image by Jacy Ippolito

In my last couple of posts I discussed the interplay between your website and your social media sites. I proclaimed boldly that, “The website is not dead.” But did you know that while the concept of a website may not be dead, your’s actually could be pronounced figuratively dead if it’s not “sticky?”

The term sticky is a marketing concept that means just that..a website that is sticky. One that keeps your visitors interested and intrigued to stick around long enough to see: 1) Who you are, and 2) What you got…and keep them coming back for more. I would venture to say, if you’re website’s not sticky you won’t be getting much traffic on your social media sites. Here are some ideas on how to make your website “sticky”:

1) SEO or Search Engine Optimization: The more eyes that see your website name on the first page of search engine results, the better.

2) Fast Content Loading: Too many graphics or troubles behind the scenes of your site can lead to a slow loading webpage. The slower your webpage loads the faster you lose your audience.

3) Simple Navigation: There is nothing I hate more then a page that is hard to navigate. My motto is, if you can’t make your webpage easy any business transaction I have with you won’t be easy either. I rather skip them both.

4) Straight Forward Easy Language: I’ve been on sites were I haven’t the faintest clue what a particular business does. Usually this comes in the form of using a lot of business specific terminology that anyone outside of the particular industry will not understand. Here is some advice: if you’re 10 year old can’t understand what you do by reading your webpage, rewrite it.

4) Updated Content: Things like blogs, Facebook pages, Social Media communities are inherently sticky because content is updated consistently (or should be). You can update your website content too. Just pick the easy things to update such as calendars, event listings, product launches, sale items, current events.

5) Interactive: The more interactive your website the better. For example polls, quizzes, product demos, video, questions, all beg your viewer to do something. The more your viewer has to do, the more they’ll come back.

It’s been said that studies have confirmed that a website has 10 to 20 seconds to impress it’s visitor. In that short amount of time, it’s imperative to have the  glue that holds it all together.

To read another great article on stickiness click here.

What ideas have you implemented on your websites or blogs to make them sticky?

image from Thomas Duchnicki

Unless you were living under a rock this past year, you know that Betty White became the host of Saturday Night Live through a Facebook petition. If you happened to miss her episode of SNL, her monologue touched on how she became the host. It went something like this…

“I have so many people to thank for being here. But I really have to thank Facebook. When I first heard about the campaign to get me to host Saturday Night Live I didn’t know what Facebook was. And now that I do know what it is I have to say…it sounds like a huge waste of time. I would never say the people on it are losers. But that’s only because I’m polite. People say, but Betty Facebook is a great way to connect with old friends. Well at my age if I want to connect with old friends I need a Ouija Board…Facebook just sounds like a drag. In my day seeing pictures of people’s vacations was considered a punishment.”

Well…things have changed. Despite Betty’s age (88.5 years), she makes an excellent point. While there are many Facebook users there are many more who are not using Facebook or any social media. In fact I had a friend just say to me. “You tweet? I don’t get Twitter.” He’s at least 40 years younger than Betty White. I know every company would like to think their customers are young, hip, and in-the-know. But hopefully, your customers run the gamut. So how do you get the “I don’t get Twitter” crowd to follow you on Twitter? Do you give up? Not quite.

For the less than social media savvy customers, you should sell your social media platforms as incentive based. “If you follow us on Twitter you find out about special sales we don’t post anywhere else. If you follow us on Facebook you have an immediate offering to our latest products for purchase before they hit the stores. If you follow us on both, we provide immediate customer service without having to wait on the phone for a live body. Or if there seems to be a universal customer issue we’ll post our progress on both of these sites &c…” Assuming this works, you must go on to step two of your consumers problem when they say…”but how do I even sign up for Facebook, Twitter, You-Tube , Ning, Foursquare… ”

My motto is a little extra effort goes a long way. Why can’t you show them how to sign-up, or provide a how-to. If you do, chances are they’ll go straight to you page due mostly to your kindness (or you can show them the page). Where did I learn this? From Verizon. When I first purchased my new Blackberry I wanted Ubertwitter on it, but had no idea how to get the application. My Verizon salesman not only showed me how. He downloaded it for me and walked me through the set-up, and told me what the various options meant and why I wanted to pick some over others. He did not have to do that, but he did. I still have his card..over one year later. He will get my business every time.

So, what are some of your ideas to sell social media if your customer says ” I don’t get it. Why should I do it?”

image by Lida Rose

In corporate marketing departments around the world, the the topic of conversation is centered around how to create a social media presence. I don’t mean to kick a dead horse. But if you have been reading my posts for long you know that I believe social media dies without the aid of cross-marketing channels (meaning-the use of one marketing channel to support and promote another marketing channel). I believe this is where and why the business website must come in.

The website is not dead, don’t let anyone convince you it is. There are hundreds of millions, probably billions of websites on the internet, and they are not going anywhere. Obviously, next to social media, websites can be a rather stagnant presence unless there is a lot of consumer interface or e-commerce capabilities. Nonetheless, websites still serve a very necessary online marketing function. They can lay the surface ground work for displaying your brand. And if (and you should) use the website to promote your social media sites, the website can act like the outer layer of a marketing web, and the social media site can act as the center of the web where one encounters the spider (figuratively of course). This means that social media is where the consumer (if caught correctly at the website) can be moved over to the social media site where they actually get to know the people behind the company, behind the brand. If they like you, this is where consumer loyalty can be created.

Strong businesses create multi-varied webs in which to grab the consumer’s attention. The website and social media sites go hand-in-hand in this way. Take it from nature. A spider if left to its devices undisturbed creates the largest web possible to trap the most prey. Your consumers are not prey, but they do need to be brought in.

image by David Joyce

In mid July (the 12th and 14th to be exact) I wrote about how to begin your brand, and market your brand (part 1 and 2). This post is part 3-growing your brand. Everyone wants to be big. We love big in America. In fact we say: “Go big or go home.” This, however, should not be your motto for branding. There are plenty of  small brands that have world wide recognition.  Whether your a beginning, small, big, well-known or unknown brand, you should grow your brand at a nice slow pace so that you can ensure the longevity of the territory your brand enters. Here are some tips on how to do just that:

1) Embrace your brands power (real or imagined).

Use that power intelligently, responsibly and powerfully. Power is perception. If you act credible you’ll be seen as credible.

2) Create a Mission.

Look for opportunities where you can live that mission out.

3) Go from Project to Project.

Projects require creativity, work, and organization. Projects allow you to show the strength, creativity, continuity, seriousness, of your brand.

4) Assess your Customer Loyalty.

Is it good, bad, indifferent? Figure out either way how to make it better.

5) Ask How Your Brand is Doing.

Insist on honest feedback. It’s the best way to determine what people believe your brand is worth on the open market in comparison to what you think.

Branding is not an overnight process. Sometimes it takes awhile to find your niche, your style, your voice. Take a cue from nature. It takes a child 18 years to grow to an adult. National & worldwide brands often take more time (if they are to stay around for the longterm).

What do you do to grow your brand?

image by Jenny Downing

On Twitter I follow @funnyoneliners, these tweets usually make my day. There was one tweet in particular that really grabbed my attention, because finally someone just said it. “This just in: Nobody knows what the hell their doing.” While it may seemingly be detrimental to my Social Media expert status I’m going to tell you about one of the mistakes (out of many I make daily) that I made in my own social networking. Once and for all, it’s necessary to start dispelling the myth of perfection.

I started a Facebook Fan page for my business, this business. At the time it was named something else. I lobbied anyone I could and got a nice beginning number of fans. Then a few months later I changed the name of my business. After careful consideration that took weeks, I finally believed I had make a new FB Fan page with the proper business name. I announced the move to all my fans and asked them to join me at my new page. Two came over immediately. That was it. I kept lobbying. Two more came over. That was it. I kept lobbying. No one budged. Finally, I just deleted the old page after a while.

Thomas Edison once said in response to the many times he failed to invent the light bulb, that he had just learned 100 ways not to invent a light bulb. It’s always through the failures that greatness comes about even in Social Media, so long as we remember what does not work. So what did I learn in my FB Page switch failure?

Don’t beg, it’s unbecoming

My content may have not been interesting enough in my audience’s opinion to warrant a continued follow

My personal friends and family (while nice to have fan numbers) probably were not my target audience to begin with

I have to rethink a different strategy, execute and be patient

I can manage the failure, keep trying, and know regardless I refuse to leave the game

As you go through your day inundated with images, documents, co-workers, media sites that offer the illusion of perfection, please don’t forget: This just in: Nobody knows what the hell they’re doing!

image by Iwan Wolkow

Social Media is all about connection. What happens if you keep engaging your audience but all you hear are crickets in return? Does this mean they don’t like you. Unlikely. They would not be following you if they did not like you. What should you do to get them to engage? Here’s the worst and most honest answer you may hear…be patient and wait.

Your audience, like yourself, is inundated with communication via different channels throughout the day. Do you respond to everything that requests an opinion from you? Do you even respond at all? If your answer is “Yes, all the time.” Then you’re rare. If your answer is, “Yes, I respond but very rarely if at all,” you’re more like the majority of the population. You read the material. It does not escape your notice. In fact, you like what you’re reading. You just don’t respond.  What makes you any different from your audience? Nothing.

So how do you get someone like you, to respond to what is being said on your Social Media sites, besides just wait & be patient. You should:

1) Keep posting good content on a very regular basis,

2) Keep asking questions & soliciting opinions on all your on-line media sites (some topic will eventually spurn someone’s interest enough to respond back to you),

3) Keep asking questions & soliciting opinions in your traditional marketing efforts too, and

4) Don’t get discouraged.

If you think about it, newspapers have been going through this for decades. How many letters to the editor do you believe a newspaper gets when it first starts, or has a circulation like the New York Times. It’s a minute fraction of their overall subscription base & general readership. Trust me, you’re not the only one who has to keep creating content & just wait.

2010 © Danielle Shelton and FindMe&FollowMe

image by Seth1492

As I stated in the last post, Social Media should be more Zen. This begs the question as to how can it be more Zen when you’re managing many different Social Media sites? Hootsuite is the answer. There are many great functions to Hootsuite that we can explore later on, but the best function is its organizational capability. I personally manage 3 blogs, 1 twitter account, 1 Linkedin profile & 2 Facebook pages (when I’m not managing any other businesses’ social media endeavors). I’m exhausted just typing it! But Hootsuite allows me to post on all of my social media accounts. All you do is register & connect your social media accounts to Hootsuite (it sounds complicated, but this is very simple). Than you can click the particular social media icon you want to post an update to…& tada…, you’re done. Hootsuite has many other great organizational features: such as Url tracking to see what kind of influence you’re having over your audience; a way to follow hashtag streams in twitter; & of course, see all the posts from the people you follow in Twitter & Linkedin. There is much more. However, until we explore the other sides of Hootsuite, just know there is an organizational tool that can make your Social Media a bit easier. While this may sound like a commercial (I hope not!), Hootsuite has not provided me anything to warrant their praises…nor has anyone else for that matter. I suppose they’d have to know about me first, no?

image by H. Kopp-Delaney

We live in an obsessive culture. We obsess about what we do, want we own, whether we are successful enough, whether we have enough money, or whether we are giving it our all. Engaging in Social Media is no different. We obsess about the number of followers, whether we’re doing it correctly, if we’ll make money doing it, or what our Return of Influence/Investment is. ENOUGH! Social Media should be fun, as should life. Here is how to put the fun & success back into your Social Media (oh yah & your life)…

1) Stop worrying about the numbers (the followers, ROI, comments, replies, fans, people you should follow, the people who should like you, the people you should get to know). Leave numbers to mathematicians.

2) Stop worrying whether you’re doing it right. According to who? The world?Doing what people believe you should do is highly overrated (I know this from personal experience). Start doing what you want to do, how you want to do it.

3) Be yourself. Your Social Media should reflect you, not who people think you should be. If you don’t know who you are than figure that out first.

4) Realize that no one knows what they’re doing. Stop assuming they do, & stop asking for direction from people who don’t know what they’re doing.

5) Be creative. Creativity garners more internal happiness & external recognition than imitations.

6) Believe. Believe what you envision will come to pass (in the negative & the positive).

The followers will come, it will be done correctly for you, the money will appear & your influence will be great, once you stop trying & obsessing.

the author's style blog: Living Copenhagen

Do you know what Wibiya is yet? Wibiya is a social networking tool bar (see Wibiya bar at the bottom of the screen image). It can be placed on your websites and blogs (with the exception of a WordPress hosted blog) to allow your visitors easy access to share your blog content on various social networks & much more. There are applications for translation of your web page to different languages, social chats, blog search functions, RSS feed and many more. The nice think about Wibiya is you choose  what goes on the tool bar. What’s even better is that it’s a free plugin. As a social media tool it’s worth having because:

Wibiya provides an extremely easy way for your viewers from all over the world to read, connect with you & share your web content all on one tool bar, &

It also provides tracking metrics such as who is visiting your site & how often, and where your information is being shared.

The easier you make connection for your web viewers the better. The more information you have about your visitors, the better. Why not use a customized tool that lets you do that for free?