Monday, September 9, 2019

The Impact of Online Social Communities on Your Business

When it comes to online social communities, people naturally gravitate toward them. Humans, by nature, are social animals. They are comfortable in groups and they feed off of each other's energy and they like to bounce ideas off of each other (among other things).
Being Engaged and Engaging Is Essential
You definitely need other people to succeed in business. In fact, without them, you will not have any business at all. You need them to eventually buy what you are selling. For that reason, online social communities work well for many things, including giving each other what the other wants and needs. You want your relationship to be mutually beneficial.
Whether you start an online social community or you join one that has already been established, your approach will be the same (minus some possible administrative responsibilities that you may have if you establish the community). It is important to remember that you are not in it by yourself no matter what. A community is a group of people who share one or more common interest.
Social media is the backbone of online social communities
Social communities are very important to the success of most businesses. It is a classic case of one hand washing the other. Businesses need online social communities to help them to fortify the social aspect of their institution. On the other hand, online social communities need businesses because they need to live and grow somewhere. Businesses can provide just such a forum and a platform for those online social communities to do just that. It is very important for you to remember that online social communities are not just for personal use. They are extremely beneficial to businesses as well.
From the marketing perspective, combining online social communities with business is truly a marriage made in Heaven. Those communities are the power behind successful marketing efforts on the part of the business. Some of the positive results that come out of that alliance are that the online social communities allow businesses to:
  • Develop solid, enduring relationships and networks that are built on trust
  • Bring people together who can share a mutually beneficial relationship
  • Participate in active, successful engagement
A wide variety of online social communities
The online social communities that you choose for your brand/business will depend on the goals that you have in mind. Those goals will drive you to pursue certain groups and certain people. You certainly have a great deal of communities from which to choose. Your chosen communities can go a long way to satisfying your business' marketing needs.

Now that you understand how online social communities work (more or less), it is important for you to understand that engagement is an essential part of the successful functioning of those communities. You should keep in mind that even though the communities are social in nature, that doesn't mean that your business will not benefit from them in the ways that you want them to. In fact, there are many effective tools that you can leverage in order to get what you want out of your engagement in those communities. Interestingly, there may be aspects of your communities that are not obvious (or even apparent).
For example, if you are a member of a community that has 2,000 members, you may still find that only 50 of those members are actively engaged in discussions and other interactions. The truth is that not every member has a desire to be heard. Some people only have enough of an interest to listen and learn, which, of course, is okay too. However, you still need some people who are more vocal than that. Otherwise, nobody would be interacting about anything. You will want to encourage as many group members to participate in the discussions that occur but you don't really have too much control over it in the end. There are many different ways to engage other people in addition to leaving a comment or a thought-provoking question. You can put out a survey (with three to four questions) or run a contest with an incentive (a discount on your products and/or services, some sort of prize, etc).
Participating in online social communities doesn't happen by itself
Undoubtedly, you understand clearly that online social communities are about people. The platforms and forums that are used are helpful (you might even go out on a limb and say that they are essential) but they are still not as important as the members of the community. In fact, the choice of platform and forum are not nearly as important as the people. Many platforms/forums can be used by communities simultaneously. One added benefit to being a part of an online social community is that it gives you the support that you may need to embrace what your competition is doing and to gather some really valuable competitive intelligence.
Conclusion
The effectiveness of your online social communities depends, in large part, on the community members and their ability to act as effective resources. In turn, you (and each one of the members) will help each other to get what is needed and wanted. After all, you are all part of the same community (think of it as a family) and that is what families do. They help each other whenever it is needed. You can use your online social communities in many different ways, including discussing products and/or services and gaining valuable feedback, which will help you to bring your business to the next level.
Michael Cohn is the founder and Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of CompuKol Communications. He has over 25 years of experience in IT and web technologies. Mr. Cohn spent a significant amount of time at a major telecommunications company, where his main focus was on initiating and leading synergy efforts across all business units by dramatically improving efficiency, online collaboration, and the company's Intranet capabilities, which accelerated gains in business productivity. He also reduced company travel and travel costs by introducing and implementing various collaboration technologies.
His expertise includes business analysis; project management; management of global cross-matrix teams; systems engineering and analysis, architecture, prototyping and integration; technology evaluation and assessment; systems development; performance evaluation; and management of off-shore development.
Mr. Cohn earned a Master's degree in project management from George Washington University in Washington, DC; and a Master's degree in computer science and a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering from Fairleigh Dickinson University in Teaneck, NJ.
Mr. Cohn is a member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).

Twitter Marketing Tutorial 2019 | Social Media Marketing Course | How to...

Effective Digital Marketing Strategies

For digital marketing to be effective, you need a clearly-defined campaign strategy. As a small business owner in the Gold Coast, limited budgets additionally emphasize the need for strategic decisions.
Online marketing strategies differ from business to business. Every business needs its own distinct and specific strategy that is best suited for its industry or niche, be it construction, restaurants and coffee bars, plumbing, roofing, real estate, or even a dentistry practice.
Combining SEO and PPC ad campaigns
A very common and usually effective strategy involves adding PPC ads to your SEO tactics. How does this work?
•1. Do detailed research on relevant keywords to your local business and the industry in general. Then, simply choose those powerful enough to bring in the largest amount of traffic.
•2. Know your target audience; their location, gender, age group, and most importantly, income. Identify your biggest customers in this group; those who have the potential to give you the greatest rewards. 3. Optimize your website and content using SEO. Build an optimized landing page on your site. This is where visitors are taken to once they click on your ad. It must be able to give them that needed push to make a purchase.
• 4. Then, craft compelling ad copy for your PPC ads. Let your words grab the attention of potential customers.
• 5. Place your PPC ads in places where your target audience are most likely to see them and of course, click.
•6. Track your conversions and results using customized tools. How much did you spend on ads? How much did you make in return? How many views? What was the overall number of clicks and visits within a specified time period?
• 7. Review your successes and failures and figure out what is working and what is not. Then, make the necessary adjustments.
• 8. Maintain your online presence by continuously optimizing your content and site.
• 9. Regularly modify your marketing strategy and campaigns to reduce cost while keeping customer retention and revenue at an all-time high.
Rather than PPC, you might decide to combine your SEO with social media marketing as it is way cheaper. PPC, on the other hand, helps you reel in those customers that are ready to make a purchase. The chances of conversion are way higher than social media advertising. At the end of the day, choosing an effective internet marketing strategy depends on your preferences, the needs of your Gold Coast business, and your priorities. The bottom line remains that whichever strategy you decide on, it must reach and engage your target audience. It must not only drive traffic to your site, it must also convert this traffic to actual sales and increased revenue.

How To Create A Digital Marketing Strategy In The Modern Landscape

Sunday, September 8, 2019

Digital Marketing Online Certification Training Course - Get Certified by Google

Did you know you could get certified by Google? Google provides a number of Digital Marketing training courses to help enhance marketing skills, some of them absolutely free of cost! Digital Marketing courses are not only helpful to those working in the field but also incredibly useful to entrepreneurs trying to make it in this fast-paced business environment. It is crucial in today's business situation to have a working knowledge of each and every aspect of the business, and while courses are widely available for a range of other aspects, Digital Marketing was a subject rarely touched upon.
However, Google is helping millions of like minded individuals worldwide with an interest in the subject by providing these free courses. We've mentioned the top 5 courses you can enroll in, with Google today!
AdWords Fundamental Course
Learn the basic and intermediate aspects of AdWords and advertising online. The course touches up on how to set up AdWords, manage a campaign and also teaches you how to measure and optimize your AdWords campaign. You can take on the assessment after going through the study material and earn a Certification from Google. The assessment consists of 65 questions that need to be completed within an hour and a half. To earn the certification, you'll need to score above 80%. The test is also available to take again in case you don't make the cut the first time.
Squared Online
This program is a 5-month training course, 6 hours per week. Squared Online is a Digital Marketing Leadership course created by Google in partnership with Home Learning College. You will be guided by Industry experts and the course takes a unique, practical approach for training. This is a great course for anyone looking to boost their Digital Marketing training skills. The course focuses on Evaluating the relationship between digital innovations and changing consumer behavior and communicating how this relationship will evolve in the future. You will learn how to propose how an organization can build an effective digital presence that concentrates on consumer engagement and organizational objectives and how to use data from a variety of sources to generate insights and make strategic commendations amongst other important skills.
AdWords Display Certification
This online course teaches you to create, manage and optimize Display campaigns. It will also help you take advantage of Google Display Network with Display campaign settings. The Pre-requisite to take this course however is to complete the AdWords Fundamentals Course, which covers the basics. You can take an assessment to earn the certification. This is a beginner course and the material is always online, meaning you can take your time to study and take the assessment as you please.
Google Analytics Individual Qualification
This Google course covers basic and advanced Analytics concepts including planning, analytics principles, implementation, data collection, configuration, administration, conversion, attribution, reports, metrics and dimensions. Once you study the material provided, you can do this on your own time and it's free, you can take the Google Analytics Assessment consisting of 70 questions to be completed within a time period of 90 minutes. To earn the certification for this course, you will need a score of 80% and above.
Google Digital Unlocked
Having partnered with the Indian School of Business in Hyderabad and FICCI, the content covered in the course will provide a foundation for basic Digital Skills. The course begins right from the basics with an Introduction and understanding of Digital Media. You will learn how to plan online strategies, gain insights on new developments in the digital world, build an online presence, be noticed by ads, work with Analytics and much more. It's a full ranged course and you can take your time going through the material. There are small assessments for every topic, once you pass them, you can move on to the next topic and complete the course to earn your certification.