38 Acts of Kindness using Social Media

Giving to others out of the kindness of your heart is a very rewarding experience.  Many people want to give, but just don’t have the time or financial resources that is frequently necessary.

But, did you know?  There are many generous acts of kindness you can do right from the convenience of your home  laptop that will truly add value to someone’s life or business.

We’ve compiled a list here to help get you started!

1)      Write a glowing review of a product that you like on Amazon

2)      On Amazon, click the Yes button that you found someone’s review helpful.

3)      Write a glowing review of a place you like on Google Local.

4)      Write a glowing review of a place you like on Yelp.

5)      Retweet something you like on Twitter.

6)      Comment on someone’s blog post.

7)      Answer a question on…

Tips for Social Media Marketing (and Homecoming Queen) Success

Do you desire social media marketing success?  Just follow these tips on how to become homecoming queen and you’ll be on your way!

School is back in session and soon homecoming will be upon us.  Girls across the country will be pursuing their dream to be voted homecoming queen.  What do these homecoming queen wannabes have to teach us about social media marketing?  When it comes to social popularity, the rules for success haven’t changed since high school.

1)      Be nice to everyone.  When success involves being voted by your peers, you need to be nice to everyone.  This is true for homecoming queens and social media marketing success.  How can you be nice to everyone on social media?  Behaviors that are akin to sharing a table at lunch include retweets, comments on blog posts, comments via…

Blogging Now for Holiday 2010 SEO Success

How to Blog for Maximum SEO Benefit

Valuable and unique content is a critical element for SEO success.  Putting together a targeted blog plan now can help you be at the top of the natural search results in the upcoming holiday season.

1) Keyword Research

It’s common to think about keywords for Pay-Per-Click Advertising and SEO, but keywords are often an afterthought when it comes to blogging.  In order for blogging to achieve SEO success, it is vital to start with a keyword strategy.

Start by thinking about the products that you want in the lead for traffic and sales in the upcoming holiday.  We’ll use an example of a retailer who sells grill accessories: Grill Mitts, Grill Lights.

The next step is to generate a list of keywords for how people are going to be gift shopping for these…

Track the ROI of Your Blog – 8 Simple Metrics

Track the Value of Your Blog with 8 Simple Charts

You just know your blog is incredibly valuable, but how can you prove it?

To help measure the ROI of your blog, we put together 8 metric areas you can track. These metrics will enable you to track the value and costs associated with your blog, and compare results to other online marketing efforts such as pay-per-click advertising and SEO.  This cost and value comparison is very helpful when determining marketing budgets and resource allocation.

1)      Traffic. Easy to Track.

It’s easy to track traffic generated by your blog inside Google Analytics and other analytic applications. This chart tracks the traffic numbers from your blog along with the percentage of total traffic that it represents.  It’s important to compare the cost to attain this traffic, to the other methods of…

Crowdsourcing and Social Media Marketing

How to Avoid “Black Hat” Techniques

If you check out popular crowdsourcing websites, you will find the “jobs” sections dominated by requests for social media marketing activities.  It can be difficult to get your social media up and off the ground–especially a regular, high-quality blog publishing effort–so it seems many small businesses have turned to what I would consider to be “black hat” techniques.

Consider the following most common social marketing “job” listings…

Blog and Article Writing. The pay for these ranges from $0.50 to $5.00 per article.  Most article requests range from 350 to 500 words and specify the keywords to be used and the keyword density.  These jobs seem to fall into a gray area.  If you can find good writers out there who can provide you with legitimate content, why not?  However, the quality of…