In season 1 of AMC’s hit show Mad Men, Rachel Menken comes to the advertising firm Sterling Cooper because she wants to give her department store, Menken’s, a makeover, so to speak. She wants to transform it from a successful department store into an elite one. “What kind of people do you want [coming into your store]?,” Creative Director Don Draper asks Menken. “I want your kind of people Mr. Draper. People who don’t care about coupons — whether or not they can afford it. People who come into the store because it is expensive,” Menken replies.

Based on what we’re hearing, HP has been having similarly themed meetings in recent months. They want to transform themselves — from HP, the successful tech juggernaut, into Apple, the sexy one.

When you think of HP, what do you think of? For most consumers it’s either printers and sort of crappy, cheap computers that you get at Best Buy. But that’s not what HP aspires to be anymore, sources familiar with HP’s thinking are telling us. They want to be Apple. They want be the makers of high-quality consumer gadgets all connected by way of a digital ecosystem. An ecosystem they own and operate. One tied together by webOS.

While it should hardly be surprising to hear that any company wants to be Apple given that company’s recent success, HP is one of a very few — and actually maybe the only company with the required assets to potentially pull off such a makeover. Of course, that doesn’t mean they’ll be able to — but it’s possible. And they know that, and that’s exactly what their strategy is going forward, apparently.

On the face of it, it may not seem to make a lot of sense. After all, HP makes nearly double the revenue that Apple does each quarter. But despite this, it’s Apple that actually makes more profit. And it’s Apple that has more than double the market cap of HP. In the eyes of investors, Apple is the up-and-coming rockstar, HP is the aging one. And they’re closely tied to their counterpart, Microsoft, who is also seen as aging.

And that’s what HP is trying to break away from.

WebOS is the key to all of this. It’s the software layer that HP’s hardware has been lacking — forcing them to go with Microsoft instead. But the Palm acquisition in April changed all of that. From the moment that happened, HP has made no secret that the reason for the deal was to “double-down” on webOS.

Just listen to what HP executive Todd Bradley had to say today at the Fortune Brainstorm Tech conference in Aspen, CO. “I think you’ll see us with a family of slate products, clearly Microsoft for the enterprise, and a webOS product,” Bradley said. “Our focus is working with still our largest software partner, Microsoft, to create a tablet, a slate, for the enterprise business,” he continued. What he’s doing there is carefully positioning HP’s relationship with Microsoft on new products going forward as being focused on the enterprise side of things. Previously, it was stated HP would do a Windows-powered slate for consumers. That is no longer the case. That tablet will be built to run webOS.

Does that mean HP is going to ditch Windows altogether anytime soon? Of course not. As the largest maker of PCs, HP is Microsoft’s largest customer. But for the new products HP is planning, it’s going to be all webOS. And on the desktop side of things, they’re working on webOS-syncing software that will run on Windows (and Macs), we hear. So again, they’re basically trying to recreate the ecosystem that Apple has.

HP executive Jon Rubinstein (the CEO of Palm) also confirmed at the same event today that webOS 2.0 is coming later this year. This new version is likely to be the first one that will start to tie all of these HP products together.

Speaking of Rubinstein, his pedigree here can’t be overlooked. He was the executive at Apple in charge of the iPod until he left in 2006. He’s the one who oversaw the framework for the ecosystem Apple has in place today. There was some talk leading up to the Palm acquisition if Rubinstein would stay or go — he’s apparently onboard with this new “let’s turn HP into Apple” idea. That shouldn’t be surprising given that this was the basic strategy at Palm with the Pre.

But Palm failed simply because they didn’t have the resources to do what they wanted to do (challenge Apple’s iPhone directly). HP does — and then some. And while HP is not a player in the mobile space right now, they plan to be once again with webOS.

From what we’re hearing, HP wants to create a seamless experience for all of their hardware. That’s PCs to notebooks to netbooks to tablets to mobile phones to printers. And they want to do so with a much more controlled product line than they’ve previously had. They want to move towards more premium products, ones with higher margins. That will make the profits go up, just as it has with Apple.

Of course, whether or not HP can make any of this happen is a pretty big “if.” One obvious problem with them being Apple is that they don’t have their own retail stores, like Apple does. HPs are sold everywhere from Best Buy to Costco, but those stores tend to attract people looking for bargains. And those that aren’t, buy Macs there.

Second, HP’s strategy in mobile phones will meet resistance not only from the iPhone, but from Google’s Android phones. But Google appears to be positioning Android as the sort-of Windows of the smartphone era. That is, they’re all about getting their software as widely distributed as possible. Like Microsoft with PCs, Google don’t make their own hardware for Android (though they had a hand in designing the Nexus One, which is all but dead now). HP would be making its own hardware to run webOS. Again, like Apple.

Android also poses a potential threat in the tablet field. But again, Google won’t be making this hardware. As I said at the beginning, because HP is a hardware maker that just happened to purchase a great piece of software in webOS, they have a shot at pulling off what Apple has. Whereas most other rivals, even Google, cannot. Android may be ubiquitous by this time next year, but the experience won’t be as seamless as it is within Apple’s ecosystem. And, HP hopes, their ecosystem. As Apple has proven, people are willing to pay a premium for that.

This is HP’s big bet on the future. They’re betting on the Apple way. And that’s the right way for them to bet because they’re a hardware company. With a shift towards mobile starting to take place, as well as new products like tablets starting to rise, HP seems smart to get ahead of this trend. They’re not Microsoft or Google where profits are in licenses and advertising, respectively. With the webOS buy, they’re much closer to Apple. The profits there are in premium products, buoyed by the seamless ecosystem.

That’s where HP is heading.

[images: AMC]

CrunchBase InformationHewlett-PackardApplePalm webOSInformation provided by CrunchBase

DJ TechTools presents the second part of their series on mastering for DJs, offering a step-by-step guide to making sure that your productions jump out of the speakers—without falling flat on their faces. Check out their suggestions, and while you're in it, enter to win a copy of Cytomic's The Glue or IK Multimedia's T-RackS.

Read more on Beatportal

Posted by Beatportal00790267998523703607

Hugh Pickens writes "Forbes reports that although videogames have long been thought of as distractions to work and education rather than aids, there is a growing school of thought that says game-playing in moderation, and in your free time, can make you more successful in your career. 'We're finding that the younger people coming into the teams who have had experience playing online games are the highest-level performers because they are constantly motivated to seek out the next challenge and grab on to performance metrics,' says John Hagel III, co-chairman of a tech-oriented strategy center for Deloitte. Elliot Noss, chief executive of domain name provider Tucows, spends six to seven hours a week playing online games and believes World of Warcraft trains him to become a better leader."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Image by Martin-Neuhof via Flickr

How’s your summer reading program going? Have you been making steady progress toward winning the prize? No? Well, here are some gems that can help you fill out that form so that you can pick out a prize from the box at the end of the summer (I know the box says “Lost and Found” on it, but they are prizes!).

1. “Dear Agile”– A Love Letter
   [Scaling Software Agility]
2. Don’t Forget the Fun
   [OutsideIn View]
3. Can Product Managers Know Too Much About Their Customers?
   [Accidental Product Manager]
4. Is Your Product a “Gym Membership” Product?
   [The Experience is the Product]
5. Marketing, Lying and the iPhone 4
   [Rocket Watcher]
6. The Eight Metaphors of Organization
   [Ribbon Farm]
7. Everything I learned in business I learned from these 3 charts
   [Product Matters]
8. Magical Thinking and the Zero-Sum Roadmap
   [Enthiosys]
9. Metrics and More Metrics
   [Enthiosys]

Disclaimer: Including a link to a particular posting in the Product Management Reader  is not an indication that I agree with the original author. In fact, I may post topics that are the opposite of my views, or at least somewhat controversial, in order to provide a contrasting viewpoint to the one I present on The Productologist.

Don’t try to use Bit.ly links on Facebook; they have been marked by the world’s largest social network as abusive, leading to dead end pages and frustrated users.

Posting Bit.ly links on Facebook is currently impossible. If you attempt to share a link with your network, you are presented with the following message:

“This message contains blocked content that has previously been flagged as abusive or spammy. Let us know if you think this is an error.”

Existing Bit.ly links are also affected. If you attempt to click on a Bit.ly link, you will be led to a Facebook abuse page (screenshot above) stating that Facebook users have reported the link as abusive.

Bit.ly is the world’s most popular URL shortener, so this problem likely affects millions of links all across Facebook. It’s unlikely the world’s largest social network would block these links purposely. Instead, it seems that Facebook’s algorithms have marked all links from the Bit.ly domain as dangerous and abusive.

We’ve reported the issue to Facebook and requested more details. We’ll update you as more information becomes available.

Update: Bit.ly links are working properly again. Facebook says it is a spam protection measure. They pointed to a previous blog post on the subject:

“These automated systems don’t just prevent spam and other annoyances. They also protect against dangerous websites that damage your computer or try to steal your information. When we’re notified about one of these sites, we immediately add it to a block list and prevent Wall posts or messages that link to it. We also provide the person who’s attempting to share the link with an explanation of why it’s blocked and a way to correct us if we’re wrong.

Sometimes, spammers try to hide their malicious links behind URL shorteners like Tiny URL or bit.ly, and in rare cases, we may temporarily block all use of a specific shortener. If you hit a block while using a URL shortener, try a different one or just use the original URL for whatever you’re trying to share.”

[hat tip to @Mazy]

Reviews: Facebook

More About: bit.ly, facebook, trending

For more Social Media coverage:

• Follow Mashable Social Media on Twitter
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• Subscribe to the Social Media channel
• Download our free apps for iPhone and iPad

We've seen teasing photos of the Boxee Box and we touched it at CES 2010, but now there's a video of the final product as it will sold by D-Link in November. Yes, it's gorgeous. [BI] More »


Rosa Golijan0804621951651093903812644597751884278957007902679985237036070416112945184687617501194856576819327635176544291999920079010883504763780971722110489845523369326267048711637818551240770726871556191237582909238025630024461111126027636965609113161295543430991064946303021799867235244543

UPDATED. As Google has infiltrated many of our online activities — mail, calendaring, search history, blogging and even YouTube viewing — it asks us to use a single Google Account. But finally, the company is testing the option to allow users to use multiple accounts within the same browser, per the (unofficial) Google Operating System.

In the past, active Google users have had to develop kludgy workarounds to use multiple accounts. Many people have multiple roles in life and online, for instance as a personal Gmail user, a contributor to a group blog on Blogger, a reader of job-related industry news on Google Reader, a sharer of personal updates on Google Buzz, and a team coordinator on Google Calendar. (Other people, of course, are secret agents.) But Google didn’t acknowledge more than one identity.

Long ago, I got into the habit of keeping a Gmail account open for personal use in Firefox and for work use in Safari (though, now that we use Google Apps at GigaOM, that’s no longer necessary). Other people use things like Greasemonkey scripts or Chrome’s Incognito mode to shield their logins from being shared across that browser’s history.

The new multiple login screen doesn’t seem to be widely available — all we have is the screenshot posted on Google Operating System. It includes (for now) the Google products Gmail (but not in offline mode), Google Calendar, Google Reader, Google Docs, Google Sites and Google Code.

At SXSW this year, members of the Gmail and Buzz teams said that one big project they are working on is to allow more fluid use for users who have both personal and professional Google Accounts. This multiple sign-in feature seems to be the first step on that front. But what’s further needed is better integration between personal Google accounts and Google Apps accounts, especially as more companies move to the cloud. The idea that people will have one identity, both personal and professional, is naive.

Update: Google noted in an emailed comment that it had already talked about testing such changes.

“Back in May we announced that we will be rolling out changes to our infrastructure for Google Apps accounts, giving Google Apps users access to many more services.  We’re currently testing this feature with many customers to get feedback on the user experience. We look forward to bringing this big improvement to the rest of our customers soon, but we have nothing further to announce at this time.”

Related content from GigaOM Pro (sub req’d):

Google Buzz’s True Home Is in the Enterprise

Posted by timsoulo

This post was originally in YOUmoz, and was promoted to the main blog because it provides great value and interest to our community. The author's views are entirely his or her own and may not reflect the views of SEOmoz, Inc.

Howdy SEOmoz fans! It is an overused practice to start from some "shocking" stats and dissertate on how Facebook is powerful and important for business. So, I will just consider you all know what is Facebook and how cool it is.

What you're about to read is a step-by-step SMM strategy for promoting your business on Facebook. I've gathered all the best practices and tips that I have used myself, together with some advice that I haven't tried but am confident will work well. Ok. That's enough for the intro, let's go!

Where To Start?

1. Brand Ambassador.

First of all, don't use your personal account to promote your business, unless you want your customers to see your childhood pictures and lulz from the recent party. You can create another (purely business oriented) instance of yourself or hire someone to become your brand ambassador. This will be the person who represents your business online and handles all communications, so the info on the profile should be brief and clear and all the pictures neat and professional. Remember that users will associate your business with this guy.

Power Tip: Create a separate e-mail account in Gmail and import all the e-mail addresses of your clients there. Now when you use this account to create a new Facebook profile - the system will automatically find all of your clients in your address book and suggest to add them as your friends on Facebook! What a great start!

2. Creating a Facebook page.

Promotion on Facebook is all about having a page for your business. To create one, go to http://www.facebook.com/pages/ and click the "+ Create a Page" button.

Power Tip: "Page Name" is one of the the strongest ranking factors on Facebook search. Don't miss the opportunity to add some keywords you wish to rank for as you are not allowed to change your page name later.

Configuring Your Facebook Page

1. Profile picture & avatar.

Profile picture is one of the few things in the design of your page that you can actually customize, so be sure to make the most of it. Here are two great articles that will help you: "5 Creative Ways to Hack Your Profile Photo"; "Making the Most of Your Facebook Profile Picture". 

2. Page info.

The next important thing to do is fill your Facebook page with information about your business. Most of it is stored under the "Info" tab, which you cannot remove or hide. Lots of people visit it, so work hard to make your info as brief and engaging as you can. "Think SEO" and use your keywords, as each of the tabs is indexable by the search engines.

Power Tip: if you type a URL starting from http:// in the info box under your profile picture, Facebook will turn it into a clickable link. So you can easily refer your visitors to your website, blog or twitter account.

3. Applications.

• Static FBML (Facebook Markup Language) - allows you to create 10 additional tabs, which can contain HTML/CSS, Flash, FBML, iframes and FBJS; 
• NetworkedBlogs - allows you to post your RSS and Atom feeds directly to your wall; 
• Twitter Tab - posts your twitter updates to a separate tab; 
• Extended Info - adds an additional box which supports html/fbml, images, video and music to the left sidebar of your page; 
• Fan Appz & Promotions - helps you handle all kinds of contests, sweepstakes & give aways.

Tip: you'll probably end up with lots of tabs by adding various applications. However you can easily drag them around if you think that some of them are more important.

4. Vanity URL.

To be able to convert your ugly "326727833086?ref=sgm&ajaxpipe=1&__a=7" URL into something fancy-looking, like "http://facebook.com/mybusinesspage" you need to have at least 25 fans. Once you do - go to http://www.facebook.com/username/ and click the "Set a username for your Pages" link at the bottom.

5. Custom landing page.

You need an attractive landing page, which will convert your visitors into fans. Here is when the FBML application comes into play. Using HTML, CSS, FBJS and even flash you can create awesome landing pages that people will not only "like", but link to, and suggest to friends.

Tip: If you've got no development skills you can find some nice facebook FBML page templates that have just started to appear around the template stores.

What To Expect?

Before we start reviewing various Facebook promotion techniques, I'd like to clear things up a little bit. Essentially when someone "Likes" your Facebook page, they will be notified every time you update its status, it's almost the same as following someone on Twitter. To have your message spread on Twitter you need to have your followers retweet your post so that their followers could see it and retweet in turn. On Facebook, the principle is a bit more sophisticated: when someone likes or comments your status update, this fact is being reflected in his profile. And when your status update gets a decent amount of "likes" and comments it is promoted to the Top News section of a user's News Feed, so that more people could see it.

 Now let's refer to a famous "90:9:1 Social Behaviors Rule" to understand what it takes for your message to become visible.

Let's consider that "Heavy Contributors" are those ready to comment on your update, "Intermittent" ones will probably "like" it, and "Lurkers" will read it or just scroll through. Say your page has 100 fans. Knowing the fact that only 12%-20% of all your "Fans" will see your status update in their Live Feed, we can see that:

I hope this delivers a clear understanding that Facebook promotion takes an enormous amount of effort to become successful.

Promoting Your Facebook Page Internally.

1. Using your Brand Ambassador.

• Add to friends any people that may be your potential customers or somehow relate to your business. Recently, Facebook has added Skype integration, which can suggest you some Facebook friends from the list of your Skype contacts. Once you have a decent amount of friends use the "Suggest to friends" and "Share" buttons to promote your Facebook page to them;
• Use Facebook Search to discover relevant pages, groups, events, people and even messages. With Search you can easily track any mentions of your brand and provide feedback - people really love that;
• Once you join pages, groups and events, you are able to participate in the conversation, which is a great way of direct promotion. Moreover you can see the list of the group members and easily add them to friends;
• Communicate. Once someone comments on your new status, a photo, or anything else - answer back. Moreover you need to make people love your brand and become active contributors and then brand ambassadors. 1/4 of search results on each big brand is UGC (User Generated Content).

Power Tip: When composing a message put the @ symbol and start typing the name of your business page to mention it, just like you mention someone on Twitter. This can be used as a signature to your updates.

2. Keep the page fresh and interesting.

People join your page hoping to receive some interesting stuff from you, so do not disappoint them. Facebookers usually prefer pictures, videos and links to plain text updates. Here is a comprehensive list of things that you should keep in mind to avoid losing your fans: don't post too many updates; don't automate your content; don't be a duplicate of your website and don't be boring. Your page wall is your social proof and a signal for people to get involved.

3. Cheat a bit.

Ask fellow staff & your team members to post "likes" and comments on each of your status updates to boost its rankings. Only status updates with 5 or more "likes" and comments show up in the Top News section. This will also make your wall look "alive", which will inspire your fans to be more active on your page and participate in the conversation.

4. Fill in your page with media content. 

• Upload pictures of your products/services, your office and your team at work to make your company easier to relate to;
• Encourage your fans to post  pictures of how they use your product;
• Upload pictures from each event you host and tag your fans there;
• Post videos of your team members talks;
• Show your products/services in action;
• Use video to respond to your fans (Bill Clinton frequently does video responses on his page).

5. Treat your fans.

You need to offer your fans something special and reward them. For instance 1-800-FLOWER Facebook page shows the discount code only when you click the "Like" button.

You can make some special offers, which are available to your Facebook fans only and are not announced outside of Facebook. It's dead easy to reward your loyal fans by promoting them to the admins of your page, which will most likely turn them into enthusiastic brand ambassadors. Anyway, if there is some prominent fan - he should be publicly rewarded.

6. Send an update to Fans.

Direct messaging is a very powerful tool, but do not misuse it. Think twice before sending a message to all of your fans - it should be really valuable if you don't want everyone to ignore it or get irritated.

Tip: Facebook allows you to send targeted updates. Think of a way you could use that feature for your business.

7. Ask your fans for help.

Now and then you can post a status update asking your fans to help build the community by suggesting your page to their friends. Just refer them to "Suggest to Friends" and "Share" links on your page and measure their response.

8. Build partnerships with other pages.

Notice that each page on Facebook has an "Add to my Page's Favorites" button. When you do this, the logo of this page appears in a special "Favorite Pages" box on your own page. People see it and they might click the link to find out more about this page.

Your aim here is to build partnerships within your niche and be "favourited" as much as possible. Add to favorites pages that you like or that your business is related to and inform their owners about it with a wall post or a private message. Most likely you will be "favorited" back.

9. Use the applications.

There are a lot of crazy apps that you can use to promote yourself. You can even develop one of your own if your budget allows that. But how do the viral applications work in common?

You need something that people would willingly launch. This might be a game or a quiz or any other kind of dynamic content that most people love. Once a person has his score, bagde, vitual gift or any other result - the application publishes it to his wall so that all his friends could see it. The application should have a clear call to action, so that new people could easily get engaged. If the application has some kind of a High Score - people will play it again and again till they outrank their friends. You can (should) use the apps for sweepstakes and giveaways - people love them a lot.

10. Spy!

Yes! Always keep an eye on your competitors, especially on those outranking you. Check what they do and if you consider it to be a successful strategy - do the same. When they fail - try to avoid their mistakes. Anyway, you should always be informed on what others are doing to promote themselves.

11. Ads?

Indeed the most common way to promote your page. But before you use it, check out these stats:

 

Promoting Your Facebook Page Externally.

 1. Facebook for webites.

The Facebook team has come a long way toward making your website more personalized and social. There is a list of great social plugins that can be easily embedded into your website and drive lots of new visitors: "Like Button" plugin, which is almost everywhere now, "Like Box", which let's you become a fan of the website without leaving the page, "Live Stream" which is often used while broadcasting some event. Try them on your website and see what happens next.

2. "Like" and "Share" buttons.

These two are so powerful that they require a separate paragraph. Once you own an online store - those buttons are of exceptional value. Whenever you find something that appeals to you in an online store - you no longer need to copy the URL and send it to your friends to ask for their opinion. Just press the "Like" button. They will see that and comment on it. This applies to photos, videos, games, blog posts, reviews - literally anything that can be found on the web.

3. Put a link everywhere.

Once you have a website, you put its address everywhere - e-mail signatures, forum signatures, twitter info, author bio section, LinkedIn profile, links section of your blog. Do exactly the same with your Facebook page. Highlight your Facebook presence at offline events, print it on your business card, use every opportunity you have.

Power Tip: Take some twitter auto follow script that follows a person whenever he has specific keywords in his tweet. Some percent of the people you've followed will follow you back. Write an engaging request to join your Facebook page and set it as an automatic direct message to people, who have just followed you. Being launched, this system will drive some new fans to your Facebook page on a regular basis.

4. Using video.

Almost every video sharing service allows you to annotate your videos with links. This is a great way to drive some new fans onto your Facebook page. You can make viral videos, funny videos, tutorials, explanations, presentations etc. and include a link to your Facebook page with a request to join. Works perfectly!

5. Other services.

There are a lot of websites where you can get some targeted audience. For instance, upon writing this guide I've gone though dozens of presentations at SlideShare and Scribd. There I've seen many referrals to join Facebook pages specialized on marketing, and I did join some of them truthfully as I enjoyed their presentations. Examine carefully all the websites where you post information or showcase your services and think of the way you could refer people to your Facebook page.

Power Tip: In case you have some kind of a digital product - create a torrent with some demos, name it with trending keywords and upload to all torrent trackers you can find. In the info or in the comments section add a link to your Facebook page. Then go to your analytics and watch your numbers grow.

Wheew... That's the end of my guide. Sure there's a lot more to add, but I tried to keep my tactics brief, to leave some space for your imagination. I'm sure each of you can invent lots of fantastic ways to use Facebook for SMM. I am open for any questions, shoot!

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Here we are just past the halfway mark in 2010 and we’ve tapped into the stream of future marketing planning with our readers for 2011 with a poll. Our question? What 3 online marketing channels & tactics will you emphasize in 2011? The number one answer? Not social media, not email marketing.

The top digital marketing tactic for OMB readers in 2011 is Search Engine Optimization

Our poll this year provided 44 different answers to choose from ranging from display advertising to no holds barred spam. Over 200 readers took the poll and made their choices. While there are many signs of marketing budgets making a recovery, the vast majority of marketers are still focused on planning the most efficient and effective online marketing mix they can for the new year.

Hopefully the responses from our poll will be helpful in making those choices as budgets and strategies are planned for 2011.

The top responses in this year’s survey reflect a more holistic perspective that includes search, social media, advertising, content and email.  While social media marketing continues to get a lot of media attention and companies are investing more ($1.2 billion 2011, Forrester), search marketing (PPC and SEO) gets the lion’s share of digital marketing budgets ($20.7 billion 2011, Forrester).

A new entrant to the top 10 this year is content marketing which is a reflection of the increasing importance on providing more than just product/service features and benefits to customers in order to get them to buy. Content is the glue for the intersection of SEO and Social Media. Content is often the outcome of social interactions online and content can be shared and linked to, increasing it’s visibility within all kinds of search. I wouldn’t be surprised if Content Marketing jumped a few more spaces next year. According to the Junta42 Content Marketing Spending Report, 59% of marketers surveyed planned to increase content marketing spending in 2010.

Advertising through Pay per click and social media rated well, but not concomitant with budgets. That is more likely an indication of the topical focus of Online Marketing Blog which pays less attention to advertising than Search Marketing, Social Media, Content Marketing and Online PR.

Keep in mind, the results of this single question poll are a reflection of our readers and with 232 responses, isn’t a significant sample size for making broad generalizations. It is however, useful insight for our readers to see what others are focusing on. Online Marketing Blog is rated well as a marketing blog and has a significant readership in the marketing community.

You can see the full set of responses and all 44 digital marketing tactics here.

Are Search Engine Optimization, Social Networking and Blogging your top digital marketing tactics for 2011? If not, what areas will you emphasize next year?

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TopRank® Online Marketing Newsletter.

© Online Marketing Blog, 2010. | SEO Tops Digital Marketing Tactics for 2011 | http://www.toprankblog.com

Posted by randfish

One of the most common questions we receive here at SEOmoz is "What's the best way to learn SEO?" There are many ways to answer, but in this post, I'm going to cover the responses I give most often and those I've seen have the most success. But, before I describe each of these, it pays to understand that not all learning methodologies are the same in style, substance or where they can take you. If you're completely new to SEO, some of these won't be appropriate and if you're already a veteran, others won't teach you much you don't already know.

Thus, let's start with a chart of relative knowledge/experience levels (similar to this old/outdated post on levels of knowledge):

Now that we have some context, let's dive in to the ways I recommend learning SEO. For each, I've provided a description of the process, the ideal starting level(s) (and where you can expect to reach via that methodology) and a list of resources with my notes.

#1 - Free Online Guides

A number of free guides, eBooks and downloadable PDFs exist on the web to help provide insight into SEO. Some are highly comprehensive while others touch only lightly on the topic. The key to being successful with this process is to identify guides that are both up-to-date and accurate in their recommendations. No council exists to regulate the dispersal of SEO information and thus, a few proprietors of free guides can lead you down incomplete or even dead wrong paths.

Recommended for: New to SEO, Aspirant, Journeyman

List of Resources:

• SEOmoz's Free Beginner's Guide to SEO (just updated for 2010)
• Aaron Wall's SEO Guide for Bloggers
• Google's Starter Guide for Webmasters
• Danny's Checklist for Learning SEO

Time Investment / Commitment Required: 1-3 hours should get you through any of the guides above

#2 - Published Literary Works

For those who like to curl up with a book, a number of authors/publishers have come out with solid resources in the past couple years. Books have a unique advantage over online guides in that they're often better written, more carefully edited and can be more easily judged on the reputation of the authors/publishers. Conversely, they are hard to update (even in the book I wrote last year, a few links and references are already broken) and thus, don't always contain the most up-to-date information.

Recommended for: New to SEO, Aspirant, Journeyman

List of Resources:

• Inbound Marketing by Dharmesh Shah & Brian Halligan
• Search Engine Optimization: Your Visual Blueprint for Effective Internet Marketing by Kris Jones
• Search Engine Optimization Secrets by Danny Dover
• Marketing in the Age of Google by Vanessa Fox
• Search Engine Optimization: An Hour a Day by Jennifer Grapone & Gradiva Couzin
• The Art of SEO by Rand Fishkin, Jessie Stricchiola, Eric Enge & Stephan Spencer

Time Investment / Commitment Required: The largest of these is ~450 pages, which might take between 4-8 hours depending on how fast you read

#3 - Blogs, Forums & Search Communities

In my opinion, everyone learning SEO can garner value from discovering 3-5 favorite sources of information online and keeping up to date with each on a daily or weekly basis. Forums and blogs pump out a tremendous quantity of content, but just by browsing the headlines and reading teh stories that stand out, you can get exposure to strategies, techniques, news and trends that would otherwise be difficulty to stumble on by yourself.

Many SEOs (myself included) first learned the practice almost entirely through contributions, questions and threads on industry blogs & forums. Today, I'd suggest starting with a base from a free guide or book, then diving into the communities to stay sharp and get individual questions answered. I've provided a few of my personal favorite resources below, but will be working on a more comprehensive list in the near future.

Recommended for: All

List of Resources:

• Forums / Q+A
  • Cre8asite Forums
  • SearchEngineWatch Forums
  • Onstartups Answers (SEO)
  • Quora (SEO)
• Blogs
  • Search Engine Land
  • SEO Book
  • Search Engine Roundtable
  • Search Engine Journal
  • Performable Blog
  • Conversation Marketing
  • Distilled Blog
• Other
  • SEO Alltop
  • Delicious SEO Tags
  • Techmeme

Time Investment / Commitment Required: 30-45 minutes per day or 90 minutes per week (if you aggregate your time into a single slot)

#4 - Building Sites & Earning Rankings

Many in the SEO field will say that building your own sites and practicing SEO in the real world is the only way to learn. I disagree with that message, but I do concur that it's possibly the most crucial step to advancing your career and abilities.

My view is that if, prior to building a site and attempting to earn some rankings, you have a great mental model of the field, you can build a truly defensible strategy for your site(s). If you simply register a domain that sounds nifty and start trying to rank for a keyword you think is popular, you can get a very warped sense for how to do SEO and what matters in the short, medium and long run. At the very least, read a free guide and engage a bit on some of the online communities.

Once you've got a base of knowledge, building a site is the next logical step. I strongly suggest starting small and preferrably with a topic that you're personally passionate about rather than one that just has high AdSense payouts. I'll recommend a number of options for building/hosting below, but if you have the technical know-how to configure your own server and write from scratch, that's a perfectly reasonable alternative (just make sure it's not too time consuming to leave room for some actual SEO).

Recommended for: Aspirant, Journeyman, Authority

List of Resources:

• Posterous
• Page.ly
• Wordpress
• Tumblr
• SquareSpace

Time Investment / Commitment Required: A minimum of 4-5 hours for setup and creation of initial content, and more likely 40-50 hours to produce something high quality and robust and conduct initial off-site SEO/marketing efforts.

#5 - Conferences & Events

If you're hungry to learn SEO in person, see real life examples and hear stories from the front lines (as well as meeting the practitioners and evangelists), getting out to events is an excellent next step. The last few years has seen an explosion in the quantity and variety of events in the field and many have different foci and target audiences, so be sure to choose the right one for accomplishing your goals. Many of the large conferences are focused on drawing out discussion around topics, advancing the discourse in the field and promoting networking while some smaller events are more specifically geared to pure education or intimate networking.

Recommended for: Journeyman and Above

List of Resources (in order of upcoming dates):

• Blueglass Los Angeles - July 19-20
• SES San Francisco - August 16-20
• SEOmoz PRO Seattle - August 30-31
• SMX East New York - October 4-6
• Inbound Marketing Summit Boston - October 6-7

Time Investment / Commitment Required: Typically 2-4 days plus travel time

#6 - Online Classes

The online online learning series I'm familiar with in this category is Market Motive, but they're impressive enough to warrant both a category of their own and a recommendation. Founded by Michael Stebbins and John Marshall (who previously founded & sold ClickTracks) along with Avinash Kaushik, Todd Malicoat, Bryan Eisenberg and more, the staff is a who's who of Internet marketing. When this many great brains get together, the results are smashing. Market Motive combines webinars, phone calls, coursework and more into a comprehensive curriculum. They end the series with a dissertation defense given over the phone and only passing candidates earn certification.

I've personally been on a few calls with early entrants and master certification candidates and been seriously impressed. Since I'm recommending them so highly, I connected with the folks at Market Motive, and they've put together a discount  for moz readers. You can sign up for MarketMotive using the code "SMZ6TOOLSMC" and get $600 off their master certification course + 3 months of SEOmoz PRO membership FREE. But, make sure to do it in the next 5 days as the upcoming master certication course starts on July 19th.

Recommended for: New to SEO, Aspirant, Journeyman and Authorities/Gurus seeking formal, recognized certification

List of Resources:

•  Market Motive

Time Investment / Commitment Required: Over the course of 90 days, this is a 10-20 hour per week commitment, possibly more when cramming for the dissertation.

The field is certainly much richer with options than when I began, but as we know from the science of conversion, more choices don't always indicate more actions. Hopefully, the recommendations above have helped to give you a starting point. I'd love to hear from you in the comments about where and how you learned SEO and what you'd recommend to others.

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randfish1573306822080240367113075508093687462509097354761794462302571494489206031533026107577593659564741830081068172904651493261784233401476316929302629756414127538763007902679985237036070770346481565733317211441659774521509949054068124974638266141065512601243972058407116003507898350933083632599998267385660060971328883790648409353311395555216279011589927122299648130367759174057116557013128062930866646491174559343647329297530294563210602692001711692478355063298517040311882672989070660852070245666537764501054801202451041912071684103684350831330558875163819416124411756051652522484846156050157314361556511332206804248507702417135901199121979552082189578848459065820166889022237388872009306151157460503073023953188700187823191089777347107320362208192912376116314173076339200823384749441703545966581774134308746563837146481203048417033140150801491166299025150438137201014446539998601099098122010979486995001816009723585231451811357199450723838060181454811132624781251275148397384482812602233559414276720376026837618182685100780551908238092733381606643196698853497884032386898962302463521762959589931981587015511100271641170178070650337638644107531542397202844788960710461096301588559870

San Francisco - Twitter has added a new location-based feature called Twitter Places, which lets users tag their tweets with specific geographic locations.

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New York - Research in Motion (NASD: RIMM) is working on a new touch-screen BlackBerry smartphone, which features a slide-out keyboard and runs a new version of the BlackBerry operating system, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing sources.

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San Francisco - Google (NASD: GOOG) is building an online music service that would provide download and streaming options and could debut as early as this fall, CNET News.com reported, citing "multiple music industry sources."

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If you're an early adopter, you've not doubt heard of (and probably even use) mobile "check-in" applications. Popular location-based services like Foursquare, Gowalla, Brightkite, Whrrl, TriOut, Loopt and others are all the rage these days, even earning magazine cover stories about the so-called "check-in wars," as different companies fight to win this space the way Facebook won the desktop.

But after spending a few weeks "checking in" at every venue, bar, restaurant or club you visit, the excitement wears off and a question comes to mind: "why am I doing this?" you may ask yourself. The rewards are, in most cases, minimal: a point, a badge, a meaningless "mayorship" that's soon stolen away and the occasional mobile coupon. Do any of these things make check-ins worthwhile?

What would? A new service called Topguest may have the answer.

Sponsor

Why Check In?

Topguest, a new service that integrates with exciting check-in applications, thinks it has the answer to the question "why check in?," at least for frequent travelers. "Checking in" could be the new travel rewards program, if Topguest has its way.

Instead of following Foursquare's footsteps and partnering with pop culture sensations like Bravo and MTV, for example, or WSJ for news and tips from around the city, Topguest wants to link your existing travel rewards programs to your mobile check-ins. To do so, it links with well-known check-in services like Foursquare, Gowalla, Google Latitude, Loopt, Yelp and even Twitter (just turn on geo-location for your tweets!) More services are coming in the near future, too, including those based outside the U.S.

"Check in" to your hotel with the service of your choice and you could earn hotel reward points. Check in to your flight and earn miles. You don't need to download another app, or check in a second time with Topguest.

But that's not all - Topguest is working on pairing physical check-ins with virtual check-ins, too. Check in at the ticket counter for your flight and earn extra points via its service, no Foursquare required.

Topguest: The Middleman for LBS and Travel Rewards Services?

To kick of its launch, Topguest has partnered with the high-end hotel chain, Standard Hotels, offering a program where four hotel stays in a week equate to a free week at one of its properties. Plus, after 10 check-ins, Topguest users can also earn 25% discounts on future reservations, in-hotel dining or cocktails plus boutique and spa discounts as well.

But while the Standard Hotels partnership is limited to only four hotels in Miami, New York, Hollywood and Downtown L.A., this is only the beginning for Topguest.

Next month, the company is announcing several more partnerships with existing reward programs, including three of largest travel programs in world, hotels and airlines included. Plus, the company has already fielded inquiries from over thirty additional travel rewards brands to date.

Topguest is poised to become the middleman between location-based services (LBS) and travel rewards programs.

Will Frequent Travelers Like This? Short Answer: Yes

For frequent travelers, the service will have broad appeal as it's not trying to serve as a replacement for traditional point-collecting means, it supplements them. And who doesn't want extra points? The company is working with partners to distribute these extra points to its users, in addition to offering additional rewards that couldn't be had elsewhere. For example, frequent fliers that use the same airline could earn access into the private VIP lounge, even if they don't pay for that upgrade. Those who regularly choose a particular hotel chain could be targeted with exclusive deals. This goes beyond traditional loyalty programs - this is on-the-spot loyalty rewards.

Serving a Niche: LBS' Future?

While not everyone is a frequent flier or business traveler in need of collecting rewards like these, it's an attractive - and frankly, wide open - niche for a service to get into. Check-ins plus travel rewards just makes sense. And unlike Foursquare, which seemingly rewards you for being a creature of habit by distributing badges and so-called "mayorships" to frequent visitors of the same venue, Topguest rewards you (with actual rewards, mind you) for going somewhere besides your local Starbucks.

And Topguest is far from being the only LBS company to figure out that serving a niche audience may be the best way yet to attract users. Take TriOut, for example. It's an entire location-based service for just the "Triangle" region (the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill metro area in North Carolina). Or the recently launched hyperlocal network DeHood, which focuses on neighborhood-level check-ins and tips. Or Miso, the check-in service for TV and movie addicts. 

It seems serving a niche is where LBS is seeing the most innovation these days. Standalone check-in apps are just the platform on which that innovation will take place.

Interested users can sign up now with Topguest here. Next month, the service will publicly launch with more partnerships.

Discuss

Sarah Perez119860128050613430480079026799852370360718048594427596169982011662651755767434631037389975907677772110695433478977144940135233174320187668970148608023062698089816479469106822869883166972495428917191260137224405178161930413837713748648687262056385061688162631241799357460794851913904614984762607313816036338536915551231791716803938474838701310880651576248036229

I've written extensively about iAds here and here, and one question I raised has to do with Apple's policies with regard to third party data and ad networks, in particular AdMob.

As All Things Digital notes today, Apple this week "clarified" its policy with regard to third party networks, and it's hard to read it as anything other than a direct declaration of war with Google. In short, third party ad networks can run in AppWorld, but only if they are "independent". Put another way, sorry AdMob, you're not welcome here. (I interviewed AdMob CEO at the CM Summit Monday, and asked him about this. This was before the policy was clarified, but he seemed pretty certain Apple would do this.)

I think this is shortsighted and wrong. I also think it's classic Apple. It's a re run of the Us vs. The World mentality that forced the Mac into a corner back in the late 1980s. This time, Google plays the role of Microsoft, but it really doesn't matter. Apple won't let anyone play in their iWorld who might pose a competitive threat.

This is all we need now - a major platform war, with marketers and developers having to pick sides, cost of development, ad serving, analytics, and marketing services at least tripled (one process for Android, one for iPhone/Pad/Touch, one for Microsoft or Palm/HP or.... ). That's not what the web is about. It's disheartening.

AdMob's response is here. From it: "This change threatens to decrease – or even eliminate – revenue that helps to support tens of thousands of developers. The terms hurt both large and small developers by severely limiting their choice of how best to make money. And because advertising funds a huge number of free and low cost apps, these terms are bad for consumers as well.

Let’s be clear. This change is not in the best interests of users or developers. In the history of technology and innovation, it’s clear that competition delivers the best outcome. Artificial barriers to competition hurt users and developers and, in the long run, stall technological progress."

What do you think?

The iPhone 4 is now here and it's all that we had hoped for and... well, that's about it. Apple's now predictable keynote began with stats, ended with "one more thing" and detailed a few highlights throughout regarding the company's latest creation, the iPhone 4.

But one thing didn't happen today: We weren't blown away. We weren't surprised. We didn't jump up and down, screaming. We don't even know if we'll rush right out and get one.

In fact, we might just skip the iPhone altogether and get an Android phone instead.

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Blame Gizmodo if you will, for spoiling all our fun with its spy shots of the iPhone prototype "found" in a bar. But we don't think that was the problem. No, the problem is that iPhone has lost its edge. Meanwhile, Android is killing it.

iPhone 4 or Android?

Case in point, here's the conversation this blogger had with the spouse:

Me: It's only $199 to upgrade my iPhone!

Him: Is it 4G?

Me: No.

Him: What's cool about it?

Me: Um, it's got a better camera. And it's faster. And it has a 3-axis gyro thingy.

Him: What's that?

Me: This thing for games, it helps when you rotate the phone, the game rotates.

Him: That's cool, but you don't really play games, do you?

Me: Not really. But it has HD video recording!

Him: So does your camera.

Me: And threaded email... And video chat!

Him: Over 3G?

Me: Well, no. Over Wi-Fi. And only with other iPhones. But EVO has Qik, and that works over 4G, actually. Hmm, maybe I should just get an EVO.

In fact, maybe I just will.

While I'm at it, here are a few more things that Apple didn't announce today:

1. 4G

No, it was not the "iPhone 4G," it was the iPhone 4. Why? Because AT&T isn't set to roll out its 4G network until next year. And Apple didn't surprise us by finally confirming the mythical Verizon iPhone - not that we expected it at this point. But still. Where's my iPhone 4G already?

2. Cloud iTunes/OTA Sync

Sure, Apple just bought Lala.com, but couldn't they have at least teased us about the forthcoming "cloud iTunes?" After all, that's what Google did. At its recent I/O conference, Google announced that an upcoming version of the Android Market would allow music and app downloads and automatic over-the-air sync. Is Apple even thinking about doing this? We have no idea.

3. 3G Video Chat

FaceTime, Apple's new mobile iChat-like application, will probably be fun, but it's not game-changing. It only works over Wi-Fi for one thing (thanks, AT&T), not 3G. Meanwhile, Qik and Fring already have video chat apps for Android, and Skype is hinting at an Android app arriving this year. Oh, and Qik on EVO offers 4G video chat, too.

4. Mobile Hotspot

In the current version of the Android operating system (the operating system!), there's a feature that lets an Android phone function as a mobile hotspot. Carriers can choose to implement this feature or not. The iPhone, meanwhile, can be tethered for $20 extra per month via USB or Bluetooth on AT&T.

5. Free MobileMe

Apple wants to compete with Google, but still charges $99/year for MobileMe (for the smallest package) while Google gives away its low-end services for free. That's not working for us either.

6. Voice Input

Trying to stop your dangerous texting while driving habit? Better get an Android phone. Although universal voice input is probably coming to the iPhone thanks to Apple's acquisition of Siri - a cutting edge, voice-based digital assistant - it's not here yet. When it is arriving, though? Apple's reluctance to disclose future plans has us again, looking to Android, which does this right now.

7. Free navigation

Navigation on the iPhone? There's an app for that! Yep, but it's not free. Google, meanwhile, offers Google Maps Navigation for free on all Android phones. Apple, either provide your own app or make nice with Google and use theirs, for goodness' sake.

8. Dashboard

We were halfway hoping that the recent news about Apple killing off all the dashboard apps on the iPhone and iPad meant the company was going to launch its own dashboard-like app similar to Android's widgets. Guess we were wrong here, too.

Conclusion?

All this being said, the iPhone 4 is still a great smartphone thanks to other hardware-based innovations like its "retina display" (326 pixels per inch!), its integrated antennas, and its glass and stainless steel casing housing the thinnest iPhone to date: 9.3 mm thick. But now that the hardware has been modernized, maybe Apple can focus on the software?

Discuss

Sarah Perez10029295098619998056128411225645438150650819757433639408052402661155014194915490098799772868682492360312671051124283763217939982916476945608126906215178628603720208176835988826301918158899507117698729026955237511834480980746486598043971286917266690024131967314167521499179917687711736146736656818599706250069729000826193142971692695365047921540593191561996634902769581784408362835055404500013015998681136000265527594300305563924790028363141066419676018721063701403960776788643251005896379697268838661061241090707489429070148309315476931893411395353069581279250117996832862234688031722289907786731258715387392647568994731129010261001464176311455301542702410074100323916568913335111005582885769700182040587932172819185612114293922988590986381149514818798779116800167117219345321312614221219680774314123051282248871407622801534116873276660976606095992534378420213134758203959316606451152203946052961507502493361864459897726137186062741937349590493251342573244478812999466221181650263106659223029599030680429181606455333933306157501981069861963121026049577053382201345558943704998446809586223004683002856010587260961886517510740712486628774631103371952910870804493034453674919735598160502881007523084332415176492652780725554110811421460282909590826820664794873784916364355786231999733073064504148240782571412706631279229640005413795616397749758161156433476802393890808517296861515341103627236897639058180007902679985237036071197818046454877614202196019584108390243143655465156597065540045602040271142852612502413682196849707155211138197563080381087387869618577552311639027659718404158004039598067484911361546823946391153370517776915326514933553048483343354088420541811586454964970115305587596957720718534133185495220364885440667226321489048107118374246111534310478089656131190606971291654859111226068253903390461659203661810091763798259011353400394862232111571337701411839423059798019015370208986805118831723764118512344807700676910255537301653094849375848379955480942868606174579522703027677480804790549

The privacy issues that have been hounding Facebook may be coming to a head. A report in the Wall Street Journal indicates that the Facebook, along with MySpace, Digg, and a handful of other social-networking sites, have been sharing users' personal data with advertisers without users' knowledge or consent.

The data shared includes names, user IDs, and other information sufficient to enable ad companies such as the Google-owned DoubleClick to identify distinct user profiles. Some of the sites in question, including MySpace and Facebook, stopped sharing the data after the Journal asked them about it. The surreptitious data sharing was first noticed (PDF) by researchers from Worcester Polytechnic Institute and AT&T Labs in August 2009, who brought it up with the sites in question. It wasn't until WSJ contacted them that changes were made.

Not surprisingly, Facebook appears to have gone farther than the other sites when it comes to sharing data. When Facebook's users clicked on ads appearing on a profile page, the site would at times provide data such as the username behind the click, as well as the user whose profile page from which the click came. "If you are looking at your profile page and you click on an ad, you are telling that advertiser who you are," Harvard Business School professor Ben Edelman told the Journal. Advertisers contacted by the paper said that they were unaware of the additional data and did not make use of it.

Facebook has tweaked its privacy policy throughout its history, with the most recent moves to open up more user information to the public drawing heavy criticism and FTC complaints. Users have also had a tough time navigating the site's often-Byzantine privacy controls, which has led to a trickle of user defections. With these latest revelations about Facebook ignoring industry standards, not to mention its own privacy policies, that trickle may turn into a torrent.

Update: want to know how the data sharing works? We explain.

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eric@arstechnica.com (Eric Bangeman)032064209685452196811782191085150927179413054029105311166648156804015759650711601357942898836247182805014792752261736291029519587144691964191743709181010545701904586094149772460257014958870443824105930101444653999860109901564959425318552483039635900996885165761135333307927144791201078909911975297443000646139471387418091134012216747801617207928423874553111682047962234836547255200360114130053591946417574314212918809006

Today at Google I/O, Vic Gundotra introduced Froyo, aka Android 2.2. But he also went a bit beyond Froyo. Coming soon, is a way to download an app through the Android Market over the web — and have it automatically download on your Android devices too. But that’s not all. Gundotra also showed off a new section of the Market — Music. Yes, an iTunes competitor on the web from Google.

Details are sparse at the moment, but here’s how this basically works. You go to the Market on the web, find a song you like, click the download button, and just like with apps, the song starts to download on your Android devices. So it’s iTunes, over the web, with auto-syncing. No word on who the partners are for this, what the prices will be, etc. Undoubtedly, we’ll hear more about that soon.

And that’s not all.

Gundotra also announced that Google recently made an aquisition: Simplify Media. Using this technology, Google will soon offer a desktop app that will give you access to all of your (DRM-free) media on your Android devices remotely.

Social media is impacting how we do business online in new and exciting ways. Customers are sharing more and more data about what they’re doing online and the things they like. Getting people to share your products on social networks is a great way to bring in traffic and find new customers.

But ecommerce sites are stuck in a hard place because the number one goal of an ecommerce site isn’t sharing, it’s selling.

Take the “King” of ecommerce sites, Amazon.com, as an example. They have sharing tools on their product pages, but it’s not quite what you’d think:

While the sharing links are above the fold, they’re in the bottom-right corner of the screen. And you can bet that Amazon has tested that spot and found that it’s the best place for those links.

It’s hard to know how to promote your products and brand on social networks, without sacrificing potential sales. Along the lines of Michelle’s sage advice on 5 Social Media Tips for Ecommerce Marketing, here are 10 ways that you can improve social media efforts on ecommerce web sites without sending away buyers.

Basic Social Media Optimization for Ecommerce Sites

1. Get Data

First things first: You need to figure out where your site visitors are sharing your products. Without this information, you won’t know where to focus your social media energies.

AddThis provides data on social sharing trends which you can use to make some generalizations about social sharing right out of the gate. For example, right now social media networks make up almost half (44%) of all the sharing done with their service. It might help to add a “Share this” button for Facebook on your product pages.

But that data isn’t specific to your site. Who knows where your site visitors are sharing? They might be doing most of their sharing on Twitter or email.

The biggest benefit from tools like ShareThis and AddThis might be the sharing analytics they provide. You can figure out where your site visitors are sharing your products, and that information is invaluable.

You can also use Google Analytics with their click tracking and goals. Twitip has an excellent tutorial on how to track Twitter conversions and click data that you could use for any other social media site as well.

Once you figure out where your shared traffic is going, then you can modify your site’s design to highlight those services. After all, you don’t want 74 sharing buttons littering your product pages when you’re trying to sell a product.

2. Set up Facebook and Twitter profiles

Your site does have a Twitter account and a Facebook page, right? These two are the “big guns”, with hands-down the most traction for your social media efforts. (Be sure to follow @toprank)

You have to focus first on what social media networks make the most impact, and these two services are the best places to start.

3. Find unique places for sharing buttons

Instead of using a generic sharing widget in the same place across all your sites, try putting sharing features in prominent placements in different places in your site’s design.

For example, after a customer creates a review of a product, give them an easy way to share the review with Facebook friends or Twitter followers. They’ve already shown they’re in sharing mood by filling out a review, why not capitalize on the good vibes? You could create a simple link that sends the url of the page to their Twitter account to send, or use a Facebook share button.

Here are some other unique places on your site that you might put sharing links or widgets:

• The thank you page, after making the order.
• sale confirmation email
• mailing list email templates

There are plenty of other nooks and crannies on your site that you could add sharing links. Don’t feel limited by this list. Just click around your own site for more ideas.

4. Add product videos

Videos are great sales tools. People like seeing a product in action, so video is an excellent way to improve sales. Companies like Zappos have seen major increases in sales just by adding product videos.

But aside from the improved sales, adding product videos on YouTube or other video sharing sites adds another social factor. People like sharing videos, and they’re more likely to embed the videos other sites. Videos are a great way to add a viral factor to your product pages.

5. Engage customers

It’s one thing to just create a Facebook page or Twitter account, but it’s another thing to actually engage with followers. Social media takes work, you have to daily interact with followers to be successful. Easy to say, much harder to do.

Figure out who’s talking about your brand (or your competitors) and open a dialog.

Social media is a great tool to help promote products away from your ecommerce site. You can get people to your site with social media, and once they’re on your site you make the sale.

6. Add exclusivity

Make a strong call to action for your visitors as to why they should follow your brand on Twitter, Facebook, or any other network. Include special offers, coupons, tips, and other things that customers wouldn’t get unless they were following you on social media sites.

7. Don’t stay in “sell mode”

Companies often only post things related to selling on their social media profiles. But that doesn’t provide much benefit to your followers, does it? People want more from social media than just a constant stream of sales pitches.

Use your social media profiles to tell customer stories, stats, news, and other things related to your business.

Here’s a crazy idea: what if you shared one of your competitor’s deals? You’d show that your brand is interested in helping your followers, not just making money from them. It would be insanely useful to your fans, and it would add trust and loyalty to your brand.

8. Integrate your customer service strategy with your social media strategy

People are already talking about your brand on social networks, and odds are a few of them are venting frustration about something. Instead of waiting for them to call or email you, diffuse the situation by reaching out to them.

There are plenty of success stories of major brands reaching out to unhappy customers and diffusing situations quickly with social media.

9. Track what people click on social media sites

Url shorteners like bit.ly give excellent click analytics. When you share links on social networks, you can track and see how many people are actually clicking the link.

Knowing what gets people to actually click a link means that you can tailor your messages to get the most impact from your social media efforts. For example, you might find that your followers click a lot more on links to coupons versus links to product updates.

You could even drill down how effective types of links are across different social media sites. You might find that your Facebook followers like to click on coupons, and your Twitter followers like breaking news.

The more you know about your followers and what they like, the more useful you can be to them.

10. Give back

Giving back creates trust, which is crucial for your brand. Think of ways that you can be useful to your followers. Share news and tips that they’ll find helpful. Ask their opinions. Give them coupons. Interact with them.

The important thing is that you’re openly trying to be helpful to them. The more useful you are to your following, the more loyal they’ll be to your brand.

What creative social media marketing tactics have you implemented with your ecommerce site? Have you noticed rules of thumb recommended that do not apply to your situation?

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© Online Marketing Blog, 2010. | 10 Essential Social Media Tips for Ecommerce Sites | http://www.toprankblog.com

The Oatmeal is running a comic today that cuts at the core of the social web: entrepreneurs in love with their unoriginal ideas. Titled “8 Websites You Need to Stop Building,” Matthew Inman skewers “Websites that let me know what my friends are up to,” “Websites whose sole purpose is to share things” and social media blogs. And while he’s at it, Inman gets in some cheap shots at Flash intros and Web 2.0 design cliches. His basic point is: You know your genius idea that’s just a slight twist on what came before? The world doesn’t need it.

As usual for The Oatmeal, the real gems are in the zany examples and perfect details, so click through to read the whole thing. I kinda want to make the comic my autoreply, but I’m not sure my heart is quite that cold.