5 Easy Ways to Liven Up Your Facebook Stream

As more advertisers and brand marketers realize the value of social media, they are flocking to set up Pages on Facebook, the largest social network of them all.

The stats are impressive. 50% of Facebook’s more than 500 million active users are creating and consuming content on the social network on any given day, and the average U.S. user spends nearly six hours per month browsing around on the social network.

With the shift to growing social media consumption, brands should be taking every step to improve their presences on social platforms, starting with the behemoth that is Facebook.

Whether your business is new to the platform or it has been around for years, there is always room for improvement.

Here are five quick and easy ways to make your Facebook stream more lively for fans.

1. Showcase Your Customers

Paint Along NYC, a New York City-based company offering painting workshops, uses Facebook to build its online community. After each painting class, the instructor uploads photos of the attendees with their works of art to the Paint Along NYC Facebook Page. Each photo album is labeled with the date of the class and the item that was painted, so that customers can easily find and tag their pictures.

During class, the instructor makes sure that attendees are aware that their photos can be found on the company’s public Facebook Page.

2. Have a Sense of Humor

Humor is said to increase a person’s levels of happiness and hope, so why not share happiness via Facebook?

Jules Thin Crust, a group of organic pizza shops in Pennsylvania, runs its Facebook Page with humor and community in mind. Operated by owner John Ordway and multiple store managers, the Jules Facebook Page has a very homey feeling. The Jules social media team doesn’t take itself too seriously — an advantage that many small businesses have over large branding-dominated corporations. When Facebook fans joke around, Jules Facebook admins are comfortable jumping right in there with the fun. The casual tone used by Jules staffers --and the fact that they personally know some of the fans — makes the updates more personable, relevant and relatable.

3. Give ‘Em Something To Consume

With such high engagement stats, Facebook has brands and content creators turning heads. Etsy, the commerce platform for handmade goods, is among the brands on Facebook that understands its following and then creates and curates content to fit its needs.

As expected, Etsy’s Facebook Page features a stream of the quirkiest products that are offered on its site. But the page also features a fair amount of original and curated content, including blog posts and videos that would be of interest to its followers. Some of the content originates from the Etsy Blog. While many of the links and videos are purely for fun, these pieces often start conversations among Etsy fans on the Page.

4. Ask Questions

It’s not enough to be broadcasting promotional messages — brands should make an effort at engaging with their audiences. Asking questions is a great way to kick off that two-way dialogue.

Take a look at any brand page on Facebook — it’s quite likely that posts with questions get more action than ones without questions. ReadyMade magazine, for example, mixes up the format of posts on its Facebook Page. Posts with questions seem to prompt more conversation, especially if the question is easy to answer. People are inclined to offer their opinions, especially when it’s so simple to get involved.

5. Take Us Behind the Curtain

Whether you own a restaurant, a tech startup or a construction company, your customers are interested in who works at your company and what goes on behind the scenes. And so, providing a glimpse behind the curtain can be an effective and engaging way to populate your Facebook Page.

You may think there aren’t many ways to make a car dealership more interesting or welcoming, but a well-run Facebook Page helps one New Jersey dealership exude a friendly vibe. Lester Glenn Auto Group uses Facebook to promote the cars it sells, announce philanthropic projects and make small talk with customers. Recent posts about holidays and summer camps have seen success relative to other posts, probably because of their non-promotional and down-to-earth tone.

The page also features lots of pictures from inside the dealership, including ones that highlight employees and events. A recent post, for example, celebrates the birthday of Internet Sales Rep Stacy Myers. These depictions of life at the dealership give fans a look inside the company, and they also help to humanize the brand.


Original Article published on Mashable.com

New Optimization Tips for Facebook Pages

It’s been a little more than a year since Facebook first introduced the now ubiquitous Like button, and a significant update three months ago has given users the ability to add comments and increased the button’s visibility for the benefit of merchants, marketers and brands.

But how does the Like button impact e-commerce websites where it counts most, in terms of traffic volume, conversions and revenue? Not surprisingly, Facebook recently shared some favorable statistics of its own, along with some tips on how to best leverage the Like button. Separately, Facebook marketing platform Buddy Media recently released some similar case studies as well as suggestions for how to propel your Facebook content to the top of the News Feed.

We have consolidated much of that data here because it is definitely a worthwhile look for merchants, but we would also like to hear about your own experiences with the Like button and Facebook social plugins in the comments section below.

Facebook Optimization Tips For Pages

1. Allowing users to add comments will significantly increase the number of clicks on the Like button

2. Display Like buttons at both the top and bottom of your posted content

3. Clicks increase dramatically when Like buttons appear near videos, images, infographics and other visual content

4. Like buttons that display thumbnail images of friends will receive three to five times more clicks than versions that don’t

5. Ask questions of users on your Fan pages, such as “Would you like …?” and “Would you prefer … ?”

6. Post fun and interactive content such as games, trivia questions and polls

7. Incorporate coupons and discounts on your Wall

8. Post time-sensitive content and relate to current events

9. Post videos and video tutorials

10. Include links to additional content


10 Facebook Optimization Tips - By Website Magazine

Facebook Tutorials | Social Media Marketing with Facebook and Twitter

Facebook Tutorials | Social Media Marketing with Facebook and Twitter

Making the Most of Social Media

Using social media for your business is a sensible and cost-effective way to market, brand, and sell your products and services. Social media is here to stay and it will continue to be more and more popular. It is very important that you leverage social media in the most effective manner possible so that your success multiplies exponentially.

To ensure a winning social media marketing campaign, you will have to set objectives, create timelines, measure performances, conduct in-depth research, and implement clever strategies to outfox your competition.

Here are some tips of getting the most out of your social media initiatives:

• Getting Started – Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Blogger, YouTube, Ning and many more. Interaction over these websites must be frequent and consistent in order to best engage your prospective customers. Create a list of five websites to begin this connection and multiply it in the same ratio as if you could afford to put in more time and resources.
   
• Quality Content – An underlying strategy that will drive your social media initiatives toward a logical conclusion is having quality content. Providing content of value will help attract genuine prospects to your social media platforms.
   
• Two-Way Participation – You will have to regularly engage in the activities of people in your network before expecting the favor returned. Networking on social media platforms is a two-way effort and must be dealt with consistently if you expect concrete results.
   
• Design and Development – There is a lot that you can achieve by tweaking your social networking websites and personalizing them to reflect the look and feel of your business to create a strong “Brand Recall.” For example, try exploring top business pages on Facebook and you will be amazed to see the monumental effort made by companies to design and develop applications from scratch.
   
• The Right Platforms – Finding the right platforms where your audiences are most active will form a big part of your initial research strategy.
   
• Analyzing Competition –  Analyzing the online endeavors of your business competition can provide valuable insights into how you should approach your social media strategy.
   
• Online Tools – Using online tools such as HootSuite to manage various social media accounts will save you a lot of time and effort.
   
• Stop Being Pushy – If you continue to thrust sales matter upon people in your network, you will soon lose their interest. You need to have a meaningful dialogue with your target audience, share information and subtly push forward your sales agenda on an occasional basis.
   
• Web Analytics – Little or no cost online web analytical tools like Google Analytics can offer valuable insights while preparing social media strategies. You can learn a lot and improve upon these strategies by reviewing analytical information such as which webpage attracted the maximum traffic or the keyword that was instrumental in bringing an online searcher to your website.

In conclusion, it is very important to emphasize that sustained efforts and a relentless pursuit of your social media objectives will definitely pay off richly. These will usually not be overnight results and instead appear over a period of time in the form of leads, sales and the invaluable awareness about your products/services. Stay on the job and keep working in a systematic manner, keeping the above tips in mind.

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About the Author.  

Marco Giunta is a Senior Business Development Executive and the author of the book: Rethinking Sales. Visit Marco’s website at marcogiunta.com.

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Project: New Website For Local Yoga Studio

We just launched a new website for a local Yoga Studio called Hot Box Yoga in the East Bay. The site's is developed out on the Wordpress content management system. We also set up their Facebook business page and tied in the social media tools back to the main site.

We had a lot of fun with this one!  To view the live site, click here.

New Rules for 21st Century Business

It is a myth to believe that working long hours at a frantic pace makes you productive. By now most of us recognize that overwork and stress cause everything from a lack of creativity to stress-related illnesses. Taking better care of ourselves makes good business sense. If you don’t believe me, try an experiment. Incorporate some of the new rules below for the next 30 days and see what happens. If you adopt some of these rules and put them into practice you’ll find that you not only get more done at work, you create more time for your life.

New Rules for 21st Century Business

1. I take lunch everyday and do something unrelated to work. For example, I get out of the office and take a walk, listen to a relaxation tape, or visit with a friend.
2. I work reasonable hours. On most days, I arrive at _____ and leave by _____.
3. I schedule “breathing room” every day so I can step back, re-evaluate my priorities and be sure that I am working on what really matters.
4. I do whatever it takes to create a healthy work environment. I keep my office free of clutter and if necessary, I use a clean air filter, full spectrum lighting, and I always keep a reserve of water nearby.
5. I have an “Absolute Yes” list for work (a 3″ x 5″ index card with my top five priorities listed in order of importance) and I refer to it often.
6. I train myself to consistently look for ways to delegate work in order to empower others while I honor my Absolute Yes list.
7. I hire only highly competent, talented people to support my efforts.
8. I ask family and friends to honor my work time by eliminating non-essential personal calls and interruptions.
9. I coordinate my work schedule to remove distractions and interruptions. For example, I design blocks of uninterrupted, focused time and I only check voicemail and e-mail twice a day (keep breathing on this one).
10. I stop taking on more than I can handle. When asked to take on a project, I check to be sure that I can complete the assignment without suffering or sacrificing my self-care.

Think of these rules as part of a 21st Century job description. Putting them into practice may be challenging at first, but I can assure you that if you do, you’ll be more effective at work and more relaxed at home.
To ensure your success, you might ask a co-worker, fellow self-employed friend, or partner to try the 30-day experiment with you. If you work for someone else, be sure to let your boss and/or co-workers know ahead of time that you’ll be using these new rules to challenge yourself to be more focused and productive during the day. Invite them to join you in discovering how self-care at work translates into bottom line results.

Take Action Challenge

Create your own 21st Century job profile. Cut and paste the above list into a file and customize it to fit your needs. When you have your new rules in place, print it out and hang it on the wall in your office. Review the list each day and pay close attention to how your workday and personal life improve over time.

This week’s video is a fun one from The X-Factor. You’ll find it here.

Life Makeover for the Year 2011(sm) is written and produced by Cheryl Richardson.© Copyright 1999-2009 Cheryl Richardson, P.O. Box 13, Newburyport, MA 01950, www.cherylrichardson.com. All rights reserved. Used with permission.