Social media has become an important part of marketing campaigns for companies both small and large around the world. It plays such an important role in building awareness, driving traffic, and establishing brand recognition and credibility. Because it’s so important to your overall success, it’s important to have a plan. And it’s important to analyze or evaluate your social media plan on a regular basis.

Here’s what to take a look at when evaluating the success of your social media marketing plan:

#1 Are you meeting your original social media goals? This may seem like an obvious statement however, it’s the first place to start. If you’re meeting your social media goals then it’s time to set new goals. If you’re not, then why not?

#2 Are your analytics telling you everything you need to know? Often, people don’t know how to read their analytics or they don’t look at the right information. Based on your goals, do your analytics help you understand if you’re meeting them? If not, how can you modify your system or update your analytics to meet your needs?

For example, if your social media goals are to drive traffic to your website, rather than to a specific product, page or offer, then your analytics are likely telling you what you need to know because you can tabulate how many visitors come to your site via social media. However, if your goals were to increase profits by 10% via social media and you’re not sending all of your social media traffic to a unique landing page, then it may be tough to tell if you’re achieving success.

#3 Are you using the right social media sites? If you’re not “connecting” or attaining your social media goals one of the reasons may be that you’re simply not on the right site for your audience. The other reason may be…

#4 You’re not providing the content that attracts your audience. Take a look at your analytics. What content generates the most results and activity? What is being completely ignored?  Create your content plan based on your audience. Offer value. Test and track results so you can repeat them.

#5 Are you engaging your audience? It’s easy to get in the rut of simply posting links to your online content and commenting. However, to truly achieve your social media goals you probably have to engage your audience. That’s accomplished by asking questions and getting them involved and also by entertaining them. Have fun, be controversial, spark a debate or conversation. If your current social media plan doesn’t incorporate engaging content, questions and interaction, create a new plan.

Most of the time, when you evaluate your social media plan, you’ll see it just needs a little sprucing up. That’s certainly better than a total overhaul. Check your goals, analyze the data and adjust your plan so it meets your needs and the needs of your audience.

Google Adsense might be the simplest way to monetize your site. Take a few minutes to create your ads and post the simple code and – viola – you have a new income stream (provided you have some site traffic, of course.)

The AdSense interface has so many innovations available to you that it’s worth checking in every now and again to see if you can make a few quick changes and actually increase your  Google AdSense revenue.

Here are a few tips and strategies to boost your AdSense revenue:

#1 Focus on quality content. In general, one of the main problems with decreasing or stagnant AdSense profits is that there are too many ads on a single page. Not only does that make the content difficult to read (you have to skip around the advertising blocks), it also dilutes the power of any one single ad. Now, the advertisement is competing with your content and with other ads on the page. Stick to the 80/20 principle – 80% content, 20% advertisements.

#2 Placement. What happens when you visit a website and the first thing you see is an ad? Do you click away?  Take care where you place your AdSense ads and test and track different locations. Many people stick to the sidebar; however, you may find better luck in the middle of your page’s content.

Additionally, many experts recommend placing your ads above the fold. This is important because while a person may not stick around on your website very long, if they’re there long enough to see the AdSense ad, they may click on it to continue their search for information. When an ad is above the fold, you practically guarantee it will be noticed by visitors.

#3 Check out the “Onsite Advertiser Sign-Up” option with Google. Advertisers can pick and choose which sites they advertise on. If they choose you, you have the opportunity to make more money. This option is available in your AdSense account.

#4 Add “AdSense for Search.” In your Google Adsense account, under the AdSense Setup tab, you’ll see a number of options beginning with AdSense for Content. The AdSense for Search option allows you to provide visitors with a search function. In addition to displaying the results (they can search your website and/or the internet), they will also see ads. If they click on one of those ads, you receive the revenue. It’s one more function to offer your visitors and one more way to make a bit of money.

#5 Add “AdSense for Feeds.” This is another option under the AdSense Setup tab. If you have a large number of subscribers, this can be a great way to generate more revenue.

#6 Test and track. In addition to placement and number of ads per page, consider testing the color of the box, the size of the ad and even the shape of the ads. Google offers you a number of customizable options and analytics. Try different variations to see what works best for your audience.

Boosting your AdSense revenue is worth the time and energy it may take to tweak your campaign. If you can turn a few dollars a month into a few hundred dollars, or a few hundred dollars a month into a few thousand, it’s worth the effort, right?

Resources for further study:

Uncommon Adsense Tips, techniques and strategies for maximizing your AdSense earnings. Solid advice from AdSense expert Eric Giguere.

Adsense Report SEO/SEM

How do you keep your Twitter account up to date, and generate more followers?

Here are three ways to use Twitter more effectively:

#1) Link your Twitter account to your site.

This is a fast and easy way to get more followers. A common method among bloggers is to put their account on the right hand side of the page. This way, your latest tweets will show up on the site itself. Then all the visitors have to do is click through to your account and add you.

Just be careful when using this strategy. You don’t want to take attention away from other components of your site. For instance, if you have an email list sign-up, you don’t want to promote your Twitter account at the expense of that. However, if you do it right, this is one of the fastest and easiest ways to get followers.

#2) Follow others

They will often follow you in return. However, you need to do this strategically. You want to go after people who have the potential to buy your product. You don’t want to follow people who would have no interest in what you are selling.

How do you get targeted followers? There are Twitter directory sites that you can use to find people interested in certain topics. So if you are selling a fitness product, you can use these sites to locate users that are interested in fitness and add them.

And another strategy that works is to find somebody who sells a similar product to yours, and start following their followers. You know those people are going to be interested in your niche, and again many of them reciprocate and will follow you back.

Won’t it take a long time to add them?

If you had to do all this by hand, this would be a nightmare. However, there is software that will add groups of people for you automatically. And if you want to stop following those who don’t follow you back, you can also do this very quickly.

#3) Do valuable tweets

This is the most important strategy of all. If you are providing good information, your current followers will recommend you to other Twitter users. Referral followers are the best kind you can have.

To provide good information, don’t view Twitter as just an advertising tool. Like an email list, you don’t want to bombard your followers with ads.

Instead, focus on providing good free information. Then every 4-5 tweets, you might want to promote something. If your free info is good, people are more likely to build up trust and buy your paid products.

The bottom line is, increasing your followers isn’t that hard. Use these three tips, and your Twitter effectiveness could skyrocket.

Facebook SEO is very important. If your profile gets ranked for highly searched terms, you can dramatically increase the number of people following you.

Of course, you don’t want to promote this page at thee expense of your main moneymaking site. But if your site is ranking, than why not try to get your Facebook profile ranked as well?

The important thing is not to focus on SEO solely for Google. Facebook has many internal searches itself. It’s basically a massive search engine, although most people don’t think of it that way. You want to get ranked within Facebook as well as Google.

Fortunately, the same tips that work for ranking in Google also are effective for Facebook. Here are five of the best:

#1) Use your keywords in your title

Make sure to include your target keywords in your title. Many people don’t think about this.

Also, many users just include as many keywords as they possibly can. This is known as “keyword spamming” and it will probably hurt your chances of getting ranked.

Make sure you have a title that is interesting to human readers. If it’s not, people will view you as a spammer and avoid your page.

#2) Use the keywords in the vanity URL

The URL you choose makes a big difference. This is known as a “username” on the site. The URL will change to reflect the username you pick, in the format facebook.com/yourusername. You want to go after the same keywords here that you did in the title.

#3) Use the keywords in the “about” box

The “about” page is going to include most of the content on your Facebook profile. Therefore, it’s very important you get your primary keywords listed here, as you won’t have a chance to put them in other places.

Try to include the main keywords towards the beginning. You want the search engines to see them as soon as possible.

#4) Get inbound links

Doing a traditional link-building campaign is a good idea. In other words, get links from directories, blogs and forums. However, another great strategy is to get more fans. This works because Facebook automatically puts links to your profile from your fan pages. So the more fans you have, the more links as well.

#5) Stay up to date

One thing you might want to do is continually read updates on the algorithm Facebook and Google use. This lets you know what they are placing the most weight on, and will help you focus on that for your page.

The bottom line is this: Facebook SEO is very similar to traditional search engine optimization. Use these five tips, and you will see an increase in your rankings in both Facebook and Google.

Many businesses are using Facebook to make a lot of money. But many never earn a dime from the site.

These people are leaving a huge amount of income on the table. When used right, Facebook can be a good business tool. How do you network on the facebook effectively?

Here are three tips to make it happen:

#1) Get involved in groups

Many people think Facebook is an untargeted site, because of the wide range of users, but there are many niche-specific groups you can join.

This enables you to target people who would be interested in your product and this is where you can reap the biggest rewards. There is no sense in trying to network with people that would not benefit from the product you are selling.

#2) Get involved in the community

Once you’ve identified the groups you want to join, you can engage in conversations with people. Developing trust is one of the most important things for effective Facebook networking.

If people believe you really want to help them, you are much more likely to sell them something. Most businesses make the mistake of ramming their sales message down others’ throats without asking what their customers want. This is a dead giveaway they are just in it for the profit.

Instead, you want to get involved in community discussions and answer people’s questions. When you do this, they will come to view you as an expert, and therefore trust what you have to say more.

Don’t expect anything in return. You should look to benefit people even if they never buy your product. If you genuinely want to help people, profits will be an inevitable by-product.

#3) Have a good profile

All that effort you put into answering questions is for naught if your profile is not effective.

One very important part of your profile is having a blog that provides valuable content. Then you can add a link to your site at the bottom. Again, just focus on providing good free content. Don’t try to sell them anything here. Leave that for your site. You want your blog to benefit your readers even if they don’t buy what you are selling.

Developing trust is key. People can instantly tell the difference between somebody who wants to sell them something and somebody who wants to help them. The key to making money on Facebook, like many other places on the web, is to provide enough good free information that people will see you as an expert. Once you establish trust and goodwill, people will come to you when they need something that you have to offer.

If you genuinely want to help people, you can’t help but make money in return. Facebook offers plenty of income potential, so implement these three tips and you will see results soon.

How to Use Pageflakes On Your Website

Pageflakes is a home page with a social twist. Like iGoogle and other home page systems, you can decide what you put on it and how it appears. But Pageflakes embraces the growing trend to share your preferences and information. This Pageflakes is also a social networking site because you can share your page as a “pagecast.”

Many people use home pages as a tool to collect and organize information. For example, you can create a page that is devoted to the news. You can put your local news channels on it, national and international news channels, your horoscope and your local weather. Now, every morning when you wake up you can read everything that’s new on one page.

Subsequent pages can also be created for other various topics. Maybe you love sports so you could create a sports page. Maybe you love websites with cute animals or home tips. The ability to customize and organize your information is infinite.

As a business owner, Pageflakes offers you the opportunity to promote your website. Here’s how:

#1 Visit Pageflakes.com, sign up and create a page. You can add and delete flakes, those little columns dedicate to a single topic, or you can move them around. Spend some time learning how to add and delete pages and learn how to share pages.

#2 Learn how to interact. Click on “Community” in the upper right hand corner and visit other people’s pagecasts.

#3 Create your own pagecast. Now it’s time to create a pagecast, a page that you can share with the public. You can do this by clicking on “Add a Page”. On the menu on the bottom of the page you’ll see “pagecasting” and a list of options. You can add a blog and post links and teasers to your website blog. You can add a discussion and add a discussion to your page. You can also add bookmarks and bookmark pages on your website you want highlighted.

If you have a YouTube video, you can add that to your Pagecast by simply clicking on YouTube from the menu and then editing the settings to show your feed.

You can also link with your Facebook account or Twitter account.

#4 Once you’ve created your page, share it by clicking n Make Pagecast. You’ll then choose how you want to share your page. You’ll also have the option of giving it a title, a description and adding tags. Finally, you can also invite people to your pagecast.

Pageflakes is a great way to share specific information about you and your business with your audience. Use it to drive traffic and to create a community by sharing it and integrating your Pagecast with your other marketing and traffic generation strategies.

WordPress blogs are great for helping you score well with search engine results.

These blogs are designed to update the search engines with new posts, so the new posts get indexed quickly.

Still, there are a number of hurdles that can affect your Search Engine Optimization efforts.

One of these is the question of duplicate content.

What is Duplicate Content and Why Does it Matter?

Duplicate content is content that is perceived, by the search engines as the same or duplicates of each other. There are various theories as to what happens when a search engine finds duplicate contents. Many SEO experts believe that, instead of indexing both posts, the search engines cancel the duplicates. Some say that the page with the highest authority (page rank, etc.) will have the content indexed. Others say it’s a more matter of timing – the first content to be indexed will be the ‘winner.”

In any case, you want to avoid duplicate content as much as possible, for the simple fact that search engines are designed to seek and reward those sites and blogs that serve up original content.

The trouble is, there are many small things that can make one blog post be perceived as duplicate content by the search engines. And this is where your work and attention to detail can pay off.

Let’s take a look at a few ways to prevent Duplicate Content with WordPress.

Customize your URL. In WordPress it automatically sets your blog post URL. The default looks something like this http://yourblogpost.com/?p=303

Of course taking a look at this, the URL doesn’t contain any keywords nor does it tell the search engines anything about your post or the contents. You can quickly fix this by going into your WordPress settings tab. Click Permalinks from the list and choose how you want your link to look. Hint: Make sure the name of your post is in the URL and then place keywords in the names of your posts for maximum search engine friendliness.

Once you take this step, you can edit the name of each post before you publish it. This can help the search engines focus on the keywords particularly when you have a long blog post title. For example, if your blog post’s title is, “10 tips to teach your dog to sit” you can quickly edit it to say “Teach your dog to sit.” The 10 tips part of the title is superfluous and doesn’t help search engine optimization.

There are also plug-ins that help eliminate duplicate content.

These plug-ins do everything from redirect visitors from old pages to new pages to eliminating some bookmarking sites from framing your content. For example Digg reframes your content with a sidebar and this can be perceived as duplicate content. A “no frames” plug-in would eliminate this from happening. And finally there are plug-ins that automatically create canonical URL tags which essentially tell search engines that it is not duplicate content.

Duplicate content issues can be quite a problem for WordPress website owners. However, with a few tweaks and plug-ins you can blog confidently without worrying about your site slipping down the search engine page results.

How often do your tweets get retweeted?

Retweets (or RTs) is where others tweet your post on their account.

Getting retweeted is one of the most important strategies for Twitter marketing and increasing your profits using Twitter.

It doesn’t take many followers for this to take off. If just a few of your followers retweeted your posts, the growth potential could be huge. Think about it: all your followers will have people following them. Therefore, you might have fifteen people who retweet your posts. If they each have fifty followers, your tweet is now in front of seven hundred and fifty new people. This will translate into many new followers, assuming your post is good.

So how do you get retweeted?

There are a few strategies that will make or break your efforts.

Here are six tips to maximize how many retweet your post:

#1) Good timing

This might not make or break your tweet, but it is crucial nonetheless. There are times when Twitter traffic is higher than others. For instance, Friday afternoon is one of the busiest times on the site, so you might want to consider tweeting then. During the weekdays, 9 am to 3 pm is generally the best time to post.

#2) Ask for Retweets

Another method is to simply ask your followers to retweet your message. You’d be surprised how many will accompany you.  This is a good strategy, but it can get obnoxious, so don’t overdo this one.

#3) Optimize the message

Make sure it’s really simple for people to retweet your post. For this reason, keep it brief. Generally, you don’t want the tweet to be any longer than one hundred and twenty characters.

This allows people to repost it without editing. Also, don’t put too many tags in your tweets.

#4) Have quality followers

The size of your followers’ list means nothing. It’s the activity level that is important. Having a list of one hundred active users is preferable to ten thousand inactive ones. The more they frequent the site, the better your chances of getting reposted.

#5) Retweet others

Reciprocating will cause other people to do the same for you. Remember treat others how you’d like to be treated. By doing things for others you stand a better chance of receiving the same treatment in return.

#5) Use links

Putting them in your tweets is great. Generally the most popular tweets are the ones with links in them.

#6) Make sure your tweets offer value.

None of the above tips matter if your tweets aren’t interesting. Make sure you include valuable information in each tweet. Don’t just post because you haven’t done so yet today. Taking a little time and putting good information will make all the difference in the world.

The bottom line: Getting retweeted is one of the most important parts of your Twitter strategy. Implement these six retweeting tips, and it will happen soon.

Successful press releases can really benefit your business. That’s a known fact.

But a lot of business owners don’t think about the long-term impact they can actually have.

If you get an instant influx of customers, many of them will remain customers for life. So press releases are not just about the immediate business they can give you. Their main benefit is what they can do long term.

Unfortunately, not all press releases are created equal. A bad press release may not even get published.

Here are five ways to write a good release:

#1) Make it interesting

It’s often been said that the worst thing you can be in business is to be boring. The same goes true for press releases. Make sure the subject of your press release is interesting. It has to have something that differentiates it from the rest of the press releases out there.

Editors get a lot of press releases. So if there is nothing about yours that makes it stand out, your chances of getting it accepted are zero.

#2) Have an exciting headline

If you have a bad headline, the editors won’t give it the time of day. Make sure the most compelling part of your story is listed in the headline.

You want to start with your best foot forward. If your headline doesn’t grab the reader’s attention, the rest of your release won’t get read no matter how good it is.

#3) Keep it short

Ideally, the release should be five hundred words or less. In other words, it should not be more than one page. Editors have a lot of stories to get though, and anything that is too long is likely to get thrown in the trash.

Keep your sentences brief as well. This breaks up the text and makes it more readable.

#4) Avoid advertising

Remember, the editors don’t care about your business. They want a story that their readers are going to find interesting. If you just write a long ad for your business, your release isn’t going to get read.

#5) Write about newsworthy events

You obviously can’t write about just anything. For instance, having a sale on paintbrushes might be important to your company, but it’s not going to be interesting enough to get readers.

Instead, write about things you know customers would care about. For instance, if you just took a poll of your clients on something, write about that.

Also, consider doing some sort of fundraising community event. It doesn’t even have to raise money. Anything that gets the community involved will be interesting to the press. An example would be holding a competition for naming your company. You might offer a cash reward for it.

Press releases are one of the most underutilized strategies by businesses for getting customers. When you do them the right way, you will reap the benefits for a long time.

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How can you make more money using #FollowFriday? Twitter can make you a lot of money when used the right way. And FollowFriday is one of the ways it can do so.

What is Follow Friday?

It is just what it sounds like. Each Friday, you get a chance to recommend your followers to check out other people. You are essentially giving someone else a plug.

So how can this benefit your business? Here are four strategies to use it effectively:

#1) Only recommend one person

This will help make your recommendation more effective. It allows you to put more focus and energy into getting others to sign up for that person.

Many Twitter users recommend tons of people. However, with all those recommendations, it’s hard for them to provide a good reason why you should follow them. Essentially all they end up with is a long list of names.

Therefore, it’s much more effective if you focus on recommending one person who would really benefit your followers. This enables you to give them a better plug.

#2) Recommend people related to your topic

For instance, if you are trying to build a golf business, your followers are obviously going to be into the sport. Therefore, only recommend people that can help them with their golf game.

#3) Give good recommendations

This one isn’t rocket science, but it’s still very important. Don’t just recommend someone just because it’s Friday.

Instead, make sure they are going to provide your followers with real value. Ideally, you want to have experience using a product they sell, or be implementing their advice. This will help you give them a personal plug for how they’ve benefited you.

If you provide good recommendations on a consistent basis, those following you will begin advocating that others follow you. And those you recommend they follow might reciprocate by sending their followers to you.

It’s similar to promoting affiliate products on a blog. If the products you advocate are not good quality, eventually people are going to unsubscribe. However, if you continually promote quality products, you build up their trust. Therefore people will value your recommendations more.

#4) Look for JV partners

Also check out other people’s recommendations. Assuming you are following people in your niche, seeing who they recommend is a great way to meet new potential JV partners.

The bottom line is, the only way to make money is to provide great value. Part of doing this on Twitter is advocating people who will help your followers.

If you limit the amount of people you recommend, and only recommend those you genuinely believe in, you will build your business while helping people at the same time. Implement these four tips, and your effectiveness using Twitter will skyrocket.