For the past several years we have been repeatedly harping on how social media is going to be ever more important to search engine optimization, visibility and clicks. Yesterday Google sent the clearest signal yet. The time for action is now. Actually the time for a social media strategy was years ago for many businesses, but let’s not quibble over nuance.

Yesterday Google released ‘Search Plus Your World‘, which melds Google’s new social network Google+’s search inline with Google’s normal search properties. And while some social has been appearing in SERPs (search engine result pages) for years, this level of prominence is so pronounced to actually draw fire from competing social networks like twitter.

To help understand how this impacts you or your companies visibility in search, consider that a searcher may see different search results if for example:

• They are using incognito or other browser privacy mode.
• Not logged into Google, cleared data, history and/or cookies.
• Logged in and has not cleared the aforementioned data.
• Logged in and socially active on other networks such as Blogger, Twitter, Facebook, et al.
• Logged in and have a Google+ account, unless they use the button to hide personal results.
• Have opted out of personalized search altogether.

In short, there are instances where your more socially active competition may show up in Google search results, and you will not.

Late last year, one week after the launch of Google+ Pages for brands and businesses, we ran a Google+ webinar and seminar where we asked our clients to wait for Google to fix ownership and notification issues before jumping in. Google fixed those issues in late December and we changed our stance to go, go, go. We are now urging those of you who still have not, to jump in. Need more proof? This has changed visibility of brands on Google.

Not sure how to get started? Let us help you with your social media strategy.

Far too often in business we either clamor for the old, familiar marketing methods that are well past their viability, or we waste time and money trying every new marketing trick that comes along. Without analyzing, tracking, or at the very least asking customers, what marketing piece moved them to action, we are left to attribute it to where we believe it came from without regard to truth or evidence.  Lacking stats, you allow the new marketing wiz kid to talk you into dropping everything for social media. Lacking stats, you may believe the agency of record when they tell you to keep doing more of the same. Does this sound like an optimal way to operate your business? Do you leave expenses, consumables, and wages up to such flippant record keeping?

My challenge to you is to start thinking of your marketing like the other critical components of your business. When you open the business each Monday morning, make sure marketing is on the checklist.

Let us help you review your marketing strategy checklist.

Sales always carried a negative connotation for me. Granted, when I came to Cirrus ABS my previous jobs had been in government and politics so that might not be a fair characterization – but I always saw “salesmen” as someone trying to get me to buy something I didn’t need.

One thing has become clear to me over the last year, my new job isn’t really that different from my old job! At my old job I spent much of the day figuring out how to solve problems, whether they were issues a constituent was having with a government agency, an internal personnel issue, or addressing a potential political problem. I’d identify tools and tactics I needed to use to solve the problem and get to work.

While the focus is slightly different than before, the work is basically the same. Either customers (or potential customers) come to us with a problem or we identify a problem they may be having with marketing their company or organization to potential customers. We have a variety of tools and tactics we can use to solve these challenges and my job is to help these clients or potential clients figure out what they can afford that will deliver the most value to their organization.

My biggest surprise getting involved with sales and business development is how much we work with competitors for mutual advantage. Today across Indiana we’re having the annual Social Media Smackdown awards, a lunch where we recognize those who were deemed most influential in social media across the state. Over 50 people have signed up for the Fort Wayne event and it will include people from different agencies and solo practitioners who are all competing for the same business we’re trying to land for our company.

So why do we collaborate? There’s a number of good reasons for it:

1. social media is an ever-growing world and there’s no limit to the number of tools and tactics you can learn about in this space,
2. how you approach challenges and deliver value is what distinguishes you from your competitors, sharing information and experience will not change that, and
3. best practices and building up knowledge are important if you hope to prevent bad practices from souring the marketplace on valid tools and tactics.

Now, I’m not suggesting that you open up the playbook and tell everyone exactly how you would solve every single problem. But honest, open discussion about best practices actually builds up the community and opens doors to opportunities that might not be available to you otherwise. Ultimately we’re all trying to help people, businesses and other organizations solve the challenges they’re facing in a way we thing brings the most value to the table.

Thanks for your time as I shared a little of what I’ve learned over the past year. I’m looking forward to an excellent year ahead and hope that some of what I’ve shared can help you improve your online marketing efforts. If you need more help, just give us a call, we love to help folks with online marketing strategy development!

Online marketing is subject to constant change. It reminds me of a phrase I learned not long after moving to Indiana. “If you don’t like the weather, stand right where you are – it’s sure to change in five minutes.” Well if there’s anything more subject to change than Hoosier weather, it’s the wild world of online marketing.

Let’s take it one step at a time, first the landscape. Not long after coming on board, Google unloaded a major change in the algorithm it uses to display search engine results. At the time I felt fortunate that I wasn’t going to have to learn how these ranking factors work all over again six months later – then Google pushed another update… six months later! It was then I realized these changes are something I’m just going to have to get used to.

Think about it… in the last year we’ve seen the introduction of Google+, huge changes in how Facebook displays user profiles, and my Twitter profile design has changed twice! To some degree these changes were responses to each other, in an effort to stay ahead of their competition.

In addition to these relatively “old” social media platforms, the tools we use on these platforms are ever changing. While you may develop a loyalty to a particular brand of tools (Can I get a “heck yeah” team Hootsuite?), the capabilities of these tools change to adapt to the ripples caused by changes with the social media platforms. These changes also create opportunities for new tools to be introduced.

Ultimately the online marketing landscape is very fluid and entrepreneurial. That being said, it’s not a lawless frontier that operates without rules or structure. If that were the case it’d be impossible for anyone to find long-term success using online marketing. So how do you navigate a path to success when change is swirling all around you?

It’s important to remember that technology is a tool, not a strategy. When you are trying to determine how to achieve your online marketing objectives, make sure they are conceived based on strategy, not the tools at your disposal. You could start a Facebook page because it’s free and you have a Facebook account and there’s lots of people using Facebook. However, if there’s no use case for your customers to interact with your brand on Facebook, the effort you put into building and maintaining that page might have been better spent purchasing a license for an inexpensive e-mail mailing service and writing a monthly e-mail to a list of subscribers.

The basic rules of marketing still apply, which is why no matter how much things change when it comes to online marketing I will still be able to have an impact because I know to stay focused on client objectives, understand what they are trying to communicate and learn with whom they are trying to interact. These are the elements you build a strategy around – once the strategy is set we can figure out what tools we need to use to make it work and add value!

Online marketing is a fast-moving, fast-paced field that is constantly changing and evolving. That may be a big reason why it’s hard for me to believe I’ve been working exclusively in this field for just over a year. I thought this would be a good opportunity to collect some thoughts I’ve gathered over the last 12 months.

The first lesson I’d like to focus on is the value proposition. Prior to joining Cirrus ABS I worked in the public sector. Unfortunately there is a highly visible example of how irresponsible government employees behave in the news right now, but responsible public sector works are always trying to figure out how to stretch their resources to provide the most value. When business increases in the private sector, it’s usually accompanied by more income and you can use that influx of cash to address resource shortfalls – this doesn’t happen in the public sector.

Just because you have additional resources to throw at a challenge, it doesn’t mean that’s going to be the most productive use of that money. From a marketing standpoint in the public sector we focused on how we could make the most use out of any activity because our greatest commodity was time. The more efficient we could be with time, the more flexibility we had to address resource allocation issues. This is a valid lesson that can be applied to online marketing in the private sector as well.

Many times when I discuss online marketing with others in the community the focus is on using a particular tool (i.e. “Is Facebook important?”, “Do my customers really use Twitter?”, “Do I need a Google+ page?”), rather than on what they’re trying to accomplish, like increasing sales from their current customers, bringing more new customers to their establishment, or introducing new products and services.

Once you focus on a goal, you can start developing a strategy to achieve the goal. It may include some or all of the channels mentioned above. It may use completely different channels you’ve never heard of. It’s very easy to spend lots of money on social media and see no results from your effort.

Anyone can accomplish anything when it comes to online marketing, it’s really just a matter of how much time do you want to spend maintaining the solution  and how much money are you willing to spend supporting it. At first there may be some guesswork involved at where those lines intersect, but over time proper data analysis will reveal the value and how much effort and money is necessary to achieve your goal.

Over the last year working with Cirrus ABS partners and potential partners, it’s clear to me these lessons from the public sector are even more critical in the private sector, especially given the current economy. Working through how to develop a strategy to achieve business goals is far more critical than embracing the latest fad. Learn more about how we approach online marketing consulting and let me know if we can help you out!

Ways to tell you’re on a secure page:

• Check the URL: If you see that the URL (or website address) starts with “https://” instead of “http://” then you are on a secured page.

• Know your browser: Most browsers have ways of showing that a page is secure. Here are some examples:

FIREFOX: Click on the button with the favicon and name of the site. There you will see the verification information and the Lock icon. The color of the button may change with the certificate type.

INTERNET EXPLORER: For more details on the certificate, look at the Lock icon.

For more details on the page’s certificate, click the Lock icon in the navigation bar.

• Check the Certificate Vendor: Secure Socket Layer or SSL ensure that data is encrypted to keep the transmission of your data safe. Different vendors such as Verisign or SSL.com issue certifications verifying that a site has this SSL encryption. Sites pay for these safety measures and usually make the seals from these companies very visible.

The site you are visiting will not have these elements throughout the site. Just make sure that you look for these items when entering your sensitive personal information.

If you’re looking to start your own eCommerce site or need additional guidance, Cirrus ABS has the solution for you.

The Flesch Reading Ease test. The Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level test. The Gunning Fog Index. The Coleman Liau Index. The SMOG Index. The Automated Readability Index. All are designed to show the level of education necessary for readers to understand a passage of written English.

Sounds good, doesn’t it? I mean, after all: getting your message across to the widest possible audience is what marketing is all about. If you could know in advance with greater certainty that your message posed no serious obstacles to reader comprehension, you’d be in clover, right? Well, hold on there a minute.

In this Age of Unbelief, even believers want the assurance of scientific validation. Tests like these are part of a trend to quantify anything and everything – even that which was once understood to be unquantifiable. We take comfort in numbers. Yardsticks. Testable phenomena. Repeatable results.

The tests I’ve listed above all use mathematical formulas to assess readability. For the most part, they count the number of characters in a passage, the number of words, the number of sentences, the average number of characters per word, the average number of syllables per word, the average number of words per sentence, and so on. The lower the numbers, generally speaking, the higher the readability for the greatest number of people.

I know from my professional associations that most writers feel as I do about these tests: we distrust them. Advertising and marketing firms tend to look on them warily as well. Why? Because, in spite of what their creators and advocates maintain, the tests aren’t accurate. Nor could they be.

Nothing so complex as “readability,” or “reader comprehension,” can be reduced to a set of numerical constructs. No mathematical equation, no arbitrary assignment of numerical values, can tell you unequivocally what readers are, or are not, taking away from something you’ve written.

Readability, simply put, is governed by too many variables. And many of those variables can never be known with confidence, precisely because they are unquantifiable.

Aside from basic intelligence, education surely plays the most significant role in readability. But all kinds of social/psychological factors also come into play. The length of words and sentences? Yes, that too has an effect. But many of the most familiar words, words that even less-educated readers recognize, have three, four – sometimes more! – syllables. A one-syllable word might score better on a Flesch test, but it wouldn’t be as apt for the audience. Beyond that, there are times when only a long sentence, well-constructed, can accurately and coherently convey an idea. To split that long sentence up would be to muddy or destroy the relationship between various components of the thought being expressed. Result? Reader confusion.

Now, I don’t say readability tests are completely without value. They can alert a writer to wordiness. And writers are always best advised to keep copy brief. Especially when writing for mass audiences.

A handful of paragraphs looks friendly. Short sentences read well. Monosyllabic words pack a punch. They’re just not always the most expressive way to communicate. Attempts at the kind of brevity these tests promote – especially by beginning or unskilled writers – often leave copy wanting. The text may be short. But it shortchanges readers because it lacks the detail that brings color and clarity; that inspires and motivates.

In the end, it’s experience that serves as a far better guide to readability than any numerically based readability test. Experienced writers and marketers know how to address different audiences; they know what engages and motivates people of different ages, in different professions, at different social levels, with different interests and inclinations. They know because countless times over their copy’s been tested in the fires of the marketplace. They’ve seen what doesn’t work. And they’ve seen what does – as evidenced in growing customer bases and greater sales, among other signs.

If numbers have anything to do with the readability of marketing copy, these are the numbers that count.

To highlight this point, the folks at Brafton have produced a fantastic infographic on the matter. The stats should open even the reluctant marketers’ eyes to the value of generating quality content. Businesses pay attention – “content is king!”

Still not creating content on your website? Can’t create content on your website? Not sure how, please investigate our Web Development, Search Engine Optimization, or Writing Services or  call us at 1-877-817-4443 or email us today.

Today I logged into SlideShare.net for the first time in a while with my Facebook account and within seconds, my Twitter feed was blowing up with “hey, why did you add me on SlideShare?” And, “I just got an email that you followed me on SlideShare, I didn’t know I had an account.”  Hmmm… I don’t recall this happening the last time I logged in, nor do I remember seeing an “auto-follow” option in any of my account settings. Looks like another forced opt-out “feature” to force “socializing” amongst users.

Lately, Facebook has received a lot of negative press for its opt-out only “feature upgrades”, yet here is another example that I’d like to discuss. Not that I have any personally revealing info on SlideShare.com, nor do I intend to, but I had no option, that I recall, to avoid blasting my friends/fans/followers list with email notifications that I was now following them. As a user of the service it left a sour taste in my mouth and leads me to think about my customers and if any of them are doing anything similar that might turn off their customers.

In this case, SlideShare offers a service that I require and I am invested in the ecosystem. Much like Facebook users, who are similarly (if not more so) invested in that ecosystem, getting upset is not going to make much of a difference and I’m sure there is a setting somewhere to disallow this “feature”.

Now, if I were evaluating a service for the first time, and not just a socially networked one like SlideShare, I may give consideration to how I intend on using the service, who I will be sharing my content with, what info I want to make available to the vendor/provider, what information I want my clients to provide and how others generally feel toward online privacy. If my first experience is “how/why did you add me/follow me” I might not come back at all. The old adage “it’s better to ask for forgiveness than permission” is not cool when it comes to online privacy issues.

In fairness, most of my clients aren’t nearly as comfortable with the socially connected world I live in and would likely cease using such a service if they had a similar experience. As online marketers, we have to recognize that we are typically on the bleeding (or at least cutting) edge and most of those around us are not. As you’ve transitioned from traditional to online marketing, have you put up potential roadblocks to engagement? Have you built up walls that you can justify scaling but your typical customer might consider too much trouble? Are you facilitating engagement and by allowing customers to opt-in or are you trying to capture them with opt-out techniques that may cause them to disengage?

You finally talked the marketing powers that be into letting you try out these newfangled QR Codes, though they are not really new at all, on some type of printed marketing material, but hold up partner, have you tested it? Failure to test QR Codes is unfortunately very common and to be honest, I made the mistake on a set of business cards once too. If the code fails to scan after being printed, well…let’s just avoid that issue shall we?

Here are some tips for testing QR codes for scan-ability before releasing them into the wild.

Quick QR code scan-ability checklist:

1. Check scanning of the QR code in poor lighting conditions.
2. Make sure the QR code can be scanned with older phones.
3. Scan the QR code with multiple scanner applications.
4. Check scanning on an old phone, with the worst QR code app, in poor lighting conditions.
5. Request a final proof, if possible, from the printer to ensure color and contrast accuracy.
6. Scan recognition should not require significant wait or distance adjustment.
7. The QR Code should successfully scan at the distance people will normally be from it. (i.e. billboard effect)

Above we see an example of a QR Code, at a major retailer, that has insufficient contrast to scan from the distance the display was set at. I am pretty certain they had very little success from this implementation.

Android applications to test against: i-nigma, Barcode Scanner, QR Droid, Scanlife, At&t Code, Google Goggles, BeeTagg, and others.

iPhone applications to test: Redlaser, Scan by QR Code City, and others.

In a future post we will discuss optimal ways to create and track QR codes. Find out how we create winning NetCentered marketing solutions.