You can get whiplash from following web technology recommendations these days. So, let me try to simplify it a little.

In a nutshell, the concept is the same. We, as consumers, use a myriad of devices these days to get the information we seek — mobile phones of a million varieties, tablets, laptops, desktops, even digital TV.

So, as a service who wishes to be found at the moment a customer goes seeking, you want to be available on every device, right? Absolutely. We agree completely.

The solution until recently has been to create a separate mobile version of your website. One that’s simplified and designed to be viewed on a mobile phone. The only problem is that statistics are showing that people don’t like to use the mobile version of a site, because they are so simplified. They often don’t include all the same features and information. I, for one, experienced this recently first hand. I was trying to get some information from the MVA (Motor Vehicle Administration) site on my mobile phone. But the mobile app didn’t include the information I was looking for. I had to go to the full site and then couldn’t read anything because the type was too small.

The answer is responsive design — a website that changes its layout to accommodate the device on which its being viewed. Nothing is simplified or taken out. All the information is still available. It’s just positioned a little differently to accommodate the device parameters.

If you spent money creating a mobile version of your site, you might be annoyed by this. But the truth is, responsive design was only made possible by experimenting with mobile design. It’s by using it and interfacing with other consumers using it that we learned to expand the use of technology into new areas. Technology helps us create better (and cheaper) websites all the time. It wasn’t that long ago when developing a website cost five times what it does now.

Some responsive design examples.

We’ve done a number of sites that utilize responsive design recently, and the results have been outstanding. Take a look:

http://www.continentalcontractors.com

http://www.alignstaffing.com

http://coordinatedresponse.com

You can see the responsiveness by either actually viewing the site on multiple devices or by dragging the bottom right corner of your browser window in and out to see how it responds. Oooooo. So cool.

— Chris Quinn, principal and brand strategist

This week, I thought it would be great to recap on the JCPenney rebrand and what has happened since its launch back in early 2012 and what we can take away from it.

Unfortunately, Ron Johnson stepped down as CEO of JCPenney at the beginning of this month. While the news is not a big surprise with reports of disappointing sales figures and less than stellar stock performance over the last seventeen months, I am sad to see him go. I think what Johnson tried to bring to JCPenney was an extremely stunning vision. I do agree that JCPenney had to fire him in order to try and save the company but I think that his vision for the company was very ambitious and quite intriguing.

New Clothes, Fair Prices

When Johnson came to JCPenney he made some big changes. Two of those changes were a new pricing model and the introduction of new brands to their already existing retail lines but these also seem to be the most controversial changes he made and what may have ultimately led to his demise.

Johnson introduced the “fair and square” everyday low pricing scheme to do away with JCPenney’s never ending stream of coupons, sales and promotions. However, he failed to listen to what shoppers wanted. Sure, his changes made prices more realistic but consumers like deals. We are lured to retail stores via coupons and price markdowns. It is a game and we like to see how well we can do. You lose this sense of accomplishment when you have honest price tags.

While at JCPenney Johnson also revamped the clothes. He did away with the plain, inexpensive pants and sweatshirts of the retail brand’s past and brought in newer and hip brands like Joe Fresh. However, this also seemed to be disastrous because he alienated the original customer base. Many of the chain’s oldest and most loyal customers felt like they were no longer JCPenney’s target market so they simply stopped shopping there.

A Failure to Execute

Ron Johnson had a bold and innovative vision but I think he might have implemented too much change too quickly.

While most product offerings and strategic shifts are tested before being rolled out for a company as big as JCPenney, Johnson didn’t. He implemented the new pricing strategy all at once. He did the same thing with the apparel revamp. Johnson could have gradually introduced jeans bars and boutiques for brands such as Joe Fresh. Instead, he wiped out JCPenney’s long-established brands without considering how loyal customers would react. He failed to listen to what JCPenney really was as a company. He executed a vision, albeit stunning, that didn’t fit the company.

So What Can We Learn

For me, I think the most important lesson to learn is to be weary of quick-fix strategies. Sure, you can make dramatic changes. You could even argue that changes have to be dramatic to get noticed, but it should be backed up with a long-term strategy that considers established, loyal customers as well as the new ones.  It seems to me that Johnson, although very successful with his work with Apple and Target, neglected to take the time to learn the culture of JCPenney before implementing his bold vision. His vision made sense and his execution was beautiful graphically, but in the end it was too much, too fast for a company with such a history.

Looking to the future

I, for one, am eager to see what JCPenney does next. They hired Johnson to try to save the company. It will be a real shame if they don’t make it. They were bold and willing to experiment with big changes. That makes me hopeful. They clearly care about their customers and remaining in business. If you ask me, I think they’ll find success. I’m eager to see how.

~ Bethany Howell, art director

I was recently surprised to see a web development company I have a great deal of regard for move to marketing their services with plain text email over HTML email. In case you’re not sure of the difference, HTML email looks like ads or brochures with images and nice looking text. Text email is plain text without images, like email you use every day to correspond with business associates.

I was quite intrigued to see a technology company making the choice for a lower-tech approach. It draws me to a few conclusions:

1. Businesses are not taking any consideration off the table when trying to figure out how to best communicate with their audience. That’s a good thing. There is certainly a place to go back to square one and rethink what we take for granted and make sure the assumptions we acted upon originally are good ones.

2. Businesses, even in technology, are frustrated with spam filters that can’t distinguish between true spam and junk email and welcome communications. I can relate. Even our newsletters sometimes get blocked and we comply with every concievable restriction.

3. It’s good to be reminded that people are different and have different preferences. Accounting for a full range of preferences is important to do in all your marketing communications.

So which is better — text email or HTML email?

As usual, that depends on your audience and your message. But it’s considered good practice in all cases to send both a plain text and HTML version of your email marketing so the recipient can view it in the format they prefer that’s suited to the device they’re using. Many people prefer to read text only on their mobile phone but HTML on their computer, laptop and tablet.

But there’s more to it than that. There are highly respected proponents of both ways. Proponents of plain text email say they use it to make a message feel more like a one-on-one conversation, like one you receive from a friend rather than a cold, corporate-looking HTML template. Proponents of HTML email say they use it to make their email correspondences as professional as they can be and less like a spammy, cheesy sales pitch.

So it seems there are two camps. I know I hate email that tries to make it seem like I’ve met the person when I haven’t. Since I am more of a cave dweller by nature, and not a big networker, the likelihood that I’ve met the person and don’t remember doing so is slim. For me, it’s a sleezy approach that has no chance of success, at least for me. And you’re never going to convince me that a well conceived visual doesn’t enhance a message ten-fold.

Taking the best of both.

To take the best of both approaches, you would have to lean in the direction of HTML email but approach it the following ways:

1. Make your correspondences amusing, light or at least interesting so they don’t seem like boring corporate correspondences. (Be careful with amusement, though.)

2. Put energy and personality into what you say and what you show in visuals. Whether your recipient is a visual aficionado or not, they’ll appreciate that.

3. Get to the point. Work on the 3-second rule – you only get three seconds of someone’s attention before they move on.

4. If you are trying to direct them to a blog post or other form of online content, don’t work so hard to sell it. Tell them about it quickly and briefly and offer one good reason why they should go there.

5. Be minimalist. Don’t add anything that does not serve a specific purpose. Use the tried and true editing rule of cut-three. Write what you want to say, cut it in half, then in half again, and if you can find anything else you can cut, do it. Only then will you have something short enough and direct enough to be effective.

Happy emailing!

— Chris Quinn, principal and brand strategist

If I asked you if you were engaged in strategic marketing, you’d probably say, “Yes, of course I am.” But strategic marketing is more than just finding your audience and marketing to them.

Strategic marketing involves using strategic thinking to see how what you do is different from what your competitors do. And it involves using creativity to invent a new service offering that you can coin as uniquely yours so you will have less competition selling it. Piece of cake, right?

Not really. But there are only a few ways to truly rise above your competition. You can go head-to-head offering the same things they do, only try to do it better. Lots of businesses take this approach. Some with success, some without.

You can try to out-market your competition — be more visible, more of a leader, a stronger networker. But this approach can be time consuming and it often attracts only one customer at a time. Not the kind of sales volume you’re looking for, I imagine.

True strategic marketing finds ways to set you apart from your competition so that you are essentially offering a different product or service than they are. You are no longer going after just a piece of the business pie, you’ve created a new pie all for yourself.

How?

Setting yourself apart from your competition is a creative exercise. It requires the courage to question how you do what you do and the openness to do it differently. And that’s not a small thing. People tend to follow what others in their industry are doing. Doing so feels safe and it takes courage to step outside of that and bring something new to the marketplace.

Ask yourself, could you collect all your services into one comprehensive service? Could you break it up into smaller micro services? Could you deliver your services differently? Is there anything you can do to make what you do more convenient for the customer? Could you price what you do differently? Is there anything that you can do that the others are not doing at all? Could you bundle your services into packages that serve different types of needs?

Most strategic marketing campaigns involve naming a service offering — or coining a catch phrase that makes it memorable and helps people distinguish it from other options in the market — before you engage in marketing it. And how well or poorly you do the naming can influence the success you experience when marketing it substantially. But the key is to do it. And to make what you do NOT a subtle difference but a significant difference. If what you do to set yourself apart is subtle and inconsequential to the customer, it will not get their attention or motivate them to act. It’s the primary reason that naming is so often necessary — to add drama to the offering and attract attention and a fresh perspective to it.

Now, actively market it.

Even the best named and most unique service offerings need marketing to back them up. You have to budget some marketing dollars, time and effort to get the word out and promote your new service offering.

How you do that is a whole different blog post, but suffice it to say for now, that marketing through email, direct mail, your website, blog posts, social media, trade shows, trade pubs and speaking engagements is how you do it. And all these activities are much easier when you offer something your customers can’t get elsewhere.

Good luck and enjoy the pie.

— Chris Quinn, principal and brand strategist

Photo by Mykl Roventine on Flickr. Some rights reserved

I’m a pretty old dog. I’ve been in the branding and marketing business for over 30 years, so I tend to think I’ve seen most everything. But it’s been impossible for a while now not to notice a phenomenon that I really thought I’d never see — working for free. We’re surrounded with free access to really complex services. Facebook is free. Twitter is free. Even hosting has become practically free.

Don’t get me wrong. I love what I do and I love helping clients. But do I want to work for free? It goes against my business survival instincts, not to mention my need to do simple things like eat and keep a roof over my head. So how can we reconcile the expectation that things should be available for free?

If you’re an advisory business, like we are, and like so many of our clients, your main product is a service or a level of expertise in a subject matter. And solving your customer’s problem or providing a service that solves their problem is where you make your money. You really can’t give that away for free. At least not completely — and that is a key distinction. You may not be able to give your expertise away for free, but you might be able to give part of your expertise away so they can essentially try you on for size and fit.

Access to free information is the solution and the problem at the same time.

One of the key things you can offer for free is advice that helps clients distinguish between the free information that’s available out there that’s NOT worth anything, and the free information that’s out there that IS worth something. Help them learn the difference. It will help them see the value in your experience and expertise and get them passed a critical step in solving whatever their problem is — weeding out the distracting information that really won’t serve them well.

Shift your thinking to the second and third steps, not the first.

Give up the expectation that your first advisory service with a customer will be paid. Dissect your services and see if you can identify something they need as a first step that you can offer easily for free. Then offer your other services at a slightly higher premium to compensate for the free first step. Yes, you’ll have a reasonable percentage of customers that will never move deeper than the first step. But statistically more will move deeper after they’ve experienced firsthand the benefit of the first step. The process creates a sense of relief that makes a further commitment feel less scary and uncertain.

Market your free service.

Focus your marketing efforts on getting customers to act on what you offer for free. Send a postcard and emailer about it. Talk it up or make a presentation about it at networking events. Run an ad about it in a publication or online. Keep your focus on the free part of your service. Make sure what you’re offering for free is not just a ploy or a trick to get them to respond. If you don’t really deliver something of value at your entry point, it will backfire. There are lots of examples of that online. Everyone offers free this and free that. But a lot of it is just a tease. We don’t recommend that approach. Be sure your free service is of real value.

It’s a matter of volume and speed. By offering something for free you will attract more people that are interested in what you offer, faster, and it will take less marketing to get there.

Almost free works, too. Sometimes even better. Give thought to the option of offering an entry point service for a next-to-nothing cost instead. It can sometimes weed out the true looky-loos who might just tie up your resources.

Avoid dramatic claims. The central way that you can distinguish what you offer from all the waste-of-time offers out there is to avoid dramatic claims. Temper your claims to be good ones but not ridiculous ones. Prospects will turn away if your claim is too extreme to be credible.

Common service freebies.

So, you might ask, what could I offer as an entry point service? Well, it’s different for every advisory business and you should use your imagination and be creative about what you can offer. But there are some obvious options to consider, like:

• free workshops and educational programs
• free webinars and recorded how-to demos
• free review with 3 recommendations
• free half-hour or one-hour one-on-one
• free trial period of your service
• free add-on services that will make the offer more tempting
• free report on research relevant to them
• free diagnostic that helps identify a problem (sometimes)
• specific instructions on things they can do themselves
• free information on insider secrets they can benefit from knowing about

You might expect free assessments to be on the list, But free assessments don’t usually work well. They’re used too often as a way to get in the door to sell something. Yours might really offer value, but you’ll have a hard time convincing someone of it. Instead, try converting an assessment to a first step task that can be completed, rather than an assessment that results in a list of what else has to be done.

Good luck.

— Chris Quinn, principal and brand strategist

Are you just starting out with social media and interested in developing a content marketing strategy? After you’re done setting up your blog and numerous social media outlets, the next step is to create a clear and concise strategy for what types of posts you will make, and why.

What Are Your Goals?

Why create content in the first place?
First, make a list of goals and direct your attention toward attaining them.
Some examples of content strategy goals would be:

• To validate yourself and your company – A strong online presence through a blog and your social media profiles shows that you’re an active, interesting and viable online presence to follow.
• To gain recognition as an industry leader. More quality content means the more likely others will share it. This is particularly important for advisory businesses who are selling their advice, consulting and unique services.
• To get more reach and gain more followers. More followers means a larger audience.
• To find out what works best for your company. Use tools like Google Analytics to track what (email campaigns, social media posts, blog posts) works best.
• SEO – The more organic content you push out, the more Google likes you— ultimately meaning a higher search rank (for relevant keywords).
• To explore reaching a new target industry.
• To ultimately generate leads.

A System of Check and Balances

But who will do all of this? For most business owners and CEOs, being a large part of the content strategy’s direction but less involved in the actual process is hard to do. The main concern of the CEO is that he or she wants to make sure  their content is parallel with the brand, but often, the CEO is too busy managing other aspects of the business. Since content strategy and constant contact with the audience through social media is a new aspect of online marketing, CEOs are wary about where to even begin.

The best way to remedy this situation is to appoint a social media and content strategist. This individual must become well versed in your company’s overall brand, voice and audience. And clear guidelines and goals need to be established with CEO input. The social media and content strategist will give the CEO peace of mind by checking in regularly and voicing any questions or concerns when gathering or creating content.

Create A Content Calendar

A content calendar is much like a production timeline. Decide what you want to create, estimate how long it will take, decide when to post and where. Before you begin actually constructing your content calendar, you may want to look at some tools that will make your efforts a lot easier.

• Google drive – With Google Drive all of your documents live in the cloud and can be accessed anywhere. It is compatable for both pc and mac, iOS and android. You can create word documents, excel sheets, presentations and more.
• Working as a team – In addition to being able to store files in the cloud, Drive allows you to collaborate with others working on the same projects. Being able to share with all involved allows for seamless sharing of information, more organization and less mess. Relating Drive back to a content calendar, if multiple people are working on creating and scheduling content, Drive is the most efficient way to work.
• Google Calendar – For deciding what to post when, Google Calendar is a great way to share with everyone involved what you’re planning and any changes you make. It keeps everyone on the same page and allows for more time spent actually working on content and less time sifting through e-mails.
• Scheduling Tools – Social Media scheduling tools like Hootsuite allow you to schedule posts for various social media channels including Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, and Foursquare. Hootsuite allows you to schedule your content so that it posts automatically at the time you set. Why use this service? For example, you have a particularly busy week ahead and know you won’t have time to actually sit down and post. If you schedule the posts prior, Hootsuite takes care of actually pushing the posts out. This frees you up to be wherever you need to be but also allows you (and your company) to be present on your social media channels.
• Although Hootsuite sends out your posts for you, let it be known that this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t check-in on your efforts. If you get a comment or a tweet, you need to respond! If relevant news items come up, post or respond appropriately. That’s the whole point of social media – creating a discussion. Don’t let services like Hootsuite make you think it’s okay to just check back once a week. It’s about engagement. Social Media should really be a daily habit.

But What Types of Things Should I Post?

The best posts are content which you create yourself  such as blog posts, graphic- or image-supported stories or videos. Some examples of relevant posts are how-to guides, tips and blog posts with commentary on current events related to your industry.

Relevant posts which you have found from news sources, industry publications, YouTube, or really anywhere else on the internet. As long as they are relevant, meaningful, promote sharing or conversation and entertain or educate, you can post it (with permission or credit attributed, of course)!

Whether created yourself or re-posted from others, the content you post should be interesting enough for the audience to want to read, watch or share, or educational enough that those in your industry can’t pass up reading it and commenting about it afterwards.

Does all of this content strategy business sound extremely high maintenance? It is. It takes time, effort and ingenuity. Posting boring things that won’t get commented on, shared or even read is a waste of time. And if you do this consistently, you will lose readers. It’s really better to create quality organic content that represents your brand and is useful, entertaining or interesting for your target market, than to churn out short, easy and boring.
If you’re screaming inside, “Wait, I still don’t know exactly what to post!”, you have a few options:

• Check out your industry associations, publications and related businesses. See what others in your industry are doing and use the findings as inspiration.
• Get advised.  Go to someone who knows what they’re doing. The term “Social Media Consultant” may sound laughable because your CEO scoffs at the word “tweet” but when you don’t know where to start, start with someone who does.
• Talk to your staff. Some of them are already super connected and very active in a variety of social media. Discuss guidelines and rotating blog authors; get them involved.
• Use your ambassadors. Every business has some tried and trued clients, vendors, friends and other relationships. Some of them have great ideas or even could be willing to guest post once in a while. They will certainly help spread the word if you ask.

Your Blog – The Content Powerhouse.

Depending on your company’s content strategy goals, you can treat your blog a couple of different ways.

1.) Post only what your company creates. (Blog posts, videos, graphics, company news, client news, portfolio snippets, etc.)

2.) Post things you think are interesting and relevant (data visualization, videos, how-to guides) made by others.

3.) Most commonly, a combination of the two.

Regardless of your choice of blog protocol, your blog should be where your company’s voice is established. Where 140-character tweets and Facebook posts lack the full picture, your blog picks up the slack. The blog is where you can dive in with more details and illustrate points you want to make, comment on current events relevant to your industry, and post the content you have created.

Make Your Content Easy to Find

Don’t just write a blog post and let it sit there. Unless you’re a largely popular blog, you probably don’t have a steady audience frequenting it. And if you do, you probably don’t need to be reading this because you have it all figured out! Pushing your blog post out through your social media channels allows for a lot more people to see that you’ve posted something and that you want them to check it out.

For those who aren’t yet a part of your social media audience, making it easy for your content to be found through key words is important. You can use Google’s Keywords Tool to find the balance between a high search volume and low competition. Google has a short description and video about using the keyword tool which can get you started.

 Measure Your Efforts

Measuring what works best should absolutely be a part of your content strategy. Using google analytics to track your ROI with social media not only validates that what you’re doing is working but also allows you to craft your next move around what works best for your particular company. For example, if you notice a certain email campaign has received a lot of click throughs, analyze it. What was your subject line? Did you use a different image in the email? Did you offer a deal?

Another way of analyzing your efforts is with Facebook Insights, Facebook’s own analytics tool built in to your Facebook Page. Facebook Insights will show you what posts are performing the best (getting the most comments, clicks, likes, etc.)

If you’ve added Pinterest to your marketing mix, they’re recently added an analytics tool of their own. Pinterest Analytics is very similar to the Facebook Insights tool and allows you to measure based on four categories: Site Metrics, Most Recent, Most Repinned and Most Clicked.

You’re On Your Way

By establishing attainable goals, deciding on what to post, appointing a content manager, creating a content calendar, generating meaningful content, utilizing your blog, and finally, measuring (and tweaking) all of your efforts, you’re now well on your way to having a powerful online presence. Keep it up! A large part of content strategy is perseverance. Keep posting even though no one is responding. Keep measuring your email and social media campaigns. Be consistent. Discovering what isn’t working will push you toward understanding what does.

– Tara Urso, social media and content strategist

image above is Brian Solis’ Conversation Prism, Version 3.0 by Brian Solis and JESS3. 

Sometimes a gift just falls in your lap (or lands in your email box). As I was contemplating a branding blog post I was working on this morning, I received this email from one of our advisory firm clients. What a pleasure when one’s work is truly appreciated, and even better when the client really “gets” it. There are some really great insights here, and I share with his permission:

Hey, Wendy:

I’m reading a book and insight180 came to mind. The Art of Doing: How Superachievers Do what They Do and How They Do It So Well, by Camille Sweeney & Josh Gosfield. The book features interviews with respected, high profile professionals about how they do what they do. I heard the authors interviewed on two different radio programs during their book tour.

One of those professionals was Tony Hsieh, the CEO of Zappos. He joined the company in its infancy as an investor and now it’s a billion dollar company. One of his 10 principles is: Build your brand one interaction at a time.

“When you think about a brand, you don’t mentally pull up a list of bullet points; you either think ‘I love this company’ or ‘ not’. Ultimately a brand is a short cut to a set of emotions … One of the best branding opportunities is the telephone … We don’t script our reps … If he or she gets the interaction right … the customer is going to remember us for a very long time.”

In the old days, my sales manager called this “belly-to-belly selling.” Face-to-face might be a better term, and today it might be Skype-to-Skype.

As you know, this is the sales model for advisory services — personalized interaction. Yesterday, I had a lunch meeting and I wanted to share how insight180 helped.

Scott Adelman, from Next Level Technology (and part of the Sales and Marketing Roundtable at Howard Tech Council, where all three of us are members) recommended me to a cybersecurity practitioner contact of his in the Baltimore-Washington area. Scott’s contact also has many additional contacts in the cybersecurity space, so for me, this expert represents both a market channel and an additional capability for my prospects. We were able to connect and have a conversation.

Near the start of our conversation, he mentioned our website. He talked about Coordinated Response with familiarity. He liked the idea behind the company and immediately made the connections that you helped us discern with brand messaging. Wow! All that from the web site! He even bought lunch. I sent him a postcard (yes THE postcard you designed as a followup) thanking him and summing up the next steps. I sent a postcard thanking Scott, too.

It made me think of Hsieh’s practice, building a brand one step at a time:

• Introduction by mutual, professional acquaintance.
• Website tells the story in a HIGHLY professional manner (style plus content)
• Face-to-face meeting to establish connection
• Exchange business cards (visual brand reinforced)
• Good dialog on value of potential partnership
• Agree to follow up meeting in a few weeks
• Postcard of appreciation (slow down the conversation, reinforce the visual brand).

This new contact offered to introduce me to the CIO at an educational institution that I have identified as a key prospect. That is trust, pretty much all we can ask for. . . .and insight180 helped. Once again I want to thank you and your team for your creativity, guidance, expertise and execution of the Coordinated Response brand.

Jim Meyer, Managing Director
Coordinated Response 

I recently heard a reference about branding and marketing that really stuck in my head. It expresses so well just how to think about branding and marketing as it relates to building a business.

” Good marketing is baked in not frosted on. “

Makes you appreciate the beauty of a well-turned phrase to communicate a complex message, doesn’t it?

And it’s so true. Marketing shouldn’t be approached as an add-on after the fact. Marketing should be integral to the creation and development of a business from the start.

Marketing isn’t decoration. It’s core messaging that helps your customer understand what you offer them. This is especially true for the consultants and advisory service businesses we so often work with.

If you offer something intangible, like a service, branding and marketing play a critical role in helping you communicate the benefits of what you offer. And if those benefits are frosted on — surface contrivances — they won’t be believable or successful.

We so often see companies working hard at marketing with messages that are fake and don’t successfully address their customers’ real concerns. Granted, it’s sometimes not easy to know fully what their real concerns are. But you have to do whatever it takes to find out. There’s no shame in calling customers and just plain asking them.

When marketing is an integral part of a business strategy and it’s interwoven into the core sales messages used in customer conversations, marketing can be so much more than frosting. It can be the most key ingredient in your cake.

Get baking! The results are yummy.

— Chris Quinn, principal and brand strategist

( Photo By Brynn, via Wikimedia Commons )

Why Likes Have Just Become More Important.

The hype is under way as an enticing new feature called Graph Search continues to be rolled out by Facebook, and the question on everyone’s mind is, “how can we utilize this new feature to optimize our business’ social media presence?” Besides being an ingenious incentive developed by the social network giant to encourage businesses to spend more time on its site, Graph Search has some interesting features which may shake up the way people make decisions. Although Graph Search is not a search engine which combs the entire internet, it does search the content that people on Facebook put on their pages (likes, check-ins, etc). Graph Search enables users to search for business pages, photos and people and, in the results, see how they are connected to those items through their friends or even through their friends of friends.

Graph Search is founded on information which users create rather than what companies themselves create and it allows users to search through the data that only lives on Facebook. This gives the power to individuals and allows for very honest answers to questions like “Where can I get some good pizza nearby?” To answer that question one could type into Graph Search, “Pizza places nearby that my friends like,” and receive results that are driven by the amount of likes by a user’s own friends. Essentially, Facebook is allowing users to get “word of mouth” answers without actually asking the individual the question.

Evaluate Your Facebook Page.

This model of search is very good news for businesses that have a thriving Facebook presence with rave reviews, recommendations and a good amount of check-ins on Facebook Places. It’s not so good for those who haven’t completely filled out their pages and haven’t optimized their Bing search engine results, since Bing will be picking up the slack where Graph Search has not “yet” indexed.

Fully Complete Your Page.

To get the highest ranking on Graph Search you will undoubtedly need to fully fill out your page information. List your hours, website, and make sure all your categories best describe your business. It’s those keywords combined with amount of  ”likes” and “check-ins”, etc, that will determine when you come up in a search.

Continually Update. 

The Facebook pages which have a lot of activity (posts, engagement, likes, check-ins, recommendations) will come up higher in the Graph Search results than those that do not. Remember it’s about engagement and conversation, and just like in Google search, the more often you update or engage, the higher in the search rankings you will appear.

“Likes” Can Be Very Helpful.

Prior to Graph Search, it was argued that Facebook “Likes” were not necessarily the most important thing. Because with Graph Search, the amount of “likes” and “check-ins” determine a page’s rank in search results, “likes” just became a lot more important. If you want your page to be high up on Graph Search results, you need “likes” and “check-ins” ASAP.

Optimize Your Content.

• To gain a higher rank with Graph Search you will really need to focus on growing your Facebook page following and engagement levels.
• Make sure your content is keyword rich and relevant.
• Post relevant and meaningful content, and respond in any kind of conversation.
• Remember to include images whenever possible. The posts that get the highest engagement contain images and videos.

Be Visible Locally.

Many Graph Search inquiries will be location based. Someone searching something like “design firms nearby” or “financial advisory firms nearby” could become the norm if Graph Search takes off.

Regardless, it’s important to have local visibility. A few ways to develop local visibility would be through creating a Google Places listing, a Yahoo local listing, and most importantly for Graph Search, a Bing local listing because as aforementioned, Bing will be picking up the slack where Graph Search cannot deliver.

For B2B Companies?

Target Leads.

For B2B companies, using Graph Search to find targeted leads could be largely beneficial.
The ability to search for individuals based on location, what they like, who they’re friends with, etc., could prove very important to generating leads. According to an article from The New York Times, Brian Blau, an analyst with Gartner said of Graph Search, “It could offer marketers a more precise signal of a Web user’s interests. It’s going to lend itself to advertising or other revenue-generating products that better matches what people are looking for. Advertisers are going to be able to better target what you’re interested in. It’s a much more meaningful search than keyword search.”

Still In Its Beta Stages…

Graph Search’s full potential is not yet clear. As Graph Search is rolled out it will be interesting to see how businesses, both B2C and B2B, begin using Graph Search. Any ideas how Graph Search will affect B2B companies in the coming months? Do you think that B2B companies should make gaining a high Graph Search ranking a priority? Let us know why or why not in the comments below.

—Tara Urso is social media & content strategist at insight180 and Wendy Baird is principal and president.

We’ve all experienced it at one time or another – that uncontrollable urge to spend time or money on the latest gizmo, app, online tool, trick or offer. Remember Dug, the adorable talking golden retriever from Pixar Disney’s movie, Up, who in the midst of conversation would become distracted and exclaim, “Squirrel!?” You may chuckle, but Shiny Object Syndrome (SOS) occurs all the time, including in our marketing.

How often have you set out a marketing plan, only to be lured by a special advertising or sponsorship offer that you just can’t refuse (even if it doesn’t truly fit your strategy), or the next app that promises to develop leads, or the next social media outlet that you just can’t “not participate in?”

As branding advisors to advisory firms, consultants and nonprofits that market “the invisible,” we’ve seen it all. And there is so much new in marketing, that sometimes it’s difficult to stay grounded. So we offer some guidelines that will help you stay focused throughout the coming months.

10 Marketing To-Dos to Keep You Focused

1. Remember your brand. Everything in marketing begins with the brand, and stronger brands get results. Having a strong brand means that you have defined your position, are truly different from your competitors, have defined “personality” — expectation even — among your clients and prospects, are consistent in the way you communicate and that your message is relevant and compelling.
2. Become crystal clear on your positioning. This is closely related to number one, but I mention it because so often companies forget to prioritize it. How many times have you been to a website, where you must search for what the company actually does? It should be front and center on your site, business card and in all marketing communications. What do you do of relevance that is different than anyone else? How do you help? What is the emotional benefit you are able to provide to your customer?
3. Know your audience. This also goes hand in hand with number one. But until you have clarity about who your target audience is, you can’t know how to best reach them. Define your ideal client in as detailed a way as you can. Create personas – realistic personality profiles that represent a significant group of this client type – looking not only at demographics, but mindset, attitude, online habits and other traits. This will help you to craft the messages, posts, tweets, emails, etc. to engage your prospects.
4. Have a great business card. Even in the age of online engagement, the business card is still one of your strongest tools. Make a good impression. Provide your essential contact and positioning information.
5. Have a great newsletter. E-newsletters are an effective and convenient way to share industry insights and thought leadership, often the very thing that sets you apart. Even if they are not read through thoroughly, a branded, consistent e-newsletter keeps you top of mind, is track-able and easily shared.
6. Be social. Just as face-to-face networking with your ideal prospects is gold, social media offers additional opportunities. But you have to participate. Don’t just set up a LinkedIn account or Facebook page and disappear. Just like a networking event, you won’t benefit unless you are there, engaging in conversations. In 2012 social media engagement among C-level execs increased dramatically, particularly on LinkedIn. Executives are realizing that social media has the ability to showcase thought leadership and the more human side of the “people in charge;” plus it’s a great avenue for sharing the story of the brand they represent. Beware of SOS (Shiny Object Syndrome) here. There are new platforms and tools to try all the time – Pinterest, Tumblr, Vine, Pheed, Thumb, and a plethora of others. It’s okay to experiment, but not every new tool is right for every business (see nos. 1, 2 and 3).
7. Provide good content. This is about relevance, thought leadership and sometimes . . . entertainment. Your content needs to compel and resonate with your audience. Again, it’s all guided by your brand. But to stay engaged with your audience, you need to provide great information, have an opinion, share something you know your audience will appreciate. Marketers who continue to improve their ability to tell stories and distribute their range of content through social media platforms will gain visibility and build stronger relationships with
8. Optimize the platforms that you have. I can almost guarantee you could do much more with your profile, company page and engagement on LinkedIn, the postings and SEO on your website, and the way you connect and share the communications that you already use. Revisit some of the platform demos, check in with the groups and companies you are following, pose questions in groups, see how you can help to promote your clients, write a guest post for an industry blog or client’s newsletter.
9. Take a different approach. Use the strength and style of the medium in which you are engaged. While LinkedIn is more focused on business information and networking, Facebook is a bit more casual. For example, on your company Facebook page, in addition to posting links to the latest thought leadership on your website, you might also share great articles or book recommendations, exciting employee news and initiatives (i.e. volunteer efforts, big anniversaries, personal achievements). This humanizes a brand. YouTube offers a great opportunity to share a significant event or talk, and can also inform and entertain. While you still want to speak from a brand perspective, these different channels offer opportunities to engage, inspire and delight, while being relevant and steady.
10. Be consistent. Whether you are utilizing traditional marketing vehicles or online social platforms, be more concerned with providing a great experience for your prospects and customers, one that is consistent, engaging and unique to your brand and the emotional connection you wish to create.

Sticking to these marketing basics should help to keep you grounded. Good luck!

— Wendy Baird, principal and president