Internet Marketing - Matt Bailey [228]
Photo Sharing
Using photo-sharing services such as Flickr can be done periodically, because this media operates at a slower pace. Simply taking a group of photos and uploading them isn’t enough, however, when using a photo-sharing service. To get them found, each photo must be optimized for visibility. By creating a title, a description, and tags for each photo when uploading photos, you increase the chances of your photos being found and shared by other users. If you don’t take the time to complete all of these areas, then there is no purpose to uploading your images. It only takes a few more minutes to complete these text fields, but it is worth it to make your photos findable.
On the other end of the speed spectrum is Twitter. Twitter is an immediate medium. While users can browse through the comments and posts of other users, the news is usually fairly old after few hours or a few days. Most active users of Twitter have programs such as Tweetdeck, Twitterific, or Twhirl (the list is endless) that enable them to keep up with conversations and users throughout the day.
Making Twitter your medium of choice is a significant time investment, because keeping up with the news as it comes across Twitter can consume a person’s day. The ability to multitask managing the Twitter stream and keeping up with one’s daily work takes a certain personality.
Discussion Forums
Discussion forums are one of the most low-impact methods of jumping into the social-media world, because discussion forums don’t require any special software, any technical knowledge to participate, or any new multimedia integration. You just need a username and password to get started. But they also offer some of the best real-world applications and user insights. The research from being exposed to nonmarketers and gaining an understanding of the joys and frustrations straight from the market will provide a significant reach for a business that is willing to be part of the forum audience.
If you are able to find an active discussion forum in your market, try to devote at least 20 to 30 minutes a day to browsing the active discussions. You’ll quickly pick up how to find the most recent discussions, as well as ones that were started since you last checked. Take the time to also read through older threads and see how the community works and how they communicate to each other.
One rule in taking this approach—don’t sell. Members of a discussion forum aren’t interested in hearing your commercial. However, if you can bring insight into a conversation as well as some advice and education, it will be appreciated. Forums are a “soft-sell” audience, so you have to establish credibility before you can sell anything.
It is fine to have a link to your website and your title in your signature, and that is acceptable. You may notice other users have sayings, links, and titles in their signatures, and that is usually allowable so that other users know who you are and your website if they choose to know more. Actively recruiting customers on a forum is simply bad taste, and they might disconnect your account if you cross the line.
YouTube
If YouTube is your choice for social media, then be sure you have video-editing capabilities. Simply adding videos to YouTube is not enough to ensure that people are able to connect the video with your company. In YouTube and Video Marketing: An Hour a Day (Wiley, 2009), author Greg Jarboe shows that videos are mostly found when they are embedded in blogs and websites. This means most people will not find your video simply because it is on YouTube. They will find it on a blog or a website and, many times, on someone else’s blog or website.
Because of this, your videos must be made to be “portable.” The branding of your company must be on the video, either as a prevideo intro or as a postvideo credit. In addition, adding your website address