Sometimes deepening the relationship between your brand and your fans is as simple as giving people a way to engage on a new level.
From Facebook, to Twitter, Google+, Instagram and YouTube, companies continue to showcase a variety of creative ways to celebrate milestones across their social media sites. A creative example can be found courtesy of TODAY, who recently reached 100,000 followers on Pinterest and thanked its community with a colorful cake recipe.
Lee Odden. Ann Handley. Jay Baer. I read their books and blogs. I hope you do too. Because they're so generous with their ideas, all three were a big help to me before I knew them. And because they know so much about online marketing, I made an effort to come to know them.
Call it the Analytics Effect: People get so hooked on cheap-and-abundant data from sources like Google Analytics that they ignore useful data from other sources. Interesting as a concept, but does it really exist?
Lately, I've been asked to judge quite a few marketing awards competitions. Mostly digital awards, but some traditional/offline categories, too. The specific awards and contests don't matter, because the affliction I see is universal. It is that most marketing awards entry write-ups are absolutely terrible. Look, I get it.
Frank Eliason, author of the new book At Your Service and Director of Global Social Media for Citi, joins the Social Pros Podcast this week to discuss crafting a cohesive social strategy for a global corporation, relying on the instincts of his team, and listening smarter.
Ah, Fourth of July. The holiday conjures up visions of American flags, fun in the sun, BBQs and fireworks. While many companies created social media posts around the holiday, PayPal's patriotic pup stole the show. Shared both on PayPal's Facebook page and Instagram channel, the words adorable and clever come to mind.
In this edition of The Baer Facts, I talk with Kyle Lacy of ExactTarget about Instagram video, and whether we should care as marketers. Are We Asking the Wrong Question? There have been lots of breathless blog posts recently that attempt to pit Vine and Instagram video in a head-to-head battle, as if we must choose in a beta vs.
Most of us are familiar with the concept of influencer marketing, i.e., marketing to a select group of individuals - such as journalists, bloggers, consultants, or industry analysts - who influence your buyers' decisions. The idea is that if you take the time to identify and build relationships with those influencers, you can leverage them to build your credibility.
YOUTILITY Why Smart Marketing Is About Help, Not Hype The difference between helping and selling is just two letters. But those two letters are critically important to your company's success. You're not competing for attention only against other, similar products. You're competing for attention against everything.
Janice Person, Social Media Director for Monsanto, joins the Social Pros Podcast this week to discuss dealing with controversy on social media, respecting transparency, and proactive versus reactive social media strategies. Read on for some of the highlights and tweetable moments, or listen to the full podcast.
Can't decide what to do with your summer day? Simply view Target's #SummerUp decision maker on the company's Vine account for a fun idea. Equal parts clever and addictive, the Vine is incredibly fast-paced and jam-packed with fun summer activity ideas. When the viewer taps their finger on their smartphone screen, the video pauses, landing on something to do.
In this edition of The Baer Facts, I talk with Kyle Lacy of ExactTarget about Mashable's new Brand Lift program, whereby brands can work with Mashable or its agency partners, DigitasLBI and Vaynermedia, to create content assets that will appear on Mashable directly.
In almost every presentation I work up, there is one line that invariably finds its way onto a slide: "Adding value through the timely publishing of useful content is the best way to generate goodwill in the communities you operate in."
I was in St. Louis the other day, talking Youtility at an event put together by my friends at Standing Partnership, a killer reputation management firm. It was on the official book launch day, so that was a milestone to remember. Also memorable was a great question from the audience.
Brad Walters, Director of Social Media and Emerging Platforms for Lowe's Home Improvement, joins the Social Pros Podcast this week to discuss starting the conversation rather than letting the customer start it, tailoring content and strategies to individual platforms, and delivering consistently helpful content across all social platforms.
In celebration of National Pride Month, Grey Poupon is generating conversation and debate around its simple yet powerful reinvention of a classic ad on the brand's Facebook page. A nod to the famous Grey Poupon commercial "Pardon Me" from 1981, the Facebook post features an image of two men holding hands across two cars with the copy, "Spread good taste."
YOUTILITY Why Smart Marketing Is About Help, Not Hype The difference between helping and selling is just two letters. But those two letters are critically important to your company's success. You're not competing for attention only against other, similar products. You're competing for attention against everything.
Mobile marketing is the future. Any marketer, or marketing firm worth their weight in invoices knows that the key to future success is adapting to and optimizing for the mobile market. When you're in a public place, you don't have to look far to find someone pre-occupied with a smartphone.
This is one of the most important posts I'll ever write. My new book, Youtility: Why Smart Marketing is About Help Not Hype releases on Thursday in hardcover, Kindle, Nook and iBook. Audible audio version on the way.
Justin Gardner, Social Media Manager at AMC Theatres, joins the Social Pros Podcast this week to discuss publicizing content without having to create it, how to balance gender-skewed social media platforms, and how his team uses their freedom to experiment to their advantage.
Miss the Burberry Prorsum Menswear S/S14 runway show on June 18th in London? Don't fret, because thanks to the social media team at Burberry, you can watch the entire show in just six seconds on Vine. Within the Vine app, more than 2,000 have liked the video.
In the B2B space, having people follow you is not enough. You have to go beyond likes and simple conversations. For B2B marketers, the promise of social is user data, and first generation social campaign technologies just weren't delivering. Learn 4 trends that will help B2B marketers secure more qualified and engaged leads.
A state of disarray so chaotic that it's dizzying to look at. A mess that is beyond the normal range of disarray. Visual clutter that draws attention to itself. It may sound like I am describing Lindsay Lohan heading into court on a Monday morning.
Customer profiling may sound like a mug shot lineup of your customers, but the goal of this post is not to imprison your customers. On the other hand, I hope to offer three steps to creating and evaluating the types of people you are looking to sell your products or services to so that you can effectively market to them.
