In a social media marketing training session yesterday I talked about the concept of integrating a blog to a company website.

So how does Bando integrate their blog into their website?

Here is what needs to be done in this case.

Currently Bando promotions has a website.

and a blog

As you can see the blog is on eBlogger and has very different branding than that of the organization.

To the user or potential customer coming to this blog is very confusing as there is no logical way to get back to the Bando website.

Recognizing this they have taken steps to rectify this situation.  The blog tab has been added to their website however this links to the blog that is sitting on eblogger!! Since this is a brand and needs to be consistent with their branding both online and off line, this is not the best setup for them.

So they need to upload wordpress to their existing website server. The look and feel needs to integrated together into whatever template appeals to them.

So when someone clicks on the blog tab at the Bando site they should see either http://www.blog.bandopromotions.com/ or http://www.bandopromotions.com/blog

or something along those lines.

Once this has be done what happens to the existing blog posts?

They can be imported into the new blog. The old blog can be deleted from eBlogger.

If the above steps are executed the end result should be when someone clicks on the blog it feels like it’s part of the website.

Take a look at the Virtual EyeSee website as an example of this.

The second questions was

“However, for our Pure Iron Athletics line we need to know if that is the same route we should be taking. Here is the site www.pureironathletics.com We want to add a blog mainly for a source for our customers that don’t have facebook or twitter and want to share their thoughts and opinions online. This will benefit us as a brand for marketing our products better.”

This question is very tricky as based on these requirements it looks like you want to build a microsite/community around your product and a blog is just one tool in which to achieve this. However not having had a detailed conversation with Samantha about their overall business goals I can’t provide the best solution.

If I were to focus just on the Blog part then the answer would be yes, do integrate the blog into the website.

Advantages of these sites

These sites are free.

Easy to setup and require no technical knowledge.

Great way to start blogging and discover you online voice.

Perfect for a personal blog, website about events, informal organizations etc…

Disadvantages of these sites are

Offer limited selection of templates.

Templates have limited capabilities

Minimal customization.

No corporate branding.

So if you are just exploring I would say this is the best way to go. I you are a small organization then you can pay the fee and get a custom URL. However if you are an established brand or even an up and coming one then I strongly suggest that you invest in doing this correctly.

Getting a blog up on your website

A number of the free blogging services also offer you an option to upload their cms systems onto your site. I will focus on WordPress in this case.

Go to WordPress.org and download the latest version of their software. Remember it’s free.

Unzip this file.

FTP these files to the server that hosts your current website.

Activate the template that you like.

You can find free or paid templates that can be modified for your use.

Add a Blog tab to your existing site and you are almost there.

Website integration

Now comes the website integration. This is the process of taking your existing website and the WordPress site and making it look the same to the user!!!  This takes a fair bit of technical skills to achieve this.

So ask your person in your company responsible for the website to do this. If you don’t have some internally then fear not as Virtual EyeSee is a full service social media agency and we offer services to do this website integration.

This seems to be quite a bit of work and effort in getting this right so why bother when you can use the free sites out there?

Advantages of integrating your blog into your website?

The first thing is the consistency in your branding both online and of line. This means that when users come to your site what is happening in the background is irrelevant to them, it should appear as one site.

The google juice is important as well i.e. search engine optimization. So one of the factors to having a high ranking is changing content on your website. Each blog post is equivalent to a page and it’s the easiest way to achieve this.

The blog gives potential customers updates, a more personal perspective on your business, or expertise in your industry etc..

Most of all ease of navigation.

To explain where I came from I used the analogy of social media being the invitation to the house party and the house being the company website. I went further to stress that if the house either did not exist nor was structurally strong then the party would fail.

So my starting point was reinforcing the house and creating the invitations.

Details are in the following presentation.

My goal was to let the people in the room leave with information that they could use to implement these basic social media tools into their websites and social media marketing mix.

The room was fairly silent with not a lot of questions however I did notice a fair bit of note taking. I guess it’s a very different dynamic from the interactive workshops that I am used to giving.

So if you were at the presentation today and have had time to digest this do you have any further questions? If you do, then drop me a line via this post and we can take it from there. Remember there is not such thing as a stupid question. Also there are other people out there that have the same questions in mind.

It’s certainly a work in progress however it’s quite a calming feeling when you use this as most of the applications, updates, requests etc. are not there. All the bells and whistles have been stripped out. So if you like this then use it.

Here’s what it looks like so far.

Top menu bar for Lite has the Profile, Events, Inbox, Settings, Logout and Search.

Compared to the regular Facebook which has Home, Profile, Frneids, Inbox, UserName, Settings, Logoug and Search.

The top bar for Lite has Write, Post Photos, Post Video.

Compared to the regular Facebook which has Wall, Info, Photos, Boxes, Video, Yearbook, + (for additional tabs)

The Lite side bar looks like this.

There is an Ad asking you to invite 2 other friends to try it out.

There are no menu items at the bottom, and all the other side bar stuff is gone.

So why a Facebook and a Facebook Lite? Time will tell as to where they want to go with this. Till then if you find it all too confusing then use Facebook Lite.

The other challenge is the fundamental philosophy of sharing from the younger age demographic to the “privacy” issue of the older age demographic.

So when I actually thought about it I realized that “you are nobody if you can’t be Googled”!!!

Personal branding is becoming more important daily and there are many ways to achieve this given the tools that are available today.

So here’s my perspective from a LinkedIn perspective.

We had a great discussion and there were a lot of relevant and great questions that were asked. There was a common theme amongst the audience of sitting in front of a computer and applying for jobs!! I was quite taken aback by this as I thought that everyone knew about the hidden job market!!

I asked if anyone had tracked the time they spent looking for jobs online and the ROI of this and it seems that no one is measuring their success. I bet you if this were to be done it would be very apparent quickly that the ROI of this activity is not very high.

So if anyone out there looking for a job wants to try this experiment I would love to hear the results.

Traditional forms of job hunting, resume writing, job postings

vs

Branding online using LinkedIn, informational interviews through reverse company checks on LinkedIn, engaging in the community.

Is anyone up for the challenge?

What are your thoughts on this? Do you have a LinkedIn success story that you would like to share with us?

The answer to this dilemma is Social Media. So what is Social Media anyway? Social Media is a term used to reference sites like Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, LinkedIn and more.

Currently there are 12,381,640 Canadians on Facebook. Statistics Canada’s  population clock estimates that the total population of Canada is 33,760,010.

That’s a significant amount of Canadians on this one social network. This does not take into account the number of people spending their time on social media sites like YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, Blogs etc…

Based on all the statistics it’s very apparent that social media is here to stay and is not just a fad. So as a business how do you advertise or market yourself in these sites? It’s through social media marketing.

Then what is social media marketing?

Marketing is about building relationships and social media tools help you achieve this in an online world. Social media marketing is about using sites like Facebook, YouTube et. to create awareness and credibility about a brand. This is indirectly translated to growing revenues for your business.

These sites are free however it’s very important to

• tie your business goals into your participation in these spaces
• not spam your audience
• use these sites the the way they were inende, entertainment
• start a dialogue with your customers (build relationships)
• incorporate this  into your business processes

Participation online takes time, effort and consistency.  If you are spending time online building your business then take time to track your efforts and tie this into your website analytics.

So before you participate in social media start paying attention to who is visiting your website and where they are coming from. This will give you a baseline to start from. Then track the difference between the traffic to your website before and after your participation in social media.Tweak this as you go.

Cutting Edge focus on Social Media for Business

“Social Media – its here, now, and ubiquitous – but how can you use it effectively in the business context.

Learn about the  role of social media in driving market conversations to understand the voice of the customer, and how a Social Media Press Release differentiates from a traditional Press Release. When it comes to implementation, you will also learn how to build your own enterprise social network using new social networking open source web applications.”

I will be speaking at The Ottawa Network this evening about Social Media Press Releases. Here are further details on this event.

Wednesday, May 27, 6:00 to 8:00 pm
Algonquin College, Woodroffe Campus just south of Baseline,
Building T, Room T130

See you there.

I talked about the Facebook Ads recently but what I am talking about today is something totally different. It’s the world of advertising colliding with geeks to create something really interesting and fun.

What I am referring to are the fun games, quizzes, gifts that people can send for free in Facebook. We are at the tail end of Cold season so Puffs have this campaign to send Get Well Gifts.

Click Here takes me to the standard Allow button. Read the terms but it seems like they are pretty standard as per the Facebook Terms and conditions. In order for most applications to work they have to access your information i.e who your friends are etc.

We are taken into the Send Puffs Get Well Gifts.

Like all standard gift applications it lists all my friends with a check box next to each photo. Choice of gift and finally Submit.

The Tabs explained

• Send Gifts – gifts to send
• Sent Gifts – gifts you have sent previously
• Received Gifts – gifts you have received
• Community – the Puffs Gift community
• Invite your Friends – standard invite friends
• More -  takes me to the Puffs Facebook Public Profile. Wow they have a custom URL. I understand that this option is available for a few select brands.

As you can see this is a FREE, fun application that people choose to partake in. The end result is that the Brand Puffs is being advertised in a fun way that is not intrusive to people.

So if you are an ad agency or a company looking of unique ways to reach your customers try a Facebook Application.

It looks pretty easy to set one up. I guess I need to advertise something, hmm, how about the seminar I am giving next week.

How To

I have an option to create an Ad to promote the Virtual EyeSee Facebook page or a regular ad.

I am going to choose a regular ad. If you don’t have a Facebook Page then the other option is via your Profile page.  The Facebook Ads are on the right hand column next to the status box.

The Ads are for connecting with Real People with the potential of reaching over 170Million active Facebook users.

They offer some good tips on how to craft that Ads.

Getting Started

It’s time to get started. First problem, Ad Title. 25 characters long!!! Hmm what should I say. How about Great Deal on Seminar oh wait here’s a better one. March Break Seminar Speci… I have run out of characters.  I have setteled on Amazing deal on Seminar

Now I have progressed to the next box. Ad body 134 characters long. Oh no it’s a whole 6 characters shorter than Twitter!!!

New Media Fundamentals for Business results in ….

Let’s explore the Capitalization guidelines, oh no, having flashbacks to Grade 6 grammar class. Moving on.

Back to 134 characters….. oh Twitter I do miss you …

Learn how to increase your revenue by using New Media effectively , 71 char left…  got to do better than this..

Wow only 1 char left!!!!

Tough economic times. No advertising budget. Then this seminar is for you. Learn how to use New Media effectively to increase profits.

Now it’s that time to upload an image, does anyone have an image of Jennifer Aniston?

Social Actions

Add Social Actions, what’s this?

Social Actions are stories about a user’s friends that are related to and displayed alongside the ad. You can select which pages or applications provide relevant social actions that can be paired with the ad.

Ok I don’t know about you this does not mean a thing to me.  If I do check the box I get the option to click on the Virtual EyeSee Page. Since I already sent this to the Fans on this page I wills skip for now.

This Ad can appear wither within a user’s News Feed as sponsored content on the the ad space along the side. There’s a great FAQ so check it out.

Targeting

I have chosen M & F between 35-65. I have the possibility to reach 111,100 people.  If I check all the boxes for Relationship and Interested In this reach drops to 25,000.  Not great.

Maybe restrict the language to English.  If UK then 1,600.  How about U.S. Much better 106,980.

I have skipped thelanguages,  Keywords and Workplaces.

Campaigns and Pricing

Campaign name in important especially if you have a number of Ads running at the same time.

Daily budget extremely important. What about $5, what does that get me?

Schedule – continuously

I will pick pay per click (CPC).

The next is the max bid per click? The options are 0.27-0.38.  I will pick the cheapest for sure.

I’M ALMOST THERE…

Reviewing Ad.

Everything is good. Now to give out the credit card info. Yup, it’s a secure connection.  Place order. Voila, I’m done.

Here’s my work of art

It’s awaiting approval.  Ottawa folks 35 and above look out for this ad. Let me know if you see it.

To escape it all, you login to facebook to catchup with friends.  Well that too has been a real challenge due to identity theft scams.  Then came the wife learns of  divorce via facebook status.

So here’s something fun for you and your friends for Valentine’s.

<3 – with a space after will give you…. go try this out

there’s more some fun applications for everyone, single, relationship or jut plain old friendship

• what color is your heart?
• what kind of smile do you have?
• wine anyone
• introduce Me
• Are you Interested?
• speed date
• private photo gallery
• sparkey
• meet new people
• Flower gifts

For the more adventurous here”s one and another ……

Go ahead and try these out whatever your status.  Have a Happy Valentine’s.