Google’s “Search Plus Your World”: What It Means for Your Business
If you’ve logged into Google lately, you may have noticed that your search results look different. This past Tuesday, January 10, Google launched “Search Plus Your World,” a new set of personalized search features for anyone logged in to Google. What Is Search Plus Your World? The tagline, “your photos, your friends, your stuff” pretty much sums up what Google is trying to do with Search Plus Your World. The idea is to make search results more personal, and therefore more relevant, to the user. Personal results are distinguished from typical search results by a special icon and...
Read MoreMobile Websites
Although there are still millions of cellphone users that have not yet adopted the smartphone, there is no question that iPods, Androids and the like are the future of cellular phones. More and more users are gravitating towards smart and tablet devices every day, and as they do, the number of people visiting websites from mobile browsers is dramatically increasing.
Read MoreDeal of the Day Marketing: Are Groupon and Living Social Worthwhile?
Interest in deal of the day sites such as Groupon and Living Social remains strong, but while these sites are extremely popular with consumers, merchants have continued to harbor doubts about whether offering deals through these sites makes business sense in the long term. In an earlier blog post on this topic, we offered our opinion about whether Groupon (and similar sites) is a good deal for businesses.
Read MoreHow much does YOUR company spend on social media?
Internet marketing firm Hubspot recently released data showing that businesses are, on average, doubling their spending on social media between 2009 and 2011. What is really interesting about this data is that small businesses are spending as much as three times more (as a percentage of their overall lead generation budgets) on social media and blogs as their larger competitors. Why are small businesses spending so much more?
Read MoreWhy Your Values Don’t Matter
The other day, I was talking with an acquaintance who is a very successful residential real estate agent specializing in high end properties. When he asked what I do for a living, I explained that I provide outsourced marketing and social marketing services for businesses. We talked a bit about what was happening in his industry, and his comment was “people who tweet and are on Facebook don’t buy houses.” It wasn’t until I read a recent blog post from one of my favorite social media bloggers, Mitch Joel of Six Pixels of Separation, that I realized why this attitude is so frustrating to me. Mitch wrote a post called “Good Old Fashioned Values” that hit the nail on the head. In it, he reminds us that “your values are not THE values.” This simple statement is a powerful reminder that, particularly in the marketing world, you cannot use your own cultural, social, moral, ethical values to reach out to your audience – you have to identify the values that your audience holds dear and find a way to connect with them that is meaningful to both you AND them.
Read MoreWhat is Branding?
Branding is one of the building blocks of the marketing process, but all too often it is neglected in favor of the day-to-day work of running a business. And really, the question most people struggle with is “what is branding?” Branding is NOT the market you are in, what your business does or sells, your tagline, or your logo. All of these things should be a reflection of your brand, but your brand itself is something deeper.
Read More