If your company wants to have a nicely-designed custom landing tab for non-fans on Facebook, you’ll now need at least 10,000 fans or be working with an advertising account manager (you’ve got a large ad budget).

Facebook used to offer businesses the option to custom-design a tab especially for non-fans. As the page administrator, you had the option to show non-fans the Wall or the custom tab. Many businesses used a custom tab for promotions or to invite people to become fans.

To see an example of a custom Facebook tab, click over to REI’s Facebook page. If you’re not already a fan, you’ll notice that rather than going to the Wall, you go directly to a custom-designed tab.

Rather than leveling the playing field by letting small or local businesses have the same options as large companies, Facebook has made the decision to force small businesses to spend lots of money on ads to have the option of a custom-designed landing tab.

Read more at the AllFacebook.com blog.

Will this affect your company’s Facebook marketing strategy? Leave a comment and tell us how.

I’ve written quite a bit about conversion rates on this blog, but the fact is that most people that visit an e-commerce web site have no intention of buying. They are window shopping. Optimizing your web site to increase your conversion rate is very important, but you can’t forget about optimizing for the 70-80% of people or more that are “window shoppers.”

The mistake that a lot of online retailers make is to not engage the vast majority of their visitors — the ones that don’t intend to buy.

Yes, you can entice a small percentage of these window shoppers to buy with offers like “buy one, get one,” coupons and free shipping, but what about the remaining lot?

The answer is engagement. If you can engage window shoppers, you can get them to continually interact with your company, and when they are ready to buy, your site will be top-of mind.

So how to you engage window shoppers? Here’s how.

Make your e-mail newsletter signup more visible

If you don’t have an e-mail newsletter, you really need to start one. Next, make sure your e-mail signup form is visible.

Many web sites have e-mail signup forms at the bottom of their sites. While that’s an acceptable place for the form, why not duplicate the form and place it higher up on the page where people can see it right away? By making the form more visible and writing a good call to action (like “Get sales and exclusive tips by signing up for our e-newsletter”), you’ll increase your subscriber rate.

This probably goes without saying, but you need to publish your e-mail newsletter regularly and pack it full of good content. Remember, it’s about keeping prospective customers engaged.

Write a blog (regularly)

No matter what you’re selling, you should publish a blog with RSS feed. Other than product inventory and pricing, the typical e-commerce site is rather static. By adding a blog, you’ll freshen the site by regularly adding content that complements the products you’re selling.

The goal in blogging is twofold. First, you want to generate some credibility for your company (see the next section on social media for some promotional tips). Second, you’re giving prospective customers some good information and keeping your company top-of-mind. Also, good search engine optimization is often a by-product of a well-written blog.

Engage in social media

Admittedly, social media isn’t for everyone. But if you, your marketing manager or other staff in your company are already using Facebook, Twitter, You Tube, etc., then you need to get them involved.

I won’t go into all of the options that social media offers (I may go into that in a future post), but for starters, you can create a discussion group on a Facebook Fan page. You can tweet latest blog posts, new products and sales on Twitter. You can make how-to videos for a You Tube channel and embed them in your blog. There are many more opportunities, so be creative.

In conclusion

Here are some questions for consideration within your company:

• How can my company test positioning of newsletter signup forms?
• Can I offer people in my company the opportunity to write blog posts to distribute the workload?
• Who in my organization can I tap to help brainstorm customer engagement ideas? (Don’t be afraid to ask entry-level employees for their advice!)
• How could I make a blog more visible?
• How can my company use social media in ways my competitors are not?

Lately, I’ve been thinking and reading a lot about marketing lead generation. For many companies, the economy has really caused slumping sales. Some are responding by stepping up their sales efforts, and the most intelligent companies are improving their web sites to generate more leads.

There’s one simple yet often overlooked step your company can take to generate more leads from your web site: include a contact form on key pages. On our site, key pages are the pages that talk about the web consulting services we offer and, not surprisingly, the contact page.

Companies typically have a single contact link or button at the top or bottom of their web sites. But why make your readers hunt for a place to contact you? By putting a short, simple lead generation form beside or at the bottom of your web pages, you’re giving people an easy way to make contact.

Many web designers will argue that you don’t need the form — that it “junks” up a design. If that’s the case, ask them to create a second version of a key web page (perhaps a whitepaper download, a sales page, a product page, etc.) with a form included and use a testing tool like Google’s Website Optimizer to test the page with the form against the page without. This head-to-head comparison will reveal which is more effective.

In nearly every case I’ve seen, the page with a form will generate more leads than a page without a form. There are exceptions, such as requiring that someone fill out a form before downloading, viewing or listening to content.

By placing lead generation forms on key pages of your company web site, you might just be able to thrive during this recession.

A while back, I stopped promoting my personal Facebook page. I did this because I received friend requests from random people I “knew” from Twitter or networking, but weren’t actually friends of mine.

What’s worse is that I kept getting cause and fan requests for things I’d never heard of.

One challenge of social media participation is that it blurs the line between business and personal activity. I now expect that using social media sites like Facebook opens me up to friend requests and fan requests from people I don’t know or for businesses/causes I’m not familiar with.

As we all become immersed in the social web, where social proof (number of Facebook friends, number of fans on your Facebook Fan Page, Twitter followers, etc.) is seemingly important, we need to proceed with caution because being too pushy is likely to impact people’s perception of our companies or causes.

If you’re too persistent, here’s what people may be thinking:

If I’ve never heard of your company, your band, your clothing line, your cause, so I’m unlikely to become a fan. Don’t even ask.

You might think I like your business because I know you, but that’s a dangerous assumption to make.

Just because we grew up together doesn‚Äôt mean that I‚Äôll support your cause, especially if I’ve never heard of it.

On the other hand, you still want Facebook fans. What can you do?

Rather than sending out a mass message to all Facebook friends asking people to become a fan of your business or cause, send invitations to people that have enough experience with your business or cause to evaluate whether they’d like to be a fan.

If you support a cause that your friends may be unfamiliar with, send them a message telling them that you support the cause and ask them to learn more if they are interested. Be sure to place a”Become a Fan” link on your “About your company” or “About your organization” page on your web site, so that when people do seek information, they have a logical next step.

Some questions to ask within your organization

• How can you generate buzz and interest to grow your Facebook fan base organically?
• How can you integrate Facebook efforts with other marketing channels?

Lots of businesses are using social media these days to promote their products and services. From Facebook to Twitter and more, businesses are embracing social media. Many small, local businesses are starting to understand the impact social media can have on their bottom lines, yet many others are skeptical.

I recently interviewed Monica Horsley, owner of By Invitation Only, a local business here in the Richmond area. I discovered Monica and her business on Twitter, and like many small business owners that rely on attracting local foot traffic into her retail location, she is using social media to her advantage.

Monica Horsley

Owner,
By Invitation Only

4017 Lauderdale Drive
Richmond, VA 23233
Web site
Twitter
Facebook

Number of employees: 5
Year established: purchased in 2003

Q: What social media channels are you currently using and what are your goals for having a presence on each?

We’re on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and we have a blog.

On Facebook, we keep customers aware of new products, sales, and special events. We also highlight gift and paper ideas and suggestions.

Our goals with Twitter are similar to Facebook but also to engage in a dialogue with current customers, potential customers and others in my industry. In addition, Twitter is a great tool for keeping up with new products and trends in the gift and stationery industry and I can get key information about upcoming trade shows and events.

I have a LinkedIn account but do not use this to its fullest potential, but my goal is to be more active in the new year.

We use a blog for several different reasons. First, we let customers know of new products. We also provide etiquette advice, talk about current trends and give people a reason to want to come into our store and shop.

Q: What are your expectations from spending time using social media to promote your business?

At first I just did it because other people in my industry did it and I was curious as to what this “Twitter Thing” was that everyone was talking about. But very quickly I found it interesting. At first I used it more for personal use and to gain info about the community and as I learned more about it I started using it to promote by business. My hope is that when people need my services they will think of By Invitation Only.

Someone once told me, “When I saw you on Twitter I thought why would anyone need to shop at a store like that,” but when he realized he needed to send out holiday cards for his business he knew exactly where to go!

Q: How does your involvement in social media help you differentiate your business from other local companies that might sell the same types of products?

Well that’s one reason I dove into it so quickly. I wanted to be the first in town to figure it out and use it to get my name out there. Now there are a few others here and there but I think I am different because I engage in dialogue with local Richmonders. I don’t just tell them why our store is the best, I give the reasons to trust us and to know that I really do care about my customers and the service I provide. It is not all about self promotion, it is really about creating dialogue and relationships that transcend outside of social media and I think I show enough of my personality so people feel they know a little about me.

Q: What impact does social media have on your business as compared to membership in a Chamber of Commerce, Rotary, BNI group or other networking?

Rotary is my passion but I am involved in Rotary because of my desire to help the local and international communities. I have been very lucky and have been trusted by many local Rotarians to use me for their paper needs.

Honestly I have gotten more customers from Rotary and social media and I truly believe it is because of the relationships that are made.

I don’t participate in BNI because of the time commitment and when I have visited I just haven’t felt it is the right fit for me.

I think being a member of the Chamber, RMA and other organizations are important to help gain info that will help my business but I haven’t found them to necessarily bring me customers.

Q: How many meaningful connections would you say you made via social media in 2009?

There are so many it is getting hard to track. I hired someone to do my graphics and printing that I met on Twitter. I found a new tech guy that bailed me out of a computer crisis on Twitter. I have engaged in great dialogue with local media that has resulted in relationships that have and will continue to get me press.

I lost count of the new customers I have gotten from Twitter in the past 4 months. I would say that we got over 75 new personal and corporate customers during the holiday season.

I have also made contacts with people who write local blogs that now have put an ad for my store on their blog. I have gotten involved with a Food Drive and a Coat Drive with DowntownShortPump.com that has allowed me to support the community as well as get my name out there.

Q: I noticed on Twitter that invited a local writing club to meet at your retail location. Are there any other ways that you’ve used Twitter to engage the local community?

I did invite Write Club to meet at my location. It introduced 20 people to my store that have never been here before and I learned more about what they do.

I tweet for Innsbrook Rotary (I am their President) to let the community know about all the great things Rotary does.

Local author Kate Hall of Richmondmom.com and I used Twitter to promote her book signing at my store.

I also plan to look for other service opportunities on Twitter and Facebook like the Coat Drive and Food Drive, and I will continue to keep a close eye on all local feeds to see how else I can engage with others in the community.

Q: Have you run any promotions exclusively on social media channels? If so, what have the results been?

We have done a “mention Twitter or Facebook to receive a discount (i.e. 10% off).” I don’t narrow this to just 1 day because you usually need a reason to shop at my store or need my products. I have found just limiting it to one day does not result in high numbers of users but we have been really successful in getting people to say “I follow you on Twitter.”

During the holidays I extended our Early Bird Specials an extra week for Faceboook Fans and Twitter Followers and this resulted in several people taking advantage of these savings.

Q: Do you have a budget for social media campaigns (i.e. monthly spend on a Facebook ad, etc.)?

Currently I do not spend money on social media, except to attend SMCRVA (Social Media Club of Richmond). I am not opposed to doing this, but I haven’t up to this point.

Q: For contrast, do you advertise in traditional media channels like radio, TV or newspapers?

I do a lot of print advertisement in many local newspapers and magazines, including Premier Bride, The Wedding Guide, Richmond Magazine, R Bride, Style Weekly, Belle, Richmond Times-Dispatch, West End’s Best, Richmond Family Magazine and Richmond Grid. I also advertise with the web sites www.downtownshortpump.com and www.richmondmom.com.

Q: How much time do you spend on social media activities daily?

It varies but I would say approximately an hour a day (my husband would say hours). I use my blackberry for Twitter probably 75% of the time so it is just here and there throughout the day as opposed to an hour straight. When I write a blog or in depth things on Facebook I obviously spend a little more time. But I have found to be successful in social media you have to be constant and engaging and they requires a little time each day.

Q: What advice would you give to other local retail business owners to help get them started with social media?

I have actually been asked to speak to local businesses about social media and at first I thought, me? I don’t know what I am doing. I don’t know the “technical stuff‚” but I know how to relate to customers. So that is what I share with other business owners. I tell them the key is to be consistent and show your personality (just not too much personal stuff). There is a difference between personality and personal info. Also I give them little tips like following people back (especially if they are in your industry or local) also I tell them to use Twitter at different times of the day, not always in the morning or night; this will help capture different audiences.

Q: In 2010, do you see yourself participating more in social media, less or the same amount and why? Is there something you plan to try that you didn’t do in 2009?

I do plan to continue. My goals are to blog on a more consistent basis and to keep my Facebook Fan page updated with new and pertinent information. Overall my goal is to work on integrating all social networks to maximize the results.

Q: Is there anything else you’d like to share?

I think the main thing is to say that I truly love social media and not just for business gain but for personal reasons. I love to hear what is going on in the city, where the best new restaurants are, where everyone is going Saturday night, etc. I have gained some relationships that I will have forever and that is what life is all about!

I’m always looking for ways to make clients’ promotions and own our work stand out amidst the clutter. This means thinking differently than most other marketers out there.

I think back to e-mail marketing’s adolescence when we figured out that creative, subject lines and the send time could be tested. Marketers are starting to do the same with social media. In fact, I’ve been testing Twitter message structure, subject and send time for four months now using a URL shortening service that measures clicks. Indeed, I’ve found some patterns.

Then I read a blog post on Search Engine Land called “Timing is Crucial to Maximize Exposure with Social Media.” While the post centers around the search engine optimization benefits of posting on social bookmarking sites Digg and Reddit, I’ve found that the patterns are similar on Twitter.

This excerpt from the article sums it up:

“If you want to share a great piece of information or resource over Twitter or Facebook updates consider what time of day you submit it. Weigh out noise vs. lower activity to make the best decision on when to shout your message.”

Something to consider, I’d say. If you’re using social media to promote your business, consider when you post messages. When is your intended audience online? Do you want more exposure or more interaction?

With all the talk about “social” this-and-that, you’re probably wondering if I made up the term “social proof.” While I can’t claim to have coined the phrase, I can tell you that using social proof in your business can dramatically increase your sales.

So what exactly is social proof?

In a nutshell, social proof is our tendency as humans to follow the crowd. We tend to rely on other people to guide our actions. Some examples of social proof include:

• Testimonials from real customers for your product or service
• Comments on blog posts
• Recommendations from well-known experts or celebrity endorsements (the “Oprah effect”)
• Customer ratings and reviews on ecommerce sites
• Customers participating in your business’ brand experience on Facebook Fan Pages
• #followfriday recommendations on Twitter (for you non-Twitterbugs, that’s when someone recommends that you follow someone else on Twitter)
• The number of Twitter followers, LinkedIn connections, RSS subscribers, blog readers, e-mail subscribers that you have
• Awards you’ve been nominated for or won
• Mentions on other web sites/social bookmarking sites
• Professional certifications or affiliations
• The granddaddy of them all — the referral

How do you get social proof?

Unlike a top 5 spot on Google Adwords, you can’t buy social proof — it must be built over time. The most clever way to build social proof is to invite your customers to interact with your business in new and interesting ways.

Threadless encourages their customers to design t-shirts that the company produces and sells. When the shirts sell, they give some of the money back to the designer. They allow customers to vote on the designs that they like the best, so the customer is ultimately making the decision about what the company sells.

Naturally, designers are more willing to promote Threadless if their shirt design has been produced and sold on the site. You know — the “My tee design was just picked up by Threadless” Facebook status or the “Vote for my newest t-shirt design at Threadless” tweet — help the company go viral. The customers do the marketing for them.¬† Brilliant, right?

In recent talks to job seekers, I’ve been telling them to use whatever means they are comfortable with to build some credibility and notoriety.¬† The unemployed project manager could write an e-book and supporting blog about what project management methodology works best in different company cultures and send links to hiring managers and other collegues. They might use the blog and other social media to promote the e-book, and as more people read and share the book, then job offers will find them.

Do this successfully and you’ve achieved marketing nirvana — people seeking out your business’ product or service. Make your product or service the best they’ve experienced and they’ll tell others, effectively marketing it for you!

Making the most of social proof

• Define and know your audience and what’s important to them.
• Work to be the best at what you do or offer the best product.
• Be passionate about your product or service. Clients and customers get a good feeling when they do business with upbeat people.
• Find ways to get feedback from your customers.
• Find ways to publicize client successes or ways customers are using the products you sell.
• Create a community for clients or customers to interact with each other, and participate in it.

Finally, forget return on investment (ROI). As MarketingFactor.com so correctly states it, “The goal of social marketing is not to generate sales directly from Squidoo, Facebook or YouTube; the goal is to generate something far more valuable for your business: social proof.”

Build social proof and sales will naturally follow.

eMarketer today published a piece called “Social Network Marketing Expands Sphere” with some encouraging business news about social networks.

While businesses are still discovering ways to achieve marketing goals with social networks, it’s evident that social networks are versatile marketing tools. eMarketer senior analyst Debra Aho Williamson noted that “The beauty of social networks is that they are a place where nearly any marketing goal can be achieved, with nearly any marketing tactic.”

A May 2009 study disputes conventional wisdom that social networking is only person-to-person. 52% of people follow or have become a fan of a company on social networks, and 46% have said something positive about companies on social networks.

Social networks haven’t shown much promise (yet) in generating direct sales. 46% of social media marketing professionals say that social networks are not effective at increasing online sales. Still, increased direct sales from social networks may eventually occur, especially considering Facebook’s upcoming virtual currency and 1-800-FLOWERS’ commerce integration with Facebook.

My guess is that many of these social media marketing professionals may be overlooking the indirect effects of brand-building. Several studies cite that “the stronger a brand’s social media presence, the better the brand performed‚ whether measured in conversations or in financial performance.”

If you’ve never heard Peter Shankman speak in person, well, you should. Not only is he a dynamic speaker with a keen sense of humor, but he’s got a lot of great things to say, especially about succeeding at social media.

I had the opportunity to watch his keynote address at Affiliate Summit East 2009 today (you can watch the 1+ hour keynote here), and made the following notes:

“We have entered the age of immediacy.”
Things online, especially in the social media space, happen very quickly. I get a lot of news from Twitter long before it’s reported on TV or radio. Don’t believe social media is immediate? Within 10 seconds of posting my weekly bike route this week on Twitter, 5 people had already clicked to see the route map.

“Your reputation is on the line. You have the chance to screw up to a large audience in a short time.”
With social media, once you post something, it’s out there for the world to read. Some social networks (Facebook comes to mind) let you edit or delete a post, but chances are someone has already read it by the time you edit or delete it.

“If you are running a social media campaign, you must talk, listen & respond.”
It’s not enough to “push” content to social networks. You have to engage by listening and responding to others.

“Social media is about trust. Doing something nice gets you remembered, not just recalled.”
As you start conversations on social networks, people form trust bonds with you. The way to separate yourself our your company on social networks is to engage and to give.¬† Whether it’s information, being helpful in some way or just making a positive impression, doing something nice for others helps you stand out.

“Want to sell more? Learn how to write!”
You can achieve brevity by learning to write. Persuasion happens online through copy. I recommend Copyblogger.com if you want to read more about learning to write.

Shankman’s Rules for Social Media

1. Be transparent. Transparency leads to trust.
2. Be relevant. Make people need your messages.
3. Brevity. Attention span is now just 2.7 seconds (or the time is takes to read 140 characters). Just say it.
4. Be top of mind. Let other people do your PR for you.

It seems that many companies are catching up with current web marketing trends. Rather than being 5-6 years behind the curve, they are only a year or two behind the curve in some cases. In fact, many companies I work with are starting to think beyond the web site — that is, thinking about how to promote their brand in other interactive channels.

So how do you think beyond the web site? Here’s are some things to consider…

“Push” content.

Your web site might be well-written, your products might offer a zoom view, spin view or video demo, and your client case studies might be spit-shined and polished. But if no one sees this content, your web site isn’t working for you.

Your business needs a strategy to “push” content to other channels and niches — ones that don’t require to actively seek your content. Social media — like Twitter, Facebook, FriendFeed and YouTube — is the first thing that comes to mind, but how about pushing blog posts, latest sales, etc. through RSS? You might consider sending a monthly e-mail newsletter (e-commerce retailers, you better be doing this!), dropping press releases about new products, services or projects, or even distributing a podcast on iTunes. You may also want to post to Craigslist.

Getting your content in front of as many people as possible is the idea, and pushing content through as many channels as possible is the solution.

Integrate with social media.

I touched on this concept above, but social media is a great way to put your content in front of readers.

Let’s face it, I don’t blog for fun. I blog so that prospective customers will read it and contact us to figure out how we can apply what we discuss on the blog to their business.¬† In order to get readers, though, I have to put it in front of as many people as possible. To do this, I post links to Twitter (follow me on Twitter here), LinkedIn (connect with me here) and Facebook (find me here). As a result, about 40% of referral traffic (not from search engines) comes from these three social media sites.

Every blog post I write also has easy ways for readers to share my blog posts on social media outlets (see the buttons at the bottom of this blog post). Also, when I post links on Twitter, some people “re-tweet” them, sharing my link with their network, which required no effort on my part.

Large companies are doing it, too. 1-800-Flowers.com recently announced that they had conducted their first transaction within their Facebook Fan Page (not on their web site). Shopping widgets with full transactional capability will become more prevalent in the coming months and years.

Embrace the mobile web.

It’s no secret that more people are using their mobile devices to browse the web and interact with your content. How does your web site look on a mobile device?

As I see it, there are really three levels of sophistication when it comes to a mobile web site.

1. Carefully coding a site so that content is readable when read on a device. We typically opt for this most simple option as most companies we work with don’t yet want to pay for a mobile version of their web site. If you want to learn about our techniques, you can read our past blog post called “How to code a web site that’s usable on mobile devices.”
2. Include a handheld stylesheet on your site to format content correctly for mobile devices. This second technique is slightly more sophisticated than the first, but is not a separate mobile site.
3. The most sophisticated technique is to create a separate mobile version of your web site. The idea here is to buy the .mobi version of your web address, then develop a site specifically for mobile browsers. When someone visits your web site, the web site automatically recognizes whether they are on a mobile device or computer screen and routes them to the appropriate version.

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While each of the above techniques isn’t right for every business, you can see that there are many ways to think beyond the traditional web site. In the end, the reason we do this stuff is to promote our businesses to a wider audience, and many companies take it a step further and use interactive technologies to develop relationships with their customers, clients and markets.

I’m sure there are many more ways to “think beyond the website,” and I’d like to hear your ideas. Leave a comment below!

Shrewd business owners know that to survive a downturn, you have to cut unnecessary costs, advertise to gain visibility and get referrals. In tough economic times, referrals are more important than ever. That’s where social networking comes in.

No doubt about it, word-of-mouth is a powerful marketing tool. Networking at the local retail merchants association, chamber of commerce or other networking organizations can produce revenue during downturns. Investing time in online networking can reach many more people than attending the face-to-face events. (Note: face-to-face has it’s place — but networking online can be done in your pajamas or at the office, a little at a time.)

MarketingCharts.com recently reported that social networking can help retailers (it can help business owners of any kind) weather the economic storm.

While participating in social media can be time-consuming (more like addicting), it’s free and can open up a whole new marketing channel. Here are some ways to build credibility and engage people using social networking.

Build “social proof” and credibility by engaging.

The number of fans your business has on your Facebook fan page or the number of followers you have on Twitter says a lot about the credibility of your business. If you have a loyal customer base that believes in your business, they’re likely to tell others. People want to be where other people are, and if your business is popular, then you just might earn customers that way.

Build and promote a Facebook fan page for your business.

I’ve admittedly been late to the punch here, but we’ll soon be launching a Facebook fan page, and we’ll be promoting it here on the blog, in e-mail signatures and more. Facebook fan pages have a feature that allows you to invite people to become a fan, so that’s an easy way to get people to join you. If you’re in retail, you should let customers know you’re on Facebook and that they should join you there.

Once you are promoting the fan page, offer some value. Perhaps offering a special sale to Facebook fans or special events for fans (and have them invite a few friends to come along) can be effective. If you’re in the professional services industry, post new blog posts to the fan page and notify fans. Use the fan page for e-mail collection and to show off your work or products you’re selling.

Use Twitter as a networking tool

While I can’t say we’ve ever gotten work directly from Twitter, we have gotten press mentions, interviews and speaking engagements that help promote the business. Twitter is a great tool to converse with like-minded people. As you make connections, they will promote you and what you have to say.

As an example, I was working for a client (a blogger) on an unrelated project and tweeted the client’s web site along with a helpful tip she had posted to her blog. The post was re-tweeted by 5 other people, so the message was seen by over 3,000 people. It’s the power of that viral network that increased my client’s blog traffic that day by over 10%.She sells advertising on her blog, and more traffic means a higher advertising fee and more revenue. Tapping into social networking by sharing useful information and linking back to her site will benefit her business’ bottom line.

These are just a few ways to use social networking to survive the tough economy. While traditional networking helps you make connections in the community, online social networking helps you attract people from all over the world into your business network. The benefits are limitless.

You probably didn’t know that early ’90s rap star MC Hammer (remember those pants?) is actually a savvy marketer and entrepreneur. An avid Twitterer with over 134,000 followers, Hammer was recently interviewed on HubSpot TV and shared the following nuggets of wisdom:

• Social media is an extension of what we do naturally, just on a different platform.
• Use technology/the web to cut out the middle man and deliver your message directly to the customer, then let them decide if and when they want to consume it.
• On Twitter: forget trying to get new followers and don’t be concerned with the number. Just stay interesting.
• Even in a recession, companies have opportunities to be more creative to survive what the economy throws at them.

You can see videos of Hammer’s interview at the blog post from HubSpot.

Happy Monday! Over the last couple of days, we’ve covered the debate over SEO vs. PPC, why companies should think like customers when they set up their campaigns, and we’ve learned the most common mistakes that companies make when setting up their own campaigns.

In this final installment, pay per click expert Matt DeYoung will share landing page tips and pay per click tools, then discuss the rising cost of pay per click marketing and alternatives to Google Adwords.

From my experience, companies focus too much on their keywords, ads and bids, but don’t focus at all on landing pages. Can you tell us why landing pages are important and give some tips to optimize them?

Yeah, I hate to say this but most business owners have their PPC process upside down. Most owners I’ve worked with pick keywords to match their business or website. Bids and ad copy are important to generate affordable qualified traffic. Quality landing pages have become the smarter way to work. You don’t have to worry about forcing your ad position by bidding higher.

With landing page optimization all you’re trying to do is match closer and closer to what’s on your customer’s mind. Dr. Flint McLaughlin from Marketing Experiments said it best, ‚ÄúYou’re not trying to just change landing pages, you’re trying to change people’s minds.‚Äù Keywords tell you what’s on your customer’s mind. Your landing pages should match.

Each optimization effort will eek out a few more conversions. Even 5% compounded monthly equals massive increases in sales over 12 months. It can be the difference between a profitable or loosing campaign.

What I suggest is to start with a landing page that best matches what you think the intent of a keyword. Then start testing minor elements of the page one at a time. Start with a simple 2 column vertical layout page. Test writing a new main headline, the 1st and 2nd sentences. Test each paragraph subheading. After that, work on testing your offer, or “call-to-action”–your method of response. Hint: put your call-to-action on both the top and bottom of the page.

Optimization is just a matter of improving on the early educated guess you made about your customer–one step at a time. It’s worth doing. Landing page optimization is truly the secret of internet marketing. It shouldn’t be a secret, but it is.

Are there any tools on the web that you recommend to small businesses that want to set up and run their own campaigns?

There are a lot of tools out there. Adwords Editor is a crucial. Download it if you don’t have it already. Using Google Adwords conversion tracking in your campaign is a must. Also learn Google Analytics inside and out will take you far. It’s free, but does more than most small biz packages.

Keyword research and campaign set up can be tedious. Adwords Accelerator and SpeedPPC are two great tools. They’re expensive, but they pay for themselves quickly. Of course, there are lots of tools out there to peak at your competitors’ PPC: KeywordSpy, SpyFu, Compete.com, PPCBully to name a few.

More businesses are advertising online and keyword bid prices are rising. What is your take on this, and how can small businesses be budget-conscious?

PPC has definitely gotten more expensive. I even saw a swift increase last half of 2008. But, the fact is I’ve still been able to lower my costs. Small businesses can maintain their budgets in two ways:

• Focusing on optimization, whether ad copy, landing pages, product offers etc. Doing more planning and testing pays off. Increasing conversion from 1% to 2% means you just cut your marketing expense in half.
• Don’t diffuse your efforts, and your budget, but try to siphon irrelevant traffic away from your website. My suggestion is to focus all your resource–time and money–on better serving the keyword that make sense for your business. Even if that means you’ll only have 5-10 keywords, you can still generate a ton of sales.

It seems like everyone is focusing on Google Adwords. Is it your favorite pay per click engine? Are there other more niche engines or properties that small businesses should evaluate?

That’s a great question. I’m thankful for Adwords. It changed SEM. I start all my efforts with Adwords. There’s so much traffic on Google, and they get ads up so fast and you can test things quickly.

Adwords isn’t always the best place to spend all your PPC money. It really depends on your customer. I have one client who has an older demographic. I have the same ad on Google as I do on Yahoo. The Yahoo ad brings in 2 or 3 times more sales. I start with Google but expand to other networks. I track my ad channels/networks individually. Each one performs differently, and I adjust my budget accordingly.

MSN and Miva (Findology, ABCSearch, 7Search, SearchFeed, FindWhat) can be other places to look for traffic too. Just track the results so you can reallocate your budget to the best performing channels. Only reward the networks that are bringing you the best sales.

Any closing advice for small businesses?

Yes. Stop changing directions. Start working with what you’ve got. Too many clients I speak with keep trying new SEM tactics before they really learned why the last effort didn’t succeed. The difference between success and failure is to just see through what you’ve started, with the tools you’ve got before you. Free tools and Microsoft Excel will go along way if you know what you’re doing. With Internet marketing it’s especially easy to keep trying new things. Sad part is you’ll probably stop one step short of all the benefits.

Yesterday, I introduced you to Matt DeYoung, and he weighed in on the SEO vs. PPC debate. Matt also talked about how small businesses need to closely examine why prospective customers would buy their product/service before setting up their pay per click campaign.

In today’s installment, I ask Matt what common mistakes are being made by small businesses that set up their own pay per click campaigns.

When you’ve audited campaigns that small businesses set up themselves, what are the most common mistakes that they make?

I see 6 common mistakes when I review pay-per-click campaigns:

1. Trying to manage too many keywords. Once upon a time you could get cheap, converting traffic by bidding on lots of keywords. That simply doesn’t work anymore. You have to be more focused now because Google values quality over quantity more than ever. Bidding on too many keywords usually leads to a huge, bank-breaking invoice from Google. You’re better off picking keywords that match your product or service exactly. If you pick keywords that help meet your customers where they’re at in the sales process‚ learning, researching, deciding, etc.‚ and mapping that to the right entry point of your website (i.e. landing page). Google will even give you a discount on your cost-per-click for this effort.
2. Poor organization of campaigns and ad groups. I still see business owners lumping 15 or more keywords into a single Ad Group. This is a horrible technique most of the time for one reason: It makes financial and performance controls almost impossible. You‚’ll get a few high traffic keywords, or poor performers that muddy up the works. There are instances where an Ad Group has a few great performing keywords. But then the 10 other words are just holding them back from their full sales-generation potential.
3. Picking the wrong keywords. Usually business owners conduct keyword research by trying to find keywords that basically describe their business, but that’s a well-intentioned waste of time. It’s too broad an effort. You have to be more specific. If you use keywords that don’t match your website page, you’ll end up paying the “idiot tax.” Google’s happy to take your money‚ and charge you a premium‚ when you bid on PPC the wrong keywords.Keywords can be defined as “wrong”  for 2 reasons. Either they keywords are too general to predict anything about what the customer is looking for, or they simply don’t align with the service offer.
4. Picking the wrong landing pages. I think the value of landing pages is grossly overlooked. Even I overlooked their value for a long time. I’ll admit that was the single most costly Internet marketing mistake I ever made.One of the best ways to waste money is sending PPC traffic to the wrong landing page. Even if your landing pages are bad, but keyword-specific, you’ll still see more sales than if you use the wrong landing page.
5. Not knowing what to improve. The number one reason business owners come to me for advice is not really knowing what to do after setting up a PPC campaign. PPC optimization is a “black box” for most small business owners I think. The question is “Where do I start?” What usually happens is there are too many clicks that don’t convert. Or hundreds of keywords get a few clicks but no sales. It starts to get as overwhelming as doing your own taxes. You start to think “what does any of this even mean?” The issue for most businesses is understanding each metric individually, but not understanding how all the PPC results lead to the next optimization step.
6. Not deleting the unproductive keywords. Why hang on to a PPC keyword that’s not profitable? You wouldn’t hang on to an employee who under-performs or helps you loose money — fire them. Do the same with keywords. Fire the keywords that aren’t performing. If a keyword is converting, but the cost-per-conversion is to high, optimize. Look at your biggest costs per campaign per month. Get rid of the ones that aren’t working fast. You’ll have more cash to promote the ones that are doing well.

On Monday, I’ll share the final part of my interview with pay per click expert Matt DeYoung. We’ll talk about landing pages, pay per click tools, the rising cost of pay per click marketing and alternatives to Google Adwords.

A few weeks ago, I found pay-per-click specialist Matt DeYoung on Twitter. He offered to answer any pay-per-click question that anyone could throw his way. I took him up on it, and we ended up on the phone talking about an upcoming campaign that I was planning for a client. During the call, he had a lot of tips to offer, so I invited him to share them here on my blog. Here’s what he had to say.

Matt, tell us a little about yourself and your business.

In late 2006 I decided to start consulting for businesses on web development and search marketing. Now, in 2009, I primarily coach business owners on how to run their own PPC.

My passion is more teaching and coaching. I’d rather teach small business owners how to apply a methodology for developing and maintaining their SEM. I’ve always liked being a mentor. It”s more energizing than anything else I do. Maybe it’s because I was the oldest of four kids growing up.

SEO, PPC or both?

PPC is the perfect starting point. I strongly recommend a tandem deployment. PPC comes first so you can test. SEO comes second because you have data from PPC to prove the SEO investment is worthwhile.

With SEO your benefits are latent. In some ways, that makes it riskier. It’s lots of hard work up front with benefits on the back end. With PPC the benefits are immediate. You can test and fix right away.

It’s tempting to think of SEO as free. It’s not. I see this mistake all the time. There’s an upfront cost of both time and money‚ even for an in-house effort. Just as with PPC, SEO has a cost to produce more traffic.

Of course the important contrast between SEO and PPC is that SEO is a kind of one-time effort and expense. With PPC you’re always going to have to pay today’s rate to keep it going. Both are important for any business owner. But I strongly discourage comparing them equally. They should be used strategically, relative to the business’ goals.

I say why not hedge your bets and use a PPC campaign as a test bed for your SEO efforts?

When we spoke, it struck me when you said that companies should ask the question, “so what?”about their product or service, meaning that companies need to ask why customers would buy their products/services. I’m assuming that you do a fair amount of product and customer research before you research keywords or write ads. What’s your thought process when planning a campaign?

The secret to PPC marketing is simple: Get inside your customer’s head. You need to know why they search they keyword they do. Your customer has an inner conversation that started long before they entered a search query. What they search, why they search, and your “so what” answers should influence every aspect of your SEM and web design. “So what” summarizes the process of looking at your product’s features, pretending your the end-customer and asking, “Well, so why do I care about product? Why should I even take one more second to understand your service?”

Answering “so what” isn’t hard really. Technology makes it easy. I use Google’s Keyword Tool and website forums. That usually is enough to get the answer. Sometimes I create my own online surveys to dig deeper.

There are about 5 or 6 steps I do before writing any ads, or even creating websites. I have a strict methodology to uncover what will drive PPC conversions to a website. Five or 6 steps sounds like a lot. It’s easy to be anxious about getting started. It might take me longer to get started because of the research steps. But, once I nail down how a product meets my customer’s problem, and even down to which keyword they use, sales conversions follow.

Read part two of our interview with Matt DeYoung, where we focus on the most common mistakes that small businesses make when setting up their own pay per click campaigns.

There are a number of free, easy or cheap ways that online retailers can boost their traffic and sales this holiday season. With the economic downturn in full swing, retailers are being forced to be more innovative to keep pace with last year’s sales numbers. Here are some ideas.

I’m enjoying a blog post called “E-commerce Tips for the Holidays: boost traffic and sales” over at the Freelance Social Media blog. The blog post covers a few cheap/easy/free ways that online retailers can enhance their marketing during the holidays.

One of my favorite recommendations from the blog post is to submit coupon codes to RetailMeNot.com and other coupon aggregation sites. Social media are coming into their own this holiday season as a way to drive traffic and sales.

As we approach 2009, I really believe that those online retailers that embrace social media will be rewarded with more traffic, sales and customer loyalty. That’s why I’ve created a category on this blog covering social media. It’s rather empty now, but there’s more to come.

As for other ways to improve holiday sales, check out my series of blog posts from last year on holiday e-commerce optimization ideas.

E-consultancy has posted an interesting blog post today — an interview with Beautique’s Jason Russell (read the blog post here). It’s a short but interesting Q&A session with an etail startup, and covers issues like the relationship between the online store and brick-and-mortar operation (salons in this case), ways they acquire new customers, implementing customer reviews and ratings, international shipping, recruiting talent and the agency versus in-house debate. Worth the read.

The big news of the week in internet marketing, in case you missed it, is that the Google Adwords Keyword Suggestion Tool is now showing actual search volume data. Specifically, the tool is showing the number of times keyphrases were searched the previous month and also the average search volume.

Many keyword research services, like Keyword Discovery and Wordtracker, collect search volume data from many search engines, but you must pay for these services.

So what does this mean for internet marketers and search engine advertisers? The Google Adwords Keyword Suggestion Tool was a great tool even before it provided actual search keyphrase data, but now why pay fees for a subscription service when you can get real numbers from Google?

There’s a new blog post over at Campaign Monitor that discusses what’s changed in e-mail marketing design in 2008. I found this article helpful as it is an updated list of best practices for the industry. These include the following topics:

• Don’t waste your readers’ time
  Inboxes are full — give them something useful.
• Permission matters
  Remind customers why they are getting the e-mail.
• Relevance trumps permission
  You need permission, but a relevant message generates action.
• Make unsubscribing easy
  Why pay to send to customers that aren’t interested?
• Image blocking is common
  View your design without images to see if the message still comes across.
• Bring back tables
  E-mail clients are not standards-compliant and your table-less CSS layouts will be totally trashed.
• Add inline styles
  Gmail will strip out all other stylesheets.
• Don’t forget your plain text version
  Make it readable and encourage scanning.
• Meet your legal obligations
  Brush up on CAN-SPAM regulations.
• Test, test, test
  Want to get more action from your e-mail? Test new versions to see what works.

With the economy in its current state and gas prices through the roof, many shoppers are leaving the car keys in the drawer and shopping online (Source: Harris Interactive — “one-third (33%) of online US adults say they are more likely to shop online rather than at a store because of high gas prices“).

Relevant, timely e-mail campaigns are a great way to drum up online business, and following the guidelines from Campaign Monitor will help you manage a better campaign.

Time and time again, I’ve seen that truly successful people (and companies) pay attention to the “little things.” This post is about one of those little things — specifically e-mail signatures.

Since nearly everyone has an iPhone, Blackberry, Smartphone or the ability to check their e-mail on their mobile devices, e-mail signatures become very important. Maybe I’m exaggerating a bit that everyone has e-mail ready mobile devices, but a good percentage of businesspeople use these devices to check their e-mail.

So why is the signature so important, and what should you include in your e-mail signature? The answer is rather obvious but goes overlooked by many — your phone number.

If you include your phone number in your e-mail signature, then the recipients of your e-mail have easy access to your phone number if they need to call. For example, if I send a proposal to a prospective client and they read my message on their mobile device, they can just “click” on my phone number to call me. If you’re like me, you probably don’t keep the contacts into your phone’s address book up-to-date like you should, so it’s really helpful when someone adds their phone number to their e-mail signature.

Making it easy for clients and customers to call you back just may net you some more business.

Think that blogging can’t have an impact on small, local businesses? This story definitely contradicts that notion. Family-owned St. Paul Classic Cookie in St. Paul, Minnesota was close to closing its doors when owner Katie Novotny blogged an appeal to her loyal customers (read it here).

The result was an outpouring of support which saved the cookie business. This case study shows that blogging is great way to reach loyal local customers. Novotny also publishes press releases, news and menu items on the blog. Small, local businesses should take note of the St. Paul Classic Cookie blog, read it, and get ideas for connecting with their customers.

Ever wondered why having a blog can be an effective promotional tool? Problogger today released and interesting albeit unscientific survey about what sites generate the most traffic for blogs (answer: Google). Read more at Problogger.

In the last six months, I’ve had a fundamental shift in thinking about how to perform brand-related search engine optimization (SEO). It used to be all about how I could get a client site to the top of the results. Now, it’s more about how many listings my clients get.

With the boom of social media sites comes a new SEO strategy. Now, I focus on getting clients as many listings as possible on the first page, gaining the client credibility and keeping their company name top-of-mind.

Palmer Web Marketing recently published a blog post on How to Own All 10 Google Results (referring to the 10 listings on the first page of a Google search). This post details ten sites (most of which are “social media-related”) that you can focus on to get extra search listings.

It’s a good (and quick) read for companies who have heard about social media optimization (SMO) but don’t yet understand how it can be beneficial.