A list of services to use for DIY press-release submission for small businesses
While many large companies use a PR agency to manage their press-releases, it's now easy to do-it-yourself and go direct to an online service for distribution. There are also some free options available which can give some SEO benefits with backlinks and through featuring in Google News. Don't expect lots of journalists to pick up on your press release though if you use these services, a more personal approach once you have identified a specialist through a tool like Vocus will work better here.
There are a growing number of websites where news and press releases can be submitted online.
The main business model is to offer a free, but upgradable service. There are limitations as the sites vary in terms of layout and "how to" submit, there are issues when adding images (some are free, but very small) and…
Ideas on techniques for sharing great content
Everyone knows that having great content is the secret to success with content marketing, but if you stop there, that's only half the battle or you're missing half the opportunity. If you just rely on Google to find and display your content then that will only get you so far, even if you can compete in SEO which is far from easy.
The power or maybe the necessity of making your content shareable is shown by the stats below.
First we see how some companies have been successful in driving more visits from social networks through sharing content and engaging with their audiences on social networks.
Next we see the trend of the growing importance of social networks compared to search engines. Interesting and challenging stuff!
…
We really like this new Influencers report, which you can get here, more because it shares great knowledge on "influencers", what they are, how important they are and how to locate and communicate with them - in some cases it requires software, naturally.
The guys at Fresh Networks decided to test nine of the leading social media monitoring tools - Attensity 360, Brandwatch, Radian6, Alterian SM2, Scoutlabs, Sysomos, Synthesio, PeerIndex and Social Radar - in order to assess how effective they are at identifying influencers across a range of social media platforms.
In simplest sense, businesses are no longer in complete control of their products, brands and messages, the consumer now has a lot of control. And, in the modern day those consumers are largely influenced by their networks of influencers - this can be friends and contacts as well as independents that have a perceived authority plus brand…
Smartblog commented this week that being a great WOM (word-of-mouth) marketer requires an understanding of the basics that motivate people to talk about you and share your brand story.
They highlight 3 ways, I've listed them below and added an example to each:
You. "€œThe "€˜You"€™ reason people talk is all about the goods "€” you"€™re doing or selling something and people want to talk about it"€. A great example would be Apple who do little to fuel WOM except launch great products. There"€™s an industry of Apple blogs! It"€™s about creating or doing something remarkable, like iPhone, to start WOM working for you.
Me. Though it applies to a smaller sub-set, "€œthis one"€™s about that feeling of being smart, important or helpful we get when we offer a recommendation or pass something along"€. Connecting people and providing a service, and maybe monetising that. A good example might be key influencers or…
Know your audience!
Value: [rating=4]
Our commentary: Marketing Minute's Drew McLellan of the blog offers some advice:
"As you are crafting a new campaign that you hope will go viral" always ask yourself, is the juice worth the squeeze for my audience?".
Drew analyzes this playful, interactive campaign from his local pizzeria Ciro's that plays on the Flat Stanley project (where players mail flat "guests" to each other and share pictures of their adventures).
On the top of the pizzeria's delivery box includes a large cartoon image of its Ciro character tossing a pizza, and comes with instructions to cut out the character and take pictures of the character that you email in to Ciro's. The best photo's earn a wall of fame spot and a free pizza.
Marketing implications: McLellan comments: "For a poor college student, this is probably just the thing to do on a Friday night. Especially after a couple beers. God only…
How do you use Google Alerts in your marketing?
Value: [rating=4]
Our commentary: I think many marketers are signed up for Google Alerts and use it for the obvious, but useful. I usually recommend setting up alerts so that you're emailed when the following are included on a newly published page and first indexed by Google:
1. Your "brand"
2. Your "brand" +
3. Your "brand" +/-
4. Your "http://www.webaddress.com"
5. Any of the above for competitors
6. Any of the above for key customers (B2B)
If you want to exclude your own site or any other site you can use the -site:www.yoursite.com syntax
It's also worth remembering you can use negative's for example I use -books,-book since lots of retailers have pages featuring my books but I don't want to be alerted about those.
Here's an example of an alert I set up a while ago on my old site:
+"dave chaffey" -books -book -pdf -download -site:davechaffey.com
I was prompted…
Question: How should I measure online pr? I am trying to write my objectives for a marketing campaign.
Smart Insights Expert Answer: Thanks for your question - it's good to see you're going for SMART objectives...
While you may not be able to set specific goals for these, it's worth stating in the plan what you will be measuring, since then you can make sure you're tracking these measures and start to build up a library of the PR or buzz effectiveness of campaigns.
As for any goal-setting and measurement you can't stress enough how having clear goals (business specific) is the key, and that those goals are aligned to commercials.
I think it's always to break down campaign measures into goals of volume, quality and cost so for PR, the type of measures to consider are:
Volume
Number of mentions of brand or campaign name during the campaign
Incremental growth in Facebook Likes or Twitter follows
Backlinks…
Question: How Do I Get My Customers To Recommend Me To Their Friends?
"€œI am interested in learning more about 'Referral Marketing' and wondered if you have any blogs or references on this subject. Essentially, my boss has asked that I e-mail all of my database with a 'Please talk about us' kind of message. I'm not too keen on this as I think it needs to have a bit more substance? Are there examples out there of people doing these types of e-mails? I'm not necessarily talking about incentivising base customers to talk about us, just nudging them to ask them to recommend us. Is that a 'done thing'?"
Answer:
Just asking people to refer does not work -- after all, why would they? Keep it authentic and treat people as you"€™d wish to be treated, we"€™re all human and it can be annoying if you sense you"€™re being hounded…
Marketers are hungry for information on how best to manage the reputation of their organisations online as shown by the popularity of our review of buzz monitoring software and services.
So, when I saw Antony Mayfield of iCrossing was publishing a book on reputation management with an intriguing title, I was keen to see his recommendations. I know Antony from his visionary advice on social media marketing at Econsultancy masterclasses and via his blog.
What I like about the book
I think it"€™s...
A book for to enhance your career
As the title shows, this book is mainly intended to help you manage your own online footprint which had become vital to an individual professional success - particularly if you work "in digital media". This point was brought home to me from hearing Dell describe how all new senior recruits are now reviewed across all the…
My most popular blog post in the last year has comfortably been the post on buzz monitoring software tools (aka social listening tools). Problem is, there are around 30 tools on the list and of course, there are more not covered.
So the obvious question for the marketer is "how on earth do I decide which tool to select for my company?". Well the original post does categorise the software according to purpose, but selecting the right one needs some assistance.
I had seen some nice case studies about a tool called Social Radar, including this one on the Infegy Buzz Study blog using it to evaluate sentiment around the iPad launch. So when I got a chance to meet and interview Gray Dudek, the Managing Director of Infegy Europe, the creators of Social Radar, I had some obvious questions to ask, and I asked them from a potential…
