Small Business Marketing

The Truth About Social Media Marketing

Social Media Marketing… What’s the buzz, what’s the hype, and more importantly what’s the truth? Does it work? How effective is it?

2010: Up and to the Right

Bottom line, yes it works. However, the better question you should consider is how well it works. As a quick analysis, if I were to give you $1 for every 50 cents you gave me, would that be worth it? Of course it would be, you would be doubling your money with each investment. What if I gave you $1 for ever 60 cents, or 70 cents? What would be your limit?

The modern hype would have you believe that Social Media Marketing can make you soar to new heights overnight; and for some people it has been exactly that. However, most people that use Social Media Marketing in their business will see steady, incremental growth over time. The great thing is that it is growth they would not have experienced using only traditional marketing methods. And if you do the math or view the diagram… steady, incremental growth adds up and makes a huge difference.

Now, why is that? Well, the answer is quite simple. People are attracted to Social Media sites right now and many businesses are using this traffic stream to promote their products and services. Those that use these methods effectively gain more traffic and as a result gain more business. And, more and more people are using these sites. So here again… this is not rocket science. It’s a matter of being at the right place at the right time.

However, there is an art to using Social Media for your business. The key therefore is to use Social Media Marketing, but in a manner that brings you the right type of additional traffic: targeted traffic. Using the right blend of SEO techniques and Web 2.0 tactics you can effectively attract new visitors that you wouldn’t have had otherwise. This is where you make your new money; new visitors that you wouldn’t have reached through your traditional marketing methods.

Now, will you double your sales? Triple? Or perhaps only increase sales by 5%.  As long as your cost is below your gain, any additional sales through Social Media Marketing easily justify your investment.

The world has not fully transitioned to online marketing; therefore, you should not consider Social Media Marketing as a replacement but rather a supplement to your current marketing efforts. Over time, as you see more and more gains with your online marketing, you can then begin to decrease your offline marketing. As the world transitions, so will you. However, I’m not at all convinced that offline marketing will ever go away completely, so keep it up! By combining and coordinating the online and offline efforts, you will continue to build your business while keeping ahead of the pack.

To your success,

Johnny Vargas

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The Death of Traditional SEO

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization and as the name suggests, it is the process of improving a web site’s standing in search engines by “optimizing” the website. However, traditional SEO methods are quickly dying and unless you understand why, your business may suffer in 2010 and beyond.

The Death of Traditional SEO

The idea of course is that the more optimized a site is, the higher it ranks in search engines and therefore receives more traffic. Optimizing a site includes modifying the site’s content as well as its design so that it not only maintains its keyword relevance, but also is able to be indexed easily by the various search engines.

Search engines use many different methods and algorithms in an attempt to ensure that search results are relevant. This of course is done to filter out unrelated listings and return desired search results to end users. However, this creates major problems for the search engines and creates a steady stream of work and constant changes in the algorithms used. The internet is constantly evolving and therefore what is considered “relevant” also changes as end-user habits change.

In December 2009, Google published several posts on its official blog which describe major changes with how Google will now display search results. These stories included “Personalized Search for everyone” (12/04/09) and “Relevance meets the real-time web” (12/07/09).

In “Personalized Search…” Google highlights the fact that when you search using Google, they will attempt to provide you relevant results based on you as an individual and your search history “based upon 180 days of search activity linked to an anonymous cookie in your browser.”  This is different than in the past when personalized search was limited to users logged into their Google account.

In “Relevance…” Google highlights that they will begin using “a dynamic stream of real-time content from across the web.”  The idea is that Google will search live updates from popular sites across the web.  If the search finds relevant information, those sites will be ranked highly in your search results. In other words, what users make popular, Google will consider relevant.

Why is this a problem for traditional SEO consultants? Because SEO consultants typically spend a considerable amount of time attempting to improve a site’s SEO score by “optimizing” the individual website. They’ve proven themselves in the past based on this type of work and they’ve gained the trust of many clients along the way. These clients have been trained to accept that this work takes months or even years to complete. Sadly, this approach alone will not work in 2010 and beyond in order to maintain high relevance within Google and other search engines.

As people flock toward social media sites, the search engines also recognize that the fresh content people talk about online has relevance and may very well be what others are hoping to find in their search results. Traditional SEO practices do not consider this shift in how search engines function.

If you want to expand your internet marketing and improve your search engine ranking, it is important that you understand what search engines consider and how you can maximize your marketing investment.  If you have content that is relevant to the keywords being used by end-users, it may be more important for you to place your content into these social media streams than to solely work on website optimization. Doing so will increase your chances that the search engines are able to make the connection between what end-users want and those sites that offer related and relevant content.

To your success!

Johnny Vargas

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