Share This!

By Kim Deppe
With all of the changes to search engine optimization that have taken place in 2013, it is still abundantly clear that good content is the MVP of SEO. Good content drives more clicks to your website or blog by interested readers, which boosts your SEO. But just writing great content is not enough - you have to share it and encourage others to spread it around the internet. It is true that very few posts or videos really go viral in a big way, but that doesn't mean that you can't take a few steps to increase the number of people who see your website or blog.

First, make sure that you are adding social sharing buttons to your website or posts. Ideally, those should be located in or near the actual article. Make it easy for your readers to share the article with their friends or followers by adding icons or links to Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, etc. Don't confuse these with the social media icons that you have on your site to direct readers to your own Facebook or Twitter pages. It is best to move these down to the footer or along the side of the page to distinguish them from social sharing buttons.

Next, promote your posts on your own social media pages. Grab the URL to your new article, copy it, then paste it into your Twitter feed, LinkedIn post or Facebook page. Add a few words that describe what your readers will learn in the article. And, it never hurts to ask your followers to share the post.

Finally, make an effort to read and share the posts of others either in your field or among your friends and followers. Engaging with others is a great way to encourage them to do the same. Reciprocal sharing is common when the content is good and the source is trusted.

Taking these steps will increase the number of people exposed to your blog or website, which in turn can improve your SEO due to increased clicks to the article. Now, please share this post!

About Kim Deppe

Kim Deppe is President of Deppe Communications, an outsource marketing firm located in the Jacksonville, FL area. Deppe Communications provides marketing consulting, search engine optimization, search engine marketing, public relations and advertising services to small and medium size businesses across the U.S. For more information, visit www.DeppeCommunications.com, call 904.524.0170 or E-mail Kim@DeppeCommunications.com.

"It Really Works!"

A couple of weeks ago, I gave a presentation about social media marketing to a business networking group I belong to. I used my white paper "Social Rules of Engagement for Businesses" as the basis of my presentation. A few days later, one of the people in the group came up to me to tell me she had tried out the suggestions I gave and that it was working. She was getting people to engage with the business through Facebook and more people were liking their page. I could see she was going to be doing more social media marketing and it made me feel great that I had been able to help that business grow even with just a few tips. Social media marketing does work, but of course it takes some work and it doesn't work for every business. It requires consistency and the commitment to being authentic and genuine. It also requires that you ignore the temptation to use it to sell things or services because you will lose the interest of your audience very quickly that way. It means you have to set aside time to do it regularly and make it a priority, not an "if I can get to it" task. More and more, customers are finding the front door to you business on their monitors. It may be your website they see first, but it also may be your LinkedIn or Facebook page, or even a video on You Tube. Take as much care with what you have out there online as you would with your storefront. And if you are not good at writing, then find someone who is because misspellings and bad grammar will hurt your business. It works, it really works. And if you would like a free copy of the "Social Rules of Engagement for Business" just email me at Kim@DeppeCommunications.com and I will get it right out to you.

Social Media for Small Business

Think you've done social media because you have a Facebook and Twitter site? Even if you happen to be posting as much as you can and effectively, there are still quite a few social media sites out there that you should consider for promoting your business. Here are a few I suggest:

Merchant Circle - this is a great site for interacting with other local businesses. While I believe they may be light on the interactivity, I do think there are very good prospects here for businesses. It is certainly good for most small businesses who offer services to other small businesses. If little else, it proliferates your brand by getting your company's name on the web in the business community. Consider it an internet based Chamber networking event. <a href=\"http://www.merchantcircle.com/\" title=\"http://www.merchantcircle.com\">www.merchantcircle.com</a>

Manta - this is one of several listing sites out there, but it is still free. They furnish free company profiles and having a listing will certainly help with your backlinks and influence the page rankings of your website. Again, I think it is a growing B2B social site that offers plenty of opportunity. It is more sophisticated than Merchant Circle. <a href=\"http://www.manta.com/\" title=\"http://www.manta.com\">www.manta.com</a>

Yelp - Yelp started out as a way for individuals to give eachother experiences about local businesses, both negative and positive. It has evolved into a robust rating system for all sorts of businesses, with a lot of valuable suggestions for restaurants, shopping, and other verticals. For those who don't \"own\" your Yelp listing, you should go online very soon and make sure you capture that. First, it will prevent anyone else (like a competitor) from taking control of your business on Yelp. Secondly, it should assure you maintain a listening ear to whatever individuals are saying about you on the site, providing you with the opportunity to respond right away.<a href=\"http://www.yelp.com/\" title=\"http://www.yelp.com\">www.yelp.com</a>

 YP - once upon a time we use to have these big books with telephone listings and business ads in them and that was how we found merchants. The yellow pages have moved online and now provide listings and ads coupled with news and information about events and activities. They have mobile apps and \"deal of the day\" to encourage engagement.<a href=\"http://www.yellowpages.com/\" title=\"http://www.yellowpages.com\">www.yellowpages.com</a>

 This is a brief overview and there are many more social sites for B2B marketing. If you d like to know more about getting your business more visibility online, just Email<a href=\"mailto:Kim@DeppeCommunications.com\" title=\"mailto:Kim@DeppeCommunications.com\">Kim@DeppeCommunications.com</a>.

New Book!

I've just published a brief guide for businesses on how to use social media called Social Media Rules of Engagement for Businesses. Check it out on Lulu!

No ROI in Social Media?

"Marketing, including social media marketing, is about efficiency. Marketing is a process of decreasing the time, money, and resources required to communicate with customers and make it easy for them to buy products and services.

The more efficient your marketing is, the more profit you make. That’s what you want to optimize for."

Thanks to Jim Kukral, I was able to appreciate this very interesting post (http://linkd.in/vbWRqb) entitled "There is No ROI in Social Media Marketing." Interesting point of view and one, I thought, that made a lot of sense. Like many experienced marketers, I've been in the situation where the organization I was working for constantly bounced from idea to idea looking for the shiny stuff. Chasing an elusive ROI with efforts that are easily distracted by the next new thing is probably the norm rather than the exception.

I like Sean Jackson's point that marketing is about profit, and efficiency, and not really about ROI. After all, I can generate lots of income with advertising but if it's the wrong kind of income, then I haven't done my client any good at all. What's the wrong kind of income? Loss leaders, for one. If I am selling lots of widgets at less than cost then there's no profit margin. That's an unsustainable model.

The other point I liked was this concept of "digital sharecropping;" that is, trying to do business using social media platforms rather than using them for what they were intended for - developing relationships. Do take a few minutes to read the blog, it is entertaining and informative. And then I'd like to hear your comments.

Have you heard about Facebook Edge Rank?

First there was the Google Page Rank, which indexed your website based on a series of factors that essentially determine how important your site is compared to others. On the 1 to 10 scale, Google ranks a 9 or a 10 (depending on who you talk to). Amazon is right up there, as is Facebook. A few weeks ago, folks started to talk about your Klout rating. This is a number that determines how influential YOU are among the people you interact with. Now, I'm reading about Facebook's Edge Rank, an index that determines which of your "friends'" posts you see and which of them see your posts. (Here's a great article that gives a good explanation: http://econsultancy.com/us/blog/7885-edgerank-the-most-important-algorithm-you-ve-never-heard-of)

So, as marketers we are challenged with an ever-changing series of factors that determine how we place our advertising, what content we should develop and how and where to place it. My dashboard is getting busier and bigger as I try to keep ahead of the latest way to measure me, my business, and my influence in the digital world.