Get More from Search - Trends in Search & Social Media

In spite of global recessions and a rapidly growing middle class in China, our consumer nation is still the world’s largest advertising market for U.S. and international companies. Yet as advanced as we are, the U.S. is not the most connected.

In Ciarán Norris’ article, “A Letter to Facebook From the Rest of the World,” he notes that while the U.S. is often the test market for new technologies such as Facebook’s geolocation service, Places, there are other countries whose connectedness would make them ideal beta testing grounds.

For instance, Facebook is now the most popular media brand in the U.K. and Sweden has a 92% internet penetration rate compared with the U.S. at 77%. Indonesia is the fourth largest market for Facebook, yet only 12% of its population is online.

As stated in Morgan Stanley’s “Mobile Internet Report,” 96% 0f Japan’s residents will have 3G mobile access this year. It is estimated that there will be more users connected to the internet via mobile devices than desktop PCs within the next five years. China and India lead the world in terms of users, with over 600 million mobile subscribers in China over 300 million in India with major growth rates expected by 2014.

So while U.S. consumers purchase more than other nations and marketers will continue to test and launch products and services, it is not the only market that should be considered for product feedback. Other nations have higher mobile and internet penetrate rates and house highly active users with unique perspectives on the social media services rooted here in the U.S.

Tweet This  Post by Jennifer Gosse.

Any worker living through this recession knows that job security doesn’t exist anymore. We are in the era of “The Disposable Worker” as dubbed by BusinessWeek in its January 2010 cover story. The recession has hastened some negative employment trends including: offshoring, declining influence of labor unions, new management techniques, regulatory changes and automation. 5% of US jobs have been lost and many of those jobs may be perpetually gone even after the recession due to the competitive drive to stay offshore and automate. Worker grievances like little pay increases, degraded working conditions and minimal job security may last for 5-10 years.  Young people are particularly affected by these trends since many can’t land their first job or their first job out of college.

So how distinguish yourself in an increasingly hostile job economy and a burgeoning global workplace? Your  personal brand - an expression of your “best self”- needs to become visible in social media.

According to a recent survey by Harris Interactive, 45% of HR professionals utilize social networking sites to research prospective employment candidates and 11% plan to implement social media screening very soon. With 35% of companies finding social media content that has caused them to not hire candidates, what you post and where you post must be given careful consideration.  On the positive side, 18% of employers have uncovered positive content at social sites that have caused them to hire someone.

Thus, social media has an increasing impact on the world’s perception of your personal brand. We’ll define four steps that will help you distinguish yourself from the pack.

First, you need to define your best attributes. You need to find your niche. This can be a challenging first step for some who pride themselves on being a jack-of-all-trades. While this can be a positive attribute, it’s subjective and should not have your sole feature.  Being great at something is more apt to make you stand out than being mediocre at dozens of things.

During the define exercise, try to quiet the inner voices that compare your attributes to others or assert aspirations that never quite come to fruition. Think of this exercise like a “features and benefits” chart that many products and services use.  Examine what you really can do, the principles that you stand for and how these attributes can benefit the world via your workplace, personal relationships and outreach.

Next, you need to network: social media is where you’ll need to build the foundation of your brand. Think of your social network as an investment in your future. You will have to be creative to stand out – this is where expressing your best self and your niche comes into play. Besides your friends, family and coworkers network, branch out and engage with people you aspire to be like, work for, or receive mentorship from. Social media is free and easy to join but its benefits can be lost on those who don’t delve into the finer details.

For instance, if you’re on Twitter, aspire up with regard to who you follow. Follow your industry’s big shots as well as the lesser-known people that post valuable insights into career and life. Look at the “following” list of people you respect and follow those same people.

Then, engage: retweet, direct message and ask questions. The big shots won’t likely message you back, but you never know when they might notice your tweet in their stream because you’re commenting on a topic that happens to be on their radar. If nothing else, learn from those who have more experience than you, a more distinct niche or habits that you’d like to emulate.

Once you’ve established a social foundation, you need to maintain your personal brand. That means you’ll need to have a good attitude, no matter who’s pulling your strings or what personal issues are troubling you. Inter-company relationships are important. Make sure your employer understands who you are and what value you provide to the company. Just because the job environment is increasingly competitive doesn’t mean you should start alienating your fellow workers. Don’t be conniving but do let the boss occasionally see that your actions towards others demonstrate concern and teamwork.

Integrity and meaningful progress have always been desirable attributes for workers, families and friends. But more than ever with an ever-changing job economy, it’s important to be transparent and evolve.

If you stumble and cause a notable offense, miss a deadline or squander an opportunity, you can use your social media profile to note your mistake and enumerate your commitment to improvement. Like we’ve seen with many companies whose product or service misses the mark, you can either ignore the rants and let the social media firestorm ignite unabated (think Ryannair or Dell) or you can face the issue head-on, express plans for reparation and direct the outcome (think Domino’s Pizza Turnaround campaign).

And as your knowledge, experience and skills progress, make sure that your social media profile expresses the positive evolution of your brand. You don’t have to always be displaying some newfangled device or talent but do keep up with advancements in your industry and cultivate efficiencies in your personal life.

Once you’ve built your personal brand on social media, persevere. This isn’t a one-off campaign; this is a evolving expression of who you are throughout the course of your life.

Increasingly, we all use the internet, search and social media to check in with and check up on the people we encounter. If you haven’t done so already, now is the time to define, network, maintain and evolve your personal brand – your “best self” - via social networking.

For more a more detailed look at personal branding, download or buy Dan Schawbel’s popular book on the subject: Me 2.0.

Tweet This  Post by Jennifer Gosse.

Social media isn’t just for students anymore. Some schools are utilizing Facebook, Twitter and blogs to keep in touch with parents, community members and alumni. Since it is easier to reach these constituents where they are instead of getting them to visit the school websites, schools are realizing that the simplicity of social media status updates and opening up two-way communication are additional benefits that social media platforms provide.

In an interview for the Washington Post, Adrian Murphy, a teacher at Green Acres in Rockville, MD that is responsible for the school’s new blog stated: “If you can read a blog and can see pictures and watch video clips, all of a sudden you have some insight into what’s going on. You’ve been invited to the conversation, and you can participate on your time.”

Reading a blog about interesting goings-on with the students and school can take as little as a minute or two, but getting parents to visit the school for a parent-teacher conference is very time-consuming. The instant and always-on nature of social media enables better, more consistent communication while preserving the precious commodity of time.

“It’s what the kids and parents are at home with, and it’s really important to be able to meet them where they are,” says Marlene Nesary, a spokeswoman International Society for Technology in Education, an Eugene, OR based nonprofit group that supports the use of information technology in learning.

Tweet This  Post by Jennifer Gosse.

Is search still “local” when you’re seeking information about another city? Local search’s functionality is discussed passionately when we’re talking about locating the things we need just down the street, but what about when we want to share the experience of another city with someone? Local takes on a broader meaning but its intent is the same: bring the best of a local neighborhood to us, via a search and a few clicks.

This is what my mom did for me recently. I knew that my parents were visiting Portland for a conference and since I’ve never been to the indie-city, my coffee-connoisseurship begged for a taste of the local brew. So I asked my mom to pick up a local roast for me on their trip. Her schedule didn’t allow for it, but weeks later, with my birthday coming up, she arranged for a full-bodied sip of Portland delivered to my door.

Her Google search used a simple phrase, “coffee from Portland OR,” which yielded the usual mix of paid and natural results for national chains and local coffeehouses.

Sifting through the results, she avoided the corporate brands like Starbucks, until she landed upon the first authentic-sounding result: “Hawthorne Coffee” which claimed it was “Portland’s coffee store…since 1980.” Local enough, she thought, as she clicked through to the website. But good enough? The first paragraph at the website answered that question:

“We appreciate that you value the kind of product knowledge and customer service found only at a neighborhood owner-operated business. We offer a wide selection of freshly roasted specialty coffees and premium teas from all parts of the world. Our coffees are roasted to your order and shipped the same day…”

Obviously, this local roaster knows a thing or two about discerning customers – even those who want to ship out a fresh taste of Portland java.

And, because I only drink organic coffee, and love the darkest, most full-bodied roasts, the next question was also quickly answered. Their right column navigation nicely organized their variety of offerings. There it was: Organic Coffee. The organic page, yielding distinct titles followed by short descriptions written in simple yet connoisseur-satisfying terms, clinched the sale.

An unfortunate shipping mishap delayed the order. The freshness may have suffered slightly but it didn’t matter: the coffee rocked. It was the finest coffee we’ve had in a long time, or perhaps, ever, noted my husband.

Kudos to Hawthorne Coffee Merchant for optimizing their site with the right content, making their navigation simple and for stating their unique value proposition at the top of their home page. These right moves showcased their understanding of their target audience and the owner-operator pride that distinguishes them. Thus, Portland-based Hawthorne has been granted another loyal customer – even though Portland isn’t our home town.

My mother’s search sleuthing led her to the best and gave me a personal and distinct taste of Portland, delivered to my door.

Small businesses should take note - you have an advantage in this increasingly franchised society. You’re authentic. Promote it via your people - people who care - to connect with your local and non-local audiences where they are - in search engines and social media.

Local search can be local even when the business isn’t local to you.

Tweet This  Post by Jennifer Gosse.

Vortaloptics custom search engines include revenue components that empower its clients to maximize the return on investment from their engines. Since the engine is completely controllable by the client, they can improve the relevancy of the search results and also place key partners and affiliates into their engines.

Vortaloptics never recommends listing irrelevant content just to profit from clicks, but rather consults our clients to focus on the most relevant content that users are seeking and match advertising, affiliates and partners to the search results pages to those search phrases to build a better user experience.

Because the content on our client results pages is hyper-relevant to the search terms and those results pages provide contextual ad and partner content, the ROI from clickthroughs is typically much higher for our clients than from traditional ads placed on blogs, for instance.  Search results page ads typically outperform regular page advertisements anyway, but because our clients can control the content of their results pages the ROI is on average, 10 times greater.

Affiliate marketing—using one website to drive traffic to another—is a form of online marketing, which is frequently overlooked by advertisers. While search engines, e-mail, and website syndication capture much of the attention of online retailers, affiliate marketing carries a much lower profile. Still, affiliates continue to play a significant role in e-retailers’ marketing strategies.

With clients being able to hone in top performing ads, they can now focus on the search phrases and clickthroughs that pay the most. Optimizing your website revenue is particularly important in a tough economy. One way to do this is to seek out the top affiliate programs and add as organic search content and banner listings.

As an example, Speedy Cash is launching a new affiliate program with one of the highest commissions per lead in the financial payday loans industry. Vortaloptics’ local search clients could signup for the Speedy Cash affiliate program and insert banners, text links and search results into their search engine for this payday loans affiliate program. When users search for or click on the financial services subcategory, the Speedy Cash program can receive prominent placement.

Being able to maximize revenue efforts by focusing on the top paying affiliate, partner and advertising initiatives makes good business sense. A well placed $85/lead link is worth the effort over a $1/lead program. Vortaloptics provides the technology to help administrators quickly focus their efforts on the top ROI programs and provide better value to their users.

Tweet This  Post by David Gosse.

To tweet or not to tweet, that is the question. And the answer is, a resounding yes!

Twitter’s success is nothing short of incredible and its rise to a preeminent social network is secure, with 6 million users and 55 million monthly visitors. The micro-blogging service is outranked in popularity only by Facebook and MySpace.

By now, you’ve either heard of Twitter, use it, or are addicted to it. Being able to communicate to your audience in 140-character micro-blogs can open up new opportunities for your business.  Whether Twitter becomes ubiquitous is yet to be seen, but with an increasing number of brands registered and millions of people using their personal accounts to establish themselves and their companies as “experts,” Twitter should become part of your social media mix.

If you’re a user, you probably went through the strategic part of setting up an account: “What am I trying to accomplish here? What will I write about? Who do I want to follow me? Is this for fun or for business?”  This is an important part of the process and will impact Twitter’s payoff.

What can Twitter do for your business?

• Keep in touch with customers, vendors, partners, employees and consultants
• Establish partnerships
• Learn about competition
• Build your network
• Open up new opportunities to participate in confererences and events
• Drive traffic to your website or blog
• Establish you/your business as an expert in an industry
• Improve productivity
• Grant you instant alerts on the latest news, stats, tools

Whether you’re already tweeting or haven’t yet caught the twitterpated bug, here are a few tips to illustrate how to optimize Twitter’s social media benefits for your business.

1. Structure your posts to get retweeted. To do this, keep your tweets short (around 120 characters, which leaves room for the necessary “RT @username” verbiage) and be relevant (ask questions, share helpful epiphanies, promote useful news and events). This “twetiquette” account is a cute and useful service to remind us all of best practices in Twitter.
2. Engage your audience. You can direct questions or topics to individuals or to your following. Using Twitter platform services such as TweetDeck or Twhirl will organize your follower’s posts, your @ replies and your direct messages. Program in searches for keywords that when posted, will alert you when you’re more apt to have something relevant to say. Keywords might be your name, your company’s name/products/services, hot industry terms, hash tag topics (#hashtag), or topics and people you’re interested in learning more about.
3. Target who you follow. Basically, follow those you want to follow you (industry leaders, popular companies, potential customers and partners). Follow-backs aren’t standard, and some think that following everyone who follows you is good “twetiquette” but by doing this, you’ll dilute the impact of your targeted audience. However, by being relevant and engaging your audience, the prospects of your targets seeing your content and following you back is much improved. Twellow lets you search for Twitter users or search by category of user).

Oh, and if you find this useful, please take a moment and retweet it!

Tweet This  Post by Jennifer Gosse.