LinkedIn currently reports that it has 200 million members worldwide. Most have probably created a LinkedIn page to connect with colleagues and clients and have high hopes of connecting to prospects. However, many will probably never be found, because they have not maximized their profiles. Here are five LinkedIn profile strengthening tips to boost your profile and create a network of professionals that has the potential to increase your business.
Archive for the ‘Social Media’ Category
Reacting Negatively on Social Media Doesn’t Help
Wednesday, May 22nd, 2013
Here’s a great example of why you should be careful about what you post on the web, especially social media. A restaurant owner in Arizona has been getting bad reviews for a while now and was recently on Fox reality TV show “Kitchen Nightmares” starring Chef Gordon Ramsey.
That show didn’t go well for him either, so he ranted on Twitter… “I AM NOT STUPID ALL OF YOU ARE, YOU JUST DO NOT KNOW GOOD FOOD.”
There’s a great article in the San Jose Mercury about this. “You need thick skin in this business,” Chef Ramsay said before walking out. It was the first time he wasn’t able to reform a business, according to the show. But the owner continued his rant on Twitter, Facebook and anything else he could find. That led to closing the restaurant for a week or two to let things simmer.
We all have an occasional bad review or negative comment in social media. The right way to deal with it is to apologize, if there was something wrong and perhaps give a discount for the next visit. But the idea is not to increase the negativity. That just doesn’t work. Here’s the article… Arizona restaurant featured on Fox show learns online reviews can make or break
Pinterest for Travel and Tourism Promotion
Tuesday, April 30th, 2013
Pinterest can be a powerful and fun addition to your travel and tourism PR social networking program. For those of you not already on the bandwagon, Pinterest is a social networking platform that allows users to create virtual bulletin boards on which they can “pin” inspiring images or videos.
Followers can like your pins, effectively bookmarking them, or repin them to their own boards to share them with their own followers. Gorgeous travel shots are particularly suited to the Pinterest audience; the combination of images, video and descriptions can bring a place to life for its followers. It’s a visually rich way to create a buzz around any travel destination.
Create boards to highlight different areas of interest for vacationers: for example, Placemaking Group client, the Guam Visitors Bureau shares images about local culture, Guam’s stunning beaches, wedding ideas, sightseeing activities, and sports and golf, among other attractions specific to Guam.
Likewise, the Micronesian island of Kosrae (also a Placemaking Group client) posts about diving and snorkeling, the island’s natural beauty, its people, and getaways, including links to reviews for Kosrae hotels.
Both islands use a mixture of original content from the Visitors Bureau uploaded to Pinterest, and repinned content posted by other Pinterest fans of Guam and Kosrae. Being engaged by sharing images is part of what it’s all about. With that in mind, Pinterest posts can easily be shared across platforms, cross-promoting your posts via Facebook and Twitter.
Contact us if you’d like to talk about having The Placemaking Group spearhead your travel destination’s social networking strategy.
Related posts:
- The Constantly Evolving World of Social Media
- Travel Writer Familiarization Programs
- Placemaking Group on Pinterest
by Deirdre Spencer, Senior Designer The Placemaking Group
SEO and Article Marketing
Monday, April 29th, 2013Do you want better SEO? Do you know why you want better SEO? Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is becoming one of the most effective tools in the world of marketing–but only when it is used correctly. In the world of PR, we’ve been using it for years. Our goal is to get journalists to find the information for their story ideas at our clients’ websites, or by contacting them directly. We do keyword tweets on Twitter. We make sure that the keywords are clear on press releases and on our clients’ websites.
One of the ways to get better Search Engine Optimization is a process called Article Marketing. Here are two excellent resources for Article Marketing. You can start at Wikipedia and get the basics. There you learn that Article Marketing has been around as long as there have been newspapers and magazines. To use Article Marketing effectively, you must be an expert at something. You write an article about that subject, and you try to get it placed in a newspaper or magazine. The article has your name on it, and you are on your way to becoming well-known in your industry. That’s how Public Relations really started in the early 1900s. When the early PR professionals realized that if they helped make the journalist’s job easier by providing the right information for a story, they could get their clients’ stories placed in print publications.
When you add the Internet with Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc., Article Marketing became, for some agencies (called Black Hat agencies), a way of tricking the search engines to get your company higher up on the search engine listings. There were sites on the web that charged you for a link. Google and their colleagues eventually figured out what the Black Hat agencies were doing; they made it very difficult for them to succeed.
But the actual concept of Article Marketing really can work for you. Your story has to be well written and informative. It can be a blog post, a press release that you have on your site, an article that you got placed in some other journalist website, or a case study that you have on your site. You want people to read it, and then go to your website and contact you. Phil Stone has written a really instructive piece called “What Is Article Marketing?” He gives you a good idea of the process, and what is possible.
The important thing to remember is to make sure your keywords are embedded in your story. But more importantly, make sure your story is worth reading–or it is a waste of your time and money.
The Constantly Evolving World of Social Media
Friday, February 15th, 2013You’ve just settled into loving the look of your Twitter page when along comes yet another “upgrade” to the interface. This is typical of the social-platform world; it is ever changing and evolving to meet the hungry demands of everyone with something to share.
Facebook recently got a big overhaul with the introduction of the “timeline” layout, allowing us to put in a big juicy image right smack on our landing profile pages, adding a custom look and feel which helps to express a little bit more of what our companies are all about.
The next to jump on this bumpy bandwagon ride is Twitter, which has just introduced the ability to add a background image to your landing feed page.
This chunk of prime real estate which once just housed a bigger version of your avatar and descriptive text, can now be filled with any 520px by 260px image your heart desires! Ah, but don’t get too carried away, there is an art to it … the background image is just that; it sits behind your avatar, Twitter handle, description and other profile info all of which is a default and unchangeable #FFFFFF (or white for those who do not speak geek).
So, the trick here is to have the right balance to set the tone for your Twitter page, and yet not be so overwhelmingly enthralling that the viewer is unable to read the pertinent info that is printed on top of it … ah, zen.
Itching to get your Twitter profile background implemented? Give us a call and we can make it happen.
Post by Jannah Lyon, Creative Director, Placemaking Group.
The Super Bowl is going for Social Media Gold!
Friday, February 1st, 2013
The Olympics, last year, was the biggest single Social Media event so far in history. It resulted in more posts, including Twitter, than 2012 Super Bowl, 2012 Grammys, 2012 Oscars, 2012 Golden Globes, and all seven games of the 2011 World Series combined.
This year, the Super Bowl is fighting back. According to Eric Kass in his post “For Second Year, Super Bowl Has Social Media Command Center” there will be over 100 Social Media volunteers working in New Orleans to answer questions and disseminate important information about the event and its locale, according to the New Orleans Times-Picayune. So the NFL and the Super Bowl, along with the New Orleans Tourism Marketing Corporation are going to be ready for the social onslaught.
As we’ve talked about in the past, for social media to really go viral, there has to be a personal, heartfelt connection. When that happens, the numbers go through the roof. Let’s see if the 49ers and the Ravens can get that kind of personal excitement going on!
Want to Know Who Won the Election? Tweet it!
Tuesday, November 6th, 2012
How many notices have you gotten from Facebook and Twitter that your friends have voted today? And how excited are you that in the next few days you won’t have to read all the political posts from your friends?
As I’ve said a number of times in this blog, if you want something to go viral, it has to have a personal, heartfelt element. And politics most definitely has that! I’m pretty sure I know how each of my friends has voted!
At this moment, I don’t have a clue who has won the election. But, the postings sure have been measured. Eric Sass tells us that the PEW research company has reported that 22% of voters have already told the world who they voted for on social media. In fact, 29% of voters ages 18-39 have announced their choice on a social networking site, compared with 19% of voters ages 50-64, and 14% of voters ages 65+. Read the whole post by Eric Sass.
I agree with him. As a participant, I’m sick of reading about this. But if I was running a campaign, I would be totally immersed in it!
Mashable has even more information if you want to just soak it up! To track the rate and volume of voting today, Mashable reports that Twitter has unveiled interactive online maps that record when and where users report they have voted. Read post. Their Twitter Political Index for the Swing States shows, what a surprise, that the states with the strongest votes for each candidate are also getting the most tweets. And overall Obama is getting the most tweets throughout the country.
Like I said, I have no idea who’s going to win yet, but there’s a lot to look at!
