Customer Service on Social Media – 5 Things Most Companies Do Wrong

5 Things Most Companies Do Wrong In Customer Service on Social Media

1. Ignoring negative comments

Most companies are afraid of negative comments on their Social Media profiles and is a major concern for Marketing Managers and Owners. Yet at the same time, many companies choose to ignore negative comments. By ignoring them, they don’t go away though. When I talk to my clients, I always try to encourage them to see negative comments as an opportunity. No customer expects your company to be perfect. What makes or breaks a deal is how you deal with issues though.

Just imagine how you would feel if you walked into a store to complain about a product or a service and the sales clerk just turns and walks away from you, totally ignoring you. This  is not how a company should treat a customer, whether it’s in person, online or on the phone.

Use a negative review or comment as a chance to showcase how you treat your customers. Offer genuine support to resolve the issue and make your customer happy. Show that you care, just like you would want other companies to care when you had a sub-par experience with them. Most customers are not too unreasonable. Make it right and make them happy and they might even turn into a raving fan after the incident.

2. Deleting bad comments/blocking people

Deleting bad comments and blocking people is only ok if they are not following your commenting guidelines. While it is ok to delete spam and comments that use inappropriate language, it is not ok to delete negative comments just so your company does not look bad. My best advice for you is to not take it personally and see it as an opportunity for your company to make your product or service even better. Thank your customers for making you aware  about this issue and how you are planning to fix it. Keep them appraised on the development, even before they ask.

Always remember that keeping a customer is much cheaper than finding a new one. Often times, you can even turn unhappy customers into raving company fans. One time, while my dad and aunt and uncle from Germany were visiting me, we went to a local Brewery for dinner. We had ordered a couple of beers and Nachos. When we were almost done chowing down our food, we discovered a tiny screw on the bottom of our Nacho plate. Nothing had happened, but we still showed it to the bar tender. Instantly, the restaurant manager was talking to us, asked if we were alright and if we wanted another plate of Nachos. As we were already full, we declined, but he nonetheless comped our whole bill (about 6 beers and the nachos). Guess what, my dad told the story of how Rock Bottom Brewery tried to “screw” us, but then provided such awesome customer service to so many people and every time he came back to visit me in San Diego, we had to go back to his favorite Nacho place 

3. Not have a Social Media Crisis plan

Dealing with individual complaints is still rather easy and does not need much planning to do right. But what happens when hundreds of customers experience the same problem or when a particularly unlucky incident goes viral and reaches a large audience? Most of these problems started out small and most likely could have been prevented if someone at the company had showed enough compassion and done the right thing.

Step up and make it right as soon as possible and don’t let the small mouse turn into a large elephant that can damage your company’s reputation and brand for many months or even years. Here is a detailed description how to create a Social Media crisis plan.

4. Unprofessional replies

Make sure that whoever has access to your company’s Social Media profiles and writes responses to your customers, has appropriate training and understanding how to provide excellent customer service on Social Media. I always cringe when I hear small business owners who tell me that their 16 year old niece is doing their Facebook for them. While I do understand that most companies cannot afford a dedicated Social Media coordinator, at least make sure the person that represents your company on platforms that can take your message to millions of people, knows what they are doing. Keep them appraised on what is going on at the company and who they should contact when they receive a negative complaint, or what to do if things spin out of control.

While there isn’t much truth on the internet, there is one absolute truth about the Internet: You can’t delete anything from the Internet! So, to make sure that your customers get the best impression of your company on Social Media, here are some points that you should keep in mind:

• Always create Social Media profiles from a dedicated email address that will stay with the company
• Train employees to represent your company online
• Create an action plan for a Social Media Crisis
• Delete/revoke access after (maybe even before) employee termination
• Create a Social Media policy

5. Learn from it

Even if your customer service on Social Media is excellent, there is one more step that you need to make. Make sure that your company learns from the feedback. Develop a plan that eradicates the root of the problem, rather than relying on customer service to make things right again. Your customers will start doubting your sincere apology, if they read in previous reviews that you have been aware of the issue for months or even years.

This step is not that easy, especially if you are the Marketing Manager and are not too involved in the Operations of your company. To make customer service on Social Media a success, you need to get the whole company on board. You need to collaborate with the customer service department to make sure your Social Media complaints are included in the customer care process. You need to work with product development or your service providers on how to make your customers’ experience even better and solving problems that they are experiencing. And then, you obviously need to the get owner/finance department on board to pay for it all.

So, how are you dealing with Customer Service on Social Media? Please share, if you found this article helpful!

via:http://jupiter-labs.com/customer-service-on-social-media/

Julie’s Blog: Product Pricing and The Power of Bundling

In my internship I have recently taken on more responsibility that is expanding my knowledge of product pricing and the power of bundling. I have learned that if a product is simple, but offers a few options it generates better profits. It is very difficult to put a price on something that isn’t physical.

Product Pricing options

People are always looking for the best deal with the best price. When you think about the best product pricing strategies, there are a few things you should keep in mind. Product pricing is tricky because every customer see’s a product with a different value. The product may be less valuable to one customer that doesn’t use it as much, but for a customer who needs it there is more value in the product. Due to the different values of the product depending on customer, it is important for you to offer different options in pricing as well. Also keep in mind that the price matches your target market. If you offer High-end luxurious products, a price that is too low can actually hurt your image. On the other side, if you are targeting people with a tight budget, a low price that still allows for special deals or regular promotions will be a better option for you. However, if you offer to many options, you run the risk of losing customers all together because they can’t decide. This can be solved by only allowing 3 options of price and bundle packages.

Product Bundling

Bundling products and services together is when you take the original product and add more value to it,  like adding a service with the product. If your product is a book then you can sell the book alone as one option, for a second option you have the book, a signed poster and a DVD. Obviously, the book, poster and DVD  price would be higher then the book alone. For clients that want it all, you can then bundle the DVD, an audio version, and a singed poster. For the third option you may even want to included gift wrapping with purchase.

Product Bundling lets the buyer chose what price point is best for them, gives them a comparison price while adding more value to your original product. If you buy a product and there is a similar product with more value for a few more dollars most people tend to chose the option where they get more value for their money.

When deciding how to price and package your product, it is important to keep these rules in mind. Limit bundle and package options to three. This give customers a price to compare, but it keeps them focused and away from confusion. It also helps you to achieve more profit, whether you have customers who are all in on the product, or if you have customers who are unsure but still want to test the product. Make sure to bundle by adding more value to each package. And finally don’t have to many options for your customers to chose from or they will be confused, which will stop them from buying the product all together.

Product pricing and creating different product and service bundles are a great way to make your product more appealing to a wider audience. It’s definitely worth it to develop a product pricing strategy and test it over time to ensure that you are providing the best deals for you customers.

via:http://jupiter-labs.com/julies-blog-product-pricing-power-bundling/

Why Outsourcing to a Social Media Consultant is a Bad Idea

I honestly think that outsourcing Social Media is the worst you can do. Maybe it would be better to not do it at all. I have to admit, this has not always been my point of view. I used to offer outsourced Social Media services to my clients for a very long time. I would update their Facebook, Twitter and write their blog posts for them. Like most other Social Media consultants, my clients could pick different packages according to their needs. I had clients in a variety of industries and in many cases, I was not familiar at all with the industry that they were in, had no insights in their business strategy and what was going on in their day to day business.

Social Media is about connecting people with people directly. This is why it is so powerful. If you hire a Social Media consultant, it feels like one of these silly situations on TV where two friends are not talking and a middle man has to play the messenger. Remember in Harry Potter, when Harry and Ron didn’t talk and Hermonine had to repeat everything they said? Pretty childish and inefficient right? So why would you do that in your business?

Social Media is also about showing that you care, want to listen and build a relationship with your customers. You can’t outsource “building a relationship”. A relationship is built on trust, mutual interest and genuine care. Do you think you could build a friendship with someone, if you only communicated through their secretary with them? Probably not.

Here are a couple more reasons why I believe that outsourcing Social Media is a bad idea:

1. Your Social Media Consultant does not know your industry

I used to do the Social Media for a budget car rental company with locations all over the US, Central America and the Caribbean. I wrote hundreds of blog posts about the various locations, things to do for tourists, the best hotels etc. The problem was, that I had never been to most of these locations. I researched my content on Trip Advisor, travel blogs, Wikipedia and more, but I had no inside knowledge. I had no way of evaluating if the information that I had researched and passed on in my blog posts was accurate or not. In short, I was just regurgitating what other people already shared.

If on the other hand, somebody at that rental car location had written a blog post about their city every couple of weeks sharing their knowledge and cool insights about the city they call home, it would have been a real value to the rental car customers, don’t you think?

Your customers want to see your expertise and insights in your industry. How can you establish yourself as a thought leader and show that you care for your customers, if you pay someone else to do it for you? You are the one who has worked in the industry for years, know the ins and outs, have the network and most importantly, know your customers. All your Social Media consultant can do is provide information that is already widely accessible and does not provide further insights. At best, it’s a good summary of information that barely touches the surface of what is really going on in your industry.

2. Your Social Media Consultant has no insights in your day to day business

Another problem was that I was working remotely and there was no way for me to gain insights into the day to day business. People who follow your company on Social Media are interested in learning more about your company from a personal level. Who are the people that are working for you? What is it like to work for your company? What does the office look like? Do your employees like their job and feel appreciated?

You probably have a ton of cool and interesting stuff going on at your office that your customers would love to see, but your remote Social Media Consultant sitting in another city, state or even country has no way of knowing what is going on.

Sharing pictures from the impromptu office party after completing a huge project or from the 5k raising money for kids in need where your whole team dressed up in company shirts? Letting your customers vote if they would prefer white, red or black Ford Mustangs as a rental car? These are all cool ideas for an interesting and engaging Social Media presence. But if you hire a Social Media consultant, implementing this will be much harder, because they need to be constantly updated on the progress, need to understand the business practices and operations, and you would have to do most of the work yourself, because you are the one who was there. But then you wouldn’t need a Social Media Consultant, would you?

3. Your Social Media Consultant is not as passionate about your business/industry as you are

 While outsourcing makes sense in many areas of your business, you can’t outsource “care”. If they are a good Social Media consultant they care about your business, because they want to keep you as a client. It’s nothing but human nature. Let’s say, there is a complaint about your company on Facebook. As your Social Media Consultant, they wont care about it as much as if you had left a negative comment on their Facebook wall. The relationship to your customers is removed by a degree separation. And quite frankly, it’s not their job to care. It’s yours. They are your customers that make your success possible. They deserve to be listened to. Building a relationship and trust is a two way street. You can’t expect your customers to be loyal customers who believe in your brand, buy your products and might even recommend you to their friends and family and you don’t even take the time to listen to what they have to say.

Another problem for Social Media consultants is that they are not on location and do not have much insights in the operations. Let’s get back to my car rental client for an example. One of the main complaints on Social Media was that their Customer Service apparently never picked up the phone. I actually tried it myself one time and rang them 5 times within one hour before someone picked up the phone. People who already were unhappy or had a problem with their rental car and called customer service experienced another break of trust when nobody answered their calls and didn’t reply to emails. When they found our Facebook page, many of them vented and shared their frustration. However, all I could do was collect their contact information, tell them that someone will contact them shortly and forward the info to my contact person, the Marketing Manager. He, also very busy with his daily tasks, eventually forwarded the complaint and contact information to the very people who didn’t pick up the phone in the first place. It turned out that the Customer Service department was notoriously understaffed and had a horrible response time because of it. If I had worked directly for the company they could have given me permission to communicate directly with the customer to make things right or at least communicate with the customer service representative directly to help the customer as soon as possible.

The person you are hiring is not an industry expert, they are a Social Media expert. Yet, you are hiring them to share industry knowledge and insights. They have no insights in your company, but you want them to share a look behind the scenes with your customers. You want them to pretend to care about your customers, but that is your job, if you want to stay in business in the long run.

via:http://jupiter-labs.com/outsourcing-to-social-media-consultant-bad-idea/

Julie’s Blog: The Fizzle Show – A Business Podcast with Personality

Julie’s Blog: The Fizzle Show – A Podcast with Personality

When searching for new content to research and blog about, I mentioned to my boss that I like re-viewing webinars where the hosts add their own personality. The first thing she said was: “Then you have to go listen to The Fizzle Show,  I haven’t come across anyone else with as much personality as them.”

The Fizzle Show – What is It?

The Fizzle Show consists of three expert entrepreneurs that share their successes and failures of starting their own online businesses. They create weekly online podcasts with advice and ideas for the beginner online entrepreneur. Their mission is to help the online entrepreneur to grow and build successful online businesses. They also have guest speakers who also share their success and failures of their experience with online business.

The Fizzle Show has Personality:

This Show is full of Personality! I would like to mention that this show may not be for everyone, and you should go listen with an open mind and a light heart.  I love following and listening to experts that include their personality in business. It makes it some much easier to relate, listen to, and take advice from experts that are not afraid to show who they are. These three guys are definitely not afraid to show the audience who they are. Each one puts their colorful voice into the podcasts, with some corny jokes and impersonations of well known characters. They will make you chuckle while learning how to improve your start-up company.

The Fizzle Show – Who They Are:

Corbett Bar- He is the Big “Daddy” of the podcasts. He has had many years of experience with online businesses. He knows what he is talking about and knows what works and doesn’t work in business.

Chase Reeve- Is the “Mommy” Has been in the business also for many years, has the wisdom and experience of online business. His focus and what he brings to the group is the design and aesthetic of the website.

Caleb Wojcik- They refer to him as the “kid” of the three guys. He is the youngest and doesn’t have as many years of experience under his belt. But he is credited with keeping the other two on time and on schedule. He is the brains behind the strategy of the Fizzle Show and works mainly on the video media presentations.

Other Projects of The Fizzle Show:

The Sparkline this site is their web blogging page. They publish good content for all sorts of people, like bloggers, entrepreneurs, publishers, artistes, connecting people with similar interests, people who want to share their stories, marketers. And many more  people who just want to build there brand and better what they do.

Fizzle.co   This is the main part of the site that offers pro training for building your online business. It is online video training that teaches you how to build and maintain a successful online business. They offer the video courses, online office hours where you can have personal questions answered by each expert, access to their community, access to their online library, and access to certain discounts on other software and services. This service does have a monthly fee, as of now it is $35 a month to sign up and have access to everything they have to offer to help you run your business.

via:http://jupiter-labs.com/julies-blog-fizzle-show-business-podcast/

6 Ways to Get Your Online Reputation Back on Track

To Err Online Is Human.
Yes, you’ve read that right. With the progression of technology and the internet nowadays, it’s not unusual for people to really commit mistakes or be involved on fights online. Rants, fights, and hurtful comments are not pretty much news especially on social networking sites. However, being human doesn’t give you the license to always mess around on the internet.

Messing around online would just give you more trouble than you could ever imagine. Aside from hurting and disrespecting others, you’re also damaging your reputation both online and on the real world from your friends, loved ones, and even your future employers. So if you feel like you’ve already crossed the line and you want to regain your online reputation back on track somehow, this article can definitely help you. Here’s how.

It’s Never Too Late to Apologize
Unlike what the One Republic’s song states, it’s never yet too late to apologize. Say you’re sorry to all the Facebook friends, Twitter followers, or Google+ people whom you think you have caused pain and disrespected one way or another. As much as possible, don’t just post or make it a status. Personal messages are always better than general statuses. It is always more sincere and believable.

Post Pets and Positivity
No one will ever hate you for posting cute dogs, playing cats, adorable babies, funny (but unoffensive) memes, and other positive photos or gifts. As a matter of fact, you might even help brighten up their busy and stressful day with those light, humorous and positive images. Just be consistent and people may see this as a surprisingly good change on your behalf.

Enough of the Rants
Yes, we definitely have this freedom of speech and expression going on. However, don’t always use it to go overboard and post your rants here, there, and everywhere in the social media. Yes, it might be your own Facebook or Twitter account. But aside from the fact that not all of your social media friends and followers care about your life and your rants, don’t you know that negative energies and anger can affect the ones who can read them. Besides, think about this — your post and the words you use to bash a certain person don’t really show something about that certain person, but those do show something about you and your character.

Put Smiley’s Generously
Regardless if it’s only a “virtual smile”, it can still somehow show your emotion as you respond to any comment, message or post. At least the person or people you are chatting or responding to would feel like you’re sincere and that you respect them and their opinion. Just like in real life, smiles are also significant online.

Comment Sparingly
As much as you could, meddle on issues or posts or tweets that has nothing to do with you. Before you type and hit that share or post or tweet button, think twice, thrice, or as many times as you possibly can. Although you may change your mind later on and delete that post, chances are there are already a couple of people who have read it and might judge you wrongly as a person or tell it to others. So as much as possible, don’t respond or make any comment especially when you’re mad.

Change Your Perspective and Attitude On and Offline
For you to be able to regain your reputation and change your persona online, change your “offline” perspective and attitude first. As soon as you are able to change the way you think and learn how to respect and treat other people better in the real world, everything else will follow, including your attitude online.

Who you are online is just a reflection of who you really are in real life. If your attitude sucks online, then there’s a huge percentage that your attitude does indeed suck. However, since everyone deserves a second chance (as cliché as it may sound), you can still get your online reputation back on track through the above mentioned tips.

Author’s bio
Katherine Smithson is a budding writer. Through bestessays.com, she is venturing the blogging realm with the hopes of gaining readership and making a name for herself in the industry. Follow her writing journey on Google+

via:http://www.newsorator.com/6-ways-to-get-your-online-reputation-back-on-track/

7 Premium Plug-ins: Best Solution for WordPress E-commerce Sites

A huge number of WordPress site owners are enthusiastic for unique website design and creativity. They use WordPress platform for building site and keen interested to generate more money from it. In order to fulfill the dream of getting more ROI, it is necessary to spend more time with their passion.

Thousands of WordPress plug-ins are available to use free and allow to explore your creativity in an elegant manner. The use of these plug-ins can be daunting for you and too many plug-ins might slow down the performance of your site or increase the chances of threats or security risk.

The idea of using eCommerce to your site is good approach that enables you to securely sell products or services online and digital files such as ebooks or paid consultation session. However, for the non-technical owners, addition of e-commerce with WordPress means that they are opting feature-rich eCommerce solutions, like WP e-commerce, WooCommerce, etc. Each is well-organized and respected solution, but it seems like using a sledgehammer over a nut to crack it.

Such type of website owners are not worry about specific compatible WordPress themes, complex customization or SSL certificates. They only require a well functioning WordPress eCommerce site as quickly as possible, which is easy to use and improve their sales figure. Generally, they don’t love to spend considerable time in building a website.

One of the prime reasons behind its popularity is a bundle of amazing features such as flexible, robust, scalable, fully customized templates/themes, secure administration, open source and many more. Two types of WordPress are available in the market to use, one is free and other is paid. If you have knowledge about development or programming, then prefer free plug-ins, otherwise choose paid services with additional benefits. It is a popular platform used by millions of users across the globe, which provides plenty of rooms for the plug-ins customization.

Here are some of the famous WordPress plug-ins for those independent creative, who want a well-functioning website without any sort of hassle.

1. Digg Digg

If you are not using social networking sites as a business owner yet, then it’s a time to join bandwagon of those businesses, who have placed their reputed position or heavily rely over these sites with the help of target-oriented marketing strategies. Digg Digg allows you place a floating box on your site, which enables your potential visitors to share it with other social network users.

2. Selz

It is not hard to handle credit card payments and orders by using Selz plug-in of WordPress e-commerce. This easy to install plug-in has a dozen of features for any independent creative site owner, who is interested to sell their services or products with the help of WordPress site.

Incredibly easy to set up and use without deep knowledge of coding or amending of themes, Selz is one of the popular plug-ins. It is much easy to embed widgets and buy now buttons into the WordPress page. Even, it can be integrated with Pinterest, Facebook and Twitter to improve the engagement with niche audiences. It acquiesces to sell digital, physical services and kickstarts your sales by offering promotional discount codes.

3. Updraft Plus

All know the importance of online backup same as your PC or your connection goes haywire suddenly. You should say thanks to this plug-in, because it is always ready to help you out. Whenever, you lost some of your data, then you can restore again through online backup option.

It facilitates you to store your data in the cloud with just one click and any piece of information will restore automatically that you had lost. If we talk about the popularity, Updraft Plus has crossed 5,10,000 downloads worldwide and has gained a highest ranking backup, according to rankwp.com.

4. All-in-one SEO Pack

It includes many notable features, such as Google Analytics support, automatic optimization for title, automatic META tag generation and search ranking. It additionally contains XML sitemap to improve search engine optimization. Beginners can work easily on this software as it works out-of-the-box.

5. CloudFlare

If you have wrangled with hackers and spammers before, then you should well-aware about this plug-in. All credit goes to WordPress technology, which has offered CloudFlare to recognize the IP address of the spammers and allows to block them accordingly. Another plus point is, it makes the speed faster of your website.

6. Clicky

If you love to keep track, from where your visitors come or what kind of page they like most to visit on your website, then use Clickly for getting all these benefits. Apart from these features of track, you can also enjoy other features, like Twitter analytics, visitor segmentation, video analytics and more.

7. WP-reCaptcha

WP-reCaptcha plug-in makes the life of hackers and spammers miserable by not allowing the bots of your website access. The search of a convenient piece of software is a real challenge for everyone, which is good because no one wants to be flooded their website with endless spam.

Conclusion:

Maximize the opportunities of getting a wide array of traffic with the help of thousands of WordPress plug-ins.

Author Bio:

David Meyer is a professional web developer as well as blogger of CSSChopper, who is enthusiastic in writing blogs.

via:http://www.newsorator.com/7-premium-plug-ins-best-solution-for-wordpress-e-commerce-sites/

Why Women are the True Influencers Behind Social Media (INFOGRAPHIC)

Manish Agrawal, Co-founder of NewsOrator, is a recognized expert in the industry of SEO, Digital Marketing, Blogging. Since 2007, He has been also involved in social media marketing, wordpress developing, PPC, affiliate marketing and content marketing. Follow him on Twitter, Pinterest, and Google+ 
via:http://www.newsorator.com/why-women-are-the-true-influencers-behind-social-media-infographic/

Remember Five Things before Write Good Post

To write normal article or post is not big deal for website but main thing is that is your post is correct and according to rules and regulations of Google search engine. Most of the blogger write post every day and but they skip many important things, which can make their performance better.

Good post and article can make your blog famous and most important thing is those articles will also compliance all rules and regulations, which is very important to know for every blogger. So we are going to tell you that Things remember before writing a good post for your blog.

Remember Five Things Before Write Good Post

Focus Keyword 
This is important tip for the bloggers who wants to make their blog famous in short run. Moreover first to choose a focus keyword and then make them repeat in their post, the repetition of focus keyword is totally depend upon the total words of the article. Like if the article is 500 words then focus keyword can be used 12 to 15 times in the whole article.

Never use Heading 1 or H1 
This is the second important thing that mostly bloggers used the heading 1 in the middle and in the entire post, which is totally wrong and violate the terms and conditions of the Google. He/She must know that heading of our article is only in heading 1 and if we use then again then it is totally wrong.

So we must not use Heading 1 in the entire post and can use heading 2 in the post but remember one thing if you have 4 main points in the full post then you can use Heading 2 in all four main points and if you are using the Heading 2 in first two main heading of your post then you can also using the Heading three or four.

Moreover one thing always remembers that always use the Heading or H tag in sequence form, which comes under the rules and regulations.

Rich Content
If you want to write post well then your content should be rich and better. Rich content is key to success; mostly people use the content quality is poor, which leads to failure because Google is always give preference to the rich content. If the content will be rich and in user friendly with readers then readers will love to read your article, and come again and again to read to your more articles.

Never Bold Keyword more than two times
This is also important fact that we must not bold the focus keyword or particular keywords more than once or two times in the whole article. Although most of the people make the keyword bold, this is totally against the policies of Google.

Do not use download link
This is another point to know that we must know use the download link, which puts the negative effect on our blog.

Author Bio: I am Aditya Singh, a passionate blogger. I’m eager to write about the Bollywood celebrities’ biography, Box office, trailer and much more on Bollywood so you can check on my blog bollywoodmap.com.

via:http://www.newsorator.com/remember-five-things-before-write-good-post/

Make Your Website Exceptional With Social Media Integration

As you reach towards your corporate website development, you need to consider an important component before you lay out your strategies, which is social media integration. Social media has changed our culture in several ways. The companies are reaping awards, who have implemented this social media strategy. A certain piece of content is shared, liked or followed by assorted people and communities via social media. Facebook, Twitter, social bookmarking sites-Digg & StumbleUpon, photo sharing sites- Pinterest & Flickr, blogging sites-WordPress and Blogger, etc and many more. All these form a big social media circle.

Need of Social Media Integrated Site

Social media is a vital element of your site’s retention and user experience that results in enhancing your website’s search ranking with the help of social signals. It is essential to integrate your site with social media, just take a look at some important facts about social media user statistics for 2012:

1. Social media users is 62% among the global population
2. Purchase behavior of users via Facebook is 47%
3. 76% of Twitter users actively tweets
4. Purchase behavior of users via Twitter is 12%
5. Usage of social sharing tools via companies is 51%
6. 21% of the best-in-class websites use a social log in feature
7. Usage of social log feature via websites is 21%
8. Logging in via social profiles is preferred by 86% of web users

Essentials of Social Media

1. Social Media Buttons

Social media buttons are icons of well-known social media sites, which are placed at the top, left, right or bottom of web page content. These social media sites are Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+, Pinterest, etc.

Tools & Resources:

Twitter

Facebook

LinkedIn

Google+

Pinterest

2. Social Share Buttons

With the help of social share button, user can share interesting content on their social media profiles. This can be done with just one click without leaving the page.

Some useful hints are given below for the positioning of social share buttons:

1. Place share buttons above the fold in order to avoid scrolling
2. Place these buttons at the bottom of the blog, so that readers share it after reading it
3. You can also have these floating social buttons bar that moves along with page scrolling
4. Keep these share buttons at places where they are actually needed to share
5. These social buttons also give a quick preview about the popularity of your content to new visitors

Tools and Resources:

ShareThis

AddThis

Po.st

Gigya

Sharexy

3. Social Login

Social login is a convenient feature that is given to users, in which they can login the site with their existing social login rather than making an entirely new one.

Benefits of Social Media Login Feature

1. No possibility of spam as real people register via social login
2. Rapid sign up
3. Convenience for users
4. You can collect their email via their social media profile
5. Bounce rates are lower

Tools and Resources:

Facebook login

Janrain

OneAll

LoginRadius

WordPress Social Login

4. Authorship

Suppose, you are searching for an article, then you are attracted with those articles that are having the picture of the author. This is achieved by adding the authorship markup with Google+. Usually, people are more attracted to such kind of contents.

Step-By-Step Process of Creating Google+ Authorship:

1. Create a personal account on Google+
2. Go to the profile page of Google+
3. Click edit profile
4. Scroll down the page & click contributor to
5. Click add custom link
6. Enter the name of the blog page along with its URL
7. Click save
8. Click done editing
9. Copy the profile page URL to the code linked with the author’s name below the content.
10. Add rel=”author” tag to it

5. Social commenting

Social commenting means giving your users a chance of providing their feedbacks to us via their existing social media profiles. There are several advantages of permitting users to comment through social media profiles rather than the regular comment box, which are stated below:

1. Spam comments are avoided as these social media profiles are owned by real people
2. Protect your brand’s reputation by preventing users from giving derogatory comments
3. Increased Social Signals to your site

Tools and Resources:

Facebook comments

DisQus

IntenseDebate

LiveFyre

LoginRadius

Ultimately, with this article our aim is to make your content as share-friendly as possible in order to grow your business by increasing your profits. This can be possible by making use of the above-mentioned social media tools and resources, thus driving social traffic to your site.

Author bio: Jennifer Adam is a web developer Expert, associated with htmlpanda.com &psdtowordpressexpert.com, a leading professional services provider. She is a great blogger, who used to exchange useful and informative ideas about several issues and services.

via:http://www.newsorator.com/make-your-website-exceptional-with-social-media-integration/

DIGITAL MARKETING MODELS AND CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE.

The ever-expanding digital landscape is continuing to alter consumers’ behaviours and disrupt a broad range of industries. Some, such as retail and consumer products, are being particularly affected. Today’s customers are expecting a lot from the brands they engage with. As a recent Booz & Company report, entitled How to Choose the Right Digital Marketing Model, explain it this way: “Consumers today expect to browse, research, solicit feedback, evaluate, and push the “buy” button at their own pace, and at the time and place—and via the platform—of their choosing. Consumers also continue to engage with brands online after a purchase and to share experiences with one another.”  

Those of us involved in marketing and dealing with the complexity of digital advertising and customer engagement experience the environment Booz describe every day.

Although there is no “one size fits all” when it comes to digital marketing  a limited number of  models are now emerging and becoming more widely accepted. The Booz  report  identified four models; Digital Branding, Demand Generators, Product Innovators and Customer Experience Designers. I describe and discuss these models below and draw some conclusions for marketers.

Digital Branders are often consumer products companies, retailers or other marketers that focus on building brand equity and deeper consumer engagement. These companies are moving away from traditional linear advertising and investing in digital experiences that connect with their customers. They are focused on recruiting new consumers to the brand, increasing advocacy and driving loyalty.

Demand Generators, such as retailers, play the numbers game. They are focused on driving traffic and converting leads in the fewest steps possible. To quote the report again, “All elements of the digital marketing strategy—website design, search engine optimisation, mobile connected apps, and engagement in social communities—are tailored to boost sales and increase loyalty. Although Demand Generators also need to leverage content to drive engagement, they are more focused on driving volume and efficiency…”

Product Innovators are organisations who use digital marketing to help identify, develop, and roll out new digital products and services. Booz explain that “…these companies employ digital interactions with consumers primarily to rapidly gather insights that can help shape the innovation pipeline.”

The fourth and final model Booz identify is Customer Experience Designers. The report states that these companies focus on “reinventing how they interact with customers, and wowing them at multiple touch points; these companies hope to create an ongoing dialogue and build a loyal customer base.”

I agree with the overall premise of the report that the digitally influenced  consumer environment is leading to the emergence of new digital marketing models – and I like the first three models they describe although they are not necessarily mutually exclusive models. For instance a “digital brander” could also choose to adopt the approach of a “product innovator” in its marketing strategy.

But I would argue that “customer experience design” is not a fourth model but rather a discipline that should be applied across all three digital marketing models. It creates the focus for the digital interactions involved in implementing these models.

For example, using the Booz  model classification a large retail client that my company is working with would be classified as a Digital Brander. However we are using customer experience frameworks and data points to mature and evolve their activity – across mobile, e-commerce, social and in-store.

The fact is that online marketing needs to be relevant, timely and, most importantly, derived from a position directed at the value to the customer. Brands can no longer rely on interruption marketing. They must focus on value creation. They need to develop experiences and messages that connect with their customers. Going one step further and delivering valuable experiences creates  a sustainable dialogue, and ultimately costs savings.  Brands who adopt this approach are thinking beyond “spray and pray” marketing techniques and see customers as more than just database entries.

Customer experience disciplines allow brands to understand the “jobs to be done” – what their customers are trying to achieve – and innovate around that. All the best brands relentlessly focus on the needs of their customers in this way. Understand what they are really trying to do and provide a solution. That is what allows products like the iPod to come into existence.

So as you develop your marketing plans for 2014, identify your marketing model, define your objectives and then take a disciplined approach to using customer experience techniques to carve out your unique position in the market. Listen, learn, innovate and succeed.

via:http://www.markrcameron.com/article/will-focus-digital-marketing-efforts-2014/