.

In the sea of information, flowing from the ocean of the information age, how do you get your target audience to engage with your content in an economy where attention is scarce? In the new economy, we now call the Attention Economy, where time is the currency, how do you get your audience, prospects, and customers to pay attention to your message? In this video, I highlight three critical rules of engagement you must adhere to in the Attention Economy.

I believe Twitter took a huge step in that direction when it launched the new user interface last year with the Twitter ‘Discover’ tab. Back then, I still believed Twitter needs to do more on the personalization front to offer a truly contextual experience. Therefore, when I came to know that Twitter is making the ‘Discover’ tab experience truly personal – I couldn’t help but feel that it’s better late than never.

How will it work?

Like all things Twitter, the new personalized discovery feature will be extremely simple to use. When you see a story in Discover that interests you, you can click “view tweets” to see popular tweets from your network. Recent, relevant Tweets are displayed directly below the story summary. Therefore, you don’t get overburdened with tweets from irrelevant people or out of context tweets.

Personalization

All users like to given special attention and they appreciate a personalized experience. While the Discover tab was a great addition to discover information that matters to you without having to follow additional accounts, it lacked true personalization. Now, this tab will feature tweets which are ranked by the strength of connections between users. Discover will also take into account content shared from friends of friends. So, all content you see is more personalized than earlier.

Context

Users tend to relate better with their friends and followers than with strangers. This latest update will let Twitter seeks out URLs shared by an individual’s immediate or circle of followers and then convert them into stories which get ranked by tweets and relationships. All in all, Twitter will be a lot more contextual than earlier.

Norm

Facebook does it. Google does it for its search feed. Personalization is more of a norm rather than an exception in Internet and social media circles these days. So, there’s no reason why Twitter should stay aloof from the benefits of personalization.

The feature is expected to be available “in the coming weeks” on the Twitter.com Website, and will subsequently find its way onto Twitter’s iPhone and Android apps.

I personally think Twitter’s efforts to launch contextual discovery will be appreciated by most Twitter users. What do you think? Please share your opinion by leaving a comment.

A case in point is Hollywood Studios, one of the world’s most successful cinema production houses. I’ve always been amazed at how they manage to churn out one blockbuster after the other. Is it just by virtue of their movies – the cast, the plot, the crew or an amalgamation of those factors? Or is it their tireless public relations (PR) regime that works round the clock to put everything together? Or perhaps, it’s a combination of all of those factors?

In this post, I present valuable tips on what your business can learn about marketing from Hollywood Studios.

Strategize

I love the innovative marketing strategies that Hollywood Studios incorporates for their new releases. And the best part – just when you think it’s going to be the good old strategy, they’ll surprise you with a new road show, a blind date Facebook contest, a Twitter promo or some other social media contest.

PR

Hollywood Studios is a champion in the PR game. They know how to reach out to the right people and how to get value out of them for their films. Whether it’s the audience, the press, the critics, their PR regime addresses all key stakeholders with amazing effectiveness.

Pro-active

Many production houses start promoting a movie when it’s nearing release. With Hollywood Studios, it’s a different ball game. In many cases, they start creating a buzz the moment a script is finalized or the first shot has been taken. In most cases, by the time a movie with big names is about to be released, there’s already a sense of anticipating among the audience.

Selling

Hollywood Studios knows how to sell. Period. Whether it’s to cinemas, online or to others in the video/ cable business, Hollywood Studios seem to be able do it all with ease. Their success mantra – build an awesome sales network and then produce some fantastic movies which their sales network can toast upon.

Showbiz

Hollywood Studios knows how to get maximum showbiz value from their movie stars. Whether it’s Twitter, Facebook or other social networks, you’ll often find movie stars connecting with audiences and spreading the word on their movies. Showbiz has a viral marketing effect and nobody knows that game better than Hollywood Studios.

What do you think of the marketing strategies adopted by Hollywood Studios? Please have your say by leaving a comment.

In my opinion, Apple is perhaps the best example of how brand affinity can boost a company’s customer loyalty in an unparalleled manner. Whether it’s the iPod, the iPhone or the Apple iPad, each of Apple’s iBrand products have been a phenomenal success. Here are a few valuable business lessons on how to increase customer loyalty with brand affinity.

Brand is everything

The best thing about Apple’s success is that the Cupertino giant has given the due emphasis to the ‘Apple’ brand. Several technology companies have launched one or more successful products but they’ve failed to replicate those individual success stories into a broader brand success. Whether it’s the iPhone 4S or the new iPad, Apple’s ensured that the brand value is more emphasized than the products.

Honesty

Apple is a remarkably honest company. Whether it’s the antennagate issue in the iPhone 4 or the heating problems with the new iPad, Apple’s always acknowledged and duly fixed its product problems. In fact, Apple decided to give away bumper cases to all iPhone 4 owners who suffered the antennagate issue. Similarly, Apple was quick to acknowledge the heating problems in the new iPad and assured its customers that it’ll resolve it sooner than later.

Cult

It’s not just about a brand name. When you deal with Apple, you’re assured of a top quality product, world class professional service and customer-friendly support. Over the years, all those factors have combined to establish Apple as a cult brand. With all due respect, no other technology company including the likes of Google and Microsoft

Promotion

Apple’s marketing is in a unique league of its own. Whether it’s the Macintosh advertisements during the 1980s or the new iPad commercials, Apple sells the brand aka the ‘Apple Experience’ in a fascinating way. I know of several people who’ve bought Apple products though they didn’t need it but they went ahead and made the purchase simply because they succumbed to the Apple experience.

What’s your take on how brands can increase customer loyalty through brand affinity? Share your opinion by leaving a comment.

To that effect, website conversion is extremely important for any business. In this post, I highlight 7 things which you must keep in mind for website conversion.

Simple

Keep it simple. People love websites which provide a simplistic user experience. Whether it’s navigation, text or images – make a conscious effort to keep things simple. You should keep in mind that your website visitors are a mix of tech-savvy people as well as those who’re still newbies in the Internet world. Simplicity works.

Know your audience

Your customers are a key stakeholder for your website so make sure you design it keeping them in mind. If you are a business offering products and services for the teen generation, a lively and rocking website fits the bill better than a sober and dull theme. Make sure that all info that your audience needs is easily accessible.

Content

Content is King – this holds true irrespective of the kind of business are you are in. If your website lacks content which can make an impact, it’s not likely to draw large conversion numbers. Make sure you offer unique quality content on your website – it’s one of the most understated principles of successful website conversion.

Customer Experience

Customers only go back to sites which they like. The foremost objective of any website is to offer a pleasing customer experience. Strive hard to improve your website and build a customer experience – rewards will automatically follow.

Selling

While the end objective is to sell, you should take care that you sell the benefits or the Unique Selling Proposition (USP) of your product/service. Don’t get too pushy with text/ images to hard sell to customers – it never works. Instead, adopt a balanced approach – educate your customers on your products and services, tell them why they should opt for it and if they oblige, make sure to treat them in a professional manner.

Action

Customers love providing feedback and they like seeing things in action. In fact, smedio.com has transformed over the years based on the feedback we’ve received from our wonderful audience. Always be prepared to take action based on customer feedback.

Competition

Know your competition – it helps. Try to understand how your competitors are using their websites to pull in more customers. Analyze what makes them successful and beware of the mistakes they make. There’s nothing like learning from your competitors’ success and failure.

What are your opinion on website conversion? Please share your tips by leaving a comment.

Enjoy the Lead Analytics Dashboard infographic below:

Source: Acton

Content is king –

I’ve often come across several websites which offer amazing content but do a poor job of marketing themselves. Similarly, the Internet has thousands of blogs with insightful and interesting information but they don’t do enough to get those important eyeballs to their content.

In this post, I walk you through 5 tips that can help get more eyeballs to your content.

Pictures

A picture is worth a thousand words – this good old mantra still holds true. In fact, I personally experience this every day. I visit hundreds of new websites every week and the ones with interesting pictures immediately strike a chord in my mind. In fact, most people remember quality content using an image as a reference and anchor. If you’ve produced great content, support it with a picture that leaves an everlasting impression on the readers.

Title

The Title Says It All – most people use content’s title as the criteria to decide whether to read the whole piece or not. If you use a mundane, uninteresting title, your content is likely to go unnoticed. On the other hand, if you use a catchy, informative, appealing title, it serves as an encouragement for readers to go ahead and read your piece. It builds expectations for a reader that they’re about to read a content with quality embedded in it.

Social

Whether it’s Facebook, Twitter or even Pinterest, social media has been a blessing for content producers and consumers alike. Social media serves as a great ambassador for spreading the reach of your content on a global level. Once you’ve produced quality content, you’d want to leverage your social media presence to spread the word and get more eyeballs to your website or blog.

Social Media

Social media is already the leading mainstream application on the Internet. Facebook has overtaken Google as the world’s most popular website and I reckon that social media will continue to grow at an explosive pace during the next three years. While it would be hard in the near future to build another social network of the stature of Facebook, I expect several new and interesting social networks such as Quora and Pinterest to emerge as noticeable attributor of content in the next few years.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Make your content SEO friendly. If your piece shows up higher in search results, there’s a greater likelihood of it being read by a wider audience. A solid SEO strategy can help build sustainable traffic for your content and smedio.com is a golden testimony to that belief.

What are your success mantras for getting eyeballs to your content? Please share your strategy by leaving a comment.

Do it all, or don’t do it at all

Twitter, much like all of social media, requires time, patience and focus. Doing Twitter halfway is worse than not doing it at all. Name your favorite company. Now, imagine you go to that company’s Twitter page and its most recent tweet is from last summer. Obviously, that’s not a company that cares enough about feedback from its customers to be bothered with paying attention to Twitter. You don’t want to gain that reputation. The first thing you have to do is make a commitment to spending time every single day monitoring your Twitter page, your followers and some other things we’ll point out a little later. Twitter success is not found by doing the bare minimum.

Be yourself, not your company

If you look through the Twitter pages of social media specialists who work for companies, you’ll likely notice that most of them are themselves. The page is for a person; not a logo or a company name. No one wants to talk to a logo. Be yourself, talk like yourself and act like yourself. You’re more likely to build on our third tip if you’re not hiding behind your company’s logo or slogan.

Make connections

Twitter is a great tool for making great connections with the most important people to your business: your customers. Engage them. Talk to them. Ask them questions. Who knows what you might learn about the way you do business. What if you get negative feedback? Listen to it and learn from it. Talk to the person giving you that feedback and find out more. Why do they feel that way? What can you do as a company to change that opinion? This is important information to have, and one of the reasons you signed up for Twitter in the first place, right? Connections with your consumers will change your business perspective in ways you never thought possible.

Respond to @ replies in a timely fashion

Under the home tab on the right side of your Twitter feed is where you will find your @ replies. Click on it and you’ll see every tweet that mentions your Twitter name. Some replies will be statements. Others will be questions. Whatever they are, respond right away. Don’t let any of your followers think for a moment no one is listening to what they have to say. If you don’t know the answer to the question they’re posing, kindly @ reply them back and tell them you’ll find an answer for them as soon as possible. Using the @ reply function is an important part of building relationships with your customers, so don’t neglect it.

Share often

Twitter is not your stage to wildly promote your own products or services. Sure, a plug here or there is great. But your focus should be on what information you can provide your followers that they would find helpful. For example, I run the social media for The Legends Poll, a top 25 college football poll voted on by legendary college football coaches. Our followers don’t just follow us to hear about our poll. They follow us to talk about all things college football, so that’s what I give them. If there’s a great article on another site that I think would spark a good discussion or provide information to our readers as college football fans, I post it. Look at the big picture and provide information about your industry or your specialization instead of just your company. Be a source for your customers like no one else can.

Post often, but not too often

Figuring out how much is too much can be difficult. The key here is to not overload your followers’ Twitter stream with a bunch of information at one time. A good rule here is to tweet maybe three times per hour. Maybe that’s too much for you, and that’s fine. But going over that means you run the risk of annoying your followers. You don’t want to do that.

Monitor conversations

Twitter search is a powerful, wonderful thing. Use it. Search for your company’s name and see if anyone out there has been talking about it on Twitter. Get in the habit of doing this, as you’ll likely find opportunities to make connections and gain followers by engaging those users. Also, use Twitter search to find conversations related to your industry. Look at the big picture. If you’re a graphic designer, search for a term like “designer” and see what comes up. You may find that people are tweeting about needing the services of a skilled graphic designer, and that’s where the true value of Twitter search really shows itself.

Compliment others

It may go against one of the top rules of business, but it’s a good idea to mention your competitors and be complimentary of them on Twitter. Scott Monty is a good example of this. Monty is the head of social media for Ford Motor Company, and while Monty does a great job of talking about Ford products, he’ll sometimes point out products from other car companies and be complimentary of them. Compliment others on Twitter, even if they’re direct competitors, and it will come back to you.