There is a continuous big shift in the web and it has mainly to do with the velocity of technology and its interactivity with the sources of content and the way it is distributed through the social graph. Looking between the difference and evolution between traditional media channels and the digital channels: Web, Mobile, Tablet-Touch, apps; the main changing and chain reaction happens at the level of content and its interactivity and velocity of technology answering to the social graph of internet in a multiple array of platform that mixes both search and social technologies with real time, local and mobile.
Technology has evolved organically and it is now a changing vehicle that somehow strengths the power of the content, the way it is update and its interaction with audiences, users, clients. The necessary attention to have now is to understand what and how to push people, audiences, and products to where you want or would like to position it.
How to reach, engage and go forward?
How to reach, engage and go forward with a strategy in a world where anyone and everyone can publish content in text, images, audio and video and also interact with brand and its products and have a say on it is the main question. The logic answer here is that the most strategic action you can make is to now be in the right place where your consumers are. This does not kills the traditional efforts and media vehicles simple fragments and makes you need to work in a coherent messaging, storytelling for your brand and products.
It is on this that content is still king. Though a king that is inside a technological matrix in a fractal landscape. An environment of crowdsourcing where social media networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter are the new players in the web and also in the interactive multiplatform’s world: apps, tablets, Smartphones and so forth.
More than being the trend or the fashion, these new players have become big and wealthy platforms that have different layers. Somehow they are the new web, interactivity.
Image via Wikipedia
Facebook the new internet king?!
Facebook with its multiple functionalities is no longer just a social network, but an entire micro web. Well not so micro anymore. Facebook is bigger as a website than actually Google, numbers from end of 2010. With almost one third of the web: 600 million users (and still growing) and now indexing the other part of the web with Facebook Connect and open graph that comprehends already more than 300k websites you cannot ignore it anymore.
Facebook with its powerful platform is surpassing Google in a lot of areas. How? When you post links of a given website on a Facebook profile wall, group or page, in discussion and on other people’s walls you are creating links that are having a powerful effect and drive traffic and create an open graph that will create a way of passing the message. Also when searching for Groups or pages that are associated with your product, keywords, interests you are relating with it. Joining these groups, pages or apps and starting to respond to discussions is a way of engaging and linking back a website, a brand a product a campaign. Make sure to leave a link to your site at the end of each response. You can also use the multiple possibilities of Facebook ads to buy likes, links and target them by region, gender, keywords, industry and more. Although it does not work as Google the effect is now holistic and it is the sum of all not just the given link or click that will give you the value. On another hand there is the commercial potential of social ecommerce. Have a look: Commerce Gets Social: How Your Networks Are Driving What You Buy http://socialcommercetoday.com/speed-summary-wired-feb-2011-cover-story-on-social-commerce/
Twitter: the real time search web and the most powerful influential Swiss knife!
On the other hand Twitter has become the real time search web and a powerful influential tool capable of creating quick brand awareness, drive buzz and engage with the right audiences if well used.
The Most Influential People in Twitter http://twitalyzer.com/list.asp?u=&f=&t=&l=
Users, industries and markets are using Twitter as the tool to research and drive traffic and engage with their peers. Twitter is as well a powerful way of learning about tendencies in any industry including the financial and investment sector. Just have a look at the quantity of influencers in this are in Twitter: http://listorious.com/tags/finance
Also about Twitter the interesting is that its value is becoming crucial when driving quality traffic towards specific audiences. If you use this platform properly! You do it targeting the right Twitter users and making sure to use keywords, hashtags in every tweet and include a relevant, short link back to the relevant landing page on your Website. Tweets are now being indexed both by Bing and Google and this will help a website link building efforts and drive more traffic to your website.
LinkedIn: A powerful network of professionals with a niche and top level professional audience. Using it as a platform to expose a brand and products to a given audience. Not only can you post links to your “wall” but also participate in LinkedIn Answers using keywords. By answering multiple questions posted by other members each week, you’ll establish credibility and attract links and sales leads. You can also leave the link to your Website as a reference which will help with your link building efforts. When you’re done answering a question you can also ask the person who asked it for a link back to your site.
What is going on finally?
The rise of apps is beginning to take people away from actual Websites. In order to combat this, it’s important to go back to the old basics of media and communication tradition of having a strong message, content and brand. Then it is all about engaging or developing a loyal base of customers following the message and interacting with it.
You do that using the old tools and even Google that is somehow caught in the middle of the new social and real time revolution and is a victim of his own success. So you should try to gain opt-in different online marketing areas such email addresses, PPC (that is still very important in some given industries and the cash cow of Google) and split your Internet marketing campaign into various parts. One to focus on the content, message and its strategy of distribution and engagement and its link building and one other to focus on driving traffic / attention to your brand / site, so old media, email marketing, branding offline events and actions and the new fast social media tools. Building a strong branding and product base will leave you with a back-up plan if apps or social media do end up totally driving people away from Websites, because you’ll be able to get expositions and link communicate your content to your audience fans/followers.
Social media is out there. And the old media is still out there as well, please always remind that. TV has not died simple evolved and got hybrid. A lot of things did not change so much! What is different is that the velocity and power of the new technologies attached to players such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn. What is going on is how they are shifting the overall perception and are creating faster ways to have awareness and feedback. Moreover they are also critical for traffic building and SEO / link building. Whether they provide business directly is no longer a question. The question is how to manage it and measure it.
See the stats bellow from eMarketeer:
A lot of big players and brands Ford and DELL, amongst other, are having excellent direct ROI and ROA results with both Facebook and Twitter, others with LinkedIn. These platforms will be an indirect and direct strategic way of doing business results. They are able to power a given brand or product to a specific audience and work on the behalf of its engagement. That can be done through in-numerous campaigns and forms: promotions, segmentation of needs, markets towards products and audiences and augmenting the conversions and awareness.
Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook are there as the present critical instruments and powerful ways of managing and distributing content and having a strong brand presence. They are actually more and more the key to understand and make sure the brand message and the products awareness is out there.
In the end it is about good strategy and management of content and its “massage”
In the end everything still depends a lot about the way media, companies and organisations use their strategies do not forget attached to a strong CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) and its content to create business. At the end of the day it is about good strategy and management of content and its “massage”. And their success or failure has a lot to do with the way the strategy, the message and its respective content is managed to reach an audience and its key users through the use of its particular channels.
Related articles
- Twitter Is the Web Real Time Search (dinisguarda.com)
- The Rise of LinkedIn as Login of Choice [Infographic] (readwriteweb.com)
