Online Marketing for Local Business
Posts tagged social media
Youth of the Nation
15 years
by admin
in Uncategorized
As a student of history (one of the few subjects I paid attention to during middle or high school), I have always been interested in studying the differences between different generations. I like to see how societal events like war, cultural influences or technologies influence whole groups of people. One of the most interesting groups to me is Generation Y, also called the Millennials.
There aren’t exact boundaries – for any generation – but Gen Y begins in the late 70s or early 80s, and extends out to approximately the year 2000.
What recently caught my attention was that many Millennials have stopped using words like “hello” and “goodbye” in their conversations. The reason is pretty straightforward, most of their conversations via social media, texting or chat services have no clear beginning or end, but are simply ongoing dialogues with other people.
Of course, older generations are using these same technologies, but they still tend to use these media for more traditional conversations.
I am trying to refrain from saying things like “back in my day”, maybe because this would mean admitting that I am finally getting old. However, you can’t help but notice the differences that adolescents today have from earlier generations. As I started my business last year, I reached out to a number of financial institutions (my past expertise) and began selling the virtues of online communications. During these conversations it struck me, younger consumers won’t find ATMs, online banking or bill pay to be especially convenient. Why would they – they’ve never known a world without them.
They’ve always had cell phones (mobile devices? Handheld super computers?); always had 150 channels to choose from; always had video games that look like the movies. And the list goes on.
The impact of this group of people on American business has been muted so far. Younger workers are usually the last hired and first fired, and the current recession has hit them hard. But as they gain valuable real world experience and skills, their numbers will grow within our workforce, as they become cheaper alternatives to older workers. As Gen Y begins to assume more leadership roles and responsibilities, how will you market to them? These are questions that will need answers pretty soon.
Do you think print advertising will be particularly effective with this group? How about standard radio advertising? TV?
Do you think your money will be more effectively spent in direct (snail) mail campaigns, or email marketing?
Would you rather have a great print newsletter, or online blog?
Prediction for 2010…
15 years
by admin
in Uncategorized
The start of a new year is the time for predictions, so I thought I would venture one of my own for 2010. The topic is a change I think will happen with online networking users, and although this refers to personal use, businesses will probably be affected as well.
A good analogy I’ve heard is that social networking brings far away people closer to you, at the expense of making those close to you further away. This makes sense, because we all have our limit of desired social interactions in a day (or week or month), and time spent talking with the college buddy who lives in Boston is time not spent talking to your much better friend who lives across town.
And after the initial rush of catching up with the high school friend who you haven’t seen in 17 years wears off, you suddenly realize that you really don’t care that they “Took the kids for ice cream this afternoon” or “Chose tiles for the big bathroom remodel project today.”
That’s not meant as a knock on old friends!
But everyone has limited time, and we are asked to do more and more with our finite resources these days.
For an example, I’m fairly new to Facebook. And as a newbie, I accepted every single invite that came my way, no matter how out of the blue it seemed…and surely thought that I’d never use the “Hide” button. For those unfamiliar, this button skips over posts made by that specific individual. It’s a little less permanent that Unfriending someone. (Don’t know that term? It was the Word of the Year in 2009). And I never thought I would use it. But now I have, at least sparingly so far.
Twitter has the same problem. You only see the last 25 tweets or so from the people you have subscribed to. But sign up for 200 or 300 accounts, just because they looked interesting at the time, and you will hardly ever see the messages that you really care about amidst the tsunami of messages from everyone else.
My prediction? Social networks will shrink, not grow, in 2010. I don’t mean that there won’t be new users who join these networks. There are still lots of people who are participating now, and some of them will finally give in this year. But the number of people you follow, or friend, or connect with will shrink to a more manageable number. (One exception may be LinkedIn. Primarily a business tool, maximizing your number of contacts will still be advantageous)
People will probably become more and more selective in who they allow into their network, to keep from being overwhelmed with information.
And note that this really doesn’t apply to celebrities, who use social networks primarily as one-way communication.
Or, that one person we all knew who had 11,423 “friends” on MySpace.
It's Magic?
15 years
by admin
in Uncategorized
Thinking about a topic for this week’s blog, once again I came across one quite by accident. Joking about my logo, and the *magic* element of my company name and logo, I was suddenly struck by the fact that what I do for clients is really NOT magic. Creating content as a path to online success that is.
That statement is not mean to diminish its importance. As you have read here and elsewhere, content – for your website, your blog, your E-Newsletter, your social media accounts – is more important than ever. And this is not to say that researching and writing and editing and revising and getting approval is an easy process! But I mean to say, if you make the commitment to share
As mentioned in a recent post, it has become increasingly difficult to differentiate yourself on the Internet with technology. There can only be so many Yahoos or Googles online. You’re either one of the huge fish, or one of the countless minnows. But providing great, insightful content and commentary on your category, whatever it is, can still provide you with a space you can stake out as your own online. You may never be the next eBay, but you CAN be the best St. Louis-based provider of exposition services.
And there really is a blueprint that you can follow to grow your business online, a step-by-step set of instructions to follow for success. That doesn’t mean that the path is exactly the same for every business, or for every category or field. You may have lots of competitors with a head start. You may be in a field with a few entrenched brands, or with many smaller ones. You may be in a niche market, with few natural customers, or an industry that is a little “behind the curve” in a technological sense.
But if you consistently share good information, and spend some time and resources on SEO work and social networking and just plain old word of mouth (how old fashioned of you!) to promote your content, you will find that more and more potential customers will begin to find you.
Now the fact that you need to provide a quality product or service, at a competitive price and with good customer support or client service, to be successful online or anywhere else hopefully goes without saying!
But whatever your business, one thing I can assure you is this: If you make a commitment to create, share and promote great content – you will eventually build the web presence that you are looking for. I’ve seen it happen. Big time, and multiple times.
And sadly (for the rabbit in my hat, at least), it wasn’t *magic*…
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all.