Blog - Page 2 of 13 - Peter Lang: Helping You Grow Through Marketing Mastery

21Mar 2013 by Peter Lang No Comments

5 Common Website Mistakes We Avoided with the NEW Uhuru Network

Most likely you're not trying to drive away your customers with your website. You love your website and I'm sure it represents your business well, except when it doesn't. From a visitors perspective, your website might be offering an entirely different message than you intended it to. Take a look at your website and see if your website is making any of these 5 common website mistakes. We certainly avoided these when building the new UhuruNetwork.com. 1. The “Cool” Factor As a business you want to stand out above the rest so you design your logo and site with attention grabbing flair. The assumption is made that the cool design will stick in people's minds and make you memorable. But far too often this level of presentation forgoes clarity and…

26Feb 2013 by Peter Lang No Comments

7 things all top bloggers do

Blogging

The world of a top blogger is a small and independent world. You have to make decisions for yourself: figure out how to create content you're passionate about, how to write, how to act, speak, present yourself, take initiative, bundle your creative efforts, and build and engage a community. Great bloggers are like great athletes - simply do the basics very well. The 7 must dos for all bloggers Brainstorming - Spending time professionally planning and creating original content. Qualification - Spend your time talking to the wrong people... it doesn't matter how wonderful you present your blog it will not be a great blog. Presentation - Your blog design, media and content needs to be at the highest level your reader expect. Handling Objections - When left with comments…

21Jan 2013 by Peter Lang No Comments

Tricky issue – Firing customers…

Business

We've all had "them"... customers with expectations so out of whack from the start they make you say "huh?" We've felt the bad vibe from just the first meeting. It's important as a business and especially in sales to know which customers to avoid, ignore or fire. The reason: bad customers suck up all of your time and resources. They never pay you for anything and they always want just one more thing. Today, I wanted to explore the toxic customer, by sharing some red flags I’ve identified and discuss how to handle some of these tricky situations. You may ask, why am I talking about firing customers? With social media's powerful word of mouth a toxic customer, if not handled appropriately, can cause major damage to your brand and…

15Jan 2013 by Peter Lang 2 Comments

Facebook Launches Search – Attacking Google and LinkedIn

Facebook, Marketing, Social Media

Over the years Facebook has been inching closer to enabling you, the user, to categorize each of your friends based on their role in your life or commonalities. Of course this has been the basis of Facebook’s advertising model but with the launch of Facebook Search I believe Facebook has found a more successful product that will utilize its Graph data. Facebook has made its impression on the world through: News feed - The curation of the people you're connected with. Timeline - The curation of everything about you. Graph Search - Look up anything shared with you on Facebook through your friends and connections and allow others to find stuff you’ve shared with them. The New Graph Search Starting with beta searching: People, Photos, Places, Pages for Businesses Sample…

09Jan 2013 by Peter Lang No Comments

The lure of social media

Blogging, Facebook

Everyday we are approached by businesses about using social media marketing / digital marketing to promote their business online. They're lured in by social media's access to people as if it were a shallow pond full of fish. The dialog starts - We want to use Facebook to drive people to our business. We have a website and a Facebook. Let's dive into this request in greater detail. Conversion The promotion this business is requesting is based upon conversion. Taking a social media user and converting them into a customer. Sadly, businesses don't understand that the correlation between a Facebook post and direct in-person transaction is rather low, nearly zero. To convert anyone online at a return worth the investment requires interaction of the personal and human kind. Business conversions…

19Nov 2012 by Peter Lang 3 Comments

MARKETING 101: START BLOGGING

Business, Marketing

I often share ideas and tools to help you market yourself or your business. Today, this post is going to dive into why blogging is marketing 101. Starting a blog should be an obvious step in your marketing mix, you may hear this frequently nowadays but let's dive into the "why". Blogs Are the most effective way to create searchable, shareable content to bring attention to your topic. The simplest tool for the value it provides. Allow you to showcase your work in a compelling way. A marketing tool that gives you, the individual, the ability to show people who you are. A way to connect online with those you've worked with in the past, present, and may work with in the future. Are the hub of your various social media profiles. Will…

15Oct 2012 by Peter Lang No Comments

Social Media for Small Businesses: 12 Things You Must Do

Blogging, Business, Social Media

This post is directed to small business owners who've heard their business needs to have a social media presence and want to get started today. After reading this post you will certainly be able to take the actions that will greatly help your company. But, take these 12 actions with this warning: WARNING: Social Media/ Digital Media is very powerful. It can both help and hurt your value proposition. Though I believe these are necessary in today's business environment many of you may need additional help to complete these actions at a level that adds value and represents your brand positively. Here are 12 things your small business must do. Your business must… Have a website. Lets start with the overwhelmingly obvious. If you own a small business and don't have a website you're committing business suicide. This doesn't mean you should throw…

07Oct 2012 by Peter Lang No Comments

Top 10 Instagram Hashtags

Photography, Social Media

Previously, I wrote How to Use Hashtags: A Simple Guide and Top 20 Instagram Hashtags and many readers told me that both were very useful. But since these posts, there have been changes in the top used hashtags so I decided to provide an updated list. Here are the top 10 hashtags as of October 7th 2012. 1) #love // 61,405,876 photos Instagram’s top hashtag, love, has remained at the top all year. Images consist of anything IGers love (animals, celebrities, or even their own faces). 2) #instagood // 46,512,887 photos Boost your like and comment numbers by using this popular hashtag. 3) #me // 35,769,075 photos Most Instagram users have their camera phones with them all the time. So it makes sense that they would take pictures of themselves…

24Sep 2012 by Peter Lang No Comments

Write an “Ultimate Guide” to Something

Blogging, Business, Marketing

Today, I'd like to talk about a very powerful piece of content. The "Ultimate Guide" is a lengthy yet effective tool if you're interested in driving search engine traffic to your site. This content is not only informative but is also a blog post formula that is proven to work. "Ultimate Guide" Here are a few reasons why “Ultimate Guides” work: 1. They get links, comments, traffic, and shares: Ultimate guides are useful, valuable content that people appreciate. Commonly, whether your blog is large or small, ultimate guide to something will be popular. An “Ultimate Guide” I wrote about Facebook Timeline was a very popular post on our Tricks Facebook blog; with over 10,000 views and 163+ likes. 2. They teach from A to Z: An “Ultimate Guide” is usually…

14Sep 2012 by Peter Lang No Comments

Weekend blog posts: Good or bad idea?

Blogging, Social Media

If you explore my rss reader you'd discover: A) that I'm an avid blog reader and B) that most blog post activity is exclusively from Monday to Friday. Few articles are posted on weekends which obviously leaves the reading options a bit on the low side. Being a blogger myself, I found that posting on weekends, when the content saturation is low, had a positive effect on the impact of those weekend posts. It's important as a content creator to keep in mind that your audience is online at different times with different expectations. Different audience on weekends Much like web traffic in the corporate world, everyone thinks "business" Monday - Wednesday and there is drop off as people begin thinking about the weekend. It's these business-oriented readers who are…