Word of mouth was every small business owners best friend. Countless times I have asked friends for advice on a mechanic, a roofer, a dog walker, and every other product, service or supplier I have ever needed. Many of the times it has been just what the doctor ordered.
I now need a new roof for my home. How am I going to find the best company? A company with a strong reputation that I can trust, someone who has replaced a roof for a friend? I am now online more then I am on the phone, I will post on my Facebook page, “Does anyone know a good roofer? I have a flat roof and need a tear off replacement.” http://www.facebook.com/john.sostak
Think about how much more efficient this is. Word of web is way faster and more effective then word of mouth ever was. Consider how before Facebook, I communicated with a couple dozen co-workers, a half a dozen friends, and few neighbors, and my sister. Now I have 300 people in my small Facebook group of friends, some I haven’t seen in person in 30 years. I will get a referral, then I can check the roofer out online before I have him come and measure my roof and give me a quote. This kills water cooler conversation and the yellow pages.
Hooray for me, and thank you Facebook. Congratulations to the entrepreneur, and in this case, the roofing company that understands the power of word of web. This roofer is repairing and replacing more roofs then his competitors. Every day we share information faster and are watching great products, companies and services grow, and it is because they are using the Internet to improve their business. This is not magic, and a lot of companies that have been slow to show up to this dance may not be doing as well, so now is the time to get up to speed.
Facebook is only one, albeit very important part, of word of web marketing, and online success. An online recommendation is a start, then the company must make sure that the rest of it’s ducks are lined up, so that valuable referral becomes a deal. Regardless of your business, make sure you have the following:
- Customers that appreciate your work. If you are not great at what you do, get great. Word of web giveth, and it can also taketh away. Do not let bad reviews kill your dream before you have a chance to succeed. Protect your reputation.
- A well made website that is optimized for your product and area. Optimization is just a matter of writing quality copy, like a blog, and having links in and out of your site, to sites that compliment your message.
- Use social media, and do it consistently. Make sure that you have attractive banners, images, and messages that can be shared on Twitter and Facebook. Use www.ping.fm when you want to update multiple sites at the same time. Consider when you post an update to your blog, or you are running a special. A quick note, with a link to your site, and traffic will come.
- Have any of your customers Yelped you? City Search, Angie’s List, Google reviews? If you have been reviewed, update your profile, make sure the contact info is accurate. If you have been reviewed poorly, and are the owner or rep of the business, do not run from the review, address the customer. Try and find out what happened. Usually it may be as easy as communicating with them, and you may turn a foe, into a friend.
Today we have seen thousands of sites pop up, seemingly over night, that serve as portals. Some a big and broad, like Twitter. Some are review or Internet marketing portals are small, and niche, like Doggie Loot. Use the appropriate ones for your company, and the returns can be measured in bottom line revenue. The most important element in a successful word of web campaign, is consistency. Marketing comes down to elbow grease, so stick to it, and tweak it as you go along, and you will discover exactly what works for you.
P.S. Be prepared to change. What works perfectly can deprecate, not unlike an old billboard or the combover. Once you have it working, keep it fresh, and Internet marketing will continue to deliver results.
Posts Tagged ‘social network’
Let’s get social
We are aware of the fact that design should captivate interest of the masses in order to deliver message across. Websites should not make crowd think too hard unless intended to. Websites should be accessible for users of all levels and present audience with simple structured navigation and clean legible content that will make comprehension of the topic more effective.
In today’s world websites are required to be more “socially available” and let people share information with a click of a button. With the invention of social networks the universe of web browsing has been changed forever and the way we evaluate and share information has changed since the awe of cool animated sites and intensely styled drop down menus.
Simply being usable is not enough. The information presented for the audience should spark an interest and captivate user’s attention from page to page, from post to post, evoking that “gotta share this” feeling of a reader. It is a good practice to make sites accessible for everyone without coming out too provocative or too timid. No funky gradients or Photoshop effects can enhance the site that lacks social interest. Just like expensive pair of sunglasses won’t alter one’s personality and make person a better human being.
The digital world gets faster and more innovative but majority of designers resist the changes forcing the web to stay more grounded and human-oriented. More and more websites became more conversational forcing readers to exchange comments, share information with friends, actively participate in discussions and re-post, re-twitt, re-direct.
According to Andrea Lunsford, a professor of writing and rhetoric at Stanford University, young people today write far more than any generation before them. That’s because so much socializing takes place online, and it almost always involves text. Before the Internet came along, most Americans never wrote anything, ever, that wasn’t a school assignment. Unless they got a job that required producing text (like in law, advertising, or media), they’d leave school and virtually never construct a paragraph again.
For the first 5 years of what I’d call the mainstream web (2000-2005), most sites lacked social skills. Plenty tried to be deliberately mysterious, and succeeded at that, even as they failed as websites. The narrative seems to finally be getting better.
I’ve come to think of it this way: when you’re out at a bar with a group of strangers, there will inevitably be one person in the room who tells the best stories. If you’re lucky, the person is also polite, they exhibit good taste and understand the dynamics of a conversation. People are attracted to that person magnetically for the rest of the evening. Our websites should be that person. So let’s go grab a drink and discuss something in a positive and captivating manner.
Word of mouth has been replaced by word of web.
Word of mouth was every small business owners best friend. Countless times I have asked friends for advice on a mechanic, a roofer, a dog walker, and every other product, service or supplier I have ever needed. Many of the times it has been just what the doctor ordered.
I now need a new roof for my home. How am I going to find the best company? A company with a strong reputation that I can trust, someone who has replaced a roof for a friend? I am now online more then I am on the phone, I will post on my Facebook page, “Does anyone know a good roofer? I have a flat roof and need a tear off replacement.” http://www.facebook.com/john.sostak
Think about how much more efficient this is. Word of web is way faster and more effective then word of mouth ever was. Consider how before Facebook, I communicated with a couple dozen co-workers, a half a dozen friends, and few neighbors, and my sister. Now I have 300 people in my small Facebook group of friends, some I haven’t seen in person in 30 years. I will get a referral, then I can check the roofer out online before I have him come and measure my roof and give me a quote. This kills water cooler conversation and the yellow pages.
Hooray for me, and thank you Facebook. Congratulations to the entrepreneur, and in this case, the roofing company that understands the power of word of web. This roofer is repairing and replacing more roofs then his competitors. Every day we share information faster and are watching great products, companies and services grow, and it is because they are using the Internet to improve their business. This is not magic, and a lot of companies that have been slow to show up to this dance may not be doing as well, so now is the time to get up to speed.
Facebook is only one, albeit very important part, of word of web marketing, and online success. An online recommendation is a start, then the company must make sure that the rest of it’s ducks are lined up, so that valuable referral becomes a deal. Regardless of your business, make sure you have the following:
Today we have seen thousands of sites pop up, seemingly over night, that serve as portals. Some a big and broad, like Twitter. Some are review or Internet marketing portals are small, and niche, like Doggie Loot. Use the appropriate ones for your company, and the returns can be measured in bottom line revenue. The most important element in a successful word of web campaign, is consistency. Marketing comes down to elbow grease, so stick to it, and tweak it as you go along, and you will discover exactly what works for you.
P.S. Be prepared to change. What works perfectly can deprecate, not unlike an old billboard or the combover. Once you have it working, keep it fresh, and Internet marketing will continue to deliver results.