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Sponsored by JenKaneCo, well known social media evangelist Brian Solis recently gave a presentation to an enthusiastic group of marketers in downtown Minneapolis to introduce the concepts behind his new book:  Engage! The Complete Guide for Brands and Businesses to Build, Cultivate and Measure Success in the New Web. The following is an overview of his presentation:

Relations vs. Relationships

There’s something interesting that’s happening right now on the web:  relations are starting to matter more than relationships.  The key lesson for marketers, and what the rest of this overview discusses, is that people will engage around content that compels them in networks where that content spreads.

We are all going to have to shift from relationships to relations:  having more, thinner (but still relevant) connections is starting to matter more.  As a marketer, this shifts the power balance.  People are connecting around psychographics rather than demographics, and this means four degrees is the new six degrees of separation.  In plain English:  we’re all becoming better connected and users are vitally important to the equation of how information spreads.

A way for your marketing to succeed is to take the approach of a sociologist, an anthropologist and a philosopher rather than a traditional marketer.  That’s because it is people who are in control of the ideas that spread.  The web has changed things and marketing and PR have changed along with it.

Context Becoming as Valuable as Content

The challenges go deeper than marketing approaches.  When you join a company, you’re not given a Facebook page and Twitter account like you are an email account.  You already have those things.  And companies aren’t sure what to do or how they can leverage their own team members to increase their digital presence.  Your team members are vitally important because “content being king” is evolving into an era where context is king (yet, content still remains quite the powerful queen).  Context is proven to show who you are connected to and why around every conversation.  Your team members are a key ingredient to providing context, their actions equating to a type of social currency for your brand.

Speaking of content, how people react to your company’s content (something now public) equates to the stature of your community.  Reputation, trust and relationships are earned through these reactions and how you connect contextually is the experience prospects seek.

Content and context define the future of successful marketing.  You’re no longer marketing to individuals, you’re now marketing to “an audience with an audience.”  And every time they react to something you do, it shows the power of relations vs. relationships.  But without remarkable content and relevant context, you can never reach “an audience with an audience” effectively because you’re missing part of the equation of why people share ideas.

Getting Started

One of the easiest things to do is see what’s happening right now.  An approach that can be used is a “30 day window” to see a snapshot in time of what’s happening around a brand.  For a brand unsure about how much conversation was happening around their products – a sample search can reveal a staggering amount of messages across social platforms.  In many cases it’s a shock and can result in disbelief from management teams.  A social media monitoring service should be required for every brand to monitor the situation in an ongoing fashion.

Getting at least a snapshot is a good first step, and ongoing monitoring is even better, but equally important is to consider the data in perspective.  Or to put it simply:  share of voice vs. share of conversation.  Share of voice only gives you a partial view as it assumes everyone is talking about companies in a given industry.  A more relevant approach is to look at share of conversation.  As an example, consider  Old Spice – in the discussions on the social web regarding “body spray,” how well did they do?  While the overall conversations and reactions generated, putting it into context truly provides meaning of share of conversation.

Share of conversation matters more than most consider.  People are actively using the social web as part of the decision making cycle, and so this is the socialization of more than just marketing, but business as a whole.

Conclusion

How are you adapting to the socialization of business to help move these things in the right direction?  You need to extend divisions so that they are responding to consumers at the right point to become trusted and a part of the community.

All companies need to realize the fact that they are now in the media business, and that every company is now a media company.  This strategy is potent enough several companies embracing it have developed brands of media so popular they’re putting out best-selling books.  The influence they have over their markets is that big.

Influence is the ability to inspire desirability and measurable action and outcomes.  It is more than a click or more than a view.  As marketers, creating content and context to ultimately form influence is how to achieve long term, sustainable social media success.

For more on getting started in social media, consider creating a social media roadmap to plan your social media strategy.

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© Online Marketing Blog, 2010. | How to Cultivate the Socialization of Your Business | http://www.toprankblog.com

The sheer volume of social media marketing and search engine optimization advice posted online can make it difficult for companies to make sense out what direction they should take. There are many models and approaches to leveraging  optimized content for discovery through search and how to develop social networks to engage customers and promote content.  It comes down to fundamentals and I think the following Four pieces of the Social SEO puzzle can help companies of any size get started in a more meaningful way on their journey towards becoming productive on the social web.

Listening, Content, Socialize and Measure could just as well be represented as a cycle, but I think the forward direction is important because you can’t reach outcomes without action. Any good social media marketing effort needs to begin with some kind of Listening program. That means using social media monitoring tools to collect, sort and manage social content according to topics being monitored.  Content is the glue that makes search engines work and content is a critical part of the social sharing experience within social media. Speaking of sharing, socializing with other like-minded individuals as a personal experience can fold well with brand interactions as long as the needs of the buyer persona has been reconciled with business objectives. Successful efforts within the social web can be measured, and should be, in a variety of ways.  Measurement justifies objectives and it’s important to identify the right tools for monitoring real time and web analytics.

Here are a few more details on each of these steps. I encourage you to think about how your company is implementing these steps in your own social media marketing efforts. Are you taking shortcuts? Are you following through? Have you found more important steps to follow?

Listening

An essential start and ongoing component for a social media marketing and optimization effort is to leverage listening tools.  As companies struggle to understand where the social web fits within their online marketing strategy, a social media monitoring program (listening) should be implemented immediately.  Collecting social web data, organizing and managing it is essential for tapping into the conversations, influencers and real-time marketing opportunities that abound in today’s internet environment.  While there are many things you can listen for with a social media monitoring effort, here are four key elements for Social SEO success:

• Social Channels - Which social destinations are your customers frequenting? Social networks like Facebook or LinkedIn? Or Twitter? What about media sharing sites like Flickr and YouTube? Forums, Blogs or Social News and Bookmarking sites? Social media monitoring will help you decide which social channels you should start testing and digging into deeper for participation, networking and promotion.  For example, why invest in videos if the majority of influencers in your category spend their time on Twitter?
• Social Keywords - Good social media monitoring tools analyze tags, comments, anchor text and other forms of text to identify keywords associated with the monitoring topic. That keyword insight can help identify topics of interest as they emerge and influence content strategy decisions as well as social media optimization. Social conversations influence search behaviors and if you can identify relevant concepts that are emerging in popularity on the social web, why not create and optimize content around those topics so you’re easily found via search engines?
• Influentials – A listening program will help identify the influentials within the topics you’re monitoring providing the ability to prioritize who to connect with. As Brian Solis mentioned yesterday, Influence is the ability to affect intended outcomes and if you can provide influencers with something of value to them and their networks, it increases the reach of your own message and content substantially.
• SERPs - Social media monitoring tools don’t track search engine results pages and that’s why you should. All major search engines purchase data feeds from different social media sources and incorporate social media content within search results. Therefore, it’s important to monitor search results for key terms relevant to your business and identify what social sources are being included.  If Google is showing blog posts above the fold for a competitive keyword phrase, it might be easier for you to get exposure by commenting on those blog posts with a link back to your site or making blog posts about that topic on your own blog.

Content

Content makes the Social SEO world go round.  One of the biggest growth areas in Online Marketing is the business of creating, optimizing and promoting content. Brands are becoming publishers, which isn’t really new, but becoming more common.  Big brands have funded TV shows, Radio networks and other forms of editorial ie content, for years. The ease of publishing online provides many opportunities for companies to engage customers with content. It’s no longer enough to simply publish features and benefits information on products and services. Customers want more.  Marketers would do well to create a content marketing strategy or as I like to call it, a Content Marketing Optimization Strategy.  Inventory content assets such as web pages, images, video, audio, rich media and file types such as HTML, PDF, MS Office docs, Structured Data Feeds and RSS to assess what can be promoted via social channels and be ranked in search results. Map search keywords to search engine optimization content. Map social keywords to social media content.

If content can be searched it can be optimized and a well planned digital asset optimization effort that works in sync with social networking and promotions can efficiently get content to those that want it and also facilitate better search visibility. That is the essence of Social SEO.

Socialize

With insight into the appropriate social media channels, influentials and a rock solid content marketing optimization strategy in place, it’s important to have a plan on how to connect with the communities where customers and prospects spend their time.  Three key pieces to socializing your marketing efforts include:

• Buyer Personas – Research what your customers do on the social web. What are their social information discovery, consumption and sharing preferences. What influences them to share and buy?
• Grow Networks – Time strapped marketers often fail to spend time growing networks. Some try to buy friends literally or through repeated incentives. Spend a small, but consistent amount of time growing networks organically. That might mean 10-30 minutes every day commenting, friending, following, liking and updating on a daily basis. There is no substitute for participation when it comes to growing a network that can have a real effect on your ability to promote content that gets passed on and on and on.
• Promote – Plan to develop a cycle of social interaction by reconciling the needs of buyer personas with business goals in your content marketing strategy. Grow networks that you can promote optimized content to.  Blogs can often serve as an ideal hub for this kind of content with spokes to the various social channels for content promotion such as YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, etc..  A cycle of social participation starts with creating & promoting optimized content & assets. That content gets noticed, shared & voted on, growing awareness.   The increased exposure attracts more subscribers, fans, friends, followers & links. Increased links & social  exposure grow search & referral traffic. Traffic & community help with research to develop & further grow your social networks for content & SEO.

Measure

Success comes in many forms and with social media marketing and social SEO, it’s the combination of social media monitoring and web analytics that provides the most actionable value. Social media monitoring tools are not only effective for initial Listening, but also to determine the social effect of your optimized content marketing on the social web. Off site engagement can be monitored, measured and analyzed in combination with web analytics tools that provide insight into what social traffic does once they get to your web site. Leveraging monitoring and analytics to inform future content creation, keyword optimization and social promotion is essential for staying ahead of the competition and being effective at meeting customer needs.

Obviously, the implementation of such a simplified strategy can vary widely according the the purpose, but with so many companies unwilling to commit to developing an overall Social Media Roadmap, experimentation becomes a more reasonable alternative. Following a basic structure like the four steps listed above can help make a social media test or even a modest social media marketing program a lot more productive.

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© Online Marketing Blog, 2010. | 4 Steps to Social SEO Success | http://www.toprankblog.com

I’ve been familiar with Brian Solis as many have, for several years. We’ve done a few video interviews with Brian and he’s contributed to popular posts here like this one on social media marketing and this one on content curation.

I have to admit that based on his early writing, I thought Brian was overly confident about the opportunities with social media. When I finally met him in person at a Media Relations conference we were both speaking at, I gained a much better understanding and appreciation for the talents and insight behind the evangelism for what has become the most significant change to the web since the introduction of search engines.

As a successful author, speaker and owner of Future Works, Brian has many opportunities to face tough questions from clients, peers and conference attendees.  In the realm of social media, it’s not unreasonable to have a lot of questions about the who, what, why, where, when and how.

How to start? How to create a strategy? How to find customers and influentials? How to create engaging social destinations? How to promote without offending? How to measure? How to report?  Those are just some of the critical questions answered in Brian’s newest book, Engage! The Complete Guide for Brands and Businesses to Build, Cultivate and Measure Success in the New Web.

I promised Brian to talk about Engage! here months ago, which was a no-brainer since we already did a review of “Putting the Public Back in Public Relations“. While I thought about a variety of perspectives to take on sharing my opinions of this book, nothing stood out until now. In the course of answering many social media questions on a daily basis, I’ve often referred Engage! to people as a resource. Therefore it makes perfect sense to share some of the top questions this book answers for marketers. Essentially, this is a list of 10 reasons why you should check the book out.

1. Where does social media fit in marketing and communications?

2. What social tools and technologies are available? What are their differences and how do they work for marketers?

3. How do you manage multi-channel social media participation? What tools are there for listening, publishing, promotion and measurement?

4. Search results can be optimized, how do you optimize social media?

5. How do you develop social networks and distribution channels?

6. What are social champions and how do we find, engage and develop influentials?

7. How do you develop a social media strategy?

8. What are the logistical and process considerations for planning, implementing and managing social web participation for companies?

9. How do we foster and manage social customer relationships?

10. How can we develop social media teams in an organization and create a model for social participation within our organization?

There you have it. Ten key social media questions that the new Brian Solis book, Engage! answers for communications professionals, business owners, marketers and social netziens all over the web.  If you have different or more questions than those listed above, by all means visit Amazon and get the book. If you need a person to walk you through the answers, then you can always talk to us at TopRank Marketing .

If you’re in Minneapolis tonight, be sure to come and see Brian present at Solera from 6-8pm.  For the millions of marketers that will not be in Minneapolis this evening, fear not. Vocus is hosting a free online event (Retweet: Engagement Means Business) all day tomorrow that features Brian Solis amongst others like David Meerman Scott and Deirdre Breakenridge.

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© Online Marketing Blog, 2010. | 10 Social Media Marketing Questions Answered by Engage! | http://www.toprankblog.com

The Search Engine Strategies conference from Incisive Media has really taken an amazing turn this year for the West Coast event. Not only have organizers move the conference from San Jose to San Francisco, but SES is now a part of an event called Connected Marketing Week that involves a coordinated effort from a number of organizations providing a 360 degree digital marketing experience.

San Francisco is one of my favorite cities and I think it’s a very smart move to change venues but also to evolve SES into being part of a much larger event. Involving other organizations will give attendees an impressive selection of content to choose from plus even more ways to connect with industry experts, peers, vendors and attendees in general. This year I’ll be giving a solo presentation on Aug 18th called, Content Marketing Optimization.  Here’s the official description:

Content Marketing Optimization (8/17 at 3:00 pm)  The core of any search or social media marketing program centers on content. Digital assets, rich media, web pages, MS Office and PDF docs as well as content created and shared by consumers all offer opportunities for optimization. If it can be searched, it can be optimized! Online marketing is increasingly competitive and brand marketers world-wide are seeking real advantages that will improve the efficiency and impact of their Social Media and SEO efforts. This session provides unique insight into content based optimization strategies and processes as well as tactics for sourcing, creation and promotion of optimized content on the social web.

We’ve posted quite a bit on the topic of content marketing, strategy and optimization. Here are a few for reference so you can get an idea of the type of information I’ll be presenting at SES:

• Key Questions to Optimize Your Content Marketing Strategy
• Content Marketing Strategy with a Side of Social
• 10 Steps to Optimize Your Content Marketing Strategy

I will also moderate a session on the challenges and opportunities with convincing business executives on the ongoing value of investing in search engine marketing.  Search marketing is just one of many marketing channels CMOs and Marketing VPs are responsible for. There is often a disconnect in the language and expectations of input to outcomes and this session will reveal first hand experiences from agencies and in-house marketers.

The lineup on this session is very impressive and includes:  Paul Wilson, Chief Revenue Officer, iProspect, Rich Lesperance, Director of Online Marketing, Walgreens, Laura Lippay, Partner, Nine by Blue and Vivek Chaudhuri, Director, Search Marketing, Digitas Health.  The official description:

Selling Search to the C-Suite (8/19 at 4:45pm)  Your CMO still calls and wants to know why your company isn’t number one for the most popular, random, non revenue orientated terms you have ever seen or heard about. Your entire day is spent answering questions about search. Search marketers and non-search marketers have traditionally had difficulty communicating in the language of their disciplines, often creating friction and unnecessary conflict. This very interactive session will explore how both disciplines can educate each other and explore such issues as the nominal percentage of marketing spend that is allocated to search.

Ron Belanger & Mike Grehan

This has been an exciting year for the internet marketing industry and my time as a member  of the SES Advisory Board will always be appreciated.  The connection between SES and TopRank’s Online Marketing Blog goes back at least 5 or 6 years as a media sponsor and our agency TopRank Marketing has had a very good experience sending staff to SES events. Additionally, I’ve been very fortunate to speak at at least 10 SES conference in different parts of the world and look forward to continuing that relationship.

One of the people I’ve worked with at SES and Incisive Media over the years is Matt McGowan. Matt has advanced quickly in the Incisive organization to Publisher & Head of U.S. at Incisive Media, which is the parent company to SES, Search Engine Watch and ClickZ. I reached out to Matt for attendee tips and for his insights on making SES part of Connected Marketing Week:

Please share a tip for conference attendees or sponsors on how they can get more out of participating with SES:

Put aside a few hours and really look over the agenda and the expo hall floor.  There are a lot of options, so chose the ones that are most important to you and your business.  Remember SES SF is part of Connected Marketing Week so the options are endless!  All partners were chosen based on their focus on education. The bar was set high.

There’s an increasing amount of competition in the marketing conference world. What advantages are there to attending SES and/or Connected Marketing Week over other events?

Education.  Most conferences sell speaking spots or put sales or commercial people on stage most of the time (yes, even other online advertising and marketing events).  SES and the other partners involved in Connected Marketing Week do not (except for a few sponsored sessions which are clearly marked).  We guarantee you will not be pitched.  Instead, you will come away with pages upon pages of notes that will help you grow your company’s profitability.

What are you most proud of with the upcoming SES San Francisco conference?

Pulling off Connected Marketing Week was no easy feat.  That said, I am very happy with the outcome.

Thanks Matt, we’re looking forward to it!

Adam Singer

No TopRank Marketing experience at a SES conference would be complete without liveblogging, so be sure to watch Online Marketing Blog August 17-19  when we’ll be posting about 2 times each day as well as Tweeting and putting up photos and videos to our Flickr and YouTube channels.  Speaking of video, we’ll be putting up another post with videos of our live bloggers talking about their expectations of SES and the sessions they plan on covering next week. That post will share our blogging schedule for SES including which sessions we plan to cover as well as a request for your help to tie-break a few sessions.

We’ve taken nearly 1,000 photos at various Search Engine Strategies conferences and you can see photos from our past SES San Jose (now San Francisco) events here:

• SES San Jose 2005 – Thanks to Thomas, we have some good photos to share since our “official” photos have gone missing.
• SES San Jose 2006 – You’ll recognize a lot of these photos as they’ve been “re-purposed” by SEO bloggers quite a bit.
• SES San Jose 2007 – TopRank sent 5 bloggers to cover SES resulting in an all-time high in photos and posts.
• SES San Jose 2008 – This set includes slides, candids and shots of the last, infamous Google Dance.
• SES San Jose 2009 – A nice mix of candids and Search Bash.

If you’ll be attending Connnected Marketing Week and/or SES San Francisco, please be sure to visit the Content Marketing Optimization session on 8/17 at 3:00 pm. I will be presenting a lot of practical tips that you can use as well as a case study you haven’t heard before.

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© Online Marketing Blog, 2010. | Getting Connected at SES San Francisco | http://www.toprankblog.com

There are many tactics companies can implement as part of a smart Twitter Marketing strategy. Growing the initial following is important as is providing the budding community you’re building with something of value to keep coming back and to spread the good word to their networks. One such tactic that offers value and brings people together is the Twitter chat.  I’ve been involved with about 5 or 6 different Twitter chats as a guest and they are a unique experience. In this post I’ll share my observations about what seems to work, some logistics and a few examples of some well-run Twitter chats for the marketing and PR verticals.

1. Pick a great hashtag – The hashtag ties your Twitter chat together. It should reflect the topic and be intuitive. Examples might be:  #poetry #crmchat or #seo411 – Here’s a list of over 150 chats, topics and the times they run at:  Twitter Chat Schedule.

2. Decide a format and schedule - Part of what makes a Twitter chat successful is that there is a consistent time that requires little reminder and also a format that’s easy to follow. There are a certain number of early adopters on Twitter that “get” how #chats work, but there are many, many more who don’t. They’ll see a sudden flurry of #chat handles in their friend’s Tweets and wonder what’s going on. Make it easy for the audience you’re after to join in and know when the next chat is happening. While there may be more, I’ve seen 2 formats standout.

• Free for all. This is where the chat is treated like a cocktail party and people start posting comments and questions and anyone that wants to, will reply. Its very much many to many and without the use of a tool like Tweetchat can be difficult to follow.

• Outside guests or experts.  If you start the chat, you’re the moderator. One of your duties if you choose the format of bringing in a guest is to find guests that your attendees respect and want to hear from. Prep the guest with how you run your chats in advance.  Use a template email or web page to communicate this. If your guest hasn’t participated in a chat before, they might need a little more guidance but once you’ve done one, the rest go pretty similarly.  Prep the guest with questions in advance so they have an idea of what the specific topic will be. This helps them provide better answers more efficiently.

Promote the guest and get the guest to promote the chat.  Tell the guest what your group responds well to and give examples if you can. This will provide some appreciated guidance for the guest and help give the group what they’re looking for.

3. Create a web page explaining your chat - While a Twitter @account for the chat is a good idea, it’s also a good idea to have a static web page somewhere that the Twitter account can link to. People should also be able to easily find the About #chat page through search engines, so get some other pages or chat members to link to it using the chat name. Explain what the purpose of the chat is, who the moderator(s) are, when the chat runs (including time zone), if the chats are archived and where, and make it easy for visitors to spread the good word about the chat by offering social sharing links/buttons.

This page can live on your blog, your web site or you can easily setup a page on posterous, wordpress or blogger.  If you want to explain more than what is reasonable on a Twitter page, a web page offers more room. A Blog, Facebook Fan page or LinkedIn group that explains the Twitter #chat can also be used and several #chats mentioned below do just that.

4. Recognize #chat participants -  Call out participants during the chat by retweeting interesting things they’ve posted. List all chat participants on the #chat web page. Offer a TweepML list of participants to make it easy for someone to follow everyone in one in a single click. You might also manage a Twitter list of past guests, another list for moderators and another list for most active participants. Possibly promote the Twitter list on services like Listorious. Besides ensuring quality questions, on-topic tweets and great guests, recognition is a powerful thing to do in order to grow a Twitter #chat group.

5. Archive the #chat - Saving the threads of discussion that occur during the chats can be very useful afterwards. This is especially true if you have a good guest and/or participants that come prepared. I like to have about 10-12 pre-written Tweets with links to useful resources prepared before the chat even starts. That way when people ask questions I can answer immediately. I’ve done this several times and it’s gone over pretty well. Look through the Twitter stream of the chat and archive the whole thing or just the most interesting threads into a web page. Archived Twitter chats are an excellent source of content for your blog. Over time, archived chats can be a very useful repository of information, attract links and create search traffic for your web site.

A few of my archived chats include:

• #socialmedia (SEO and Social Media)
• #blogchat (SEO for Blogs)
• AdWeekMedia Connect (Intersection of Search & Social Media)
• #twt20 (Search & Social Media)
• #MeasurePR (SEO and PR Measurement)

Now that I’ve shared a few tips that Twitter #chat editors or moderators should consider, here are some of the best marketing and PR #chats to check out:

• #blogchat – Run by @mackcollier, #blogchat is a long running chat that covers all aspects of blogging on Sunday nights from 8-9pm Central.  View transcripts and other info here.
• #journchat – Run by @prsaraevans,  #journchat is another long running weekly conversation (Mon 7-10pm Central) between journalists, bloggers and PR people.
• #pr20chat – Moderated by @PRtini and @JGoldsborough, #pr20chat is a weekly conversation (Tues 8PM EST) that focuses on public relations 2.0 topics.
• #socialmedia – @Marc_Meyer & @JasonBreed moderate the #socialmedia chat, which of course, is all about social media and occurs Tuesdays at 12 pm Noon EST. Each episode is also tagged with a number, such as #sm1 #sm2 etc. View the live stream here.
• #commschat – @AdamVincenzini & @EmilyCagle run this UK-based Twitter ‘communications’ chat #commschat Monday nights, 8pm (UK time) on traditional / social media, PR, journalism, blogging. See the Blog and FB page.
• #measurepr – Run by @shonali, #measurepr covers measurement topics within the public relations and social media industries that kicked off on February 2, 2010, and is held bi-weekly on Tuesdays from that date, from 12-1 pm ET.
• #prstudchat – Run by @dbreakenridge & @valeriesimon, the monthly #PRStudChat (I thought “stud” meant “manly” not “student” the first time I saw it) provides a platform for conversation between Public Relations Students, Educators and Professionals. See more on WTH.
• #imcchat – Moderated by @bethharte & @abarcelos, #IMCChat is a chat for all of those interested in Integrated Marketing Communications and runs every Wednesday night at 8pm ET.

What are your favorite Twitter chats for Marketing and Public Relations topics? What advice do you have for running or participating in a successful Twitter chat?

Besides the tips above, there are great posts on how to run and participate in Twitter chats on Mashable, from Mack Collier and here.

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© Online Marketing Blog, 2010. | 5 Tips on Twitter Chats Plus 8 Marketing & PR Chats to Follow | http://www.toprankblog.com

Hiring outside expertise to grow thought leadership, sales and market share is essential for companies that do not have the internal resources to do so. At TopRank Online Marketing, we have conversations with companies every day that have deep expertise in their fields, but when it comes to online marketing, they’ve realized the need for outside advice to take the business to the next level.

If a pre-existing relationship doesn’t already exist with a digital marketing agency it can be a challenge for companies to tell the difference between all the different consultants and agencies offering their services. Businesses use a variety of resources to find marketing consultants and when they do, there are several “signals” of credibility than can make the agency stand out over others.

As a “walk the talk” agency, here’s a list of such signals that TopRank is either implementing itself or for clients. It’s also an invitation to share which you feel are the most reliable or unreliable in the comments.

• CEO, Executive and/or Company Blog – Blogs can be exceptionally effective at communicating an agency’s point of view and corporate personality. Company web sites tend to be dry and careful or conversely, full of hype. A well written and promoted blog can do absolutely amazing things for an agency’s reputation in an industry. I think it’s safe to say that TopRank’s  Online Marketing Blog is a good example of that.

• Social Media Footprint – The boon in social network usage by members of the search marketing community gives abundant opportunity to see another side of an online marketing agency. Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn get most of the attention but there are niche networks and groups that may be smaller in numbers of members, but very rich in influence with buyers. Promoting unique knowledge through social media formats and networks can give important indications of an agency’s expertise in formats that can match the information consumption preferences of a variety of potential clients.

• Rock Star Employees & Thought Leaders –  The ability for motivated staff to share their perspectives easily through numerous publishing channels online creates attention to talent that in the past, would have been squandered. Rather than seeing these brandividuals as potential liabilities, agencies that embrace and encourage smart expression of expertise can gain a significant advantage. Empowered employees that work with strong leadership within the agency are a powerful force.

• Conference Speaking – Baring it all in front of an audience so to speak, can go both ways. If the speaker knows their subject matter and can entertain as well, speaking at conferences, regional events, on webinars and at Universities can be very productive. However, if the speaker does not present well or “know their stuff” things can go badly. Presenting “too much” secret sauce to impress potential customers can also fuel the competition, so there is a fine line between being a standout and being an competitive liability.

• Client Testimonials – Client success stories are often one of the first things that catches the eye when looking at different marketing consultants. Common mistakes include testimonials that are too enthusiastic or those that are benign but packed as if they’re something special. Most importantly, testimonials should reflect issues of interest to the target audience.

• Case Studies – With more complex situations, companies want to drill down into specifics of how a company does what it does. The changing nature of the search marketing industry means a continuous set of problem/solution exercises. Case studies present a picture of a company’s breadth and depth of ability to solve a variety of issues.

• Industry Awards – Getting recognized by a respected third party can mean a quick trip to the credibility club. However, such awards are only as meaningful as the credibility of the entities giving them out. There are an increasing number of awards in the digital marketing space and if an agency’s accolades are made up entirely of awards and nothing else, you’ll probably find them looking in a mirror before you see them in front of a computer.

• Being Quoted by the Media – Being cited as an authority on a particular topic in a high profile publication can transform an agency’s reputation and credibility overnight. Getting profiled with a photo on the cover of a regional print publication had amazing effects for TopRank but not nearly as much as getting mentioned in a very favorable light in The Economist or mentions online by sites like Mashable, ClickZ, Yahoo SEM Blog, Microsoft Advertising Blog, Seth Godin’s Blog, eMarketer, Search Engine Watch and Search Engine Land.

• Web Site’s Design & Functionality – A web site still says a lot about a company. A properly designed and informative web site can foster a sense of authority and credibility. Increasingly, agencies are adding social features to their websites such as blogs or syndicating external feeds from social channels and curating that content for readers.

• Editorial Contributions to Industry Publications – Contributing articles to prominent online or print publications gives companies an opportunity to show their unique problem solving abilities and expertise. By association with the publication, the agency also gets a boost in the credibility department. We’ve done this more in the past with publications like MediaPost, iMedia Connection and American Express OPEN Forum.

• Advertising – One way of “buying your reputation” is to advertise in all the places your target audience looks for credible information. Creative advertising on and offline over a period of time can do wonders when implemented with a strong editorial and social media marketing program. This takes a crack creative team and a very healthy budget.

• Conference Sponsorships – Primary sponsorships of the Platinum, Gold and Silver sort at prominent industry conferences can put companies front and center of the most desirable audience: Companies looking for more information on the industry and vendor sourcing. This also takes a healthy budget and as such, gives the impression that the sponsoring agencies are also very healthy. Media sponsorships are another avenue for promotion with most going to prominent print publications and some online pubs. Rarely if ever, is an agency allowed to be a media sponsor unless their blog or newsletter is highly visible and relevant.

• Frontline Staff - Answering the phone, speaking to prospects in meetings, networking online and offline, front line staff behavior can have leave a big impression (good or bad) on potential clients. Account Management and Client Services staff that work with existing customers also have a big impact on word of mouth between clients and the other companies they might refer the agency’s services to.

• Existance or Lack Thereof, of Embarrasing Employee or Executive Photos/Videos Online – If you’ve been to industry conferences, especially search marketing or blogging related events, then you know that attendees are “packing”. Packing smart phones that is, equipped with cameras, livestreaming video, Twitter and Facebook. Why some companies actually promote irreverent behavior of employees, I don’t really know. In fact, some agencies might even take seemingly blase photos and make them seem somewhat irreverent in the name of “humor”. Without context, such images can be as damaging to a brand as if they were true.

• Client List – You are who you associate with. Big brand clients brings a whole other set of challenges and opportunities. But seeing those big names often gives lesser known brand prospects a certain kind of warm fuzzy feeling, “If this agency made it through the vendor sourcing process with a Fortune 50 company, then they’re probably of the right caliber for my $500m company.”

• Search Engine Visibility on Competitive Industry Terms – I can’t tell you how many times companies have said, “We found you on Google by searching for (insert industry term here) and we figured if you can do it for yourself, you can probably do it for us.” I know, I know. There’s so much wrong with that kind of ranking logic these days, but it’s a fact of life in the search biz. Search engine visibility is a form of public relations and showing up for relevant, broad terms (as well as your niche specialties) makes your brand name (if your Title tags are written properly) associated with those terms.

• Brand – Message, Identity, Logo – There’s a lot that goes into creating a brand. I like the definition: “A brand is a promise kept”. Each interaction between a prospective company and something that communicates information about the agency is an opportunity to make a brand promise. Repeat interactions provide the opportunity to keep that promise. Thoughtful messaging and a well designed logo also convey important messages that evoke feelings which can either build or detract from credibility.

• Press Releases – Sending out non-news press releases, “We just moved to a new building” or “We launched a new web site design”, is worse than not sending any press releases at all. But sending out press releases to wire services and directly to cultivated lists of relevant industry publications sends signals of your credibility. And with clever pitching, they might even get you some press coverage.

• Research Published – In the same way that faculty at Universities gain prominence and reputation by publishing research in professional journals, companies that have the insight and resources to conduct real research and publish their findings create very strong signals of credibility. It is not only the execution of such research that makes it an effective “signal” though. The intelligent promotion of these learnings is as much or more important.

• Industry Association Involvement – Investing in the future of the overall industry through association involvement can give the impression that a company has a higher level commitment than those that are not involved. Being involved with setting industry standards, guidelines and even training programs can set an agency apart and give an indication of their expertise.

• The Agency’s Offices – While many internet marketing agencies operate virtually, most maintain physical offices. Depending on the manner in which the agency pitches potential clients, those offices can give an impression of the agency’s style, personality and health.

• Word on the Street, Buzz, Word of Mouth – First and foremost, doing good work is the cornerstone of building positive word of mouth. At the same time, successfully engaging the tactics on this list will build positive buzz, but the longevity of that buzz is only sustainable if the agency has something significant in it’s ability to deliver results, to back it up. There is such a thing as over-marketing and people are smart enough to realize that one company can’t do everything. Making it easy for clients to pass on the good news or making sure testimonials are properly promoted can extend a company’s reach with nominal marketing investment.

• Being Included on Industry “Lists” of Top Agencies – No matter how you slice and dice it, getting included on a list sends a signal. Lists are inherently controversial because getting included means others are excluded. If you know how to create and promote the right signals, like doing great work for clients and letting the world know about it, getting on the kinds of lists that build credibility is pretty straightforward. Leaving it to chance and expecting inclusion based purely on merit is flat out naive.

If you have experience hiring outside marketing expertise, especially online marketing services, what signals of credibility carry the most weight? What signals have you found to be unreliable? Please share in the comments below or join the conversation on Facebook.

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© Online Marketing Blog, 2010. | Is Your Online Marketing Agency a Dud? 23 Signals of Credibility | http://www.toprankblog.com

Sometimes we learn best about doing things in new and innovative ways by understanding them in terms of something we already know. Stories provide useful context and perspective and that’s exactly what David Meerman Scott has done with his latest book that’s just been announced: “Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead: What Every Business Can Learn from the Most Iconic Band in History“.

A longtime fan of the Dead, David co-wrote the book with HubSpot co-founder and fellow deadhead, Brian Halligan to share the brilliant innovations the Dead brought to the business of marketing music and building an incredibly passionate community of brand enthusiasts.

While we were both speaking at the Vocus User’s conference in Washington D.C. last month, David took a few minutes with me to do the following video interview on his new book:

Here’s a summary of the book and the lessons we can all learn about marketing, social media principles and thinking outside the “rules” of business as usual:

“The Grateful Dead broke almost every rule in the music industry book. They encouraged their fans to record shows and trade tapes; they built a mailing list and sold concert tickets directly to fans; and they built their business model on live concerts, not album sales. By cultivating a dedicated, active community, collaborating with their audience to co-create the Deadhead lifestyle, and giving away “freemium” content, the Dead pioneered many social media and inbound marketing concepts successfully used by businesses across all industries today.”

The book can be ordered on Amazon.

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© Online Marketing Blog, 2010. | Video: Marketing Lessons From the Grateful Dead | http://www.toprankblog.com

Here we are just past the halfway mark in 2010 and we’ve tapped into the stream of future marketing planning with our readers for 2011 with a poll. Our question? What 3 online marketing channels & tactics will you emphasize in 2011? The number one answer? Not social media, not email marketing.

The top digital marketing tactic for OMB readers in 2011 is Search Engine Optimization

Our poll this year provided 44 different answers to choose from ranging from display advertising to no holds barred spam. Over 200 readers took the poll and made their choices. While there are many signs of marketing budgets making a recovery, the vast majority of marketers are still focused on planning the most efficient and effective online marketing mix they can for the new year.

Hopefully the responses from our poll will be helpful in making those choices as budgets and strategies are planned for 2011.

The top responses in this year’s survey reflect a more holistic perspective that includes search, social media, advertising, content and email.  While social media marketing continues to get a lot of media attention and companies are investing more ($1.2 billion 2011, Forrester), search marketing (PPC and SEO) gets the lion’s share of digital marketing budgets ($20.7 billion 2011, Forrester).

A new entrant to the top 10 this year is content marketing which is a reflection of the increasing importance on providing more than just product/service features and benefits to customers in order to get them to buy. Content is the glue for the intersection of SEO and Social Media. Content is often the outcome of social interactions online and content can be shared and linked to, increasing it’s visibility within all kinds of search. I wouldn’t be surprised if Content Marketing jumped a few more spaces next year. According to the Junta42 Content Marketing Spending Report, 59% of marketers surveyed planned to increase content marketing spending in 2010.

Advertising through Pay per click and social media rated well, but not concomitant with budgets. That is more likely an indication of the topical focus of Online Marketing Blog which pays less attention to advertising than Search Marketing, Social Media, Content Marketing and Online PR.

Keep in mind, the results of this single question poll are a reflection of our readers and with 232 responses, isn’t a significant sample size for making broad generalizations. It is however, useful insight for our readers to see what others are focusing on. Online Marketing Blog is rated well as a marketing blog and has a significant readership in the marketing community.

You can see the full set of responses and all 44 digital marketing tactics here.

Are Search Engine Optimization, Social Networking and Blogging your top digital marketing tactics for 2011? If not, what areas will you emphasize next year?

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© Online Marketing Blog, 2010. | SEO Tops Digital Marketing Tactics for 2011 | http://www.toprankblog.com

Like many others, I recently purchased an iPad out of curiosity. While my intentions were of discovery, I quickly found some productivity gains with blogging.

The upside to blogging with an iPad is that it’s portable and you can easily log your thoughts on a screen that is a lot more convenient than typing into an iPhone or other smartphone. Also, there are a number of apps to make it fairly easy.

The downside is that even though typing is easier on a much larger screen, typing on a screen vs. a tactile keyboard still takes some getting used to, even if you’re an iPhone owner. I also found some issues with copy/paste and for web based tools, anything that uses Flash is a no-go.

Here are several tips and tools that you can use to become productive more quickly when blogging using an iPad. Each icon links to the app store and this post was written entirely on an iPad.

WordPress App – The free app for WordPress is handy and is of course a very limited version of the web based version. The advantage of using the app is a simplified view and larger editing area. Basic functions like create, edit and delete of pages, comments and posts is available. If the limited nature of the app doesn’t work for you, the web based version works well too, albeit with smaller text and work area.

Bonus tip: Another handy blogging tool for iPad is BlogPress, which now supports updating Twitter & Facebook as well as upload & embedding of YouTube videos.

Dragon Dictation – One very handy workaround awkward typing on the iPad is to use speech to text. I had pretty low expectations of Dragon speech to text software but it’s pretty easy to use. You just speak into the microphone on the iPad and then copy the text from Dragon software over into WordPress or wherever it is that you’re blogging with. There might be a few small edits to make, but I found it to be pretty efficient and pretty accurate. Speech to text saves a lot of time and it’s something you can do when typing isn’t convenient. In fact, most of this post was done with Dragon.

PhotoPad & Built-In Screen Capture – With many blog posts, I capture images as screen grabs and then do some editing to customize for a particular blog post. iPhones and iPads can easily take a picture of whatever is displayed on your screen by holding down the top and bottom buttons at the same time. The image is automatically stored to your images folder.

Then I use the free PhotoPad app to open the image and do basic editing. Upload the image using WordPress and you’re all set. Editing options are very limited and I would love to get other recommendations.

Disqus Pro App – We use Disqus to manage comments on Online Marketing Blog, so moderation duties can be handled in part with this app that is made for iPhone, but usable on the iPad.

Echofon Pro – What good is writing a great blog post (or dictating one as in our case here) if no one knows you’ve published it? That’s where tools for Twitter and/or Facebook come in. I use Echofon for my Tweeting activities on my iPhone 4 and the iPad. In regards to blog promotion, it’s a quick way to share links to your best posts. There is a Tweetdeck app for iPad too, but I’ve had little luck getting it to work.

Analytics App – If you need a quick fix for top level web stats for your blog and you use Google Analytics, then this app comes in handy. Like the other apps on this list, it’s limited, but can offer you info on the go.

Will the iPad server as a replacement device for blogging over the laptop?  For now I would say no. The limited features of the iPad apps over their web counterparts means too much switching back and forth between app and browser. However, I do see the iPad providing more convenient access to blogging than a cell phone. If you’re like me and manage a large number of draft posts at any given time, being able to finish off a post in between watching streaming movies on Netflix or HuluPro can add a slice of productivity to an otherwise all-entertainment device.

There are many other apps for iPad and if you have found some that are particularly useful for blogging, please share in the comments.

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© Online Marketing Blog, 2010. | 6 Tools For Better Blogging With An iPad | http://www.toprankblog.com

As a longtime customer of PRWeb, I’ve seen many changes over the years. The oldest optimized press release I could find of mine that’s still online dates back to mid 2001 and in the years since, it’s been an evolving relationship moving from customer to consultant.

From the days of talking new features as a super user with founder David McInnis to our current role as search and social media consultants, the focus on innovation and serving customers has always been a mutual focus. I’ve had the pleasure of getting to know Vocus Product Manager for PRWeb, Jiyan Wei, Director of Online Marketing, Meg Walker and Vocus CMO Bill Wagner as well as other members of the Vocus team and they’ve been working very hard to make an array of substantial changes to the PRWeb platform to better serve customers.

PRWeb innovated the entire idea of the optimized press release and was in use by hundreds if not thousands of SEOs long before any other wire service thought to start following their lead and offer SEO friendly features. Now PRWeb has launched a new design, site architecture, press release templates and resource center that provides even greater Search Engine Optimization and Social Media exposure benefits.

Here’s a quick video tour of the all new PRWeb that’s worth a look:

More SEO & Social “Built Into” the Template - The press release template that PRWeb uses to publish press releases offers critical opportunities for customer discovery, consumption and sharing. That means making it easier for readers to find press releases by baking in more search engine friendly features, providing more room for media such as images and video, offering social sharing options and optimizing code for faster loading pages.

Centralized News – In particular, the move away from showing over 100 press releases on the PRWeb home page to a dedicated news center with specific industry category pages will allow even more entry points via search and give customer press releases even more exposure, especially in the long term. With over 500,000 pages, implementing SEO friendly design and architecture changes to a site like PRWeb is no small feat. Structuring the news center according to industry categories creates more of a news destination vs. a repository of press releases. Better design and content organization provides a better user experience and will attract more links.

More How To Online Marketing Resources - Another major enhancement for the new PRWeb site is the resource center with a growing collection of useful how to tips, articles, videos, webinars and white papers for everything from press release writing tips to general online marketing topics. Seeing examples of press releases organized by specific industry gives marketers useful insight for making their use of press releases successful.

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© Online Marketing Blog, 2010. | 3 Things You Should Know About the New PRWeb | http://www.toprankblog.com