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Andy Wooles, LinkedIn

Great Twitter application from Manchester Airport

People are always looking for examples of how Twitter can be used effectively by businesses.

I came across a great customer service application from Manchester Airport when checking some arrival times yesterday.

If you follow ‘manairport’  on Twitter and send them a DM (direct message) containing your flight number, you receive live flight status updates via DM. When the status changes on the Departure/Arrival Boards, then you get that update as a Twitter DM.

And if your Twitter account is also configured to forward DMs as text messages to your mobile, you’ll get the latest updates as you are driving to the airport to catch a flight or pick someone up!

If you would like guidance on using Twitter for your business, WSI provides a range of consultancy and training services. Call us today on 01928 787026.

Is your website customer focused? Test it now!

While you are proud of your company and think its products and services are great, most customers only care about how well you can help them with their wants and needs.

Your website therefore needs to engage with them, and be focused upon their needs. And the words you use on your website will make all the difference.

Are you talking mostly about them and their needs or are you talking mostly about yourself?

I came across a great free tool which analyses the words on a web page and determines whether they are focused on the customer…….or you!

Give it a try at http://www.futurenowinc.com/wewe.htm . You may be surprised by the results.

For help and advice on refocusing the content and structure of your website to improve the results you receive, call (01928 787026) or contact WSI today.

Workshop - How to use Social Media in your business - Advance Notice

WSI Internet Marketing will be hosting a half day ‘Social Media’ workshop in Chester at the end of February.

It will take delegates through planning and implementing an effective Social Media strategy for their business.

The workshop will help entrepreneurs, business owners, sales and marketing managers.

In fact it will benefit anyone who would like to understand more about how using Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn  can positively influence their business success in 2010.

Venue logistics are currently being finalised. To ensure you receive an invitation to this training event, and subsequent events organised by WSI, please complete the contact form below.

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Yes you can monitor and measure Social Media Marketing

One of the often heard concerns about the use of social media by business is “How do I know its working?”.

A very valid concern as the traditional web analytics methods can only really measure activity on your own website.

However there are now a wide variety of new tools and services available to allow companies and their marketing consultants to monitor the social media and to measure the “buzz” surrounding a brand name, product and keyphrases.

Now, the effectiveness of social media campaigns can be tracked and measured.

Some tools are free, such as -

Google Alerts – emails updates of the latest relevant Google results (web, news, etc.) based on your choice of query or topic.

Social Mention – for one-off keyword searches,  it provides results from blogs, twitter (microblogs), video, comments, bookmarks, news, events etc.  and includes information such as Sentiment, Top Keywords, Top users and Sources. A lot of useful information at a glance.

However the bulk of the social media monitoring tools are chargeable based on access and usage. These offer much more sophisticated data collection and analysis across a wide variety of keywords, with comprehensive dashboard and reporting facilities.

If effective use of the social media is part of your marketing plans for 2010, we can advise you on the tools available and provide a regular social media monitoring and reporting service for your business. Call us today on 01928 787026

Using Social Media for Business – How to get started in 2010

Are you planning to implement a social media strategy for your business?

To help your company get started in 2010 with Social Media, WSI has created a Social Media Strategy Kit, that contains best practices, checklists, templates, tools and resources.

Using the Social Media Strategy Kit will enable you to:WSI Social Media Strategy Kit

  • Educate yourself and your staff on social media
  • Ensure social media policies and guidelines are established
  • Ensure your brand is protected and consistent
  • Create a social presence and community
  • Utilise social media in your PR endeavours
  • Measure your social activities
  • Monitor your online brand reputation
  • Establish a digital crisis management strategy for social damage control

To operate in today’s highly competitive economy, successful companies benefit from using the latest digital media and technologies. Using the social media, you can monitor what customers are saying about your brand online, but more importantly, use these tools to create and develop positive conversations around your brand.

If making use of the social media is part of your company’s plans for 2010, contact WSI today for advice and guidance on implementing an effective social media strategy, and secure your personal copy of the WSI Social Media Strategy Kit.

Google Personalized Search will affect your search rankings

Early in December, Google quietly announced that ‘Personalized Search’ results will now be the default for all users.

Previously this was only available to logged-in Google users based on their web history.

According to Google :

“This addition enables us to customize search results for you based upon 180 days of search activity linked to an anonymous cookie in your browser. It’s completely separate from your Google Account and Web History (which are only available to signed-in users). You’ll know when we customize results because a “View customizations” link will appear on the top right of the search results page. Clicking the link will let you see how we’ve customized your results and also let you turn off this type of customization.”

The impact of this is that the Google search results seen be an individual browser will now be influenced by that user’s previous searching habits and history.

Search results will no longer be ‘largely’ universal as different searchers will see different results. One person’s #1 search result could be another’s #21, depending upon their searching history!

Does this mean SEO is dead? No!

Personalized Search is designed to deliver the most relevant search results to each individual user. So traditional SEO techniques are still important:

  1. Make pages accessible and easy to use
  2. Target with keywords that your target searchers will use
  3. Build unique content that users will find useful and valuable
  4. Build in-bound  links from good sources

In addition, as Google is now specifically looking at site visitors and traffic, then increased focus on building brand and site loyalty and generating return visits will be very beneficial.

The potential is that Personalized Search will deliver higher quality searchers to your site, i.e. those more likely to be interested in your content and so more likely to convert to clients. Time will tell.

The one certainty is that search ranking reports will become a less useful tool for measuring site effectiveness and reach, and that a much broader range of visitor analytic data will be needed to monitor the impact of a site.

If you would like to discuss the optimisation of your website for the new world  of Personalized Search, call WSI on 01928 787026.

6 New Year’s Resolutions for the Social Media Age

Its that time of year to plan and start laying the foundations for 2010. So here’s my input with some simple Social Media New Years Resolutions:

1. Just Do it!
Get off the fence for 2010, the social media is here to stay and will play an increasingly important role for businesses of all sizes.
So aim to become active with some or all of  the Big 5 this year – Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn and your own/company blog.

2. Prioritise it!
Make social media interaction part of your company’s daily/weekly schedule; don’t treat it as an after-thought.

3. Share it!
Ensure your employees understand the power of the social media ,your company’s strategy, and their responsibilities. They can be great brand advocates. Effective education can promote appropriate use and prevent ‘loose cannons’.

4. Promote it!
Publicise your social media profiles as widely as possible. Add badges to your websites, email footers. And don’t forget off-line media.

5. Brand it!
Use the social media as extensions to your website and brand. So use the customisation options available to reinforce your branding on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube etc

6. Plan it!
Take time to plan what you want to achieve, and how social media will help that process. Read widely – there are lots of useful blog articles and seek advise. There is a lot of hype around about how social media is changing the world, so always try to anchor your strategy to your fundamental business objectives e.g. monitor my brand name in Twitter to improve customer service.

There are lots more possible New Year Resolutions, but the first on this list is the most important.

If you would like advice and assistance in implementing a social media plan for your business, just give me a call on 01928 787026

Is a Brand just the result of good design?

There is often talk about “brand values” and “protecting/building a brand”, but what is a “brand” in today’s digital economy. And is it just the result of good design work?

Seth Godin’s definition from a recent blog post is :
“A brand is the set of expectations, memories, stories and relationships that, taken together, account for a consumer’s decision to choose one product or service over another. If the consumer (whether it’s a business, a buyer, a voter or a donor) doesn’t pay a premium, make a selection or spread the word, then no brand value exists for that consumer. “

He argues that a brand’s value is merely the sum total of how much extra people will pay, or how often they choose, the expectations, memories, stories and relationships of one brand over the alternatives.

No mention of design. A brand used to be a logo or design or packaging. But in today’s world, these often just mark a brand’s existence.

A company’s online presence and reputation can help to build and support a brand’s value.

To understand more about how effective use of the internet can help your brand, call WSI today on 01928 787026.

Social media and email marketing can work together

Email marketing has traditionally been one of the cost-effective and powerful ways to communicate with a network of contacts and nurture the relationship.

With the growing adoption by businesses of social media such as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn, many companies have shifted focus away from email marketing.

But the two channels can and should be working together.

Email marketing can encourage social media membership, while the social media can be used to promote email sign-ups.

It is important to establish and promote different roles for the two channels. Typically email marketing can be more targeted and exclusive, as you can gather demographic data as part of the sign-up process. So valuable content can be shared with a selected audience e.g. seasonal sales vouchers.

Social media membership is typically a lot broader and probably less well qualified. Involvement and shared content can encourage interaction with the company website, email sign-ups etc.

If you would like to understand more about how email marketing and social media can benefit your business, call WSI on 01928 787026

Google shows real-time results

Last week, Google starting featuring real-time content from across the internet in its search results.

After conducting a search, you will now see live updates from sites such as Twitter, Facebook, Myspace  and Friendfeed together with headlines from news channels and blog posts.

And the results will continue to be updated in a scrolling feed area as you view the search results.

Try searching for a hot topic, such as “Tiger Woods” and you’ll see the new real-time search in action.

For more on this exciting new feature, visit Google’s official blog on the topic.

Update: 3 seconds after publishing this post and generating an automated Twitter tweet, it appeared in Google’s search results from my Twitter feed!