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??Is Social Media better than Sex??

All right, I don’t like to be too light heart on the articles I find…

However this one by

Scott Kleinberg covers a large amount of facts even if the caption is outlandish.

This is marketing  after all!

So enjoy.  Love to know what you  think about it!

Issue date: 3/26/10 

(MCT) – Raise your hand if you check update your Facebook status or tweet after you go to bed. As weird as that sounds, it’s not rare at all.

The latest Retrevo Gadgetology study asked social media users that question among others.

TWITTER and FACEBOOK:

48 percent of people check/update Facebook and/or Twitter after they go to bed.

18 percent of people under 25 years old can’t go more than a couple hours without checking in on Facebook.

61 percent of people under 25 have to check in on Facebook at least once a day.

11 percent of people over 25 years old can’t go more than a couple hours without checking in on Facebook.

55 percent of people over 25 have to check in on Facebook at least once a day.

16 percent of people under 25 years old rely on Twitter and/or Facebook for the morning “news.”

ELECTRONIC MESSAGES:

11 percent of people under 25 years old can be interrupted by an electronic message during sex. (The number drops to 6 percent of people over 25 years old.)

24 percent of people under 25 can be interrupted by an electronic message while in the bathroom. (This number drops to 12 percent of people over age 25.)

49 percent of people under 25 years old can be interrupted by an electronic message during a meal. (27 percent for people over 25 years of age.)

22 percent of people under 25 years old can be interrupted by an electronic message during a meeting. (11 percent of people over 25 years of age.)

IPHONE USERS:

28 percent of iPhone users check/update Twitter before they get out of bed.

26 percent of iPhone users check/update Twitter before they turn on their TV.

23 percent of iPhone users rely on Twitter for their morning news interrupted by an electronic message during a meeting. (11 percent of people over 25 years of age.)

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Small Businesses Double Social Media Adoption

Further proof that Your business needs to incorporate Social Media into your marketing plan.

after you read this article from Emarketer.  Email Mary for a free consultation.

Most small businesses satisfied with results

A difficult economy has helped spur small businesses to adopt social media marketing in greater numbers, according to “The State of Small Business Report” from Network Solutions and the Center for Excellence in Service at the University of Maryland Robert H. Smith School of Business. Social media usage increased to 24%, from 12% the year before.

The most common usage of social media among small business was a company page on a social networking site, followed by posting status updates.

Social Media Tactics Used by US Small Businesses, December 2009 (% of respondents)

Small businesses’ expectations of social media seem roughly to be in line with their experiences, although they are not quite as successful as they had hoped. Respondents’ top accomplishments were customer acquisition and placing their own businesses within the market, but did not meet expectations fully. Social media’s capabilities for staying engaged with consumers and collaborating with other businesses, however, were more in line with businesses’ expectations.

Performance of Social Media Tactics According to US Small Businesses, December 2009 (% of respondents)

Most small businesses say they are just breaking even with their current usage of social media, but a solid one-fifth find it profitable already. Businesses are positive about the potential as well: Nearly one-half believe it will make them money in the next 12 months, and another 39% think they will break even on it. Just 9% think social marketing will continue to be a losing proposition.

Current and Potential Impact of Social Media Marketing on Their Business According to US Small Businesses, December 2009 (% of respondents)

Overall, 58% of respondents felt social media lived up to their expectations. One-half felt it took up more time than they realized, but only 6% claimed negative comments on social media had hurt their business.

“Social media levels the playing field for small businesses by helping them deliver customer service,” said Janet Wagner, director of the Center for Excellence in Service, in a statement. “Time spent on Twitter, Facebook and blogs is an investment in making it easier for small businesses to compete.”

Previous research on small businesses and social media use revealed a somewhat rocky relationship. A Citibank study indicated social media was not working well for small businesses’ lead gen efforts, but other data showed small companies would be upping spending in the channel.

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10 Ways in Which Twitter is Used In Business

24/7 Wall St. has come up with 10 ways in which Twitter will permanently change American business within the next two to three years, based on an examination of Twitter’s model, the ways that corporations and small businesses are currently using the service and some of the logical extensions of how companies will use Twitter in the future

Read more: Time. Com Article
Email Mary`

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Customer Satisfaction and Managed Internet Marketing

Customer Satisfaction using managed internet marketing can help your business retain customers.

Did you know that 68% of customers who quit doing business with a company do so because they don’t feel cared about as compared to the 14% who don’t like the product or service?  Isn’t this an interesting fact? If only those customers were followed up with!!!

Think about it that’s 7 out of 10 people!  Can you afford to lose that many people?  What could you have done differently to avoid this common pitfall?

In addition, of the customers who use your product 4 out of 100 will be active complainers and will tell at least 10 others of their difficulties or problems!  that’s potentially 40 people NOT buying from you!
Also,of these 4 complainers over 90% will stop doing business with your company and tell at least 9 others about it
of those who are handled correctly beween 80-95% will come back and may refer as many as 5 new customers.  That’s 3 of the 4 coming back with a potential 15 new customers!  You do the math.

Listen to my radio blog and learn more!

Meanwhile if you want to do something about this and get a system in place that will improve your customer retention;
Email Mary if you need help!

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Social Media: An Inside Look at the People Who Use It

New Research Sheds Light on Social Media Use

3/8/2010The Retail Advertising and Marketing Association released research on the habits of social media users.

The Retail Advertising and Marketing Association, a division of National Retail Federation, released new research at NRF’s Retail Innovation & Marketing Conference on the habits of social media users. Comparing social media users to the average U.S. adult, the survey looks at the differences in demographics for each group, including male and female usage as well as age differences in social media users compared to other adults.The survey, “Social Media: An Inside Look at the People Who Use It,” compares U.S. social media users to the average American adult. Survey highlights include:

•Seven out of 10 social media users between the ages of 18-34 regularly use Facebook more than other sites such as MySpace, Twitter and Classmates
•71.8 percent of social media users say that after an online search, they communicate with others about a product or service with face-to-face communication
•More people who use social media prefer to give advice about a product or service rather than receive it
•Social media users are more likely to use other new media compared to adults 18+
•70.6 percent of female social media users regularly use Facebook, compared to 61.0 percent of males
•More men than women prefer to communicate with others via a cell phone conversation after searching for a product or service online

Click here to view the entire research report.

http://www.pctonline.com/social-media-research.aspx

Chart: Regular New Media Usage by Age

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Regular New Media Usage by Age

Powered By: iCharts | create, share, and embed interactive charts online

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Nine Bullet Points to Manage Your Social Media Marketing

Nine points of advice to keep your Internet Marketing Successful!

  • Pay attention to and monitor your own social media presence AND your competitor’s presence.
  • Your entire business must participate in your business’s  social media efforts.
  • Develop a Highly Effective social media strategy.
  • Define and publish a social media policy within your business to protect your Business Brand.
  • Develop internal structure and time-line to implement your Social Media Strategy.
  • Contribute to the community and actively involve your business in the community’s concerns.
  • Participate in good times and in bad.
  • Respond in real time.
  • Measure the impact of social media engagement to your Business Success!

If Your Business takes these nine Bullets and implements even 50% of the time, you WILL see a return on Investment of your time and money.

Email Mary` if you need help!

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54% of US Internet users on Facebook, 27% on MySpace

Click here to find out more!Another form Marketing is the use of a Fanpage in Facebook.

The reasons businesses should use a Fanpage in their marketing campaigns are explained in the following article.

If you have comments leave them below.

February 10, 2010 | LeeAnn Prescott | Comments |

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December 2009 data from comScore puts Facebook’s unique US visitor count at nearly 112 million. With a total estimated US Internet population of 205 million, that means that 54% of all Internet users are on Facebook. MySpace captured a still strong 57 million users in December — 27% of the Internet population.

Social Networking by the Numbers, a study I conducted using comScore and Experian Hitwise data from December 2009, details US data on visitor counts, time spent, and growth rates for the top 10 purely social networks (not vertical networks like LinkedIn and Flixster) over the past year.

Some surprises in the comScore data -

  • Facebook users were more engaged than MySpace users, visiting Facebook an average of 27 times in December versus 14 for MySpace.
  • Tagged, MyYearbook, and Orkut users were the most active, visiting those sites about every other day or more.
  • MyYearbook and Tagged users spent 2 minutes longer on average on those sites than the average Facebook user.

Experian Hitwise offered trend data that demonstrates how big social networking has become:

  • One in four (25%) US Internet page views occurred at one of the top social networking sites in December 2009, up 83% from 13.8% in December 2008.
  • Nearly one in 10 visits went to one of these sites in December 2009, versus 5.8% in December 2008.
  • MySpace and Facebook virtually flipped positions over the course of a year — in December 2009, visits to Facebook accounted for 68% of visits to a custom category of 10 social networks, compared to MySpace’s 28%. In December 2008, Facebook had 29% of visits and MySpace had 64%.
  • Facebook drove category growth, with its overall market share growing 286% from December 2008 to December 2009.
  • The only other site to grow in market share in that period was Tagged, whose overall share grew by 35%.

When taken in sum, these data suggest that all of the attention directed toward Facebook in the past year is warranted. But the 57 million highly engaged users on MySpace are nothing to sneeze at, and the second-tier networks have millions of users. Expect them to begin to integrate with Facebook or MySpace over the course of the next year, just as vertically oriented sites have done (Flixster, a movie review social network is integrated with MySpace, and Goodreads, a site where users share book recommendations, is integrated with Facebook).

There’s no shame in doing what you do best, keeping your users happy, and allowing them to grow their network by sharing their activities on the largest social networking site in the world.

http://digital.venturebeat.com/2010/02/10/54-of-us-internet-users-on-facebook-27-on-myspace/

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Coca-Cola’s Super Bowl Ad Plans Include Social Media

If this does not convince you that social media marketing is right for your business NOTHING will convince you to use it.

Please read this article listed in the New York Times and in the comment below state whether Pepsi-Cola is using their resources wisely!

If you happen to agree with their marketing approach you may want to incorporate Managed Internet Marketing into your Strategic Plan to gain Business Success! Email Mary`

Coca-Cola’s Super Bowl Ad Plans Include Social Media

By STUART ELLIOTT

Coca-Cola is telling Pepsi-Cola that when it comes to Super Bowl advertising, you can walk and chew gum at the same time.

In December, Pepsi-Cola said that it would not buy commercial time during the 2010 Super Bowl for the first time in more than two decades. Company executives said they wanted to concentrate on a campaign centered on philanthropy and the social media rather than spots during the big game.

On Wednesday, in a Webcast news conference, Coca-Cola executives discussed how they intend to incorporate philanthropy and the social media into their Super Bowl ad plans. The social media component will come courtesy of Facebook, which is teaming up with Coca-Cola for the initiative.

Coca-Cola is scheduled to run two commercials during Super Bowl XLIV on CBS on Feb. 7. The company bought the time from CBS before Pepsi-Cola announced that it would skip the game.

Visitors to the Coca-Cola fan page on Facebook (facebook.com/livepositively) will be able to share virtual gifts with friends, after which three things are to take place:

* The gift recipients get an image of a Coke bottle that is displayed on their Facebook pages and news feed.

* The gift givers will get a 20-second sneak peek at one of the two Coca-Cola Super Bowl commercials.

* Coca-Cola will donate a dollar to the Boys and Girls Clubs of America.

The altruistic element to be added to the Super Bowl ad effort reflects a longtime corporate philosophy “to do a little good while you’re refreshing people,” Katie Bayne, chief marketing officer at Coca-Cola North America.

The philanthropy also fits in with a Coca-Cola corporate campaign carrying the theme “Live positively,” Ms. Bayne said, which discusses subjects like recycling, as well as with the campaign for the Coca-Cola brand, which carries the theme “Open happiness.”

As for Pepsi-Cola’s absence from the Super Bowl, “we’ll miss them,” Ms. Bayne said. “They have other things planned.”

For Coca-Cola, the Super Bowl represents a chance “to be part of the celebration,” she added, and to “make brand-equity deposits” with the large audience expected to watch the game.

The two Coke spots during the game, created by Wieden & Kennedy, are part of the “Open happiness” campaign. One features characters from “The Simpsons” and tells a story about Montgomery Burns, Homer Simpson’s stingy boss, losing his entire fortune.

The other Coke spot in the Super Bowl, set to a version of Ravel’s “Bolero,” shows a man sleepwalking through some scary moments in the African veldt.

Coca-Cola and Pepsi-Cola have zigged and zagged their way through many Super Bowls. In the early years, both brands bought spots during the game. Coke pulled out for many years after Pepsi-Cola kept outscoring Coke in the annual USA Today Ad Meter competition, in which consumers rank their favorite Super Bowl spots.

Coke returned to the Super Bowl in 2007 and the two brands went head-to-head again that year as well as in 2008 and 2009.

Instead of advertising during Super Bowl XLIV, Pepsi-Cola is introducing what it calls the Pepsi Refresh Project, which is heavily based in the digital media rather than in traditional media like TV. The effort will be centered on the Pepsi brand making donations to organizations that are chosen by consumers.

Although Pepsi-Cola will be absent from the Super Bowl, there will still be a beverage battle. Coca-Cola will face off against Dr Pepper Cherry, a soda sold by the Dr Pepper Snapple Group. The Dr Pepper Cherry spot, created by the Los Angeles office of Deutsch, will feature the rock band Kiss.

During the Webcast, Ms. Bayne and Pio Schunker, senior vice president for creative excellence — yes, that is his title — at Coca-Cola North America, showed some Coca-Cola spots that will appear during other high-profile TV events in addition to the Super Bowl. The venues will include the Daytona 500 Nascar race and the Winter Olympics.

As the Webcast ended before 2 p.m. Eastern time, Ms. Bayne noted that 2,500 virtual Coke gifts had already been given away through Facebook.

There may have been much more but Coca-Cola’s timing was off: the Webcast was up against the introduction by Apple of the iPad.

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LinkedIn’s Relationship to Businesses

Here’s an article by Ben Williams that I found at Ezine.com.
What I like about it is how simply he tells us how LinkedIn is another Social Media Site that we can use to market our businesses.
After you’ve read the article, let me know  how you will be using LinkedIn to promote your business!

If you have no clue how to use LinkedIn or Twitter or Facebook to market your business, Email Mary` and I will gladly help you.

So many businesses already know the power that they can harness by joining LinkedIn. LinkedIn is a bit like Facebook, but completely business-orientated. People use it to connect and build rapport with potential clients, as well as with other business owners, where they can share past experiences and advice. In this post, I will give you 5 tips to improve you success on LinkedIn. So, have a read!

• Add a personal touch – LinkedIn is full of businesses who just set up their profile and then expect new business to come rolling in. To a certain extent, you might get some new business, but in order to maximise your chance on LinkedIn, add a personal touch to your profile, and show other business owners and potential clients that you have actually put the effort in to create a friendly page.

• Interact – As with any other social networking site, be it Facebook, Twitter or anything else, the main point of it is to interact with potential clients. Maybe say on your profile that you are happy to help anyone who is having any problems, and then when messages come through asking for advice, give it to them; for free. This will help to build a relationship with that person. Just don’t give too much advice, or they wouldn’t need to do business with you!

• Profile Picture – Same as Facebook and Twitter; if you have a picture of yourself up, people will be a lot more inclined to interact with you. It always helps to have a face behind the brand.

• Connections – Connect with as many people as you can. I don’t mean randomly adding people, I mean searching keywords that your ideal customer may have included in their profile, and add them. Once they have accepted, be the first to message them thanking them for accepting you, and let them know what you do.

• Rapport – As with any sort of marketing, build rapport with your customer. You shouldn’t sell directly on LinkedIn, you should try and re-direct anyone who is interested to your website or blog. Make sure you build some rapport with these people first though, once they like you, they will pay more attention to the links you post.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Ben_M_Williams

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Five Biggest Mistakes Businesses make with Social Media Marketing

Below is yet another article I found that explains why Businesses need to look for competent Internet Marketing Specialists to help them with their business goals!
Let me know what you think and contact me if you would like a free consultation Email Mary`
What do you think are the five biggest mistakes people make when it comes to marketing with social media? Read on and find out.

There are many ways in which you can fritter away your time and your money without getting the results you are hoping for. Sure, social media are usually free or very low cost, but time is money too, and you’re probably using resources that cost you money as well.

So here are five key ways in which people miss out on the potential benefits of Facebook, Twitter, and company.

1) Not leveraging social media properly

That’s probably the biggest mistakes. Many companies and business owners use social media, which means that they invest time, energy, and money. But they don’t know how to turn that investment into a profit. They don’t leverage the power they have the potential to unleash with their investment.

2) Lack of planning

Diving in and throwing lots of stuff at it to see what sticks doesn’t usually get result in other context either. And it sure won’t work in social media.

Social media are just too vast to make an impact in unless you have a plan and focus your energy. Two things are likely to happen from lack of planning: lack of results, and overspending of resources.

If you fail to plan, you can easily get sucked into endless activities on Twitter, Facebook, and so on, and you may or may not ever get anything out of it. Before you know it, you may have frittered away your resources without getting any benefit in return.

3) Lack of respect for their personality and etiquette rules

Social media also require that you approach them the right way. You need to respect them and their distinct personalities and etiquette rules.

What works on Twitter won’t necessarily work on Facebook, and what works on either or both of these definitely won’t work on LinkedIn.

Even bookmarking services have their personalities. Articles that are a big hit on stumbleupon can be just as big a flop at Digg — and vice versa.

You need to get to know the specific social media venue and work with it rather than just deploying one-size-fits-all promotional materials.

4) Too much promotion

Speaking of promotional materials… Too much promotion can quickly kill off your campaign in any of the social media venues.

Social media are about being social and about sharing information. So you need to provide value, interesting information, feedback, and just generally come across as a nice guy and a good citizen and member of the specific venue that you’re currently using.

If you fail to abide by the etiquette rules, written AND unwritten, you can quickly lose your follower and/or friends, and even get banned from the network. So it pays to focus on just a few and really get to know them.

5) Failing to track your results

So what ARE you getting from your efforts? Be sure to track where your new leads and customers (and sales) come from, if any, to the best of your ability.

Social media feel so casual that this is a step that many business owners miss. Don’t be one of them.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Maria_Gudelis

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