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</description><title>SEO Consulting Services by Downright Media</title><generator>Tumblr (3.0; @downrightmedia)</generator><link>http://downrightmedia.com/</link><item><title>I just released a new iPhone app called Cheazza, which highlights NYC's best cheap pizza. The app is hyper-local to New York City, free and created in my spare time with my partner and co-creator. I work in digital media, and have been marketing the app throughs social media. Do you  have any other recommendations for low-cost (or free) marketing at a local level? Thanks!</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;br/&gt;The first thing that I would do actively find people who are looking for pizza.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Go to &lt;strong&gt;search.twitter.com. &lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;Do an advance Twitter search.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Search for people in NYC who are talking about pizza.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Follow and engage&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;This handles your local online audience.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Another thing that you can do is print up flyers and place them around high traffic pizzerias e.g. Tony’s on MacDougal St, next to NYU.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;If you personalize the flyer with the actual location name, the business will be much more friendly to you posting a flyer.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;On this flyer make sure to have:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;A QR code to download your app&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Use the &lt;strong&gt;Marketing strategy of AIDA&lt;/strong&gt;, to write your flyer&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Try to do a pizza giveaway&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;Use this giveaway to write blog posts, the blog posts will attract people who are traveling to New York and are researching pizza spots on the internet.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I suggest just blogging once a week, and every so often making a post about your pizza winner.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Make sure to take photos.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;P.S&lt;/strong&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Create a Pinterest board around NYC pizza.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;You’ll be able to add links directly to your app/blog. Also, Pinterest is very food friendly.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Just looking at the popular pins, you’ll notice tons of different food items.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;P.P.S.&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Be sure to collect email addresses on your blog, use mailchimp for your newsletters, they have a &lt;strong&gt;FREE&lt;/strong&gt; service.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Email marketing is essential.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Best of luck!&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Wilson Davalos&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://downrightmedia.com/post/21438815364</link><guid>http://downrightmedia.com/post/21438815364</guid><pubDate>Fri, 20 Apr 2012 12:04:57 -0400</pubDate></item><item><title>The Perks of Digital Advertising and the Battle of the Social Networks</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;img align="right" src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m19nznFCRv1qav5fs.jpg"/&gt;Technological innovations and strides have granted anybody and everybody the ability to access any piece of information in the blink of an eye.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The world has revolved around this concept, and society has changed completely over the course of the last decade because of it.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Consumers are not only more intuitive but expect nothing less than knowing everything surrounding the product that they are about to consume.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Producers recognize this and deliver by utilizing the newest technologies to their fullest extents.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;As a result, advertising has to be more intuitive and effective as well.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Utilizing the boundless capabilities of the Digital World as its consumers do and keeping up with this technology is the only way that the advertising/marketing industry will thrive and survive.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;According to Time: Techland&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Online adveritsing has generated a total of $26 billion in 2010, a 15% raise in revenue from 2009 (1).&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;This is a remarkable statistic for an aspiring digital marketer/advertiser like myself, but even more of a remarkable statistic for those who have or will invest anything into the Digital World.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;An important question to address in this scenario is why, and how did this become? &lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;As stated in the article, &lt;strong&gt;IAB Chief Executive Randall Rothenberg&lt;/strong&gt; said that &lt;em&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&amp;#8220;helping to boost online sales is most likely the growing amount of time people are spending on heavily trafficked sites such as Facebook, Twitter and Netflix.&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Thus, digital ads and marketing are one of the most effective tools that businesses can have to draw and keep customers.&amp;#8221;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;This is true, as placing digital advertisements in these social environments are proving to be more and more effective each and every day because of society’s new expectations.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;As mentioned before, the society of the Information Age now demands that all information can be received at the most rapid of paces.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Those who provide this information in the fastest, most innovative and most creative ways will triumph.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;However, those who effectively allocate all of this information into one source where others can share it will triumph over all.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The ability for information to spread itself is key and is why social networks are so lucrative.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;That is exactly what Facebook and Twitter have done in the age of information, and why they dominate.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;So Who Does it Better?&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The answer is not too obvious, and certainly was not obvious to me at all.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;However, after careful deliberation,  this writer believes that Twitter has done it better since its inception, and will always be dominate is this field over Facebook. &lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;The reason that this is so is because of how each website’s life force is structured and designed to function.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Sean Parker could not have explained it any better via this quote from The Social Network. &lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;“We lived on farms, then we lived in cities, and now we’re going to live on the internet!”&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strong&gt; (2)&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;This quote, speaking about the effect of Facebook, is incredibly valid.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Facebook is not only a social experience but has expanded into a way of life. We live and breathe through our Facebooks, as people’s interpretations of our social profiles are congruent to their interpretations of our selves outside of the computer.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Digital Advertising cannot be as effective on Facebook as it is on Twitter because advertising on Facebook would be a direct interference into our online lives.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;This is exactly why users do not see posts of advertisers newest products on their own Facebook News Feeds.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;This scenario of post bombardment would be exactly the same as a representative from the Gap walking right to us in the middle of the sidewalk telling us about their newest deals four different times.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;While the information may benefit us, hearing it more than once turns into annoyance, interferes with where we are going, and is thus not welcome.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Is Facebook Advertising Effective?&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;It very much &lt;strong&gt;IS&lt;/strong&gt; effective for digital advertising.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;It is one of the more effective strategies and the more efficient ways of reaching a large audience with minimal cost and effort.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;However, what I explained before serves as the principle difference between Facebook and Twitter.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;In the Facebook world, those who seek information can access it by searching within Facebook’s database to find it.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;In the Twitter world, information is directly delivered to the consumer, by choice of the consumer.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The true distinction is that the Twitter user always purposefully seeks this information, as opposed to the Facebook user.&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;With Twitter, any user can follow a corporation or business, who can post specials at their own disclosure. These corporations are encouraged to post as many times as possible, and those who are hungry are one click away to all of the content in one place.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Twitter is the greatest form of window shopping of the internet has ever created&lt;/strong&gt; and has to offer. It is also the embodiment of the success of simple ideas expanding beyond the wildest realms.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Social Networking: Not The Only Reason for Digital Advertising Success&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The entire scope of digital advertising is one of the main reasons it is so lucrative.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;New concepts of integration for advertising have been implemented, and are effectively drawing users into the content.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The advertising experience is more than just the advertisements now.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;For instance, a digital ad for a movie no longer encompasses a poster, but a trailer, a link to the Facebook, Twitter and Youtube profiles for the movie, a behind the scenes look at the movie, and a direct link to the movie’s website with even more features.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;You could even customize characters and share them on your Facebook or Twitters, or spread the word of the coolest advertising experiences you ever had by encouraging users to spread this information.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;If you were to watch an advertisement on television, you could not access this information all at once. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Digital advertising itself is an incredibly interesting field to work in and experience.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Newer &lt;strong&gt;&amp;#8220;Rich Media&amp;#8221;&lt;/strong&gt; technologies are providing more intuitive ways to advertise.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;For instance, be on the lookout for strides in Location Based Service Advertising and Integrative Advertising within Video Games to be the next biggest thing.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;For now, if there was anything to take from this piece, it is that Digital Advertising/Marketing is evolving, and has massive potential for success.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Stay ahead of the game and you will dominate the game.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;div&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;Sources:&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div&gt;
&lt;p&gt;(1) &lt;a href="http://techland.time.com/2011/05/27/online-ad-spending-sets-new-record-in-first-quarter/" target="_blank"&gt;Online Ad Spending Sets New Record in First Quarter&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div&gt;
&lt;p&gt;(2)  &lt;a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1285016/quotes" target="_blank"&gt;The Social Network (2010)&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Matthew Ian Preven&lt;/strong&gt; is a current Penn State University student and Digital and Social Media Marketing/Advertising Enthusiast. &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;He has worked on multiple campaigns and marketing packages in his time at Comedy Central under MTV Networks/Viacom. &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;To connect with him, please feel free to visit &lt;/span&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.about.me/mpreven" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.about.me/mpreven" target="_blank"&gt;www.about.me/mpreven&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;What&amp;#8217;s your opinion? Let&amp;#8217;s continue the dialogue below, in the comments section.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;</description><link>http://downrightmedia.com/post/19717652520</link><guid>http://downrightmedia.com/post/19717652520</guid><pubDate>Wed, 21 Mar 2012 23:43:00 -0400</pubDate><category>Advertising</category><category>Digital Media</category><category>Social Networking</category><category>Twitter</category><category>Facebook</category><category>submission</category></item><item><title>Small Business and B2B Inbound Online Marketing</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;img align="right" src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m0oy0wtMsR1qav5fs.jpg"/&gt;It is becoming increasingly obvious in the B2B arena that &lt;strong&gt;inbound marketing&lt;/strong&gt; works well for businesses, even the smaller ones. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;A recent study released by the &lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Hinge Research Institute&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strong&gt; revealed a remarkable correlation between profitability and online lead generation among professional services firms. The study concluded:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;#8220;&lt;em&gt;Firms generating 60% or more of their leads online are 2X more profitable than those generating less than 20% of their leads online.&amp;#8221;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="http://goo.gl/iLmDv" target="_blank"&gt;You can read the blog for more information&lt;/a&gt; &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;You may be wondering how inbound online marketing can work for your small B2B business.  Here are 3 possible ways:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Inbound Marketing Works By Targeting Those Who Are Seeking Your Services&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Outbound marketing involves directly contacting potential clients to tell them about you and your solutions.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;To use a fishing analogy, your company is expected to cast a wide enough net in order to capture at least a few interested members from a huge audience. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Conversely, inbound strategies let potential clients who are specifically interested in your offerings find and come to you. This concentration on being found by interested parties rather than going after them is certainly an efficient and effective use of the fewer resources available in a smaller business.  &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;This efficiency can also be appreciated for B2B companies with limited marketing budgets and multiple time constraints.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Inbound Marketing Fits Small Business Budgets&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;When you are looking for services where do you go first?  I know I personally rely on the internet and specific search engines to find everything these days. I believe almost anyone can create an effective Boolean search on the internet that will allow them to locate what they need within a few seconds. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Small businesses, even those with a focus on &lt;strong&gt;B2B marketing&lt;/strong&gt;, should be using inbound marketing tools like &lt;em&gt;social media&lt;/em&gt;, &lt;em&gt;SEO&lt;/em&gt;, and &lt;em&gt;internet advertising&lt;/em&gt;, to help them be easily found via search engines. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Many of these tools are free (or inexpensive), efficient, and very user-friendly. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Even the smallest of B2B business will find that inbound strategies are affordable and viable, especially with their high levels of efficiency and effectiveness.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Inbound Marke&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;strong&gt;ting Maximizes Integral Exposure&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;div&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Inbound strategies provide an additional and beneficial component as a cost-effective advertising tool for small businesses with a B2B focus. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;This is done by borrowing the credibility and genuine interest of your leads, both actual and potential. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;When interested parties have located your company via &lt;strong&gt;SEO&lt;/strong&gt; and social media, they are more likely to share your information with their friends and followers. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Then those friends and followers will share with their friends and followers &amp;#8212; and so on and so on.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Many of these B2B companies have their own online followings through their websites, &lt;em&gt;Facebook&lt;/em&gt;, &lt;em&gt;Twitter&lt;/em&gt;, &lt;em&gt;LinkedIn&lt;/em&gt; or &lt;em&gt;blogs&lt;/em&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Their names and/or reputations may even be more recognizable than your own. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;This association will be beneficial for all parties who are involved.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Summary&lt;/strong&gt; &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Your small business would be able to connect with many more potential leads in cost-effective ways and at a fraction of the cost of direct marketing campaigns. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;One of the best parts is that the leads have found you and are specifically interested in what you have to offer. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;No cold-calling or hard-selling&amp;#8230; What’s not to like about that?&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Any thoughts, or comments? Let us know how you feel in the comments section.&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;</description><link>http://downrightmedia.com/post/19082691809</link><guid>http://downrightmedia.com/post/19082691809</guid><pubDate>Sat, 10 Mar 2012 17:55:31 -0500</pubDate><category>B2B Inbound Online Marketing</category><category>Small Business</category><category>submission</category></item><item><title>Local SEO... What's That About?</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;img align="right" src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lt3geabrel1qav5fs.jpg"/&gt;If you have a brick and mortar business, then without a second thought&amp;#8230; you need to focus on your local SEO marketing.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Especially if you depend on walk-in traffic.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;You&amp;#8217;ve probably heard the term SEO. It stands for Search Engine Marketing.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Basically it&amp;#8217;s a strategy to make the search engines aware of your website&amp;#8230; specifically using the keywords that best describe your business and website.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;But it&amp;#8217;s so much more than that&amp;#8230; and it can get very difficult. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Let&amp;#8217;s say that you are a Dentist in Midtown Manhattan.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;It would be silly for a person who is looking for a Dentist in California to visit your website.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;This is where local SEO comes in&amp;#8230; you would want to tell the search engines that you are a dentist in Midtown Manhattan.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Local SEO&amp;#8230; Why&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;You&amp;#8217;ll want to focus on optimizing your local SEO for many reasons. In fact if you only service customers locally, you should only need to focus on you local SEO efforts. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The number one reason being&amp;#8230; you are not wasting your efforts targeting unqualified leads. Also your competition is drastically reduced, because you are not competing against the global keyword &amp;#8220;dentist&amp;#8221;. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;In fact, even in a crowded place like Midtown Manhattan your competition is very low. Most small business owners don&amp;#8217;t understand what local SEO is&amp;#8230; and they wouldn&amp;#8217;t hire a large ad agency to consult them.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Also most small business owners are getting advice from their local &amp;#8220;Computer Tech Service Provider&amp;#8221;, &amp;#8220;IT Guy” or their so-called &amp;#8220;computer whiz&amp;#8221; teenage nephew. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Hardly the experts that I would want to trust&amp;#8230; despite their good intentions.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;How Local SEO Works For You&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;People more often then not are researching online before they buy, as a local business if you can control the handful of local keywords you&amp;#8217;ll be positioning yourself for success.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;So what are these local keywords? Well, &amp;#8220;Midtown Dentist&amp;#8221; is one, so is &amp;#8220;Midtown Cosmetic Teeth Surgery&amp;#8221;. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;In essence it&amp;#8217;s a keyword that describes your services, with your location. But not all of these local keywords would be effective. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;You&amp;#8217;ll need to research what keywords are worth the effort. Some of the Local SEO keywords have almost no competition, however they get thousands of searches per month. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Imagine how much your business would grow if you received a few thousand extra qualified leads per month.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Think about this… customers are researching online more and more, and it’s only going to increase. So take advantage of the little local SEO competition that you have today. Most of the local SEO traffic is going to the large directories&amp;#8230; customers are much more likely to trust you vs a faceless list.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Customers already know that the people at the top of these directory listings, are the business that paid the most&amp;#8230; it&amp;#8217;s an easy win for you.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;How did you like this post?&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;If you liked it… feel free to share it via Facebook or Twitter and especially with your friends who own small local business. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Are you looking for a &lt;a href="http://downrightmedia.com/local-seo" target="_blank"&gt;Local SEO Consultant&lt;/a&gt; or Agency&amp;#8230; Talk to us.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://downrightmedia.com/post/11469292569</link><guid>http://downrightmedia.com/post/11469292569</guid><pubDate>Sat, 15 Oct 2011 02:25:00 -0400</pubDate><category>local seo</category><category>local seo services</category><category>local seo expert</category><category>local seo consultant</category></item><item><title>Guerilla Online Reputation Management: Low Budget, No Budget, No Clue?  No Problem</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_loysg9D7Z21qav5fs.png"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Guest Post by  Jill Rowen&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;Everyone who has ever been to high school, or had a friend enter into sorority/fraternity life in college, knows the importance of a reputation. Reputations could make or break your social life; Remember that time at that party when Doug dressed up as a monkey, shoved Richard, fought Mike and then up chucked in the living room?  You never knew Doug, that is, until yesterday. However, you have known of Doug for several years since the incident at that party. How are you reacting to meeting him, are you able to overlook what you know about his potential alcoholism and emotional instability? Are you willing to let your friends, family and colleagues know you associate with Doug? Are you able to believe that he has changed over the last few years?&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Online Reputation&lt;/strong&gt; is everything as we grow older and enter into business. The internet acts as a bathroom wall where anything and everything can be written about you, whether true or not, and erasing (managing) your negative feedback is even harder than taking a sharpie and scribbling over the words, hoping not that many people had read it yet.  How do we manage our &lt;strong&gt;Online Reputation&lt;/strong&gt;?&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;You Are Your Brand&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;For starters, NO ONE, knows YOU or YOUR PRODUCT better than YOU do. Tell people what you do.  Tell people how great YOU are. Set the stage for everyone to know exactly who you are before someone else can define you.  &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Whoever Strikes First Wins&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;Make sure when someone wants to post disparagingly about you there will be a debate about the post and posters validity. Whoever strikes first wins – and like Charlie Sheen, make sure to wake up winning.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Your Online Reputation Needs Some Work&amp;#8230; Now What?&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;On the off chance you have managed to anger someone out in the world and they decided to bring down your &lt;strong&gt;reputation&lt;/strong&gt;&amp;#8230; online. There are few steps that you can take.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;Contact the person directly and see if you can smooth this situation over and possibly have them remove or revise their post.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;You can always post a reply apology which may smooth things over with a third party viewer, but make sure to not admit fault or guilt. &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;This tactic is only for extreme situations&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt; and only meant to make the poster of the bad press look emotionally unstable so no one values their opinion.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;If this doesn’t work, recruit your friends to write good things about you/your company/your services so the one bad review seems like an anomaly.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Make sure to not do this all at once so it’s an obvious tactic to dilute your bad press.  Ask one or two friends per week to post good posts about you for a month or so, or ask all of your friends at once but do two to three friends per website.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Blog for and about other people/companies. Make friends on the internet who will link to you and say great things about you.  Start by blogging about how great someone else is, then send them a link to your post.  You will surely get some link love if not a corresponding blog back.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Comment on other blogs related to you/your interests/your company or industry.  This will not only make you an expert in your field (and who cares if an expert is criticized, it happens all the time) but it will allow people to form their own opinions of you meaning the bad press will not phase your public as much, if at all.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Use your social media to build a fan base around you to protect you against Internet attacks. Even if every review you had was bad, potential clients have to ask what it is you are doing so right that everyone still loves you.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Having a Facebook page with many likes or a twitter account with 1,000 followers doesn’t mean anything if you’re not active in your community. Post topically, post frequently, and when in doubt, just repost other people’s stuff – they’ll love it.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Reposting is a must and is the ultimate online hype man move. It adds immediate credibility to the original post; everyone who has a hype man is going to return the favor if for no other reason than to ensure that hype mans value for their ultimate, continuing gain.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;If your online persona/professional persona is nothing like the way you behave at home, make your personal social media extremely private.  If you don’t know someone personally, don’t friend them on Facebook, and keep your tweets locked.  If you know them professionally and want to have an online relationship, that’s what LinkedIn is for.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Remember&lt;/strong&gt;:&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;Always take the high road. Try not to engage in negativity.  If you feel there is no other way to do this, you have one of two options: ask someone else to be negative for you, or commit fully to your new, jerky persona. At least with a jerky persona, people will know you for something rather than nothing, and know what to expect. I highly recommend only using this tactic if your product is in fact, the best, or just that hard to find.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Jill Rowen&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;Sales and Marketing Coordinator&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;Apple Visual Graphics &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;718.361.2000 (phone) &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;718.433.4587 (fax)&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;jill@applevisualgraphics.com&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.applevisualgraphics.com/" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.applevisualgraphics.com" target="_blank"&gt;www.applevisualgraphics.com&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://downrightmedia.com/post/8105154555</link><guid>http://downrightmedia.com/post/8105154555</guid><pubDate>Tue, 26 Jul 2011 19:42:00 -0400</pubDate><category>online reputation</category><category>reputation management online</category><category>submission</category></item><item><title>Reputation Management, Online</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lor2973NM21qav5fs.png"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Online Reputation Management&lt;/strong&gt; is a topic of growing concern for businesses of all sizes. One of the good things is that you can automate some of this process. The bare minimum that a company should be doing is setting up &lt;strong&gt;Google Alerts&lt;/strong&gt;, and maybe setting up services like &lt;strong&gt;TagBulb&lt;/strong&gt; &amp;amp; &lt;strong&gt;BlogPulse&lt;/strong&gt;. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;But what can you do after that? So we sourced the advice to two Titans. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Ann Smarty&lt;/strong&gt; &amp;amp; &lt;strong&gt;Barry Schwartz&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Ann Smarty is:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;span class="org summary"&gt;The founder of &lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.seosmarty.com/"&gt;SeoSmarty&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt; and &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;span class="org summary"&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://myblogguest.com/"&gt;MyBlogGuest&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt; and is an Editor and Blogger at &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.searchenginejournal.com/"&gt;Search Engine Journal&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Ann says that:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span id="internal-source-marker_0.43542104167863727"&gt;The first thing that a business should do is to embrace and understand &lt;strong&gt;Social Media Search&lt;/strong&gt;.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;Filter out Clutter and Find Real Brand-Related Discussions:&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;Filter out links in Twitter search with [-filter:links] operator&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;Play with emotional coloring (using the smile emoticons) as well as search for tweeted questions&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;span&gt;Use | operator in &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;Facebook&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt; to find more relevant conversations&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;Ann expands on the topic on a post that she wrote on Mashable, &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://mashable.com/2011/03/25/advanced-social-media-search/"&gt;Advanced Social Media Search&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;br/&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;span&gt;Ann also shares a few more advanced tips on using various tools to monitor your brand online:&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.searchenginejournal.com/7-awesome-ideas-to-use-gmail-filters-for-seo-tasks/17220/"&gt;7 Awesome Ideas to use Gmail Filters for SEO Tasks&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt; (see tip 2)&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.searchenginejournal.com/5-free-tools-for-monitoring-brand-mentions-on-facebook/25614/"&gt;5 Free tools for monitoring brand mentions on Facebook&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.searchenginejournal.com/steal-this-idea-display-your-brand-name-mentions-in-your-blog-sidebar/23202/"&gt;Steal This Idea: Display Your Brand Name Mentions in your Blog Sidebar&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;You can follow Ann Smarty on:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.seosmarty.com/"&gt;SEOSmarty&lt;/a&gt; and be sure to follow her on Twitter &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://twitter.com/seosmarty"&gt;@SEOSmarty&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Barry Schwartz is:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;CEO at &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.rustybrick.com/"&gt;RustyBrick&lt;/a&gt;, Executive Editor of &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.seroundtable.com/"&gt;Search Engine Roundtable&lt;/a&gt; and News Editor at &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://searchengineland.com/"&gt;Search Engine Land&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;br/&gt;Barry says that:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&amp;#8220;Google Alerts&lt;/strong&gt; are the bare minimum a brand (company, product, personal name) should be using to track what blogs, writers and their customers are saying about them.  Google Alerts works very well, I personally like the RSS subscription option, but they all work well.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Aside from your own rep management, track your partners, to see where they stand financially or competitively.  I once wrote about &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.cartoonbarry.com/2008/09/track_your_banks_reputation_on.html"&gt;tracking my bank&lt;/a&gt;, during the time of the banks were having issues because of mortgages.  I rather be early to read if a partner is having issues or their CEO gets booted than finding out from that partner directly.&amp;#8221;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;You can follow Barry on &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.rustybrick.com/"&gt;RustyBrick&lt;/a&gt; and on Twitter at &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://twitter.com/#!/rustybrick"&gt;@RustyBrick&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;It&amp;#8217;s all very clear&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;If you are not monitoring your reputation online&amp;#8230; then you need to do so. As I said earlier, most of this will be automated for you. It just takes a moment to set things up. Feel free to share your thoughts and comments with us on this topic of &lt;strong&gt;Online Reputation Management&lt;/strong&gt;.   &lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://downrightmedia.com/post/7937860483</link><guid>http://downrightmedia.com/post/7937860483</guid><pubDate>Fri, 22 Jul 2011 15:33:42 -0400</pubDate><category>Reputation Management Online</category></item><item><title>Hello My name is William Perez. I was wondering what made you reblog my  picture? Im trying to get into the Advertising industry and I was wondering if you could help me get a head start into the advertising industry,</title><description>&lt;p&gt;William…&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Thanks for the question. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;- That photo had a strong message… It was a great Ad.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;- Checkout the &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://adage.com/power150/"&gt;Power 150&lt;/a&gt;, and add some of these sites to your daily read. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;- Join LinkedIn and use it daily… join groups and engage with others&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;- The easiest way to get a job in the Online, Marketing World is in sales. It’s also the best way to become a known name in your industry as you move into Business Development. From that you can move into just about any position.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;- Join a local Toast Master Club, this will teach you how to speak to a group and to present your ideas clearly.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;- Take an active role in face to face networking&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I hope that this helps.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://downrightmedia.com/post/7275806333</link><guid>http://downrightmedia.com/post/7275806333</guid><pubDate>Tue, 05 Jul 2011 17:04:48 -0400</pubDate></item><item><title>What a strong message

elitefreshness:

Good Campaign, Good...</title><description>&lt;img src="http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lnqdo54y6Z1qlvob7o1_500.jpg"/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;What a strong message&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="http://elitefreshness.tumblr.com/post/7172852476" target="_blank"&gt;elitefreshness&lt;/a&gt;:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Good Campaign, Good Cause. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;</description><link>http://downrightmedia.com/post/7219005740</link><guid>http://downrightmedia.com/post/7219005740</guid><pubDate>Mon, 04 Jul 2011 01:31:16 -0400</pubDate><category>Advertising</category></item><item><title>The Keys to Building Influencer Status on Twitter  </title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lnf4guaOHt1qav5fs.jpg"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;We at &lt;strong&gt;Downright Media&lt;/strong&gt; love Social Media. As a business owner, Twitter gives you the opportunity to interact with your industry and customers in a way that has never existed before in history. However, It can have a downside. Especially if you are the type of person that can get distracted easily. So we&amp;#8217;ve gone ahead and created this &lt;strong&gt;executable action plan&lt;/strong&gt; for you.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Get Clicky&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Go to &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://getclicky.com/"&gt;GetClicky.com&lt;/a&gt; and create an account for your site. Get Clicky will let you monitor and analyze your web traffic. You can also use &lt;strong&gt;Google Analytics&lt;/strong&gt; if you like. The important thing is have this website traffic data. Without it, you are wasting your time and effort. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Growing Your Twitter Following &lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Twitter&lt;/strong&gt; usage has been exploding over the last year years. In fact &lt;strong&gt;Google&lt;/strong&gt; and other search engines think so highly of Twitter that they have started to include &lt;strong&gt;realtime tweets into search results&lt;/strong&gt;. The problem is that Twitter can seem like a huge conversation about nothing. This is why most people don&amp;#8217;t understand nor get Twitter. They say things like &amp;#8220;Why do I care about what so and so had for lunch?&amp;#8221; and that&amp;#8217;s true. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The opportunity with Twitter is knowing how to read the &lt;strong&gt;signal from the noise&lt;/strong&gt;. Meaning, you should be able to find the conversations that matter to you. So if you love &lt;em&gt;Indie Rock Bands from Brooklyn&lt;/em&gt;, you should find that conversation, listen in or contribute to it. It&amp;#8217;s that simple. &lt;strong&gt;Twitter is brilliant finding real-time conversations on whatever matters to you.&lt;/strong&gt; &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Okay so let&amp;#8217;s move into growing your Twitter Following. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;Use the &amp;#8220;&lt;strong&gt;Advanced Search&lt;/strong&gt;&amp;#8221; on &lt;strong&gt;Search.Twitter.com&lt;/strong&gt; for Your Research&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Follow Influencers in Your Chosen Field&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Add friends ( find like minded people)&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Remove Friends ( 36 hours if they haven&amp;#8217;t friended you)&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Interact &amp;amp; Engage &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Rinse &amp;amp; Repeat&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;Follow all the influencers in your field. Start adding people that follow these &lt;strong&gt;Twitter influencers&lt;/strong&gt; and are like minded, remember Twitter has many automated account or &lt;strong&gt;Twitter Bots&lt;/strong&gt; that just ReTweet things and don&amp;#8217;t add anything to the conversation. Stay away from these guys, you only want real people.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Don&amp;#8217;t go crazy and add too many, Twitter will ban your account. Remove friends that haven&amp;#8217;t followed you back, give them about a 36 hour window. Again don&amp;#8217;t go crazy here, Twitter will ban you if you unfollow too fast. Interact and engage this new audience, you have to be genuine. Whatever topic you pick should be your passion, so this should be easy for you. Lastly Rinse &amp;amp; Repeat. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Following this game-plan will &lt;strong&gt;increase your Twitter following&lt;/strong&gt; and with time will make you an influencer. The best thing about become an influencer is that your &lt;strong&gt;Twitter following will start to grow organically&lt;/strong&gt;. People will start to follow you automatically, which makes you even more of an influencer in the eyes of others.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Now make sure that your &lt;strong&gt;Twitter page&lt;/strong&gt; leads to your site. You basically want your &lt;strong&gt;Twitter traffic&lt;/strong&gt; to &lt;strong&gt;generate leads&lt;/strong&gt; into your &lt;strong&gt;sales funnel&lt;/strong&gt;. It&amp;#8217;s okay if you don&amp;#8217;t have a product or service to sell. Just have the ability to send your &lt;strong&gt;Twitter followers&lt;/strong&gt; to something. It could be your blog, your resume or anything else that you want to promote and use to solidify your influencer status. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;By continually working on this &lt;strong&gt;action plan&lt;/strong&gt;, you will increase your Twitter friends, followers, fans, influencer status and your bottom-line. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Let us know what you think? Continue the conversation in our comments section.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://downrightmedia.com/post/6951602841</link><guid>http://downrightmedia.com/post/6951602841</guid><pubDate>Sun, 26 Jun 2011 18:15:00 -0400</pubDate><category>Growing Your Twitter Friends</category><category>Twitter</category><category>Twitter Influence</category><category>Growing Twitter Friends</category></item><item><title>jaymug:

Hard Rock Cafe Advertising - Rockin Fork
</title><description>&lt;img src="http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lluqcaYqSD1qiqf01o1_500.jpg"/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.jaymug.com/post/6488314741" target="_blank"&gt;jaymug&lt;/a&gt;:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Hard Rock Cafe Advertising - Rockin Fork&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;</description><link>http://downrightmedia.com/post/6740845695</link><guid>http://downrightmedia.com/post/6740845695</guid><pubDate>Mon, 20 Jun 2011 21:06:06 -0400</pubDate><category>Advertising</category><category>Ads</category><category>Design</category></item><item><title>How Small Businesses Can Compete Against National Brands Using Google Maps</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_ln3u8k8ZcA1qav5fs.jpg"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Most people think that &lt;strong&gt;Google Maps&lt;/strong&gt; is just for finding directions. Today smart &lt;strong&gt;local business owners&lt;/strong&gt; worldwide are using Google Maps as part of their &lt;strong&gt;internet marketing campaign&lt;/strong&gt;. Google Maps has the ability to increase sales. Every &lt;strong&gt;business&lt;/strong&gt; should take advantage of this powerful &lt;strong&gt;business generating tool&lt;/strong&gt;. There is no reason for you to be left behind. It is free, it is easy, and it literally puts you on the map against your competitors. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;When someone on the internet searches for a term that is relevant to your business. You want your company name to come up within the search results. Preferably as one of the first results. A business can &lt;strong&gt;optimize&lt;/strong&gt; certain things to increase the likelihood of being among these first top results.  This is called &lt;strong&gt;Search Engine Optimization&lt;/strong&gt;. Typically it can be very costly and time consuming, but with large rewards. Right now, Search Engine Optimization (&lt;strong&gt;SEO&lt;/strong&gt;) can be applied to Google Maps. For example, if you type the word &amp;#8216;Plumber&amp;#8217; followed by your local area in &lt;strong&gt;Google&lt;/strong&gt;. You will see that Google Maps will display a lists of plumbing companies in that specific area. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;You can do some very simple things to attract more business from this Google Maps listing.  This is huge, it levels the playing field for the &lt;strong&gt;small business&lt;/strong&gt;. The obvious benefit here is that it gives the small local business a fighting chance against bigger national companies that also service your local area. If you are a &lt;strong&gt;small company&lt;/strong&gt;, you may not have the budget to optimized your website in order to &lt;strong&gt;rank higher in the Google search results&lt;/strong&gt;. However, with &lt;strong&gt;Google Maps SEO&lt;/strong&gt; you get to be on this precious piece of &lt;strong&gt;digital real estate&lt;/strong&gt; without having to come out with a huge budget. In fact your best strategy here is offering a &lt;strong&gt;discount to customers who review your business&lt;/strong&gt;. You’ll notice that most businesses don’t have any reviews. You can actually &lt;strong&gt;dominate your local market&lt;/strong&gt; by just filling out all your business information in Google Maps and having real customers review your service.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;As a small business who uses Google Maps, you are &lt;strong&gt;targeting local customers&lt;/strong&gt;. Believe it or not, most customers prefer supporting smaller local businesses. So if you have a handful of &lt;strong&gt;great reviews&lt;/strong&gt;, you should be able to easily compete with the &lt;strong&gt;larger national brands&lt;/strong&gt;. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;However, if you want to start to include Google Maps into your marketing campaign, it is best to &lt;strong&gt;consult an SEO specialist&lt;/strong&gt;. This would save you a lot of money and avoid having to go through &lt;strong&gt;trial and error&lt;/strong&gt; experience as they would set up everything for you seamlessly. If not, be sure to do proper study and research on effectively using Google Maps for your small local business.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://downrightmedia.com/post/6731726340</link><guid>http://downrightmedia.com/post/6731726340</guid><pubDate>Mon, 20 Jun 2011 16:01:42 -0400</pubDate><category>Google Maps SEO</category><category>SEO</category><category>Small business</category><category>Local Marketing</category></item><item><title>Why Social Marketing Benefits Your Small Business </title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;img src="http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_ln2k6aox5A1qav5fs.jpg"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;So we know that we have many &lt;strong&gt;social networks&lt;/strong&gt; that you can sign up your &lt;strong&gt;small business&lt;/strong&gt; for. This phenomenon of &lt;strong&gt;Social Marketing&lt;/strong&gt; is here to stay, and if used right you have a huge opportunity to really &lt;strong&gt;grow your business&lt;/strong&gt;. Let’s look at the two networks that everyone needs to use right now. The current heavy weight king of social networks is &lt;strong&gt;Facebook&lt;/strong&gt;. This is the biggest, that baddest, and most established website in the social scene. You can pretty much do everything that you need to do on Facebook to grow your business, without any cost to you.&lt;span class="s1"&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="p2"&gt;The key with Social Marketing is &lt;strong&gt;engagement&lt;/strong&gt;, and it’s no different with Facebook. If you want your fans to keep coming back to your fan page, you need to have an open line of communication with them. &lt;span class="s1"&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="p2"&gt;&lt;span class="s1"&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;You can easily do this by:&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Asking Questions&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Answer Questions&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Posting Photos, Videos&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Individually Thanking Your Fans&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Offering Facebook Only Specials&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;You also don’t want to &lt;strong&gt;overwhelm your fans&lt;/strong&gt;. If your Facebook fans don’t think that your status updates are useful, they can just as easily un-fan your page. So be sure to keep this in mind before blindly posting every few minutes. Ask yourself this question before updating your status, “&lt;strong&gt;Does this information benefit my customers?&lt;/strong&gt;” If it doesn’t, don’t post it.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="p2"&gt;The next big player in the &lt;strong&gt;social network landscape&lt;/strong&gt; that all small &lt;strong&gt;business owners&lt;/strong&gt; should use, is &lt;strong&gt;Twitter&lt;/strong&gt;. I really like Twitter for the small business. Mainly because they train you to be brief and concise. Since you only have 140 characters to use, you better use them wisely. This allows you to think like a &lt;strong&gt;Newspaper Editor&lt;/strong&gt;. Think about this for a moment. If you read news paper and magazine headlines, you pretty much have an idea of what the article is about. But if you need more information, or you find the headline interesting you’ll read the entire article.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="p2"&gt;You should use your Twitter status exactly like this. Give a short, very to the point headline, with a link back to a page on your site with all the information that they need to know. Twitter is &lt;strong&gt;very powerful&lt;/strong&gt; to the small business owner. You can search for people that have questions and problems in your field, and help them just by answering a question. How amazing is that? &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="p2"&gt;The &lt;strong&gt;benefits of social marketing&lt;/strong&gt; are many, however you shouldn’t see this activity as a task. You should see this as a genuine way to &lt;strong&gt;interactive with your audience&lt;/strong&gt;. As we all know, people like doing business with people that they like. &lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://downrightmedia.com/post/6711507301</link><guid>http://downrightmedia.com/post/6711507301</guid><pubDate>Sun, 19 Jun 2011 23:30:54 -0400</pubDate><category>Twitter</category><category>Facebook</category><category>Social Marketing</category><category>Social Networks</category><category>Small Business</category></item><item><title>What a great message from Amnesty...</title><description>&lt;img src="http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lmsgr9WeIQ1qiqf01o1_500.jpg"/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;What a great message from Amnesty International.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.jaymug.com/post/6524068343" target="_blank"&gt;jaymug&lt;/a&gt;:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Amnesty International: Fight with signatures -     Signatures can be as powerful as bullets.     Join Amnesty International in the fight against death penalty.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;</description><link>http://downrightmedia.com/post/6547619786</link><guid>http://downrightmedia.com/post/6547619786</guid><pubDate>Wed, 15 Jun 2011 02:26:53 -0400</pubDate><category>Advertising</category></item><item><title>oliphillips:

Skittles Advertising
</title><description>&lt;img src="http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lmqpzoGTd91qbg4qwo1_500.jpg"/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="http://blog.oliverphillips91.co.uk/post/6519886587" target="_blank"&gt;oliphillips&lt;/a&gt;:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Skittles Advertising&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;</description><link>http://downrightmedia.com/post/6547372432</link><guid>http://downrightmedia.com/post/6547372432</guid><pubDate>Wed, 15 Jun 2011 02:12:53 -0400</pubDate><category>Advertising</category></item></channel></rss>

