How to Sell and Market Your Business on Instagram

Instagram is an excellent medium for sharing your company's information with the web. Its combination of aesthetics and social networking allows photos and ads to be shared across multiple platforms. Posts can be synchronized among networks such as Twitter, Facebook and the blogging platform Tum...

By Margaret Murphy • May 2, 2014

5 Easy Editing Tips to Pump up Your Website's SEO Power!

So, you've got a great-looking website with a content management system (CMS) that lets you add new pages and put them online in the blank of an eye. Publishing new content should be as simple as adding some text and making sure everything looks the way it should, right?While you certainly can ad...

By Randy Milanovic • May 2, 2014

Obtain Sales Online Through Clever SEO Marketing

Have you ever thought about how Google categorizes each of the 643,011,029-webpage results in .40 seconds? Did you know that there is an exact algorithm that Google, Bing, and Yahoo use? Were you also aware that YouTube is the world's second largest search engine? There is also an answer to the ...

By Jason Parks • May 2, 2014

Yelp and the Rise of Consumer Reviews

You're new in town, or you've traveled to a new destination and you want to know what restaurants the locals like or where you can find the best shopping. So you reach for your smartphone and consult a trusted advisor. By making a phone call? No, by checking out Yelp. Now more than ever, we're us...

By Derek Smith • May 2, 2014

13 Odd Lessons from Digital Marketing

As a personal and professional blogger, social media advocate, and interested party in the evolution of content marketing, I thought I'd share a few paradoxical lessons I've learned throughout the past few years.1. The Quality vs. Quantity ConundrumTwo factors determine the duration of time it ta...

By Brennan Girdler • May 2, 2014

What This Content Marketer Does Is By Far The Most Insane Thing I've Seen In My Life

There he goes again, creating all that helpful and compelling content and publishing it on his company's rarely visited blog. It's not that the content is bad or that he's not publishing enough of it - his employer has 10 other writers just like him. The problem is that there are over 1,000 other...

By Chad Pollitt • May 2, 2014

Welcome to the Social Marketing Party

Being a successful social marketer is like constantly hosting a party - inviting people, giving them a reason to stay, and providing entertainment so good that they'll tell all their friends about it afterwards. For any good host, one of the most important things about a party is making sure tha...

By Kimberley Brind • May 2, 2014

Beyond Engagement: Why People Follow the Leader

Dear Business Leader:Your contribution to the success of employee advocacy in your organization is simple:You have to believe in everything your program encompasses; and you must leave your people in no doubt that you believe.That's all. Sounds easy? If you say so...Believing may be the easy part...

By Mike Bailey • May 2, 2014

Let's Make Brands More Social

Starting (or Spurring) Your SocialIf you already have a powerful brand, a social presence, and a lot of great content, it's a much easier job than if you're starting out on social for the first time, no one in your community or marketplace has ever heard of you, and you don't have the time or res...

By Ben Wachtel • May 2, 2014

Why Invisible Activities Matter in Social Media

Only 7% of word-of-mouth happens online. This is a key figure in understanding that leaving a digital footprint is part of a sophisticated process; diverse drivers explain why an idea goes online. For instance, when citizens want an idea to go public when it comes to a cause. Or when content beco...

By Laurent Francois • May 2, 2014

The Social Media Pocket Guide: Six Ways Marketers Should Use Social

The following is an excerpt from "The Social Media Pocket Guide: Six Ways Marketers Should Use Social," an exclusive guide from Spredfast. The Social Media Pocket Guide reveals how marketers at big brands like AARP, AT&T, Discover, and Nokia have leveraged social to reach their campaign goals...

By Spredfast Business • May 1, 2014

Using Social Media and SEO in 2014

When it comes to growing your company, there is no better way to do it than to promote your goods or services on the world-wide-web. We all know that search engines are responsible for a majority of the market share but over the last few years, social media has made its way to the top of the lead...

By Sergio Aicardi • May 1, 2014

4 Reasons You Should be Using Twitter for Your Business

Twitter has exploded in popularity for both business and personal uses. What makes it unique from Facebook or LinkedIn is the fact that, just as you can with those other social media websites, post status updates immediately for all of your followers to see. The difference is that only 140 charac...

By Kristin Hovde • May 1, 2014

Reincarnation of a Salesman

With the advent of content marketing, many a thought leader has predicted the demise of the traditional salesman. Life has yet to imitate art, and as of now, we're not close to nearing Death of a Salesman. If anything, salesmen are much closer to being reincarnated - in the form of a half markete...

By Valerie Levin • May 1, 2014

How Creativity Can Help Boost Online Sales

As digital marketing and advertising has changed throughout over time, function has slowly gobbled up form, one click, like, page view and web lead at a time. It's 2014. And Don Draper ain't walking through the doors of your boardroom with a storyboard anytime soon.But creativity and imagination ...

By Ryan Ernst • May 1, 2014

Small Businesses: Is Your Website a Novelty or a Utility?

A recent post in eMarketer featured the results of two studies that inspired me to finally write about a topic which has been bothering me for a while now: at a time when consumers are making the shift to digital at an alarming rate, too many small businesses are operating websites that serve as ...

By Chris Horton • May 1, 2014

Creating Infographics: The Best Way to Generate Leads These Days

It has been proven through research that the human brain comprehends pictures more easily than text. This is primarily because since the earliest days of human civilization, pictures were the primary form of communication. The advent of alphabets is a comparatively new incident. Besides, the pict...

By William Johnson • May 1, 2014

5 Subtle Content Techniques That Drive Website Sales

There once was a time when advertising gimmicks, fancy GIFs and pop-ups could entice the occasional idiot to purchase from your site (we all did it). Now, even the simplest of beings seem immune to such trickery.More than 50% of consumers now don't trust any type of advertising. When you consider...

By Michael Bird • May 1, 2014

This Is How Facebook Will Achieve the Next Billion Users

Facebook - the mobile first company in its latest Q1 2014 earnings call stated that total user count is up 4% from 1.23 billion total monthly users, total daily user count is up 5.9% from 757 million, and daily mobile user count is up 9.5% from 556 million. Facebook is the undisputed leader in th...

By Prasant Naidu • May 1, 2014

What Not To Write: The Don'ts of SEO

You know what not to wear and what not to share on social media, but do you know what not to write with SEO? There are many things that you have to stay away from when writing your content for Google and this blog will talk about those dirty tactics. You will learn more about Black Hat SEO, how t...

By Julia McCoy • May 1, 2014

Managing a Sterling Communications Debacle

My former business partner Dan Callahan has often said to clients, "I can get you on the front page of the New York Times if you really want. You might not like it, but I can get you there."I was reminded of this, of course, as the racism debacle surrounding Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Ster...

By Aaron Perlut • May 1, 2014

Increase Purchase Intent Through Social Media Responsiveness

If you're a 'set it and forget it' kind of social media marketer, recent statistics published on Inc. (via Column Five, survey data from Bazaarvoice) may have you thinking more strongly about getting involved in audience-initiated conversations and reviews.To cut to the chase, investing in social...

By Matthew Peneycad • May 1, 2014

Snapchat: A New Breed of Network

Social media continues to evolve at a furious pace, and Snapchat sits at the intersection of an ongoing debate about the nature of social. Must networks be long-term repositories of messages and media, or can some be vehicles for sharing information for a short time? Snapchat contrasts with other...

By Derek Smith • May 1, 2014

Do You Advertise on Facebook Yet?

Have you lost your organic reach on Facebook? There's so much griping these days about brands losing the free reach they once had on the world's largest social media site.Google introduced advertising - in 2000. We weren't so out of whack about that. But, with Facebook, we've been, well, spoiled....

By Krista Bunskoek • May 1, 2014

LinkedIn Company Pages You Should Copy

They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and unless it's a very sarcastic impression of your company's CEO, that's probably accurate.It's very hard to have an interesting LinkedIn company page because the social media network is so business-oriented. Everyone on LinkedIn is there for...

By Ben Wachtel • April 30, 2014