After being a part – however small – of the ongoing Innovation Night series of events for our Hamilton based Innovation Factory, it was no surprise that again this past Wednesday, myself and over two hundred other startup aficiandos attended the first 2012 gala event at the MIPs centre! And what an event it was!

Disclaimer: I am actively involved in the ‘behind-the-scenes’ marketing for Snappay, one of the evening’s contestants and I wanted to state that right up front. That said, what a wonderful boost to said marketing program, as Lorne Lantz, the founder of Snappay won the event with the judged Best Business Proposition Award and took home one of those brand new color Kobo readers! #kudos to Snappay….and signup here for more information!

But that’s not all the news, the evening itself was chock full of great startup pitches and I was enthused as usual, as I was one of the mentors who worked with all of the presenting founders to first craft and then hone their one minute elevator pitches that captured the real ‘essence’ of their concept that was presented to the judging panel. This panel was well versed in startups and included the following folks

• Carolynn Reid of Hamilton’s EcDev division
• Doug Osborne of Doug’s Unlimited
• Jennifer Bell of Intuit
• Peter Milne of Gowlings

And one of the nicest things was that the Master of Ceremonies, was Mike Saniga of Quant, Inc. – one of the Innovation Factory’s first ever clients, who are truly a success story locally as they’ve achieved some amazing traction, have gotten funded and yes, they too were Innovation Night contestants just a few short months ago too! So #kudos to Quant and Mike who did a spot-on job of MC-ing the whole evening!

As you most likely know, the Innovation Night is a series of events, key events really – that is for innovators and entrepreneurs to share and develop their ideas, practice and perfect their pitch and present to their peers and the local innovation community at large. And what a list and variety of ideas there were….too long to list here, but I did want to mention some of the ones that struck me as very interesting…

Alicai Di Lulio of Golden Girls is an artist – but instead of sculpting in stone or bronze, she uses sugar. Sugar? Yes sugar and her collection includes some of the most amazing high-heel stilletto womens shoes and placques and animals…..that it’s not enough to think about putting same on the mantel at home – but she is a baker and they are usually put on cakes or food displays…did I mention that they’re made out of sugar…and are yes – edible!!! #yum!

Mohamed El Mahallawy of NerVu, offered up a simple idea….that if a visitor to their website indicates what kind of brands (Levis or Swatch say) that they’re interested in, then NerVu will scour the web for the best deals and sales and SMS that simple note to your smartphone! You’d always find out when those sales/deals are before the general public and therefore never miss a deal again! I like that one!

And lastly today, Snappay and Lorne Lantz…whose idea is really IMHO a potential disruptor in both the retail/POS world. What Lorne has done is to create an app, a free app mind you, that a smartphone user (iPhone and Android users now, BB is under development) has to simply download and that will allow them in minutes to use their phone as a mobile POS system. Working a trade show say, selling jewellry and can’t afford the hundreds of dollars that the event company charges to hook up your booth with a dedicated phone line for your hardware intensive POS system? Use your phone, which simply scans the buyers’ credit card, sends the data encrypted to Paypal and the sale is completed. No fuss. No muss…and no risk for either the buyer or seller! Snappay does take a simple processing fee of course, but did I mention that the app is free? Frictionless signup process – PayPal protected & secure – easy to access and use – and the payments are yours instantly! NO WAITING for your cash…how’s that for an idea, eh?

And as the fellow who “ran” the demo by simply standing in front of the judges at the event, and showing how in less than 30 seconds, I made a purchase, scanned my credit card, waited for PayPal to process same and then got the “Transaction Successful” screen back…the judges loved it! No wonder IMHO, then that the winner of the Best Business Opportunity Award went to Lorne and Snappay….watch out world….POS systems are coming to the mobile world…and Snappay is at the forefront of same, eh!

Ahh….Friday again…and as usual it’s been a heck of a week in SEO land! Many many small issues arise throughout a week of working on SEO Campaigns for clients and this past one was no exception. As many of you know, I visit about 200+ sites each and every morning that are news related, opinion related, blog posts, forums, bulletin boards and even still newsgroups looking for the latest “bleeding edge” SEO tactics and this weeks visits once again pointed out a few real winners!

First up today, is the great Infographic entitled “A Market for Lemons” from the terrific SEO firm Lumin Consulting…and I’m chuffed about this company! Their site is simple to look at and navigate, doesn’t “hard sell” their services yet somehow IMHO, climbs the depths of the SEO well to be right near the top for me.

The Infographic that I’m pointing you at is all about the premise that “a seller will take advantage of a buyer’s lack of knowledge…” in SEO land…and aint that the truth! Go to this amazingly spot-on graphic and read and learn what most of us real SEO practitioners already know…that the best client is an educated one!

Well worth the click, eh for SMBs to learn about Canadian SEO! I like these guys. I do and #Kudos to them for their great Infographics!

Forrester is one of those huge, multinationals that spans the globe with their research, stats, market studies and while I’m sure you too have heard of same, if you’re honestly like me, the cost of acquiring their reports is sometimes just too dang expensive. That said, I do keep an eye on what their latest releases are, and the recent launch of their report entitled “Social Media Adoption in 2011″may just mean that I’m gonna have to find the cash to get the full report! That report illustrates how consumers are using social media by applying Forrester’s Social Technographics® global classification system.

That Infographic illustrates this framework where they classify consumers into seven groups based on online activities, and consumers can fall into several different groups…and yes, a lot has changed in the world of social media. Social networking has morphed into a global phenomenon. Today, 86% of online US adults and 79% of European online adults engage with social media. And consumers in emerging markets are also on social media — not just catching up. In fact, they lead the world in social media usage and engagement. So #Kudos too to the Forrester folks….now, where can I find some extra cash this weekend, eh?

And lastly for today’s roundup is a great combo of an SEO blog post by Rand Fishkin of SEOmoz and the accompanying Infographic on a topic that should be near and dear to all SMB owners….as it’s on SEO firms and the pricing of an SEO Campaign, eh!

I couldn’t explain it any better than Rand himself on their blog page so here’s the raison d’etre -

“Near the end of December 2011, we ran a surveyon this blog asking consultants and agencies of all sizes and geographies to contribute their pricing models and cost structures. I’m pleased to share the results of that survey in the hopes that it will give everyone in the search industry a better idea of the range of fees and the services provided.

Obviously, this data is imperfect – SEOmoz is not a professional data surveying firm and our only tool was a basic list of questions on SurveyMonkey. That said, I’d be surprised if a professional surveyor found dramatically different data – there was enough participation to receive a trustworthy sample size and firms provided their personal/contact information (many of which I recognized while digging through the responses, but obviously will not be sharing identities publicly), which means we likely did not receive intentionally manipulative/misleading information. The data is provided below in three formats – first, some personal, high level takeaways from the survey, next an infographic from the great folks at AYTM Market Research…”

Your time will be well spent – just like your marketing budgets too, if you do click on those two links and go and read and learn about what this large survey shows concerning SEO practitioners in various countries and how our pricing models are similar and distinct too! So again, big big #Kudos to Rand and the folks over at SEOmoz for this….shows me right where “we” are in the larger scheme of all things SEO and lets me see how others do their own SEO Campaign pricings too! Cool…very cool Friday, eh?

So, to the finds for this week, and there’s no better one to start with than the folks over in merry old England at FreshEgg SEO! Never heard of these guys before, but after a tip to go and look at one of their infographics on branding, I found a host of others that are top-notch – well, let’s let them speak for themselves – here’s the link to the FreshEgg infographic blog area so you be the judge.

They combine “a market-leading, technical approach to SEO with a passion for high-quality, innovative web design and development” they say in their own words, and judging by the quality of the infographics, of their blog postings and yup, even by their client list – the folks at FreshEgg know their stuff! Do click over to their spot to see what I mean, eh! There is much more there than I can even cover here….so the learning is up to you but the click should well for your own education!

Our #2 choice this week is no less a great infographic – in fact the folks over at Reactorr, have done up a superb look/see/learn one here, entitled “Socializing your Brand” and it’s chock full of great items to ponder – especially if you’ve got a brand that might need some social media help, eh!

And the fact that this site and it’s founders are Canucks, makes me especially proud to point out their site as a great resource for all us SEO types, eh! Mark their blog with a bookmark and visit often as they update their thoughts on Canadian SEO - I did and if you run an SMB, so should you!

And lastly today, is the great infographic from KISSMetrics (a great name, eh!) entitled “Social Timing” and it’s a recap for those of us who Tweet and use Facebook, on what and when and why making those tweets excel can become…. As it’s shown that it comes from Dan Zarrella of HubSpot and is available as well in a Webinar format, that’s a link that should NOT be passed up either, eh! Hubspot works hard – damn hard – at it’s inbound marketing lead model and as we’ve been watching them closely, this infographic is just the tip of the whole Hubspot iceberg! Do click and learn! Worth the time, eh!

Okay it’s time to finally begin to wrap-up our Online Marketing Program and what better way is there than to capture all of the metrics and analytics in one big bucket….so that we can “judge” how we’re doing, right? Right…and that task alone can be daunting, eh!

Once you have the basics “in hand,” that is you’ve at least begun the tasks that we’ve scheduled for you in this marketing program, you will find that the most stringent of tasks – monitoring those tasks, is still to come.

You will need tools to do this and while we’ve listed some of them here below, you must remember that no matter how you much data you get, you need to constantly look at that data to get the information that you can use – to tweak and change and modify all of the other factors already in place.

You will need to monitor all of the various aspects of the sales process, and yes, you will also need to tweak your Sales Conversions too. Basically, your Sales Conversion funnel breaks down into 4 main areas…

1. Create an offer                                 
2. Build a call to action
3. Build a landing page
4. Measure, test and then tweak….

The Sales Funnel metaphor has its roots in the real world use of funnels. A large amount of liquid, or website visitors, can fit into the top wide portion of the funnel. However, as you move down toward the funnel neck, less and less opportunities can fit as those visitors thin and leave less numbers of leads. Finally those leads turn into customers, at the bottom end of the funnel and that means that you made e and offer where two parties exchange something of value.

On the chance that you might not know at any given moment exactly what your online marketing program has produced revenue stream wise – you would be wise to remember that unless you check these numbers daily, you will never know for sure!

You will of course need analytics to show you just what kind of traffic your site is receiving, what kind of conversions you’re achieving, what kind of bounce rates and click-thrus are occurring and finally, what kind of revenues you receive.

So here’s a short list of various sites that you can look over to check out what types of analytics are “out there” and most have a free or free trial period for same.

• http://www.google.com/analytics
• http://sitescanga.com/
• http://yoast.com/out/clicky/
• http://www.clicktale.com/
• http://www.google.com/websiteoptimizer
• https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/home?hl=en
• https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/home?hl=en
• http://www.opensiteexplorer.org/
• http://piwik.org/
• http://www.hittail.com/
• http://blumenthals.com/blog/2011/03/15/infographic-owning-your-local-web-equity/
• http://www.eloqua.com/
• http://www.marketo.com/
• http://www.trackur.com/
• http://www.link-assistant.com/

For ease of understanding what it is we’re presenting here, can be understood by our following Infographic – our Pyramid to Online Marketing Success!

 What can be seen from this program is that for a website to be a successful revenue generator for any online entrepreneur or firm, is that you must remember the following mantra – “that the web is built on engagement leading to conversion.”

If you start with a great aesthetically looking, navigable website that offers up your products/services with the appropriate call to action – you will gain conversions based on the traffic that your SEO campaign brings.  Add in the daily use of social media to become a respected online authority in your channel and the further reputation that comes with building your social community to reinforce and own your channel.

Which means of course, that if you use the basic foundation tasks that we’ve outlined herein, all timed as shown, that you can and you will build that revenue stream. It is truly not easy, nor for that matter is it a process that once laid out remains a constant as it changes with a regularity that is both impossible to gauge or to predict.

Staying current is perhaps one of the most persistent characteristics of an online marketer – it’s the true measure of those who are successful, and this online marketing program can help any online entrepreneur be up at the leading edge.

So follow this online marketing strategy, educate yourself and you will find that honest hard work will pay off in the end…and follow our mantra….

Read…learn…hypothesize…test

…analyze….to Rank!

 [Monitor Tasks]

[def. ~ is the set of tasks that must be done on an ongoing basis where you will on a daily basis check the analytics and stats for all of the previously listed tasks. You will need to have the ability to judge the various factors that will come to light and then take action by revisiting everything from your website to your SEO campaign to your Social Media programs and then make the necessary changes to test and then adopt new tactics.]

Curriculum Credits…

• Jim Rudnick — MCSD          
• CEO ~ KKT INTERACTIVE
• a Microsoft Certified Solution Developer
• more than 14 years of SEO experience
• with more than 23 years of web experience
• and more than 35 years of marketing communication and sales experience too!
• have worked for NY Yankees, PEP Boys, GE, The Disney Company, Canada Life,  Mercedes, SAAB, Reuters and Quaker State Oil…
• built more than 400 sites…has run more than 100 SEO Campaigns
• we build sites that have had millions of hits come up on the first page in  search engines and more than that – we build sites that generate new   business for our clients day after day!!!
• we blog about Canadian SEO at www.canuckseo.com 

Please contact the author, Jim Rudnick at jrudnick@kkti.com or (905) 667-8565

First up today, is the great one on SEO Audits in 20 Minutes, from the folks over at InMotion.com! As you can see by the image here, they’ve tried to capture what to do and how to do it in a method that tackles one of the most necessary yet under-utilized aspects of Internet marketing: the SEO audit.

This simple beginning factor is often overlooked by SMBs because they just don’t grasp that you must do this up front, before you mount any SEO Campaign else you may be making changes that are futile. Or worse, you may make changes that will affect your SEO rankings in a negative manner.

We often have clients, who come to us quoting SEO tactics that they’ve read worked, have tried and then they ended up on page 39….obviously the tactics don’t work, but they have no idea because they are fighting an uphill battle as they try to get their skill levels up to professional levels. Click here for the full-sized infographic too!

Okay, on to #2 this week…and it’s a real winner in our books from folks we’ve blogged about before, over at Voltier Digital. This one is a real capture of how to “go viral” and in their own words they say “This new infographic from our team takes a top level look at what “going viral” is all about.  There’s a science behind virility, and many factors that influence how far and wide a piece of content might be able to spread.   In this infographic, we walk through some of the factors influencing virility directly, and hopefully give some food for thought as you construct your next viral campaign!”

And how right they are too….give this one a read – note, it’s pretty long and comprehensive, but spot-on, eh! So #Kudos to these guys once again….what a great infographic, eh!

And then lastly for this week, is the one I found over on Aaron’s site, SEOBook.com….that is all about how organic links have lost their “weight” or their “heft” in SEO ranking factors…and I couldn’t agree more!

This one takes a bit to absorb…to dwell on…and then to hypothesize on how to combat the various Google factors and get back in the game, eh! I liked it muchly – and have already got one item from same in testing…and the outcomes already look positive! Look at the bottom for the notes on cross-linking…great stuff, Aaron! #Kudos and well done!

Social Media Authority, leads to positioning that one can expect will lead to the following increase in awareness on the web…i.e. the formation of your own Social Media Community…

Social Media Communities are built via the generation of links, i.e. backlinks from relevant sites and the more links from authority sites, the more people view the linked to author’s content as authoritative.

All the while, your increased links lead to increased ranking in Google and Bing/Yahoo and many people take high rankings in search engines to mean that Google itself has decided that the site is yes, an Authority.

And remember, that search has higher conversion rates than most other media, which means it is viewed less as advertising and more as trusted referrals.

Authority gives birth to Community!

Building your new Social Community, means helping forge more online friends/followers/Likes from other social media sites too like portals, wikis, blogs, photo gallery sites too… all through outright networking, than necessarily via content. Once again, the more friends/fans/Likes someone has, the more they are viewed as an authority, and the more likely they are to have others view their work and opinions as authoritative. Yes, Social Authority builds Community!

Tactical methods to enable your own Social Media Authority….

• Blogs ~
  [http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/26-ways-to-use-social-media-for-lead-generation/#more-8364]
• Email Marketing ~
  [http://www.clickz.com/clickz/column/2032325/email-social]
• [http://www.openforum.com/idea-hub/topics/marketing/article/start-somewhere-with-social-media-chris-brogan]
• Speaking Engagements ~
  [http://lesliealbritton.com/marketing-your-brand-through-speaking-engagements.shtml]
• Article Writing ~
  [http://ezinearticles.com/?Website-and-Blog-Traffic---How-Does-Article-Marketing-Help?&id=4906076]
• Facebook ~
  [http://www.facebook.com/topic.php?uid=59400547335&topic=8866]
  [http://www.insidefacebook.com/2007/12/09/inside-facebook-marketing-bible-24-ways-to-market-your-brand-company-product-or-service-in-facebook/]
• LinkedIN ~
  [http://linkedinformarketing.com/]
  [http://www.pamorama.net/2010/03/29/how-to-use-linkedin-to-market-your-business/]
• Twitter ~
  [http://www.allentan.net/blog/2011/02/18/how-twitter-marketing-can-help-your-business/]
  [http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/7178/Twitter-Rolls-Out-Analytics-Tool.aspx]
  [http://www.ehow.com/how_6887833_develop-effective-twitter-marketing-strategies.html]
• Google News Alerts ~
  [http://www.google.com/support/alerts/bin/static.py?hl=en&page=guide.cs&guide=28413&rd=1]
  [http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/5-interesting-ways-google-news-rss-feeds/]
• Social Media Analytics ~
  [http://www.toprankblog.com/2010/03/11-free-tools-for-social-media-optimization/]
  [http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/26-ways-to-use-social-media-for-lead-generation/#more-8364]
  [http://www.slideshare.net/kunocreative/presentations]
  [http://www.optify.net/internet-marketing/optify-resources/]

Okay, the weeks almost over and we’ve seen some great new items this week that need to be shared about online marketing and of course, on SEO too! While that might seem like a daunting task, i.e. the capture of a whole week’s worth of marketing data – I must explain that with over 170+ blogs, forums, boards and polling sites read daily, it’s harder to “cut” an item out of this short Friday list than to keep them all to share…but here goes! Got your learning cap on?

Greg Sterling, I’ve never met…but I can tell you, I read his blog and articles all over the web and his pointer this week that I’d like to share first, is on a recent survey from the folks at Merchant Circle and it’s a doozy! Greg comments on both Search Engine Land via a notice there as well as an in-depth look at same on his own blog at screenwerk.com here….and the numbers are pretty significant! What Merchant Circle published is a survey and infographic of over 2500 firms involved in assessing SMBs’ perceptions of the economy and their top business challenges, the survey is a great barometer of SMB marketing attitudes and tactics.

The survey was conducted last month and received roughly 2,500 responses from SMBs drawn from Merchant Circle’s 1.6 million member database. Almost 80% (78%) were from companies with fewer than four employees. Only 1.7% of responses came from merchants with more than 50 employees. The headcount distribution of businesses in the sample is directionally consistent with US Census data.

Just under half of the respondents (48%) saw the business climate as weaker, while 52% said it was improved to varying degrees. Only 21% of these businesses said they were going to decrease marketing spending. Most were going to hold the line (57%) or increase spending (29%). The majority (63%) of these SMBs said they spent $2,500 or less on marketing annually….and you should definitely look at the charts on both the SEL blog and Greg’s too….as well as over at Merchantcircle.com! So Kudos to Greg….and you should add his blog to your daily reading list too, eh!

Did you know that Canadians – yes, us Canucks – are the world’s top video surfers? It seems that this postshows that  Canada’s love affair with online video and smartphones is fuelling big growth in mobile marketing that rivals the U.S. scene, the latest research shows. Canadians consume more video on the Web than any other nationality on the planet, according to the latest figures from comScore Inc. The average Canadian spends 16.8 hours per month viewing 221 videos on the Net, topping the U.S. average of 13 hours a month spent viewing 200 videos.  And 40 per cent of Canadians now own a smartphone, ranking us fourth in the world after Spain, the U.K. and Italy and ahead of fifth-place U.S., where penetration is 38 per cent, according to comScore. Both trends are feeding off of one another to drive a surge in mobile marketing in Canada, including short form video ads and teasers designed specifically for smartphones, says Jason Cowell, the creative director at Toronto marketing agency BStreet. Cool Canuck SEO!

Lastly for today, is an infographic titled “Who’s Using Google+?” –  that I feel really captures the usage of the fairly new Google+ social media app…and it’s from the folks over at Flowtown, a site that I’ve pointed you to before here and here and here! This infographic (by Dan Martell) speaks directly to the users, their numbers and what I found most interesting was that after studying same, I was surprised to see that 83% of the Google+ members are inactive…..they don’t post nor it appears even drop in to look around anymore. Open only since the launch back in June, Google+ as Flowtown points out, is no Facebook killer — and the stats on this infographic show just that to be true!

What is Social Authority?

One of the key components in successful social media marketing implementation is building “social authority.“

Social authority is developed when an individual or organization establishes themselves as an “expert” in their given field or area, thereby becoming an “influencer” in that field or
area…

Why can that be important to SME business owners?

It is through this process of “building social authority” that social media becomes effective. That is why one of the foundational concepts in social media has become that you cannot completely control your message through social media but rather you can simply begin to participate in the “conversation” in the hopes that you can become a relevant influence in that conversation.

However, this conversation participation must be cleverly executed because while people are resistant to marketing in general, they are even more resistant to direct or overt marketing through social media platforms…

How to become a Social Authority?

Your conversation participation with prospective customers must be cleverly executed…because they are even more resistant to direct or overt marketing through social media platforms…

You cannot expect people to be receptive to a marketing message in and of itself….from social media outlets…as your prospects most trusted company or product information coming from “people like me” — inferred to be information from someone they trusted…

So to become an Authority, you need to establish TRUST and CREDIBLE Authority to your marketplace….

So the Rationale in trying to become a Social Media Authority is…

Someone performing a “marketing” role within a company must honestly convince people of their genuine intentions, knowledge, and expertise in a specific area or industry through providing valuable and accurate information on an ongoing basis without a marketing angle overtly associated…

If this can be done, trust with, and of, the recipient of that information – and that message itself – begins to develop naturally. This person or organization becomes a thought leader and value provider – setting themselves up as a trusted advisor instead of marketer.

Top of mind awareness develops and the consumer naturally begins to gravitate to the products and/or offerings of the authority/influencer…by protecting your company name!

Why would being a Social Media Authority be a good way to help build website traffic to your website?

• 38% or more than 1 in every 3 of us, reads via social media a recommendation or referral from a friend — and then follow thru on same! [Empathica.com Report]
• 56% of online businesses spend more than 6 hours weekly on social media marketing? And of that number, 12% of them spend more than 20 hours weekly?  [http://www.flowtown.com/blog/everybodys-doing-it-how-marketers-are-utilizing-social-media-in-2010?display=wide]
• Use LinkedIN to get new Targeted Biz Traffic! [CanuckSEO.com]
• Where Social and Rank Meet… [Blumenthals.com/blog]
• Social Media Reality Check [Newswire.ca]
• Infographics for Social Media Understanding [http://searchengineland.com/7-local-web-marketing-infographics-to-overload-your-brain-68444]
• Lee Odden on Social Media [http://www.toprankblog.com/2011/03/integrated-seo-social-media/]
• SEOMoz on Social Medis Authority and Influence [http://www.seomoz.org/ugc/social-authority-meets-search-measuring-influence]

Note the common Venn items…….FaceBook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Skype!

And I had fun. No two ways about it….I met lots of start-ups that I’ve coached or mentored or who’ve taken our own “Go-To-Market” seminars and chatted with them all!

Over a glass or two of red wine of course…but nevertheless this Soiree with more than 400 or so folks was surely (so far at least) THE holiday party of the year! Twinkly little lights and servers with trays of scrumptious hors d’oeuvres is the way to this online marketers heart…and I was definitely a happy Canuck SEO practitioner last night for sure!

That said just one big tip for you online marketers….on conversion, which can be defined as the process whereby a sales lead moves “into” your sales funnel and moves down lower to become a new customer/client via that conversion processs. Not really a very tough concept to grab ahold of….but when you ask clients or potential clients who their own Chief Conversion Officer is – you just get a blank stare.

Yup, as this great infographic from Column Five Media shows, each and every single company has to have, wants to have and yes, needs to have someone who takes on that same exact role!

So if your own company uses a “spray & pray” type of strategy, this latest research in a very easy to grasp-hold-of infographic is for you! Oh, do look at others there too….there’s hundreds by many of the contintent’s best infographic firms….and I’m working  my way thru one at a time!

Okay, it’s time to move “up” our Online Marketing Success Pyramid, to the next level where weekly tasks abound – your Social Media Program Campaign!

And a reminder, that Social Media tasks can be defined as -

[def. ~ is the set of tasks that must be done on a daily basis that deal with your online reputation, your position of credibility within your channel and your ability to mentor and aid others within that channel. More than that, you are also planning on proving your social authority as a recognized expert in that channel.]

And, as reminder too, that this set of tasks must be done DAILY! And I mean daily to keep up with the speed at which the social media world moves too, eh!

First some background on all Social Media strategy from Wikipedia on Social Media…

“Social media are media for social interaction, using highly accessible and scalable publishing techniques. Social media uses web-based technologies to turn communication into interactive dialogues.

“Social Media is a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, which allows the creation and exchange of user-generated content.“

“Social authority is developed when an individual or organization establishes themselves as an “expert” in their given field or area, thereby becoming an “influencer” in that field or area.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_media

And a latest comScore survey results show that 39% of all search engine users believe that “…seeing a company listed among the top search engine results make them think that the company is a leader in its field!” 

Why is Social Media Important to me?

Look at this chart, from Empathica….almost half of the online world read posts or view pictures online…and only 1.5% of online folks “make recommendations!”

Imagine that…i.e. if your customers make recommendations about your business – about half of the online world may see it…

And learn about you and your products or services having the “mind-set” that your items are quality, trusted and reliable too!

Social media works!

Social media has become a part of daily life for many Internet users. Social media is primarily a venue for personal communication between individuals. However, many
social media sites have evolved and people have found ways to use them for business purposes as well.

Sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter can be a great way to generate new business by using your existing network of friends.

Other sites such as social bookmarking sites (Digg, Delicious, etc.) can generate traffic to your website from articles that you post.

If an article posted on a major social bookmarking site receives enough bookmarks to be listed on the front page, it could generate thousands of visitors to your website…visitors who just may buy something!

Blogs and forums are other types of social media. These types of social media provide you with additional content posted by yourself and by your users, which will result in more traffic to your website as well as more brand coverage.

HubSpot Charts show this well….

And HubSpot also has an excellent Online Marketing Blueprint .pdf too….

[http://www.hubspot.com/blueprint/]