October 19th, 2011
The original popularity of the Internet was due to the fact that it was built on a World Wide Web. The concept of having immediate access to sites from around the world was instantly appealing, but this is not the case today. Instead, many people are ecstatic about the Web thanks to what it can give them on a local basis.
There are all kinds of studies and statistics about the use of online searching for consumer goods and services, but the basic fact of them all is that most people (at least 70 percent or more) will automatically head to their computers when looking for a local service or product.
Whether you need a plumber, a bookstore, a specialty food, or a masseuse, it is likely that you will head to your preferred search engine instead of the yellow pages. This is also why social media is “going local” too.
Local Social Media
We understand that most of the social media sites are jam-packed with user generated content. The sites don’t have a lot of information written by a person who is paid to contribute descriptive stories and information about the subjects, and instead it is the members who fill pages full of … continue reading article.
November 27th, 2009
OK, so maybe us B2B marketers do feel the frustration of coming second to marketers that are targeting individual consumers. The majority of marketing research that is out there seems no doubt written from a B2C angle.
Its been over a year now since Brian Solis introduced the conversation prism and social media research for B2B markets is still lagging behind. So what I hear you say? Maybe instead of licking our wounds we should do something about it. I say we should just jump in and be creative – lets give them something to talk about!
And where better to start than with Facebook. In October 2009, Hitwise found that Facebook is completely dominating the UK social networking scene. Facebook has more than 300 million active users with more than 10 million of these becoming page fans every single day. Hitwise is a very useful tool as it shows regularly updated social networking statistics.
Getting Started
Joining is relatively easy as Facebook have a step by step guide for advertisers. When an organisation joins Facebook they cannot create a profile like they can with an individual account (this is against Facebook policy and could risk losing all your data). An organisation … continue reading article.
October 12th, 2009
This is something that when I started in business I didn’t really appreciate.
The idea of going to a networking event to meet new people, to talk about their businesses, just didn’t interest me. I was so focused on what I was doing, I couldn’t understand how going along at 7am in the morning to a breakfast meeting would have any benefit!
Then one day Steve who fix’s my computer talked me into going. He was the chair of the local Chamber of Commerce group, and had been going on about it for ages. So off I went, slightly apprehensive and wasn’t really sure what to expect.
Well… Why hadn’t I gone sooner? I came away from it with 4 business cards to follow up, I couldn’t believe it, NETWORKING WORKED, and what’s more I actually enjoyed it. What I found was that everybody there was there to work with you as a local business in your area, not work against you which was one of my concerns in the first place.
Networking is not just about turning up at a breakfast meeting once a week and telling people about the product you are offering there are many types of marketing that in my … continue reading article.