When we think of inbound marketing, we think of search optimized content, great blogs, social media presence, keyword etc. Questions is, is it really true? Does the buck stop there? Well, you will definitely prove to be a savvy inbound marketer, you will be generating good leads, you will be all aggressive on Face book and Twitter, people will be talking about you, people will be clicking on your links etc. Truth is, you are just half way there!

Advertising, mailers, hoardings etc are traditional ways of advertising and marketing. Recently, with the onslaught of the world wide web, social media became a rage and suddenly, reaching out to the customers became comparatively easy. Everything started happening in real time – customer feedback, responses, comments, suggestions, reviews and the like! It was search friendly, useful and easy. Thus, inbound marketing became a sought after and a great way to advertise products and services for marketers.

Sad part is, companies and marketers think that by doing this, their job is done and as long as they get increased clicks and hits on their sites, leads are generated. Well, this is great but it is the first and most primary step to spread awareness. Leads generation and leads conversion are two different things. As they say, it is one thing to get the horse to the water, but altogether a another thing to make the horse drink it! Similarly, customers can come to your website, but will they buy your products and services is the main point. Companies will benefit only if buying happens. This is the tricky, most important and unfortunately overlooked part of SEO (Search Engine Optimization package).

It is very important to know the preferences, tastes, likes and dislikes of your customer, Only once you know it, can you design and modify the product and SEO accordingly. Marketing communications plays an important role but knowing your customer is very crucial. It is an endeavor of companies like EvoMantra, which specializes in the whole package, to give you a proper direction and further optimize the content!

Tags: Evomantra, facebook, Leads generation Lead Conversion, social media agency, social media presence, twitter
Posted in Blogging, SEO, Social Media Marketing | No Comments »

It started with MySpace, moved on to Orkut and now the world cannot live without “face booking” every 5 minutes. Writing on walls and “liking” comments is the new rage. Face book has changed the face of social media forever. Not just individuals, but corporate, NGO`s, Broadway etc have their pages and groups on face book as part of their online marketing efforts. Face book has entered every household, every organization and every famous personality`s life.

The beauty of social media and over the entire internet itself is that it is a growing tremendously by the minute. Every day, something new is coming up.  Google recently launched Google Plus in direct competition and head on with Face book. It works on the same principle of connecting with friends, sharing photos, comments etc. but unlike face book, Google plus is built from the concept of sharing with people based on “circles”. The idea is that you can easily drag and drop people into different circle – school friends circle, cousins’ circle, salsa class circle etc. this enables you to segregate people and share specific things with specific people. Like, if you want to communicate salsa class schedule or share pictures of your performance with that group and do not really want the whole world to see that, you can just do it circle wise. This concept has become a big hit with everyone. Well, you definitely do not want your parents to know about your girls’ night out other than those girl friends only!

Well, most of things between other social network sites and Google plus are same like sharing albums, comments, thoughts etc. main difference is of circle. You can put as many people in a circle as you want. Good thing is, just because someone has put you in a circle, does not mean you need to put them in your circle. Just like twitter, you can be followed by someone but you do not need to necessarily follow that person back! Another good things is the security of Google plus. Personal information can be displayed or not displayed. That is left to your discretion.

Google plus today has nearly 10 million people and the members are growing. The question is the pace of growth? People are so used to face book and its ways, the question is will people shift and adapt to more or less the same thing? It is a wait game. Face book has evolved with time. Businesses’ have practically grown due to face book and twitter marketing strategies. Google plus, till date has not come up with business functionalities. That is a major drawback. People are now used to “liking” something. In Google plus, if you are interested in something, you create “sparks”. These terms have not really gone down with many people.

It is early to say whether Google plus will eventually be the popular one or not, but it has started creating little waves. Face book and twitter will definitely give it tough competition and will keep innovating themselves. Till the time the game goes on, people are on the benefiting side. We will keep getting better products. Why complain?!

Tags: facebook, Google Facebook, Google Plus, Google Plus Facebook, Google Plus vs. Facebook, Google+ Vs Facebook
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Facebook has become the most popular social networking medium with more than 500 million users. Apart from networking features, Facebook offers lots of other features like groups, fan page and applications for promoting individual or business profile. So, this becomes an ideal platform to promote your business. I have penned down the various ways to leverage the Facebook platform for your business.

Social profile

You can build a professional profile and connect with business friends and prospective customers. The wall of Facebook allows you to express your views and share links, photos and videos with other users. The privacy settings allow you to manage what you would like users to view and what not.

The profile can further be extended using additional tabs for services and products. A welcome page can be created with professional content and layout to attract the customers.

Social groups

Facebook features a section called groups where you can either create your own group or join the groups of interest. You can create a business based group where you can provide information, updates and promotions about your business and products or services. You can also join other groups which may be complement your business and bring in more customers and associates.

Fan pages

Facebook fan page is the most important feature for business promotion. Its an advertising platform through which you can create a fan base and advertise your business.

The fan pages are available to the public and searchable by search engines. Owing to Facebook’s popularity, the fan pages get indexed quickly and provide you a way to get organic traffic to your website.

You can create a fan base and send updates to them. The updates get published in the users’ feeds also provided the user has not blocked the access to the feeds. This adds a viral effect to your fan page.

Facebook Ads

Facebook Ads is a PPC (pay per click) advertising platform. You can use this medium to advertise your products and services to targeted set of customers. The best part of Facebook ads is the large number of targeting options. You can select the connections, location and other demographic options to reach the desired set of users, thus improving your ROI.

Facebook Apps

Facebook is extended by a huge number of applications. You can use any available application on your profile page or you can create an application suited to your business. Using applications, you can publish your latest blog posts on your profile. You can connect your Linkedin and Twitter posts into your profile. You can use slideshare for displaying your presentation slides, group chat apps for online chat, ecommerce store for selling products and many others.

Integrating with Facebook

Once you have a professional profile on Facebook, you can cross promote it on your website. You can use the like button for your fan page. You can display your feeds on the website.

You can also use Facebook Connect for users to login using their Facebook credentials. If you have a whitepaper or a document on the website which can be downloaded by registration only, then you can use Facebook Connect.

Facebook has become the most dependable social networking and business promotion website. With such a huge user base and plethora of features, you can pretty much run your website on Facebook with a sound marketing strategy. If you are looking for a sound social media marketing strategy for your business, do contact us.

Tags: facebook, social media marketing
Posted in SEO, Social Media Marketing | 15 Comments »