Today,  

Igniting Viral Campaigns: In a world dominated by behemoths like bud.tv, MySpace, and YouTube, how do mid-sized and smaller companies break through to generate online destinations that create buzz, encourage word of mouth and establish relationships with potential buyers. This session unveils the secrets of Web 2.0 techniques and technologies that enable companies to standout and be talked about.

Moderator: Rebecca Lieb, Vice President & Editor-In-Chief, The ClickZ Network

Speakers: Bill Hanekamp, CEO, The Well, Ed Kim, Chief Executive Officer, Red Bricks Media, Fionn Downhill, CEO & President, Elixir Systems.

Rebecca opened up the session with a statement: talking about can you build the next chicken! Well, she was pointing to the subservient chicken of Burger King from last year and how they were able to perk up their sales. The case alluded to the contents of this particular session.

Bill Hanekamp, CEO of The Well, was the first to take to the dais,

He started off with food for thought for the audience, he asked them to consider, that after you’ve done all the things to optimize your page, what works the best for Google? What works are the relevant results. So the next, question that arises is, whether you’ve chosen appropriate keywords that match the content you deliver. Further, if a visitor lands up on your site would they be interested, and would the refer you site to others?

He classified "the content," into two categories. The first, is what you write, and second is the user generated content. He explained that the content generated by the user is:

• Engagement – such as the miller and their manlaws site.
• Referrals and links to third party sites such as YouTube, dig, etc.

He further, mentioned features of a content that can help to create a buzz. They are:

• How entertaining your content is?
• It needs to be relevant – so that a visitor isn’t disappointed and the message gets to the right one.
• Timeliness is important.
• And off course the uniqueness or how exclusive it is?

He cited the example of Nirvana by Dove in terms of relevancy and its ability to engage the user.

Bill ended with a question for the audience to ponder about, With all your content does anyone care?

The next one to take up the podium was Ed Kim, Chief Executive Officer, Red Bricks Media. At the very outset he emphasized the need for researching who the users are gonna be before writing content for them.

He suggested a systematic approach towards achieving this end:

First, you need to identify and profile the users, who would serve as the buzz agents. Secondly, the media and the tools to be use based on your target audience’s profiles. And finally the content that’ll work would be the one that they find intriguing, and consider as "buzzworthy."

He was quick to point out the high value of third party recommendations. The consumers are sure to direct to their communities when they search for guidance. All in all it’s important to identify and influence those who would influence others.

Ed also spoke about the "Buttons of Buzz," he said there were eight in all, four of them are: ‘The remarkable,’ ‘The outrageous,’ ‘The hilarious,’ ‘Of Value.’

The last one to speak was, Fionn Downhill, CEO & President, Elixir Systems. She spoke about the ways in which small sized and medium sized businesses can cash in on the strategies of viral marketing economically.

She spoke about the tools which can be used to achieve that. Some free tools she spoke about were:

• RSS feeds, wherein you could have news pages or other interesting content that gets updated frequently.
• Writing Articles
• White Papers
• You can add links to social bookmarks
• You can also add "email this page to a friend" to your pages
• It’s worthwhile to make use of Social media groups and networking
• Then you can find the influencers to influence.
• And once you’ve prepare your strategy, test your campaign

PHOTO CREDITS: toprankonlinemarketing

Comments

Tag: SES Chicago

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Admin wrote: 

The folks over at PPC Hero are doing a new series this week on paid search advertising called “Learn to Think and Search Like Your Customers.” Their goal is to break down the different areas of paid search campaigns and to help you learn how taking the time to really consider your customer can help you position your product to be THE answer to their search.

John launches the week long series today. His first post points out that it all starts with understanding your customer:

Everyone is different and sees the world through their individual set of filters. The millions of people who use search engines each day are no exception. Thankfully, as advertisers, each of us comes to the table with a pre-defined product or service that segments those millions of searchers into more manageable chunks. Very quickly you can begin to make assertions about your customer’s needs based on what your business’s offering, and you can answer some basic questions.

John goes on to offer up some solid examples of how certain keyword phrases give you insight into the person running the search. He also explains how you can use this insight to write ad text and landing pages that are more likely to convert your clicks into purchases.

It’s solid advice. When setting up paid search campaigns, it can be really easy to get caught up in getting higher placement or driving more traffic,

Coming up the rest of the week:

Tuesday: How to Predict When Your Traffic Will Drop and Ways to Prevent It

Wednesday: How to Use Analytics and Reports to Get to Know Your Customers Better

Thursday: How to Fit General Keywords into a Profitable Campaign

Friday: How to Use Long Tail Keywords to Target Searchers When They’re Ready to Buy

Incidentally, if you’re new to paid search advertising, you should add PPC Hero to your RSS feed.

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Today,  

I spend a fair amount of time talking with small and medium sized business owners about their web marketing. Often times these individuals aren’t ready to shoulder the costs associated with true goal-oriented web design, SEO, or PPC, so the conversation turns to, “what can I be doing in the meantime?”

Aside from blogging, posting on forums, and keeping their site content fresh, I always talk about online PR. Most of the time the people I’m conversing with have no idea that you can freely or cheaply distribute press releases online.

Writing a press release and then pushing it out to the various distribution services is a great way to get the word out about recent newsworthy happenings at your organization, and also an effective method of getting inbound links for the purpose of Search Engine Optimization. Some of these sites will also distribute the releases to news syndication services such a Google News and Yahoo! News.

If you’re confident in your writing ability, read over a few press releases that have been released in your industry to get a feel for the format and the writing style and give it a whirl (I wrote the majority of the press releases in the early days of Awecomm - how hard can it be!). If not, go out and hire a freelance writer. There are a lot of good ones out there that don’t charge all that much.

Like many things in business and search engine optimization, this isn’t the holy grail; it’s just one more thing that can attract website visitors and potential customers, and one more thing that you should be doing. Also, there’s really no substitution for a good Public Relations firm if you’re at the point that you can afford it. Until then, get writing, and use the list below!

Free Press Release Distribution Websites

- PR Leap

- I-Newswire

- Webwire

- ClickPress

- PR.com

- PR Log

Paid Press Release Distribution Websites

- PR Web

- 24-7 Press Release

- PR Zoom

- PR Newswire

- Business Wire

Comments

Tag: press releases

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Admin wrote: ”One of my clients wants to do a giveaway to build up his house list. “
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Admin wrote: 

Eric Ward doesn’t mind pointing out that of the top ten Google results for "link building expert" his name pops up six times. Call it good keyword branding if you like, bust most in the SEO industry will tell you he’s earned his title. Because of that, it might sting a little more when he pens a lengthy I told you so about linking strategies.

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