Attack of the Daily Deal Couponeros!

Posted by ADMAX on Jan 20, 2011 in Da Blog! | 0 comments

Its a new era for bargain seekers with a constant stream of strongly discounted coupon offers: 40% off a Princess Cruise ticket, 55% off a facial, or 5 worth of laundry and dry cleaning for .

Entrepreneurs, venture capitalists,and big corporations are gambling that the new discount coupon promotional services represent a tectonic shift in consumer trends, and a profound new way to pull in new customers.

Last year, Groupon, one of largest players, turned down a $6 billion acquisition offer from Google, LivingSocial, and Web site that distributes daily deals for restaurants, spas and retail outlets, added $400 million to its coffers last week as investors continued to funnel money into the fast-growing company.
Even megalithic facebook is launching a Daily Deals program to test waters. Yahoo announced the launch of Local Offers program recently is partnering with websites like Groupon, LivingSocial, Gilt City, and others to provide a wide selection of local deals coupons from nearby restaurants or local retailers.

So what’s scoop here? Can these help or hurt a small business?

Reports Scott Kirsner at Boston Globe –

Salespeople from Groupon, BuyWithMe, LivingSocial, or coupon services are eagerly calling small businesses to get them to offer deep discounts on the products services. “People call you daily,’’ says Bob Schwartz, director of marketing at Boston Duck Tours. “ and once you offer a deal with one service, all others will call you assuming you’ll do a deal with them.’’

But could all this excitement about a new way of circulating coupons be an unsustainable blip?

Here’s how things work. Deals are offered for a few days only, and you have to pay up front with a credit card. You print a coupon to bring to the business, or, in some cases, show your mobile phone screen. As with old-fashioned coupons, there’s an expiration date.  These services emphasize they can help introduce new customers to a company without upfront outlays for advertising. Some of those customers may come back, or spend more than coupon value on that first visit, executives at services say.

And all is not golden as Forbes writes –

Groupon looks to be suffering the death of a thousand cuts—paper cuts, that is, from class actions around terms of its deals, state regulator cease–desist letters around its marketing of alcohol me-too business plans of 425 competitors that have flooded marketplace. As Groupon preps an initial public offering rumored to value it at $15 billion,the  question is: Are these problems just annoyances or signs of a more serious struggle to transform its cult following into a sustainable business for long run?

At Dellaria Salons & Spas of Allston, some of its 26 salons attracted repeat customers after offering coupons through EverSave and LivingSocial. But or locations just “really seemed to get deal-seekers who buy the coupon and jump from place to place,’’ says marketing manager Hayley Goff.

We call those customers “couponeros” they really take some of luster out of concept.

Tips For Businesses Using Daily Deal type coupon marketing –

To avoid plunderings of “couponeros,” Marketing pundit Tom Muse suggested that businesses offer structured deals that spread out the coupon’s discount over several visits. For example, instead of a one-time coupon that offers $30 worth of services, business should offer a deal that includes three coupons that are each worth $10 in services. Doing so may help develop a rapport with customer to encourage return visits and increase probability that business would make a profit with their deal promotion. Or suggestions include offering discounts on specific items rather than total bill, cross-selling products and services to customers, targeting less popular product or service items, and setting coupon redemption dates to increase off-peak or seasonal traffic.

Saving Your Small Business Social Media Sanity!

Posted by Lynnea on Oct 20, 2010 in Da Blog! | 0 comments

Source: Catalyst Enterprise Solutions

What do you have to say to your clients and prospects and what do they have to say about your business or company? You certainly do not need social media to reach out to your customers and clients but it doesn’t hurt to spread your name and brand in a way others looking for someone in your field can clearly see. Social media is about more than just marketing though. It’s about learning from those you engage with.

Karen Leland

The flip side, however, is that social media management for your small business can become maddening, due to the attention drain it requires. Social media attention-deficit is on the increase, but Karen Leland at Sterling Consulting Group provided a great 5-point primer, and a cute dog story to go with.

Source: Karen Leland | Huffington Post

Earlier this week, I came across a springy King Charles spaniel happily chewing on a tennis ball, when he suddenly became aware of his owner filling up his water bowl at the drinking fountain.

The dog — who had previously been in a state of single focus bliss — began to nervously shift his attention from the ball, to the bowl and back again. Then a bicycle blew by and the confused canine whipped around to take a look. Not sure which of these things was the most deserving of his attention, clearly stressed, and unable to make a choice, his head went from bike, to bowl, to ball and back again, over and over.

I know just how that dog feels.

And so does any small business owner or entrepreneur, who is confronted with crafting a modern marketing strategy out of the vast array of choices presented by today’s social media landscape.

“I think small businesses are confused about what they should do and how they should do it,” says Brian Halligan, CEO of HubSpot. “They stick their toe in the water by tweeting once a week or creating a page on Facebook, but that really doesn’t work. What they need to do is jump in, ask questions, learn and fully engage.”

In fact, the recent 2011 Social Media Marketing Industry Report , which surveyed 3,342 marketers, found that 48 percent of small business owners, who did engage, saw improved sales as a direct result of their social media efforts.

Mike Schultz, author of Rainmaking Conversations: Influence, Persuade, and Sell in Any Situation, says that there are benefits to marketing online but cautions that there are two social media paths a small business can pursue.

“Some people focus on the path of acquiring as many followers as they can,” says Schultz. “But the other path, which is much less sexy, but leads to more money, is to focus on finding people that you could not easily find in the past and reaching out to them in the right way.”

Just what is that right way? While social media mastery has many layers, the experts all agree that following five core steps is a good start to bringing social media sanity to your small business.

1. Generate an abundance of high-quality content. Be it blog posts, podcasts, ebooks, web pages, videos or webinars. The more substantial, unique and useful your content is, the more your potential customers will find you. Stuck on what kind of content to create? Ask yourself: What questions are my clients always asking me? Then write your answers to those.

2. Optimize that content for social media. Research the keywords your potential clients would use to find you and integrate those into your blog posts, page titles, blog headings, website text and any other content on your site. Google Keyword Tool provides easy research.

3. Integrate your website/blog with your social media. Publish your posts on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. In addition, post links on your social media back to your website offering free downloadable content. Blog buttons such as LinkedIn Share and TweetMeme help integrate social media.

4. Use alerts to monitor the conversation. Google Alerts notifies you when your business appears online but also helps you find journalists and bloggers in your field. Schultz suggests using Twitter Alerts as well. “One company I know of got a $250,000 sale by following up with a potential client who tweeted a general industry question,” he says.

5. Measure social media marketing. Google Analytics can give you instant access to where your Web traffic is coming from, how long people are staying on your site, which pages are the most popular and whether your overall website visits are going up or down.

In an era where participating in social media has gone from being nice to necessary, it’s critical to outline an overall plan for integrating social media into your marketing mix. Just remember to keep your eye on the tennis ball.

Take our quick poll: What is your biggest social media pain?

What are your greatest social media challenges? We would love to hear your commentsand questions. Call us to discuss your small business social media and search marketing needs. ADMAX can help!

Google Algorithm Punishing ‘Alternative News?’

Posted by Lynnea on Jul 16, 2010 in Da Blog! | 0 comments

Source: Catalyst House Blog

The new Google Algorithm is live. Just over a month ago, Google announced that they were changing their algorithm in order to weaken the search engine rankings of sites they deem to be “content farmers. Read Google’s announcement here.

 “Whereas most of Google’s algorithm changes are barely noticeable,” Eric Blair & Michael Edwards write at Activist Post. “The current change that they have been working on since last January will affect 12% of U.S. searches.”

There has been much debate about what “content farming” is, and Google has done little to offer a clear explanation, simply stating, “low quality” or “shallow” sites would be affected. This is similar to the vague definition of pornography — you’ll know it when you see it.

The problem with such a vague approach to what is a strictly defined algorithm is that it leaves too much room for a human interpretation. And as we have seen, Google has been exposed as having connections to U.S. intelligence agencies, which doesn’t bode well for alternative news sites that aggregate anti-establishment stories from around the web.

Given the other censorship threats facing the Internet, it seems those who might be critical of Internet control and real-time surveillance of average Americans are being targeted.

One definition of content farming sites comes from Danny Sullivan at Search Engine Land:

– Looks to see what are popular searches in a particular category (news, help topics)

– Generates content specifically tailored to those searches

– Usually spends very little time and or money, even perhaps as little as possible, to generate that content

The first point is troubling for alternative news – these are sites who often scour mainstream news to find topics of popular interest so that competing commentary can be offered on a given issue. Even in the area of “help topics” there are many alternative news sites, such as our own, who focus on tips for survival, protection from economic crisis, advice for privacy protection and personal security, etc.

More from Activist Post –

Again, with the overshadowing definition of “shallow” content, who is deciding this? Furthermore, point two addresses tailoring content for specific searches, which sounds a lot like the “Google Bombs” introduced by Alex Jones and implemented by others as an effective way to compete with the mainstream media pablum, which focuses heavily on celebrities, sports, and other truly shallow and low quality content.

And, finally, point three seems to penalize blogs and other low-cost means of sharing opinions, as if not having a mainstream media budget automatically implies low quality, when provably the reverse is often true. Those who research information and present their own opinions as to the significance of what they have studied generally are doing so out of a passion to expose lies and direct their fellow man to the truth.

Google’s punishment of those who re-post material as an essential tool for sharing information appears to now reduce news aggregators to the status of plagiarists within the algorithm. There are many alternative news sites and blogs which have original material that they freely share, in part or in full, purely to support one another in disseminating the truth. We all know what plagiarism looks like and a link back to the original source should not, for instance, be grounds for labeling a site as shallow.

Google needs to address the vital tool of sharing information, as well as to more clearly define their algorithm in upcoming press releases, or we can only conclude that they have begun to wage war on news sites who aggregate information to present an alternative to establishment media.

Video Marketing Secrets for Small Businesses

Posted by Lynnea on Apr 20, 2010 in Da Blog! | 0 comments

Guest post by Brian Dean

Early on Video-Dean.com recognized that while online Video Marketing is one of the world’s most effective online advertising formats, the Internet is the fastest growing segment in Online Marketing; when you put Video Marketing and the Internet together you have the most powerful combination today for small business advertising.

The Internet Video Marketing trend is growing exponentially. The longer your company waits to start using online video ads to build credibility, trust, loyalty and excitement for your products and services the harder it will be for your company to make sales period! Online Video Ads are definitely the way to go.

When it comes to search engine visibility, search optimized Internet Videos have much greater odds then website based search results. Internet placed Videos are 53 times more likely to appear on the first page of the online search results than ordinary Web pages!

Video-Dean.com recognizes four primary factors affecting your video’s likelihood of appearing on main search page results:

1. Which Video Site Is Selected for Submission

YouTube reigns supreme in the search results at Google – but there are other video sites with good visibility results, including MetaCafe, Daily Motion, and Kewego. Same even for Bing and Yahoo, though YouTube is only slightly less prominent. Video-Dean.com recommends “cross-submitting” your business video to multiple platforms in order to maximize your potential audience and overall search engine reach.

2. Ranking From Within the “Native Platform”

The platform page one ranking of your video (as an example, YouTube’s native search results affects whether it will be included in main search engine pages. Research conducted by Video-Dean.com and others indicate that virtually all of the videos showing on the main search page results also appeared on the main page of their submission site search. And remember, YouTube, for example, is the third biggest search engine in its own right, even for so-called “local search” business queries.

3. Keyword Intention

The “Keyword intention” plays a major factor in determining whether your video is included in the main search page results. On the other hand videos that are search-optimized for transaction keywords (those including words like “ purchase,” “affordable,” or “on sale”) perform relatively poorly for main search results. Informational keywords, are what you really need to put your attention on. These are keyword phrases that are comparative in nature (“us versus them” or “ABC compared to XYZ”), educational (“do it yourself” or “learn how to”), and informational phrases (“who is” or “what is”). Navigation keywords and phrases produced inconsistent results. These are keywords that often include website URLs, brands, and product descriptions. But locational keywords, like city locations and targets, counties, etc., are vital for local search video marketing.

4. Make great videos: Use your best images, if its a montage-style video. Get your message across in under two minutes. Less is more for most marketing-type videos, especially for local business search videos.

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Brian Dean is a nationally regarded expert on producing search engine optimized videos that work. He is the president of Las Vegas based Video-Dean.com. Call Video Dean today at 1-888-479-5215 and find out how you can bring your business increased search engine visibility with customized Internet Marketing video ads.