Signals from the Field

Handling Negative Social Media Publicity

By Tara Lappe—Marketing Coordinator, WebStrategies, Inc., February 18, 2011

1. Search engines and social media sites will boom and begin a "love affair" with each other.

Search engines will remain the "king" of online marketing and will continue to be the place to find information, products, services and people. The social media sites are where more and more people are going to "check out" someone or some business before engagement occurs. It's a validation process and a place to go to get recommendations. Angie's List is a relatively popular social media site that rates a variety of service providers. Rating websites are popping up every day giving consumers significant power to evaluate products and services. If you think Online Reputation Management is important today - it will be 10 times more important in 2012.

Using Google Places to Drive Awareness and Website Traffic

Google recently made some major-league changes to their search engine results listings, particularly for those doing localized searches. In their usual manner, Google understood that a significant amount of online searches are intended to find local products and services, and they reacted accordingly by enhancing local search results.

What should I do with social media? Should I invest in search engine marketing to generate leads and sales? Do I need a website that sells online? All good questions - but first things first.

"I know that half of my advertising is wasted - I just don't know which half." That's a famous quote from John Wanamaker, a successful merchant in the 1800’s and considered by many to be the father of advertising. His comment underscores the challenges that marketers have had since the beginning of time – how do I know if my marketing is working and what elements are working better than others?

While it's only been about 15 years since its creation (we won't argue here who created it), the internet has not only changed the way we live and work, it has also become the most critical marketing medium out there. Many people consider a business that doesn't have a website questionable, and recent statistics show that more than 90% of people considering doing business with you will check you out online before engaging in any meaningful interaction.

These days, it seems the minute you buy a smart-phone (SP) it is obsolete. In all my years in consumer electronics retailing, I've never seen a shorter product life cycle. What's driving the craze and what does all this mean to online marketing?

Getting interested prospects to a poorly designed website is similar to someone coming to your office or store and no one's there to help them. After a few minutes, or on the internet a few seconds, they get frustrated and leave. On the internet, it's likely that prospect will never return - there are just too many other competitors out there. This article provides some information about how people behave online and communicates 5 important elements of a good website.

The major search engines (Google, Bing, Yahoo) remain the number one source to attract new customers online. Sure, we’ve heard about how social media is the new big thing in terms of online marketing, and that’s certainly true – but the search engines continue to be the foundation for marketing online.