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This is a guest post by Kristi Hines, social media and blogging enthusiast, on the benefits of business blogging, best practices when starting out a business blog, and ways to find topic ideas for your industry with some examples.

When I first began blogging almost ten years ago, blogs were used almost soley for personal diaries and online journals meant to be shared with only friends and family, or kept private. Within the first two years, however, blogging as a source of income started to rear its head with affiliate programs being pitched to the most known personal blogs. Fast foward to today, and blogs are not only used for individual gain but also for businesses.

Benefits of Blogging for Business

Business and corporate blogs can be valuable assets to a company’s website. They can help a business:

• Build their brand identity and positively manage their online reputation by putting positive content linked to their name out on the web.
• Help them go beyond simply offering products or services to gaining credibility by becoming experts in their industry.
• Allow them to build a stronger relationship and community with their customers, potential clients, and even others in their industry through blog comments and social sharing of new information.
• Give their site fresh new content, inviting visitors and search engines to return to their site again and again, boosting overall traffic.
• Get them ranked for long tail keyword search terms and phrases.

These are the main benefits of business blogging. Now, let’s look at how to make a business blog successful.

Questions to Ask When Getting Started

Probably the most important benefit is, if a business blog is done right, blog posts can lead to conversions and sales. What are the main things to keep in mind when starting or maintaining a business blog?

Who is Your Audience?

B2B businesses will want to write posts targeted towards businesses who are in need of their products and services, whereas B2C businesses will want to write posts geared toward their targeted customer demographic.

When corporate bloggers are coming up with post ideas, it is essential to put themselves in their targeted reader’s shoes and ask themselves:

• What would I want to learn about this business and industry?
• What hook would make me want to subscribe?
• What topic would make me want to comment?
• What kind of post wold make me want to inquire about products or services from this company?

Asking yourself these questions will help you determine just the kind of writing that you need to do to get a good response from your future blog community.

What Do My Competitors Do?

Business bloggers should do a bit of homework to see which of their competitors also have a corporate blog, and look at how well it goes over with their audience.

• Do they get a lot of comments?
• Do the posts do well in search?
• Do the posts get a lot of social shares? A quick way to check is by installing the Topsy bookmarklet or Delicious Bookmark history bookmarklet (all the way at the bottom of the page) to your browser and seeing how many tweets and bookmarks the posts’ acquire.
• What elements of the posts and blog do I like? What elements do I dislike?

This kind of “competitor research” will help you more easily determine what results you want to get from your blog as well as what will help you get your results.

Blogging Best Practices

Whether you are blogging for personal or business purposes, there are some basic best blogging practices that you should always keep in mind.

• Make each post easy to share and more socialble by using social sharing buttons and comment plugins to encourage more interaction.
• Write like you are talking to your audience – business blogging should be professional, but is also less formal than press releases and article marketing.
• Don’t think of your blog (or social networking) as just an advertising platform. Blog readers like information, how-to’s, and, once you have built their trust, occasional recommedations. If they feel like they’re being pushed to buy something in every post, they will likely not come around again.
• Link out to other sites that are informational as well. Remember your goal is to create a valuable resources for your readers. Seeing you share quality information will make them trust you even more.

Business Blog Topics

Probably one of the biggest hold-ups in a business creating a blog is what to write about, especially if the business is in a very tight niche.

Finding Inspiration

If you have answered the above “Who is Your Audience?” questions, then you will have a general idea of what topics will interest your potential readers. Other ways to generate ideas include:

• Using Twitter and HootSuite (or other Twitter management tools) for monitoring influential twitterers in your industry and what is being discussed by the general public about it.
• Does your business have a support department or help desk? What questions are commonly asked by your clients or potential customers? These might be good topics to answer on your blog.
• Cover your views on current events and other hot topics in your industry by following major blogs on specific niches using major news networks and sites like Alltop, Technorati, or PostRank.

You might think that some subjects have been covered over and over again and can be found pretty much all over the internet, but what you want to realize is that, when someone is on your site, you want them to be able to find as much useful information possible about your industry on your site without having to go elsewhere (and possibly end up on a competitor’s blog instead).

Specific Examples

Using some of the sponsors of the recent blogging contest by Famous Bloggers (another great resource on how to blog) and The ComLuv Network (home of one of the most comment generating plugins for WordPress), we’ll look at some businesses that do not yet have blogs, and some topics they could be talking about.

Claims.com

Claims.com, the accidents at work specialists, handles personal injury, traffic accidents, and work-related injury claims. There are ton of great topic ideas I can see just from perusing a few pages into their website, including:

• Top 5 Most Common Workplace Accidents – What they are, and how much they generally cost if you are not insured.
• What is Sofa Rash? – What is it, how can it develop, and what you can do to prevent it.
• Whiplash – Where Can it Happen – Whiplash does not just happen when you are in a car wreck. Find out common ways someone can get whiplash, what the symptoms are, and what kind of treatment will be necessary to correct it.

Local Proud

Local Proud is a discount card program that helps you start your own business that will not only help vitalize the local economy, but also promotes going green. Some great blog posts for this site include:

• Why Go Local? – A look at the struggles of local businesses, and why it is more important than ever to support small businesses in your community.
• How Does Local Proud Help the Environment? – Describe how this program helps a community be more green by keeping things closer to home and not requiring printed out coupons. (Great link bait to possibly get on environmental blogs.)
• Case Studies – Go beyond a short testimonial and get a business owner to describe their experience with this kind of business, as well as how it has helped them boost local businesses and help the environment.

Online Recruiters Directory

The Online Recruiters Directory is an executive search firm that allows job seekers to connect with those seeking executive talent. This site actually has a small database of articles for jobseekers that could easily be turned into a blog for more interaction and traffic. Some other topic ideas include…

• What Do You Need to Get a 100k Job? – A look at the top earners in the most popular 100k+ careers and what they have in terms of college education, certifications, and experience.
• Top 100k Jobs for 2010 – A list of the most popular 100k jobs available this year.
• You’re Hired – Now What? – What to expect on your first days at a new job for career changers, from those who have transitioned from one field to another. (Could be a great interview series for those who successfully found a job through this service.)

ANS Gear

ANS Gear carries a huge line of paintball guns & gear at discounted prices. Coming from the perspective of someone who has never been involved in paintball, but has heard some very interesting stories, a few topics that would get me interested include:

• Paintball 101 – What essential equipment do you need to get started.
• Best Places to Compete – What are the top rated places to play in major metropolitan areas.
• Top 5 Common Paintball Injuries – What they are, how to avoid them (ie. protective gear), and if avoidance isn’t possible, how to treat them.

Now Relevant

NowRelevant.com is the best new search engine, an alternative to the major search engines for finding relevant niche information. Some interesting things to know about this search engine would be:

• What Makes Now Relevant Different? – Expand upon the information in the about us page and show some examples of search results for Now Relevant compared to the other major engines.
• PPC 101 – How does it work, and why advertisers should choose Now Relevant’s pay per click program over Adwords or others.
• Comprehensive Guide to Using Now Relevant – Cover everything from advanced search operators to where Now Relevant pulls its information from (blogs, social networks, etc.).

Your Thoughts on Business Blogging

Do you have a favorite business blog that others should follow the example of? What are your likes and dislikes about corporate blogs? If you have a business and have a blog, what positive results have you seen? If you are a business that doesn’t have a blog, what is stopping you?

Kristi is the author of Kikolani, a blog which provides blogging tips for successful personal and business bloggers alike, and an Internet Marketing Specialist providing link building services.

This post supports the some of the sponsors of the Famous Bloggers and ComLuv blogging contest. Please visit Kristi’s entry for powerful tips on how to promote your articles for more traffic, link value, and earnings.

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On my way back from the Cannes Advertising Festival a few weeks ago a couple of work buddies and I decided to take a break and take advantage of our European travel to stop in London for a day at Wimbledon. I’m not a giant tennis fan, but I love any opportunity to experience a remarkable event. So it was a no-brainer to cross the channel and splurge on a day at Court 1 in this historic facility. But my “Marketing with Meaning” hat never comes off, dear readers. While enjoying the matches and sipping my new favorite summer drink, Pimm’s, I noticed something that sparked this blog post…

In the program for the event I noticed a full-page ad for HSBC—captured by my iPhone in the photo above. As you can see, HSBC offered free strawberries and cream for its cardholders at the matches. It struck me as a terrific example of Marketing with Meaning, and perhaps a new trend that other brands are picking up on.

Another great example of a brand that is providing added value for its loyal customers is Lexus. I recently had a chance to prepare a presentation for a group of Lexus dealers, and through the process of researching their work discovered how many of these independent businesses are similarly doing special things for their owners. For example, in several major cities around the U.S. local Lexus dealers have arranged for free, private parking for its car owners. You can find this benefit at the BankAtlantic Center in Tampa, at the Texas Rangers ballpark and AT&T Performing Arts Center in Dallas, and at the U.S. Open tennis championship.

All too often in banking, automotive, or other businesses, current customers get little care and feeding once the bank account is open or the car drives off the lot. In these and many other industries (e.g., phone service, credit cards, cable TV) a vast majority of marketing dollars are put against acquiring new customers. Marketing managers become completely focused on cost-per-acquisition and churn rate, but rarely think about how the easiest sell is the one they’ve already made.

There is tremendous opportunity for brands to win by moving more of their marketing budgets to the benefit of current, loyal customers. Broadly speaking, there are two main benefits of this approach. First, there is almost always an opportunity to sell more products and services to those who are already buying from you. Car makers can convince you to put another one of their vehicles in the garage or upgrade to a new model faster. Banks have an opportunity to cross-sell countless other financial services.

But the second, often-ignored benefit of marketing to your current customers is that it can be a way to impress and win over new prospects. This ad for HSBC naturally advises current cardholders of a special treat, but in doing so it also shows all non-HSBC customers how well this bank treats its own. Similarly, Lexus understands that free, premium parking means that friends will want to ride in the Lexus owner’s car and thus get a free sample of the riding and service experience. And in both examples, the brand has chosen special, high-end events where the prized, highest-income customers attend.

How might you use marketing dollars to benefit your best customers while attracting prized prospects to your side? Or if you are already providing valuable services to current customers, how might you better show prospects what they are missing?

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• ISBN13: 9781593271992
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.

Product Description

Friends with Benefits: A Social Media Marketing Handbook

There are many intersections between earned media and organic search engine rankings, so it makes sense that they would work well together. The PR industry is in an interesting situation right now with so much of the traditional media world moving to digital media.  Whether they admit it or not, journalists rely on PR professionals for a pipeline of stories and information. When journalists lose their jobs, media relations professionals lose an essential reason for being in business.

Even if PR departments and organizations are digitally savvy, there are a good number of reasons (7 in fact) to incorporate search engine optimization into their processes:

Reach Journalists where they’re looking - There are many formal studies as well as our own outreach to the media that have illustrated the changing behavior of journalists, analysts and reporters to use search to do their job of research and reporting the news.  Optimizing news content and digital assets presents a significant opportunity to “be” where journalists are looking.

Search extends reach of PR & communications - The content produced by Public Relations departments is of value to many audiences outside of the media.  Employees, potential employees, investors, partners, customers and even prospective customers are influenced by news content.  Whether it’s a press release or an announcement through video, optimizing what can be searched extends the reach of PR and communications efforts far beyond traditional news distribution channels.

Increase unsolicited media placements – TopRank Online Marketing and many other web sites that optimize and promote news content receive unsolicited mentions from industry news sites, blogs, online and offline publications. Optimizing news content for discovery by search can have an amplifying effect on traditional media relations outreach efforts. When a journalist receives a compelling pitch via email, the natural instinct is to go to Google an search the topic. When your content shows prominently in the search results it can be a one-two punch to capture interest and show credibility.

Bypass media channels: direct to consumer – Increasing numbers of companies are taking to heart, the notion of “brand as publisher” and creating their own content strategies for news. Large companies have owned TV stations, radio stations, newspapers and other publishing channels for as long as they have existed. Why should online media be any different? Optimized content can be searched for and found by anyone: Including consumers or companies researching products and services to buy.

Optimized PR facilitates marketing goals – News content is often syndicated and stories re-published. When links are included, they can serve as a link building effort that directly affects marketing objectives through direct traffic to the company site and increase search visibility due to the influence of links.

Protect your brand & online reputation - As many brands have discovered, it takes just a few upset bloggers with time on their hands and savvy connections to bring unwanted attention to negative and dissenting views.  Companies that publish content can ensure some of that content is optimized for brand terms, products, company names and any other brand asset they wish to protect in the search results.

For the most part, one domain name can only display up to 2 search results for a single query. That means content that lives outside of the main corporate web site, such as press releases hosted indefinitely by wire services like PRWeb, can serve to occupy additional search results for your brand name.  Don’t wait until someone creates a yourbrandsucks.com web site that ranks #1 for your brand name to start working on your search results reputation. Be proactive about optimizing content on and especially, off the corporate web site for brand names.

Demonstrate more value from PR & Communications - As budgets are cut in Marketing and Public Relations departments, PR needs to do a much better job of showing value. Despite giving SEO workshops and seminars for PR professionals for hundreds of Media Relations, Communications and PR practitioners over the past 3-4 years, most PR firms don’t incorporate SEO.

Those that do, can demonstrate more effective Pull PR results, but can also demonstrate the direct and indirect effect on marketing, customer service, recruiting and investor relations by the search traffic earned through optimized news content.

I’ll be discussing these and many other aspects of how companies can enhance their marketing efforts through optimized Public Relations at the Vocus User’s Conference in Washington D.C. today. Actually, I’ll be attending the event today to see Brian Solis and many others. I will be giving my presentation on Friday morning, right after David Meerman Scott does one of his famous keynotes.

At the same time, TopRank’s Adam Singer is in Toronto, for the Search Engine Strategies conference. He’s presenting on a similar topic that also includes a substantial consideration of social media along with search engine optimization and digital PR.

If you’re attending either event, please be sure to connect with Adam or I afterwards.  If you’re liveblogging either event and these sessions in particular, be sure to let us know so we can link to your post in our roundup.

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7 Benefits of Partnering SEO & PR | http://www.toprankblog.com

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University of Minnesota researcher Christine Greenhow breaks down how her research has found that social networking sites like Facebook and Myspace can have an impact for learning and educational growth for high school students. By working with students in a Minneapolis high school to study how they use the social sites, she has discovered that the benefits may just outweigh any risks. This video is part of the Expert Perspectives series at the University of Minnesota.

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Do Follow Blogs – Click for image credit

Time is our most precious resource. All bloggers and business owners wish they had more of it and continually seek ways to accomplish more each day.

KeywordLuv and CommentLuv are effective ways to make every comment we write or receive provide far more benefits.

I strongly recommend bloggers join the do follow movement and install the CommentLuv and KeywordLuv plugins.

We and many of our favorite bloggers are focusing more and more of our time and efforts exclusively in dofollow blogs. The CommentLuv community is especially strong and readers can easily see CommentLuv featured posts.

They may not be aware that installing CommentLuv and registering your site allows you to suggest one of your last ten posts. Andy has already acted on a suggestion I made to allow you to select your most important posts instead and he has even added the ability to select your own anchor text for that post! Used wisely, that new feature can allow you to get ranked in the search engines for your most important keyword phrases.

The benefits of using KeywordLuv are not as obvious to many so I want to spell them out and explain exactly why I so strongly recommend using it. First you need to clearly understand what anchor text is and why it is so important to you.

Anchor text is simply the words used in the actual link that tell the search engines what the page the link points to is about.

Many bloggers are NOT using anchor text effectively or do not even know what phrases are important to them. There is nothing more important to your getting more traffic from the search engines than clearly targeting your best anchor text. Read my building traffic post for how to do this.

BENEFITS OF KEYWORDLUV:

1. Most bloggers and blog readers dislike keywords in the name field instead of a name. The reason commentators do that is because without KeywordLuv whatever is in the Name field is what is used as anchor text – and that is NOT effective. Installing KeywordLuv fixes that issue by allowing commentators to separate their name from the keywords.
2. KeywordLuv allows business owners and bloggers to select their own anchor text and pair it with the most targeted landing page.
3. Bloggers can more clearly understand what their commentators do and what their major interests are based on the keywords they use.
4. When we blog about our regular commentators we can use the anchor text and links they shared to ensure we are providing them with maximum benefits.

KeywordLuv allows us all to combine commenting and SEO efforts so that we can interact more frequently, strengthen our blogging community relationships and make our sites easier to find in the search engines which will increase our traffic, subscribers and potentially our incomes.

HOW TO USE KEYWORDLUV:

KeywordLuv is simple to use. Instead of putting your name or keywords into the Name field of a comment, use YourName @ Your Keywords.

Here are some examples so everyone is clear on the idea:

• Adam @ Merchant Affiliate Program Manager or Adam @ OPM
• Gail @ Social Media Marketing or Gail @ Business Blogging
• Pete @ Gift Affiliate Program
• Michelle @ Poster Printing
• Jeff @ Wedding Affiliate Program

Notice that only the keyword phrase is linked and that is exactly what your comment name field will look like too. You can vary the anchor text you choose.

For maximum benefit choose specific pages or posts optimized for each phrase and link that specific page/post to that specific keyword phrase.

You will not end up with enough incoming links to any one page if you do not send specific keyword phrases to specific pages/posts.

You can maximize the effectiveness of what you write by optimizing a page specifically for each keyword phrase – especially if you are offering services or products.

That involves good timing in blogs using CommentLuv so read on for how to change your landing page to match your keyword phrase. When you register your site at CommentLuv you entered your URL.

For CommentLuv to work you must enter it into the URL field EXACTLY as you registered it including using or not using the www and including or not including the trailing slash / at the end. You may want to copy and paste it somewhere so you can paste it back in later.

If you don’t see your last ten posts in CommentLuv the most likely cause is the URL you entered is not exactly how you registered it.

To link your selected anchor text to a page different than the one you registered with CommentLuv, fill in your comment as usual, select the CommentLuv post you wish to feature and then do this:

Just before you submit the comment, paste the URL of your preferred post/page into the URL field and immediately submit the comment.

It takes CommentLuv some time to realize the URL field has changed. If you forget or take too long you will lose the CommentLuv featured post you selected.

If that happens just paste your registered URL back into the Website URL field and click into the body of the comment. That will prompt CommentLuv to find your last ten posts again. Select the one you want, and then change the URL again and immediately submit the comment.

By installing KeywordLuv you allow business and blog owners to help themselves to generate more traffic and more sales.

Some will notice that I keep comments most bloggers would summarily delete. I do this because I know that businesses are in dire economic condition and it is essential that small and online businesses survive and even thrive in spite of the current economic climate.

I encourage my fellow bloggers to be forgiving of those who are new and haven’t learned to write excellent comments yet. Is it not better to educate them and even the offshore SEO companies they hire so they can call learn?

Many businesses do not have the time or skills needed to leave their own comments and may not know the difference between spam and adding to the conversation. We can educate them and make the world a better place.

For those bloggers willing to do more I ask that you participate in my new BizLuv MEME and find out how you can Support Your Favorite Businesses and benefit your own blog at the same time.

Note that not all blogs using CommentLuv or KeywordLuv are Do Follow.

I suspect that many assume they are and I personally find it disingenuous to use  these plugins that are so connected to the dofollow community and make them nofollow. For this reason I choose not to include nofollowed KeywordLuv sites in my KeywordLuv Twitter List.

CommentLuv blogs are included on my DoFollow Twitter List. Would anyone prefer that I create a DoFollow CommentLuv List?

WHERE TO GET THE PLUGINS:

• KeywordLuv plugin – I claimed @KeywordLuv to make the KeywordLuv plugin and this information post easy to find
• CommentLuv plugin | How to use CommentLuv with IntenseDebate

I am currently compiling lists of Keyword Love enabled blogs, keywordluv lists and will add keyword luv tools if I find any.

Why should you link to bloggers who use KeywordLuv? Because they understand the importance of anchor text and are highly likely to add high quality links to your sites!

KEYWORDLUV LISTS:

• Dofollow.info Do follow blogs tagged as having KeywordLuv installed
• BlogAbout Everything KeywordLuv list (Updated Feb 12, 2010)

Please leave links to any additional Keyword Luv lists or tools you know of in the comments of this post. Thank you.

KEYWORD LUV BLOGS BY NICHE:

Use these lists to find KeywordLuv enabled blogs in your niche. I highly recommend going beyond exchanging comments to linking to and writing about each other’s sites.

Anchor text is so very important that if you appear in the list below I will edit yours on request. Just leave a comment in this post.

COMPUTER FINANCING:

Computer Financing Today – I thought some of my readers might be interested to know that Creative_Ace’s dofollow blog offers 5.99% computer financing with no credit checks. CJ is working on getting KeywordLuv working as I type this.

BLOGGING:

BloggerLuv (Twitter) Blog Collaboration
Kikolani (Twitter) The Art of Blogging for Blogging Tips and Social Media Marketing
Tycoon Blogger (Twitter) Blogging Tips
Andrew Rondeau (Twitter) How to Build a Blog Download your free blogging guide
Nice Blogger (BituMihau) Blogging Best Practices
Hot Blog Tips (HotBlogTips) Blogging Tips
Another Blogger (AnotherBlogger) Blogging Tips including How to Import Blogger Blogs to WordPress
Pot Politics (JSinKeyWest) Blogging Tips and Everything Else

INTERNET MARKETING:

GrowMap – this site
Don Power’s Local Business Internet Marketing and Local Social Media Marketing
Dennis Edell Direct Sales Marketing
I Do Web Marketing
Extreme John (Twitter) Business Reviews and Blogging Tips
Internet Marketing for Mommies (momtohanna) Making Money with Squidoo Lens – Get a Squidoo Lens Review

AFFILIATE MARKETING:

AffiliateXFiles (Twitter) Affiliate Marketing Advice

WEB DEVELOPMENT:

Activo Web Development Blog team of Web Designers dedicated to KeywordLuv

DOFOLLOW LISTS:

Blog about Do Follow Blogs

FREELANCE WRITERS and PRODUCT REVIEWERS:

Moomettes Magnificents (Twitter) Product Reviews | Add Your Contests and Giveaways
Creative Ace (Creative_Ace) Freelance Writing and Online Technical Writing

VIRTUAL ASSISTANTS:

Social Media Virtual Assistant (Twitter) Offering Social Media Marketing Services

HOME IMPROVEMENT / REAL ESTATE:

Good Millwork Architectural Moldings including Crown Moldings, Baseboards and Chair Rail and Exterior Shutters, Wood Siding and other Millwork
Tampa Florida Real Estate Blog (DannyinTampa)
Gulf Coast Beach Team Alabama Gulf Coast Real Estate (GulfShoresLife)
Las Vegas Real Estate

WEDDINGS and GIFTS:

ExecGiftsBlog Associated with Executive Gift Shoppe’s Personalized Gifts Store and featuring a Wedding Store
Valentine’s Day Chocolate Truffles and Chocolate Do Follow Blog with CommentLuv and KeywordLuv

GOLF:

NoBogies Golf Blog and Golf Store with comprehensive posts on the Rules of Golf
Putting Mat Improving Your Golf Putting Confirmed Do Follow CommentLuv KeywordLuv

MUSIC:

Remergence Rembeatz Electronica Duo (JJ_Remergence) and (Rembeatz)
Blazing Minds Music Blog (BlazingMinds)

TECHNOLOGY, HARDWARE, SOFTWARE:

Software Critics Software Reviews (MathDelane)

GENERAL:

Known dofollow KeywordLuv enabled blogs in all other niches (more sections to be added as needed):

The Blog About Everything | KeywordLuv list (Updated Feb 12, 2010)

Know of a Do Follow KeywordLuv blog missing from the above list? Let me know in the comments. If it is yours please also include your best anchor text phrases and landing pages and fill in the Twitter field too.

Posts like this take an extremely long time to compile and create. There are many more KeywordLuv enabled blogs to be added from Kikolani’s Dofollow.info Do follow blogs tagged as having KeywordLuv installed and to be found by searching.

We collectively need to decide on the best solution for compiling KeywordLuv blogs by niche. Please volunteer or leave suggestions in the comments. Thank you.

I am asking my readers to contribute to this project by adding your favorite KeywordLuv enabled blogs in the comments of this post. Please provide desired anchor text and landing pages.

As time allows I WILL move them into the body of this post to provide you with stronger editorial links.

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If you’re “on Twitter”, no doubt you’ve noticed different Tweeple running polls from time to time. We ran our first poll on Twitter over 3 years ago which resulted in the post, “Guide to Twitter as a Tool for Marketing and PR“, offering insights from other marketing and PR professionals experienced with the Twitter web site.

Polls have been popular interactive tools on web sites as far back as Angelfire and Geocities. Polls have been popular widgets on blogs too. Polls on Twitter are effective for a variety of reasons including the real time feedback and mass, yet relevant, reach that can be achieved.

To understand how running polls on Twitter may or may not be right for you, read on for 10 benefits to running Tweet Polls:

1. Find new, smart people to follow. Connections are essential for a productive Twitter experience and that means connecting with the right people. Twitter polls should use a common hash tag (ex: #mypoll) that will tie the Questions and Answers together. In doing so, the followers of your poll participants will be exposed to the Q & A and potentially participate.  Others’ use of the common hashtag will reveal their replies and you may find new and interesting people to follow.

2. Collect great insights and tips from your followers. This is an obvious benefit for any poll. Asking the right questions can evoke some very useful tips and perspectives from your Twitter network that can be useful to you as well as the community at large.  You can get tough questions answered that many others are searching for.

3. Create an opportunity to engage with your Twitter network.  Connections are the Yin and Engagement is the Yang of social participation. They feed on each other. Polls can create an engagement opportunity that allows your network to “show their stuff” on topics of interest, teaching you more about who you’re connected to and vice versa.

4. Create an opportunity for your Twitter network to engage with each other. If you’ve successfully built a network or two or three on the social web, you know it’s not “all about you”.  Helping social network participants meet their needs is a cornerstone of effective social networking. Poll respondents and observers using the common Tweet poll hashtag will benefit from the same exposure to interesting insights and people as you will. Successful polls with this objective quickly spawn discussions on various threads related to the original poll questions.

5. Crowdsource blog, article or conference presentation content that rewards participants. Asking questions on Twitter and then using the answers in a PowerPoint or blog post is an easy way to generate content. Doing so in a way that recognizes those who contributed ideas via Twitter is even more powerful. Let you network know you’ve used their feedback and list them as contributors in the PPT deck or article. Often times, they’ll tweet or re-tweet links back to the content driving even more traffic and attention. People will work for a living, but they’ll die for recognition.

6. Identify potential candidates or consultants for hire or marketing partners based on their answers and interaction. It’s common to have casual connections with others on Twitter. I don’t follow everyone myself, but do follow about 2,000 people. I know just over a third of those people in real life. Poll responses show insight from followers that helps me get to know them better. Some of which, might be people that would be a great addition to our Social SEO Agency or whom we can hire for certain projects.

7. Build goodwill. Recognize certain Twitter contacts by dropping questions just for them to answer, then acknowledge their answers. This tactic isn’t for everyone of course and it’s effectiveness is based on real questions and real answers. Manufactured interactions are most often weak and of little value. If there is a person you’d like to hire, get hired by, or connect with in some other way, building goodwill can reduce barriers and provide an opportunity for dialog.

8. Attract new followers to yourself that notice the sudden use of a certain hashtag and the Q/A. The polls on Twitter that I’ve run have not been particularly effective for growing a quantity of followers, but the quality (as in relevance of connection) has been very good. The hash tag takes the “conversation” outside of the threaded discussion within your own Twitter network. It is essential though, that the text used in the hash tag make sense towards the topic being discussed. Ex: #blogseo or #veganrecipes or #crmsoftware

9. Attract new followers to your Twitter network through the smarts of their participation. As mentioned in benefit #4, you can help your Twitter network gain benefit from interacting with each other through participation on Twitter polls. When one of your connections answers a poll question, their response can catch the attention of other Twitter users following the hash tag. This extension can lead to more followers for the members of your network that participate.

10. Flush out survey questions on Twitter to see which questions to use, or what syntax to use in a more formal survey. If you are in the business of conducting research on a larger scale, sharing informal survey questions on Twitter can be a very useful litmus test for certain questions. Content, syntax, relevance and timeliness can all be tested so that the questions used in the formal survey are better suited for response.

Bonus: Build your own credibility. Show you’re a thinker with succinct, smart and timely questions on a topic your followers care about. If you can consistently show the ability to bring people together in a valuable way, it builds trust, shows leadership and boosts credibility with your network.

What benefits have you realized from running polls on Twitter?

Photo credit, olivepress.

© Online Marketing Blog, 2010

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Know The Upsides –And Downsides Of Your Adoption Behavior
Individuals and companies should be deliberate in their adoption strategy, there are benefits and risks to each category. It’s been interesting watching different group adopt social technologies over the past few years, I can see who benefits from being first –and the pains to be a thought leader of both individuals and companies.

Above, this is the standard Rogers Adoption Curve, it’s important to point out that my matrix below only is in context of social technologies, it will vary from technology to technology.  I found this take on the adoption stages of social technologies helpful in framing how I thought about the following matrix. I built this following matrix in the context of social technologies and adoption by both individuals and mixed in with organizations and industries.

Matrix: Social Technology Adoption Curve Benefits –and Downsides

Matrix: Be Deliberate In Your Adoption Strategy
Each category has specific benefits and risks, but rather than just behaving in a way that comes natural, I encourage you in your personal and work adoption to be deliberate in your actions.

1. Examine your organizations adoption patterns. First, define how quickly your organization responds and adopts to technologies, and factor into your considerations.
2. Be a Category Ahead Of Your Company. If you’re responsible for new technologies at your company, your personal adoption should be a level or two ahead of the organizations adoption, as you cannot effectively deploy for your company if you don’t personally understand the impacts of the new technologies.
3. Track The Category Ahead Of You. Find an individual that’s above your adoption category (the early adopter watches the innovator) and be sure to watch their behaviors and learn from them. Adopters are often blazing their own trail, and may not ever follow anyone.

My Strategy: Early Adopter –But Not Innovator
One thing is clear, being first doesn’t mean you’re right, in fact, the Innovators have a difficult time dealing with early and late majority, paving roads of opportunity for analysis, agencies, and consultants. As a result, I make a distinct effort to be an early adopter of new social technologies, but not the innovator, as I find I’d rather be more often right, and expend less energy trying to be first.

Leave a Comment. Share Your Adoption Strategy
Let’s learn from each other, I’d like to know about your adoption behavior and that of your company. Were you deliberate in choosing your adoption strategy? How does it hurt or help your company?

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