22Mar 2015 by Bob Cargill

20 Types of Selfies to Ask Your Audience to Share

Marketing, Social Media
It was the word of the year in 2013, and last year it reached the tipping point. Yup. The selfie is more than just a thing now, it’s kind of a big deal. No, really, the selfie is more than just a fad, a superficial exercise in narcissism. The selfie has gone from a silly little trend to a mainstream phenomenon, something almost everyone has embraced, from astronauts to athletes, Ellen DeGeneres to Tom Hanks, the president of the United States to the Pope. Sure, the selfie is still mocked and subjected to ridicule by laggards and luddites, critics and curmudgeons. But most people get it. Most people see the selfie for what it is, a fun way to capture the moment up close and personal, and share it with…
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01Mar 2015 by Bob Cargill

5 Ways to Use Social Media to Make a Huge Impact in Real Life

Marketing, Social Media
As ubiquitous as social media in this day and age, more people are turning an apathetic ear to what brands have to say rather than hanging on their every word on these channels. That shouldn’t come as a shock to you, though. After all, like direct mail, email, print and broadcast, social media channels are far from immune to audience fatigue. Regardless of the medium, customers and prospects grow tired of a barrage of the same old marketing messages. They become skeptical, jaded and impatient over time. They turn off and tune out. Fortunately, there’s no shortage of ways to reinvent the wheel and take your social media program to the next level. Contests. Paid advertising. Bigger staffs. Better strategies. Those are just a few quick ideas. But what about…
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02Feb 2015 by Bob Cargill

Six Brands That Are Killing It on Instagram

Advertising, Branding, Instagram, Marketing, Social Media
Having recently turned four years old, Instagram’s user base of just north of 200 million may pale in comparison to Facebook’s 1.35 billion, but the engagement rate for brands on this visually oriented app is hard to beat in the social media ecosystem. In fact, pretty much anyone who uses Instagram knows just how superior the ratio of likes and comments to followers on it is compared to other comparable online communities. Instagram makes it easy for businesses and consumers alike to share high-quality photos and videos with one another whenever, wherever. What’s not to like? Maybe that’s why such a tech behemoth as Microsoft didn’t just dip a toe into the Instagram waters, but jumped in with both feet last month, announcing they’ve hired a photojournalist who “will travel…
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06Dec 2014 by Bob Cargill

How to Plan a Social Media Strategy in 12 Steps

Marketing, Social Media
Unless you’re a popular celebrity or a big, iconic brand, a lot has got to come together in order for you to succeed on social media. Not only do you need to have an engaged, loyal audience and something valuable to offer them, you need to be able to maintain a strong social presence by sharing timely, relevant content on a non-stop basis. There’s no rest for the weary on Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest and other such online communication channels. If you make the development of a solid strategy a top priority, however, everything else should fall into place. A comprehensive strategic plan articulates the action you’re going to take during the course of your campaign. It explains the who, what, where, when, how and why of what you’re going to…
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05Oct 2014 by Bob Cargill

10 Reasons Why You Should Use Vine to Build Your Brand

Advertising, Branding, Marketing, Social Media
If your bandwidth is limited, the best social networks on which to set up shop and share are probably going to be sites such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Pinterest, four of the most popular players in the field today. But if time is not an issue and you really want to make a splash in the social media waters, you should try making videos with the mobile app, Vine. Sure, with more than one billion unique users visiting the site each month, your potential audience on YouTube is going to be gargantuan. And with over 150 million monthly active users on Instagram, you’d be hard pressed not to experiment there as well, even if your videos can only be up to 15 seconds in length. If you want to…
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06Sep 2014 by Bob Cargill

10 Ways to Build a Social Media Audience

Branding, Business, Marketing, Social Media
In direct marketing, it's long been said that a bad offer to a good list will perform better than a good offer to a bad list. The point being that without a decent audience, you may as well forget about it. You may have a great product or service, but unless you have a long list of people who are at least prospective customers, even the best marketing efforts in the world probably won't be able to sell it. That's how it is in social media, too. You can spend a ton of time and money in creating content that absolutely rocks, but if you aren't reaching enough people, your efforts will be in vain and you won't have a chance of going viral. You'll be like the proverbial tree…
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09Aug 2014 by Bob Cargill

10 Types of Visuals to Boost Your Social Media Engagement

Facebook, Marketing, Social Media, Twitter, YouTube
As a writer by trade, it's not easy for me to utter these words, but I'm not going to lie: On social media, a picture is worth a thousand words. It's true. Content may be king, but visuals rule. All the latest studies and statistics suggest that images on social media command more attention than text alone. If you want more likes, comments, shares, retweets, and clicks, you want to include pictures with your social media posts. You want to be more visual. As Carla Gates says here on her 3 to 5 Marketing Blog... "Images used in your social media (and by definition, your blog content) are far more attention-grabbing than text or plain old links, more likely to be shared, evoke emotional reactions in viewers (and emotion SELLS),…
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20Jul 2014 by Bob Cargill

10 Ways Your Brand Can Stand Out on Twitter

Advertising, Branding, Marketing, Social Media, Twitter
With over 241 million active users on Twitter, more and more brands are realizing that establishing a presence there is no longer an option. It’s a must. The good news is that it’s relatively easy to get up and running on this social media channel. Building a substantial audience that hangs on everything you’re saying in 140 characters or less? Not so much. Success on Twitter takes time as well as a deep knowledge of the best practices that only comes with experience through trial and error. Keeping an eye on what others are doing on the channel is an excellent way to learn the latest strategies and tactics as well. To monitor how brands are using Twitter to capture the attention of their constituents, I’ve compiled a list of…
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22Jan 2014 by Bob Cargill

Using Signage to Drive Social Media Traffic

Advertising, Branding, Business, Marketing, Social Media
In this day and age, most businesses and brands realize the importance of having a presence on social media. However, far too many still don’t know how to attract an audience to these channels. They either mistakenly subscribe to the notion that if they build it, they will come, or they simply have no idea how to drive such traffic. The good news is there are countless ways to generate more likes, followers, fans and friends. You can cross-promote your Twitter account on Facebook and vice versa. You can put your social media credentials on your customers’ receipts. You can promote your social channels on your own website, on your business cards, in your email signature, in a company newsletter and even in paid advertising campaigns. But perhaps the easiest…
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