Click here to read this article on multichannel marketing.
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, Facebook , YouTube and more. Every day, it seems hard to avoid the buzz about social media -- who's on it, what they're doing and what the latest trend is. Through all the chatter, it can be difficult for many business owners to know whether they should get involved, where to start, and how to launch their own social media campaign. To continue reading this article on Social Media and Holiday Sales click here.]]>
Unfortunately, two recent studies on SMB adoption of social media marketing do little to clear up this confusion.
A recent online survey by Internet2Go and MerchantCircle assessed small business marketing practices among members of the MerchantCircle member base. It found that out of 2,500 responses, 45.2% say they have a Facebook page for their business and 46% have a presence on Twitter - in the form of either a business or personal account or both.
To continue reading this article on SMB's use of social media click here.
]]>While the majority of consumers will identify Black Friday weekend as the time to really go for that product that you have always wanted, new research has shown that Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales are actually quite similar, meaning that shoppers shouldn’t separate the two this year in terms of online and offline sales.
As some of you might know, Cyber Monday is the Monday which follows Black Friday. You might often associate Black Friday with a complete range of sales both in-store and online, while emphasis for Cyber Monday is usually placed solely on online sales.
A recent study by the Yahoo Insights team has concluded that online sales on Black Friday were not too far behind sales that occured on Cyber Monday. Even more interesting, the study reveals that online retailers experienced a greater percentage increase in conversions on Black Friday than Cyber Monday. Continue reading article on online sales
]]>Used properly, social networking tools like Facebook, Twitter and MySpace can generate leads, create community with existing customers, and provide information on products and services. Great advice from the experts over at MetroplexInteractive
You might think Twitter, Facebook and MySpace are only for your fifteen year old tween texting wildly on her cell phone, but these social networking sites have become important tools for large, respectable companies in generating business leads and extending their brand.
Facebook currently has over 100,000,000 members who link to each other through known friends and to new friends through suggestions from existing friends. Though primarily for personal profiles – many companies have discovered that creating a company profile enables existing and perspective customers to learn about your company’s services, products and to receive news blasts as you update your status. To continue reading this article on how social networking can increase sales click here.
Road warriors may enjoy virtually unlimited choices when it comes to finding a place to work, but by no means are those options all equal: wifi availability, noise levels and even the quality of the coffee served can all have a big impact on a mobile worker's productivity.
That's where WorkSnug comes in. The mobile application uses augmented reality to show users what workspaces are nearby along with reviews of their offerings. The WorkSnug team has gathered hundreds of spots—from small cafes to formal co-working spaces—and reviewed them on such factors as wifi access, power supply, noise levels, community feel and—yes—even the coffee. Mobile workers simply launch the application on their iPhone 3GS and use the phone to scan what's around them. The application then displays the information it has about what's nearby; there's also an option for users to add reviews of their own. Click here to continue reading about the iPhone App for Road Warriors
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It's no secret that record labels are searching for new ways of doing business. Earlier this year we spotted Groove Armada's distribution partnership with Bacardi. Now Mariah Carey is joining the fun, orchestrating several sponsorships for her latest album, 'Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel'.
Carey recorded the album in the Bahamas, so sponsorship by the Bahamas Board of Tourism was a natural fit. As was Elizabeth Arden, which sells Carey's Forever perfume. Other sponsors include Métier De Beauté beauty cosmetics and Angel champagne. Sponsorship comes in the form of a small booklet that accompanies the album, filled with glossy advertisements that promote a Mariah Carey-esque lifestyle. The content of the 'mini-magazine' will be written by Elle's editorial staff, and the magazine will be distributed to the first 1.5 million buyers of the CD, which comes out later this month. According to an article in The Sunday Times, the sponsorship reportedly covered the cost of making the album (GBP 4 million) album. Click here to continue reading about Advertising Sponsored Mariah Carey album
]]>The 34% of online retailers who say social marketing helps to increase sales participate in five or more forms of it—the most common being social network pages, customer ratings and reviews, and blogs—compared to fewer than four by retailers who don’t tie sales growth to social media, according to the State of Retailing Online 2009 report.
The report, which was conducted by Forrester Research Inc. on behalf of Shop.org, the online retailing division of the National Retail Federation, an industry trade group, notes that most retailers regard customer ratings and reviews as useful and directly correlated to sales.
Continue reading this article on social media
]]>The introduction of the Wave will evolve social networking to social marketing and allow marketers to better target and effectively encourage customer behavior such as communication, collaboration, interaction and ideally, purchase.
The Wave builds on the concept of cloud computing. Through cloud computing, a single application can be delivered through a Web browser to thousands of customers using a multitenant architecture. One of the best-known examples among enterprise applications is Salesforce.com. In its basic form, a cloud allows multiple users to access applications hosted on a hub instead of having the application installed on their PC, removing the need for a laptop to have to support anything other than connection to the internet. To understand in real-life terms, it’s like a chess game created as an application, hosted on a Wave, where users play against each other in real time with the ability to view the Wave in the present, as well as activities that happened previously in that same Wave.
Continue reading this article on social media and Google Wave
]]>We discovered examples of these ads on Monday while searching for a Verizon Wireless store. You should also take note -- this is the first time advertisements have appeared within one of the iPhones default apps rather than something we've downloaded for free or purchased from the App Store. Our search for "Verizon" resulted in the following list view: Click here to continue reading this article on Google Adsense and the iPhone. Click here to continue reading this article on Google Adsense and the iPhone.
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Last year we reported on Bin Ends, who gave the public the opportunity to take part in wine tastings via Twitter. Last month, a London restaurant got in on the social media act by crowdsourcing their wine list selection. L'Anima, Time Out's pick for Best New Italian Restaurant 2009, hosted a tasting for six wine experts, including wine writer Anthony Rose, wine vlogger Denise Medrano and resident sommelier Gal Zohar. The tasters formed three teams to sample Zohar's short list and settle on the final selection. "Unfortunately," said the sommelier on his blog, "these enthusiasts, rarely agree with each other." That's where the public came in.
Continue reading this article on social media
Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn. There’s no doubt that social media marketing is all the rage – and everyone is either talking about doing it or already engaged in these social channels.
People want to know how to make social media work for their business, how to use it to generate leads and obtain more sales. And social media can help you do this, allowing the proper research and strategies are in place. But it can’t do it alone.
Optimizing your entire digital presence
There’s no doubt that social media is the shiny new marketing strategy. And it does and can produce results. But it needs a little help from those tried-and-true tactics that have proven to work with measurable results. Click here to continue reading on social media
Yes, I’m talking about search engine optimization, pay per click and online display advertising. And more important, I’m talking about the power of integration.
Click here to read more: http://www.adweek.com/aw/content_display/news/agency/e3i505f5fdeedc76b42ca9d8d4695e83c6c
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