Thursday, March 24, 2011

“New Twitter vs. Old Twitter – “Who to Follow” Feature”

Twitter logo initial

Image via Wikipedia

The absolute best thing about Twitter is the connections you make with other people. The new version of Twitter has a new menu item called “Who To Follow”.

 

Old Twitter

Old Twitter included the following options under “Find Friends”.

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New Twitter

The new version of Twitter now calls this “Who To Follow” and it does not include the option to “Find on Twitter” or “Invite By Email”.

In the new version, click on Who to Follow.

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You are given three options: View Suggestions, Browse Interests, and Find Friends.

Let’s look at “View Suggestions” first. Click on the link that says “interesting accounts” to see some suggestions from Twitter.

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The next “Who To Follow” option is “Browse Interests”. As you can see in the screenshot below, there are categories to choose from and Twitter will also suggest certain twitter accounts.

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The final option under “Who To Follow” is “Find Friends”. This option allows you to connect to various email accounts you own as well as LinkedIn. When you click on one of the choices, you will be presented with a screen to enter your login information. For example, if you choose Gmail, you’ll need to enter your Gmail login to access that account. Only those people who have agreed to be found by email address will be shown.

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Monday, March 14, 2011

“How to Use Video for Business Promotion”

Everyone loves watching videos online. If you need proof of that just look at the success of YouTube. Here are a few stats “2 billion videos viewed per day, 24 hours of video uploaded every minute and the average person spends 15 minutes per day on YouTube.” Fore more see you_tube http://www.viralblog.com/research/youtube-statistics/ Now put that in your pipe and smoke it.  Beginning to see some marketing potential here?

If you have a business and a website, then you've likely considered video marketing. If you haven’t, you really should. Once you're convinced of the power of video the next step is to decide how to use them to promote yourself. There are a number of ways to implement video marketing into your marketing plan.

Try studying videos done by others in a similar niches to get those creative juices flowing and spark some ideas.

Here are just a few ideas:

1.Testimonials – Ask your customers or clients to give you quick 1-minute videos of their feedback. You can also interview them about your business for a more structured testimonial.

2.Product Demos – One of the biggest drawbacks to buying online is that you can't actually test the product. Bypass that objection and demonstrate your product on video to help increase sales.

3.Case Studies – If you're involved in some kind of before-and-after (website design, fitness, SEO, etc.) case studies are an excellent way to demonstrate your expertise. Seeing an example helps the potential customer understand exactly what impact your service or product can have on their business.

4.Product Reviews – Video brings an added element to product reviews, particularly if you're reviewing a physical product. But hearing you talk about a book or piece of software is effective too.

5.Education – Use video to educate your market on the use of your products. Lead them towards the sale by answering their most frequently asked questions and objections.

6.Entertainment – People love to be entertained! If you can entertain in your video and combine that with a call to action, you'll have a winning combination. If it’s funny people will be more likely to pass it on to their friends.

7.Webinars – If you provide webinars or other video presentations to your market, capture them via video and offer a replay to generate leads or even sell as a product.

8.Commercial – Done correctly (meaning compelling with a clear call to action), commercials for your product or service can be very effective.

9.Business Overview – One of the first things many people look for is who they are buying from and what they stand for. Let your potential customers learn about you and your business through a business overview.

As you can see from the list above, there are many ways to use video to promote your business. Just creating video is not the only step to effective marketing. You must craft a video that responds to the wants and needs of your market. What’s in it for them? They are looking for solutions to problems and questions. It's your job to figure out how to use a video to solve issues, answer questions, provide the right solutions and lead them to the next step.

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