Location Based Marketing Strategies

Location based marketing & digital strategies you can use. WhatDidEricSay.com

Tag Archives: Social network

How Word of Mouth Marketing Will Explode

Everyone knows how powerful Word of Mouth marketing is. It’s about to get an incredible shot in the arm thanks to the new social graph features within the upcoming Timeline profile.

Facebook’s goal is to let you share every facet of your life with anyone and everyone you care to. Sure, on a personal level we may not be in interested in all of this activity (hello lists) – but from a digital marketing perspective, this is just huge.

One of the activities users will be able to share is that new car they just bought. (When, where, who they were with, description & share a photo) Note the location element. Should be a fun feature to leverage.

Facebook Timeline Marketing

 

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Facebook Places Can’t Find It’s Place

The location based marketing services landscape just shifted. Heavily.facebook places

Facebook Places, their answer to the check-in game, is shutting down. Not a major shocker. Sure, there was activity, relegated mostly to larger metropolitan areas. I used it two times – once at a restaurant to show my friends how it worked and once at a concert with my wife. No rewards, no tips, no to-do’s. Not even a goofy badge to show off.

Businesses failed to promote the check-in activity, presumably from a lack of support or a defined benefit. I tried to find the opportunity to leverage Facebook Places for Auction Direct, but it didn’t make sense. A lack of purpose, rewards and trust made it difficult for anyone to make checking-in within Facebook a consistent activity. Most users probably won’t even notice the service isn’t even available once shut down.

Killing off Facebook’s Places leaves me thinking about three items:

  • Great opportunity for Foursquare to pick up additional activity from Places users
  • New opportunities for niche check-in platforms such as GetGlue
  • Niche location and photo-sharing applications will have had a longer life than Places, such a CarZar. And possibly even more users, such as Foodspotting.

Will you miss Facebook Places?

Update: Ok, so location as a feature hasn’t been shut off 100%. It just won’t function as it did before – completely pointless. The mobile app hasn’t been updated yet, but the web version has. Still pointless to me, yet shows Facebook is looking to change how location based services fit into their platform. Not quite sure what that change will look like seeing that Facebook Deals has been axed as well. Stay tuned.

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7 Social Marketing Channels With The Highest ROI

Great article from Marketing Profs. shows the seven social marketing channels & activities with the highest ROI:

  1. Ratings & Reviews
  2. Your Company/Brand Community
  3. Your Company/Brand Blog
  4. Participate in Industry Blog/Forum
  5. Facebook
  6. LinkedIn
  7. Twitter

Also interesting to note: The high percentage of CMO’s responding that they either don’t know or have zero ROI for their activities. Tracking and listening to activities still seems to be lacking.

What’s working for you?

Marketing Profs Social Media ROI

Read more at MarketingProfs.com

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Which Industry Has The Most Succesful Facebook Ads?

Still wondering if Facebook is the place for your online ads to appear? Stop guessing – Silicon Valley Insider published their top performing market segments and their ad performance based on Clickthrough rate & Cost-Per-Click.

Top 5 performers:

1. Tabloids and blogs
2. Media & Entertainment
3. E-commerce
4. Travel
5. Automotive (Yup – automotive…wow)

Looks like the CTR %  for tabloids & blogs may be a misprint in the chart – I’m guessing it should be 0.165% – not 0.0165%

Keep in mind, the shelf life for these ads is nowhere near as standard online display channels; they require closer management and higher rotation frequency. One item I’d like to see with this info is how frequently the most successful industries are changing their ads.

What has your success rate (or lack of) been with Facebook ads?

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/ao5f4
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Can Quora Kill Blogging?

Quora is awesome.

If you haven’t checked it out, here’s a few quick reasons why I think it has the chance to change the way information is shared & discovered.

I see it as a unique combo of Twitter and a Blog. (Tlog? Blitter?) Maybe even a dash of Linkedin Q&A’s. The premise is simple. Ask a question about any topic, share your responses, vote them up and follow/get followed. If you’ve been online for a while, all the familiar faces are there & they’re willing to share their experiences and knowledge.

So far, the content I’m following has been hype/spam free, just great people asking & sharing good stuff. I like Twitter because it
helps me find content…but this helps me find specific topics,
answers and a quick connection to the person to who actually knows
something about the question being asked. No need to read a full
blog post and it’s comments to find out who else is a real expert
on the subject.

Looking for another way to build your own credibility on a topic and help your personal brand? Answer some questions and share your knowledge. Pro bloggers typically end their blog posts with thought provoking, engaging questions to get the conversation started. Quora skips all that fluff and gets right down to that last question at the end of the blog post. And the responses are great.

Check it out. I’ll save my question for Quora:)

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14 Ideas & Tips To Promote Your Business

american breakfast

Want to test yourself? Talk to a group about the basic, simple principles behind some of your business strategies.

That’s what Tim Eddinger, Josh Pies and I did today at the Victor Chamber of Commerce Social Media Breakfast hosted at Auction Direct USA.

A quick survey showed nearly everyone in attendance using social media. However, only a couple were confident enough to say they were using it effectively for their business.

Recap of the ideas & tips shared with the group. (Geared towards users with a general familiarity of SM sites, looking to add an additional layer to their efforts)

  • Companies & brands who actively blog, see 55% more website visitors, 97% more inbound links and 434% more pages indexed by search engines than those who don’t (Hubspot)
  • 75% of social media site users spend 25% of their time online
  • Friends & fans of brands via social network sites are up to 63% more likely to purchase from that brand again.
Quick ideas on how to get started creating content: (Stumped? need something fresh?)
  • Expert advice – You’re an expert. Tell your unique story and simply explain how you can help make things bigger, faster, cheaper, etc. (This is different from selling – this is how you help)
  • Leverage testimonials & word of mouth – people trust testimonials. Genuine testimonials are great. Video testimonials are even better.
  • Interview other influential people – Great way to meet people, build relationships and give your contacts the attention rather than you or your company
  • Host an event at your business. Simple way to create even more exposure:)
  • Ask your clients/customers for feedback – When they give it, listen to it and act upon it
  • Share content – blend the mix between informative & entertaining; always tasteful, yet memorable
  • Know your intended audience and the content they’re seeking. If it’s not what they want – its basically spam
  • Check the default security settings for your new profiles. Concerned about what people may see or gain access to? Change your settings or even easier – don’t share it!

Quick links & examples:

Thanks to everyone who made it out this morning!

What else would you share with someone starting out or looking for fresh ideas?

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Study: 36% of Fans Disengaging with Brands on Facebook

Keeping a consistent presence anywhere online, especially Facebook, is more than a full-time effort. Unless you’re among the creative elite, have a seven figure ad spend and an army of support superstars, you’re in for a mighty challenge.

Plus, if you’re in an industry with a less than favorable perception of customer service and experiences – say, automotive – the odds are against you.

It doesn’t mean it can’t be done. Check out CheckeredFlag on Facebook – Christine does such an incredible job owning their Facebook presence with valuable relevant content on a consistent basis. Pictures, videos & contests with the occasional passive sales message; always some new from her – even fun stuff like trivia & riddles. And it works – it ropes me in every time. (Nice job Christine!)

How do you keep your fans involved?

Check out the BizReport Study below for even more info.`

Amplify’d from www.bizreport.com

Study: 36% of fans disengaging with brands on Facebook

Read more at www.bizreport.com
See this Amp at http://bit.ly/dbqQvW

 

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Foursquare Experimenting With Recommendation Engine

Foursquare Logo
Image via Wikipedia

Foursquare continues to raise the bar with their new features.

Users are becoming more familiar with the general concept and the potential benefit they can deliver. Foursquare ‘s next big push is to provide the ability to generate relevant recommendations based on your activities, locations and even items on your to-do lists. (Figured those to-do lists would turn into a proactive feature eventually)

I’m looking forward to the new experiences these developments can create for users and businesses.

Read more about Dennis Crowley’s announcement:

Amplify’d from www.readwriteweb.com

Read more at www.readwriteweb.com
See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/b5q8

 

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2 New Twitter Features. 1 Excellent. 1 Meh.

So what’s twitter been working on recently?

1st item – Location Based Tweets. (The meh choice)

This is probably the only location based marketing feature I don’t even notice. Why? Users can put their location in their bio. Sure – it may not represent their current location, but of all things location, this is not a concern. And, I’m fairly confident nobody else cares where my message originates…

I’m sure this is simply the raw form of something bigger to come – say, integration into a specific service like Google maps; real-time tweets within a check-in based platform a’la Foursquare or Gowalla may be more interesting & relevant. Knowing where someone is when they shriek about Justin Bieber in a tweet is not important to me. Or the rest of the country over 17.

2nd item –  Recommended People to Follow. (The excellent choice)

A sharp conversation with my friend Mike Johansson got me thinking about this deeper. Twitter now provides suggestions as to who you may want to follow. Why show recommended choices? And why does it work? Mike & were in agreement that it played more on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. This level of the Needs Pyramid would be Esteem; the need to respect others or be respected by others.

Yes – the whole debate over Maslow and twitter’s success has been played out over the years. But – this finally provides a new visual motivation for users. It could be the face of someone they are intrigued by, someone they have heard of or better yet – a brand they may not have thought about seeking out via twitter – but are now aware.

Either way – I find this element fascinating. Yet, their location…not so much. Hopefully the brands will embrace it though. Location based marketing strategies will continue to drive new life into otherwise lame consumer experiences.

What do you think of these new features?

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6 Words That Make People Share Content

The Open Share icon conveys the act of sharing...
Image via Wikipedia

Dan Zarella dug up some great insight regarding the best words to use, and the best to avoid, to get more people to share you content. If anyone knows, its Dan. (Self proclaimed Social Media Scientist)

Dan stated that adjectives don’t work as well as verbs & nouns; big shocker – sexual references appear to work the best with regards to total sharing.

6 Words that make people want to share content:

  1. Facebook
  2. Why
  3. Most
  4. World
  5. How
  6. Health

6 Words to stay away from

  1. Vs
  2. Apps
  3. Review
  4. Down
  5. Poll
  6. Game

When content is simple and easy to understand, people will share it more often. As reading level and overall ability to understand the content increases, frequency of content sharing decreases.

Simple stuff gets shared.

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