by Robert McCourty

This article from The Mender (Issue 34),
Metamend’s Web Site Optimization and Marketing Newsletter.

Momentum is quickly gathering for location-based navigation among search engines and mobile device makers. Web search technology companies including FAST Search & Transfer and Google are working with wireless phone companies to power mobile searches that can benefit from locally targeted results. In addition, wireless Internet devices are becoming more equipped with GPS technology which can track the user’s physical whereabouts. Both parties want to localize Web searching to make it more relevant for the searcher and hopefully draw more regional advertising dollars. “Alltheweb” today can tailor results to the searcher’s country. It’s only a matter of time before search results will be narrowed down to city block size or smaller.

GIS Latitude and Longitude coordinates within web sites will soon become an absolute necessity for everyone performing ecommerce via the Internet. This data may relate to the physical location of the web site or where the site is being served from (if applicable) or where the actual business represented by the site is physically located. There may also be multiple web site locations and coding involved, if for example, you have a franchise with multiple locations, (e.g.. Starbucks) each location will probably need a page of it’s own with the correct corresponding locational data.

Obviously a web site is a stable beast. It sits on a server somewhere and doesn’t move much, so at first glance it may not seem plausible to need GIS Locational Data tucked into the web site’s source code. On the contrary, one aspect the web site represents, is the business’s physical location(s) and if people are going to try to find services and products based purely upon location, shouldn’t you at the very least, tell them where you are and how to get there?

Let’s look at one example of how location-based web site marketing may be utilized.

You are vacationing in a new city for the first time. Once you get settled into your Hotel room you pull out your hand-held, wireless device, log onto the web and search for “Italian Food in San Francisco.” Five hundred results come back. So you click the new “location-based” feature on your device which triggers a GPS satellite feed to pinpoint your exact location within the city. Now only ten Italian Restaurants, relevant to your physical location (who’s respective marketing firms’ were smart enough to code their client’s web sites with GIS data,) show up in the search results. Guess which Restaurants did not show up? The other four hundred and ninety. Starting to get the picture?

From a marketers perspective the advent of location-based marketing can include many benefits:

• A captured target. The consumer is already in or near your place of business. Remember, this is location-based marketing. A customer is much more likely to come through your door if a competitors store is a twenty minute drive away, but your store happens to be right around the corner from where they are standing.
• Increased Impulse buying. Real time delivery of advertising prompting benefits of immediate response. Example; Come in within the next 30 minutes and receive 20% off your meal.
• Development of one-to-one relationship marketing. Consumer purchasing history can be examined, thereby enhancing future marketing messages.
• Direct marketing spending effectiveness. True targeting of promotional materials. Materials are delivered electronically and on demand, as required. No hard copy waste or excess printing inventory.
• Psychological Nurturing. The consumer ‘feels like a somebody,’ building brand recognition and loyalty.
• Increased return on investment (ROI) Repeat or additional consumer purchases during a visit.

Aligning your marketing efforts toward this newest wave of e-commerce means preparing well in advance. Implementation of a professional search engine optimization (SEO) campaign for your site is absolutely critical. Whether in-house or outsourced this aspect must be taken into consideration when pricing a marketing campaign. Not only will the web site need to be properly indexed and found within the general Internet’s top search engines, soon it will also need to be found by physical, geographic, location as well. Specific key words and phrases will need constant tweaking to reflect the search patterns of mobile consumers in a wireless world. People may not necessarily search by the exact name of the business but rather by general terms, (Italian Restaurant) but you still want them to find you. This will require vigilance by you or your marketing company. Success will depend upon the ability to constantly extrapolate information from your web site statistics and apply those results back into your marketing equations.

You should be also prepared for your marketing budget to go through some changes as the location-based phase of Internet marketing begins to expand. Flexibility will be key. Additional costs such as subscribing to a “streaming” service to feed your site into those search results should be included. This aspect of service delivery could prove to be an escalating expense if based on a ‘price-per-clickthrough’ scenario.

Industry standards and the methods of serving out GIS, web-based, locational data are still within the developmental phases but given the speed of technology, it’s a safe bet full implementation will be sooner rather than later. Give yourself and/or your clients a competitive edge. Find out if your site is ready for wireless searching. Today’s science fiction is tomorrow’s science fact. “Thank you for your wireless reservation at Luigi’s! Your table and online bonus of a chilled bottle of complimentary wine, will be waiting for you upon arrival.” Hmmm, a person could get used to this in a hurray!

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I just started using Foursquare. I know, I know. You hate it. Or you love it, and you can’t believe it took me so long to get onto it. Foursquare just became available in Alaska so I’m on a mission to visit and list as many places as I can with tips and reviews so that by summertime, Alaska businesses will reap the rewards.

My feelings about location-based social networks like Foursquare, Gowalla, BrightKite and the like have been mixed. I’ve avoided them to date because of that knee-jerk “it’s too creepy” reaction that one gets when thinking of letting others — especially strangers — know one’s exact location. Maybe it’s because, frankly, many women I know (myself included) have been stalked.

But lately, because of Fourquare, I’ve been looking at location-based social networks in a different way. I recently wrote about Foursquare on my personal blog and concluded that the benefits far outweighed the drawbacks.

Here’ s my take on the benefits of location-based social networks like Foursquare from a work standpoint:

1. Connecting. With business travel, particularly to conferences, I find that I often don’t even know some of my friends and colleagues are in the vicinity. Foursquare notices that appear from friends on the network allow serendipitous discovery and can lead to impromptu meet-ups that can prove fruitful for work.
2. Socializing. A few years ago, Twitter took SXSW by storm, with attendees utilizing the microblogging system to track people down. I’m wondering if Foursquare will be this year’s Twitter at SXSW, or maybe it is already over in those more techie circles and everyone has moved on to the next app. Personally, I’m looking forward to seeing when someone I know is at a nearby cafe or restaurant. I’m assuming it would then be socially acceptable to just show up and say “hi,” since they’ve publicly announced their location.
3. Discovering. Gone are the days of being on a business trip and having to rely on the concierge for restaurant suggestions or the wait staff for meal recommendations. I’m already enjoying the Foursquare tips that show up for establishments nearby. I’ve also used Around Me on recent trips, but Foursquare’s recommendations of friends popping up when I’m in a new area is far more compelling than simple listings.
4. Promoting. What is really interesting about an application like Foursquare is how local businesses can leverage it to attract more customers. The concept that Foursquare members can get discounts and perks from businesses by becoming “mayor” or frequenting a place often is genius.

In an age of marketing when consumers are digesting information in new ways, taking advantage of hybrid applications that combine online and offline elements is smart business. For example, Yelp’s Monocle mode augmented reality feature is dramatically changing the ways we think of “online,” “offline” and “location.”

While privacy and safety issues still exist with any GPS-enabled application that lets you broadcast your stats to your friends or the world, I think we are going to location-based apps continue to become more mainstream. And I, for one, am eager to see where else this can take us, and how it will affect the way we network and work.

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1.  Refine Your Goals

Today it is very hot to talk about Twitter & Facebook, just like a few years ago Myspace was king.  All of these tools can be quite effective if used correctly and the first step in this adventure is to refine your goals.  What exactly are you trying to achieve by putting your business on Facebook or Twitter?  Do you want more customers?  Do you want to develop an arm of your corporate culture (see below) to extend into the community? Do you just want to be hip and cool?  Well each of these are valid questions (even the last one) but make sure you spend time with your team and determine what your goal is.

Nothing fails worse than just having your web2.0 team running about creating accounts and updating all the social networking sites like crazy.  Make sure your goals are defined and this will lead you right into the next step.

2.  Determine Your Market

Each social networking site has a target audience, now many of these are quite broad but they can be defined.  Twitter for instance is seeing increased growth in the 50+ market and in the overseas market.  Facebook continues to grow on all fronts but seems to be favored by tech savvy middle and upper middle class users.  Myspace has become a haven for musicians and artists, and LinkedIn is favored by corporate users.   Check out the public numbers from each site, check out how each site works and determine if it fits in with your customer or user base.  If you are looking to target the 50+ market perhaps Twitter is a good starting point for your social marketing campaign.  If you have many corporate customers, perhaps LinkedIn will be a good starting point.  Your base market should determine where to start your social marketing strategy.

This is very important, I have seen many companies jump head first into all the social marketing sites with no rhyme or reason.  Create your first social site based on your customers needs and their demographic, why create a Flickr (a image gallery sharing site) account if you are not providing images to your customers?  Keep focused on your goals and use this to determine your market.

3.  Uncover Your Culture

Your company culture is really what you are trying to sell, the social marketing sites are more than just large advertising boards, they are a whole new way to think about customers. When you are posting on Twitter or Facebook for example try to post as if you are talking directly to a person and you want feedback.   Nobody likes a company that just constantly sends out updates that are strictly marketing speak or advertisements.  A good example of this is a small clothing company I worked with who had a large fan base on Facebook but never really had any customer comments.  This is because they were constantly just sending out updates like, “50% off this weekend” and “New items in stock”.   These are important information updates but by changing their updates to “What do you think of these new items?” or “What kind of sale should we have this weekend?”  They were able to really get the customers involved in the product and their fan pages, thus increasing their culture.

Uncover what your company is all about and try to express this in your updates to the social community.  You want to get your customers involved in your culture, you want them involved in the experience.  After you know what you are selling, and you determine where you want to jump off at, then its time to uncover your culture.  This is a great step in helping your social marketing campaign really get off the ground and deliver where you need it to.

4.  Establish Accountability

One of the worst mistakes I have seen in social marketing is being non-responsive or secretive.  Remember you are entering a brave new world of openness and accountability to your customer base, you are targeting them directly, and you are delivering your culture to them and making them want to be a part of that.  A key element of this is allowing the customer to voice their opinions on things without taking it to heart.  Many a social marketing campaign has failed because of a companies inability to handle criticism, or being to quick to delete negative comments on an update.  If you start getting negative comments about your company, this is just what you were looking for, this gives you the opportunity to directly address these concerns and turn a naysayer or disgruntled customer into a return happy customer.  (Keep in mind that you always want to delete offensive, racist, or comments filled with vulgarity.)

Make sure you are delivering in your accountability.  Have a plan before you start your social marketing campaign on exactly who will respond to negative comments, and what will be said.  If this involves a few meetings that is fine, but make sure you respond quickly and with the same culture driven voice you have used for updates or other complaints.   Nothing ticks off a customer worse than to be treated differently than another customer.   Accountability is effective policy and resolution of a customers problem.

5.  Track Your Results

An effective social media campaign will bring results in that you can see.  Are your Facebook fan page numbers growing?  Are your website unique hits or page views increasing?  All of these items can be tracked either with in house web analytic software, or by using something like Google Analytics on your website.  On Facebook you can see the results directly with customer responses, page hits, and new fans.  On Twitter you can see if your followers are increasing.

Tracking your results is a key element to see if your message is being delivered effectively.  If after 6 months or so of steady posting and interaction you do not see any results it might be time to go over the steps again and make sure your social marketing campaign is hitting all the right markers.

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1. Keywords, Keywords, Keywords!

Keywords are important, but they should take a back seat to your topic. Match your chosen keywords to your content. Recent changes in the search engines only magnify this point.

If the reader wants to know about oranges, don’t tell him about apples. Tell him everything you know about oranges and use ‘orange’ related keywords.

To find the right topic, consider your site’s organization. Where you will put the content? Why is the reader in a specific area of your site?

Want to know a bit more? Copywriter Glenn Murray recently made an excellent video on how to organize keywords and content topics.

In the end, a logical order with the right topics and keywords will satisfy both search engines and people.

Oh, and before I forget, stop keyword stuffing! It sounds terrible, looks bad, the search engines can tell, and YES people without SEO experience can tell. Focus on placement, and forget density!

2. Failing To Target The Right Audience

A majority of SEO copywriting has nothing to do with search engine optimization; it focuses on your target client. In fact, the more you know about your audience the better. What’s your customer’s main priority? What do they do for fun? What do they know? What problem can you solve? Answer these questions, and you’ll end up with perfect copy every time.

Stay current. People want to read about what’s going on right now or discuss relevant issues. Social media and search tools such as Google Insights are full of hot topics. Be sure to use them!

3. Providing The Same Old Thing

If you want to market an eBook to advanced Twitter users, basic topics such as ‘how to use Twitter’ are overdone and a waste of time. It certainly won’t make you sound like an authority. Instead, improve the user’s experience and make them a better tweeter with advanced topics such as ‘how to increase your retweet rates’.

If you want to add common information to your content, link to a quality source. On a commercial site, get creative with the basics (offer an eBook, or create a database). This makes it optional for the reader and leaves the reader with nothing but pure, juicy tidbits.

Bottom line: be unique, give the reader an ‘ah’ or a ‘D’oh’ moment, and prove why you are a superior source.

4. Using The Wrong Resources

Wikipedia is NOT a trusted resource! If you’ve made this mistake, you are in good company, but don’t repeat it. Only use Wikipedia to get a general idea of a topic rather than collecting facts.

Incorrect statements cause you to lose all credibility with your clients. In some cases, you could even do harm. Imagine your doctor consulting Wikipedia before you’re supposed to go under the knife. Would you feel comfortable?

Use several resources and always check them before you write your content. Wolfram seems promising in the straight facts department, but I would still check them.

5. Not Showing Off Good Content To The Fullest Extent

For website copy, use content to add value to your products. For example, use it to get into your reader’s mind and show them what life will be like if they buy your do-it-all new gadget. But, don’t fall into the trap of listing the features. Instead, show how the client will feel and think once they try your gadget.

If you write blog posts or articles, don’t write them and leave them sit. Tweet them, link to them, use social media, refer others to it, and treat good content like it matters. The difference is astounding!

And, here’s a freebie:

6. Deal with the negatives for a product or service before someone else does. This keeps you in control of the situation and it sounds a lot more honest and credible (not that it isn’t!). For example, if you price a product low, why is it so cheap? What are its real downfalls?

Be honest, but don’t say ‘I make a few new points that other’s don’t’, say ‘I have been in the industry for 20 years and have learned the finer points that come only with experience’. The trick is how you address those negatives!

Content involves more than throwing words at the page. Great content brings people, products, search engines, and your business together all in one place.

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Perhaps you’ve pondered the same?

When people I respect started singing the praises of Twitter, I decided to give it a go. At first I just didn’t get it. However, after a short while I was shocked at the level of access to high profile individuals I was able to achieve.

This article reveals how bestselling authors and business professionals use Twitter to grow their businesses and reveals ideas you can employ to achieve Twitter success.

In fact, I used Twitter (and LinkedIn) to source much of what you see here!
First, What is Twitter Again?

“Twitter is instant messaging made available to the public,” stated talk show host and author Hugh Hewitt.

I think that’s a fair starting point. I’ve heard others call Twitter a micro-blogging platform.

Here’s what you need to know. According to the State of the Twittersphere report, each day 5 to 10 thousand new people join Twitter. Current estimates of total users top out around 5 million. That’s a lot of opportunity.

Twitter allows you to post updates (called Tweets) as often as you want (and limited to 140 characters). When you follow other people on Twitter, you see their tweets. When they follow you, they see your tweets.

It’s a constant stream of communication. The good news is you can turn it on or off as often as you like. Twitter also keeps a public record of all updates, which can be mined with Twitter Search.
Why High-Profile People Use Twitter

Twitter is not just a fad. When very high profile folks begin evangelizing Twitter, it’s worth closer examination. Here’s what some of those gurus told me:

Duct Tape Marketing founder John Jantsch identified three big advantages of Twitter, “(1) I get great insight when I ask questions, (2) let’s face it, I get traffic and (3) people on Twitter spread my thoughts to new places.”

Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos.com said, “We’ve found that Twitter has been a great way for us to connect on a more personal level with our employees and customers. We use it to help build our brand, not drive direct sales. It’d be like asking how does providing a telephone number for customer service translate into new business when they are mostly non-sales-related calls. In the long term, Twitter helps drive repeat customers and word of mouth, but we’re not looking to it as a way of driving immediate sales.”

Bestselling author David Meerman Scott said, “I have personally connected with hundreds of people I otherwise wouldn’t have, and I booked an interview on NPR and a big daily newspaper using Twitter.”

Copyblogger’s own Brian Clark said, “Twitter Search is an amazing way to see what people are saying about your products or services. For example, I’ll do searches for Thesis Theme and people will be asking questions about our WordPress Theme. I’ll use the reply function to answer the question, which has led to direct sales. Plus, my answer creates awareness of Thesis for others that follow me. It’s a form of constructive promotion.”

Be sure to check out this Business Week article that surveyed 18 CEOs and how they’re using Twitter to help their businesses.
Practical Ways Twitter Can Help Your Business

This is where it gets interesting. A lot of people are doing some very innovate things with Twitter. Here’s some of their stories.

The Twitter Plan

Cindy King, an international sales specialist, saw a huge boost in business inquires by implementing a strategic Twitter plan.

“Following the right people on Twitter was key. There are some people very gifted at building relationships on Twitter. As I followed these online community builders, I realized that some of them are also excellent direct response copywriters. They get their Twitter followers to take action,” said King.

“Light bulbs went off, and I spent a weekend putting together a tweet marketing plan and entered in 6 weeks worth of tweets, 5 a day, using TweetLater. I used a mindmap, created categories, varied times on tweets and used BUDurls so I could track results and improve my tweet plan the next time around. That was a month ago,” explained King.

When King finds a spare minute between projects, she logs into Twitter and watches what folks are talking about. When she Tweets, about 90 percent of the time she presents useful information and resources to her followers. The remaining tweets are surveys and questions. Following this strategy, King saw an 800 percent increase in inquiries about her business after she setup her Twitter campaign.

Getting In Front of High Profile People

B2B copywriter Terri Rylander took a much different approach. At first she was very skeptical of Twitter. “I looked at it but couldn’t figure out why people would continually send out messages about the size of a text message, unless they were a teenager. Twitter was for sending updates they said. I don’t have time for updates, and besides, who would care?” said Rylander.

She later came across a peer in her industry that was using Twitter and suggested Rylander follow her on Twitter. “That’s when I discovered Twitter as a business tool. I’ve been in my particular niche for over 10 years and know who the players are (though they don’t know me). When I checked who she was following on Twitter, there they all were! It read like a “Who’s Who” list.”

Rylander joined Twitter and began following and interacting with the people she respected. “Other than a cold call on the phone or e-mail, I would never have the chance to get my name in front of vendors, industry analysts, and industry experts. I’ve had a number of Twitter conversations that have also led to personal conversations.”

To stay top of mind with experts, she offers interesting links, responds to tweets, and posts her thoughts for conversation at least a few times a day.

Getting Traffic and Leads

Pam O’Neil, VP of Marketing at BreakingPoint said, “Twitter has all but replaced our PR agency as a large percentage of our followers are press and analysts. A writer for ZDNet wrote about us and linked to us based on something we tweeted and that resulted in a huge spike in web traffic and at least one deal with a major service provider.”

Mike Damphousse of Green Leads said, “Twitter is new to us. That said, in a few short weeks we’ve had definite increase in all sorts of traffic. Out of the normal inbound leads, the number has increased 15% and two of the inbounds are now active pipeline opportunities. We’ve found one extremely valuable partner relationship. We are also building PR relationships, although finding the contacts is a bit of a chore.”

Are you beginning to see the potential here?
A Few Tools to Help Your Twitter Experience

Twitter has a whole world of available support applications you can employ to gain the most of the service for your business. Here’s a few of my favorites:

TwitterFox: This Firefox web browser plugin allows you to view Tweets within your web browser (in a popup menu). This is very handy and eliminates the need to constantly go to Twitter.com.

TweetLater: This powerful service allows you to schedule tweets (much like you would schedule emails). Another very powerful feature is the ability to receive email digests of keyword activity in the Tweetosphere. This allows you to join a conversation or track topics and trends.

Ping.fm: If you have accounts with many services, such as LinkedIn and Facebook, this amazing site allows you to post updates across ALL of your social media sites in one single step.

Twitter for Facebook: If you are on Facebook, this application forwards your Twitter updates directly to Facebook as status updates.

And just in case you get addicted to Twitter, here’s some advice from one of the leading authorities on Twitter. Chris Brogan says, “Most people who see Twitter the first time either flat-out ‘get it,’ or they say, ‘why bother?’ Here’s what people miss. They believe one should read every single update that rolls across your screen of choice. Don’t. Just let it roll past like a stream.”

So what are you waiting for? Go check out Twitter and report back here with your experience.

Has Twitter already helped your business? If so, tell us your story.

About the Author: Michael Stelzner is the bestselling author of Writing White Papers: How to Capture Readers and Keep Them Engaged. You can follow Michael here on Twitter or check out his latest project here.

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