Social Networking Marketing Common Requirements

LinkedIn – Joining the LinkedIn network can help your business make strides by giving you access to over 7 million people. LinkedIn members are professionals who are interested in being as effective and proactive as possible each day. LinkedIn gives you access to contacts that might have seemed impossible to reach at one time.

Needed:

•Business Email

•Information about your business industry such as country, business address, zip code anything that best describe your business

•Describe in details what are the demographics on your network contacts (what kind of professional or business you would like as your business contacts)

•Information on your business experience how many years, achievements and all

•Information about your educational background

•A photo for your profile (probably 1 or 2)


Facebook – just one of several social networking sites to appear in the last decade. As the site evolved, it began offering more capabilities with more than 130 million active users worldwide. Bring identity and connections to your site or application.

Needed:

•Business Email

•Category and Name (describe the category that best fits what you'd like to promote on Facebook)

•Profile picture (graphic or photo that best represents your business)

•Business Information (basic and detailed information as you can. The fields available will depend on your Page type. The more details you can add about who you are, what you do, and when and where customers can buy your products, the more successful you will be.)

•Rich and engaging - Like user profiles, Pages have multiple tabs. By default, your Page has a Wall tab for you and your fans to share content, an Info tab for you to share business information, and a Boxes tab for application modules. For instance a small business owner might add the Visa Business Network application to connect with peers. If you can provide videos, ads, or movies that might relate to your business, behind the scenes' content often works well, list an event for your grand opening or in-store sale, note about upcoming promotions please do so.

•Audience (Please give us a specific details demographics and geographical location)


Myspace – a social networking website targeted at a general audience. With an interactive, user-submitted network of friends, personal profiles, blogs, groups, photos, music and more. Increasingly, America's middle- and upper-class social networks as virtual community centers

Needed:

•Business Email

•Basic Info: Gender, Date of Birth and Region (State)

•Background and Lifestyle information

•Your Business Name and URL

•Company Overview, the “About Me” Section (concise overview of your company and how it may benefit your target audience)

•Potential Clients, the “Who I’d like to meet” Section (Here you can breakdown your target audience. Keep it targeted, yet open enough for any and every potential consumer.)

•Company’s Interests (if any of these interests may help to build your clientele or add to the appeal of your product offerings, feel free to give more detailed information. Remember, you’re adding a friendly feel to your business, so think of what answers may offer some insight into your site’s personality.)

•Pictures, the “Profile Pic” (You’ll need a profile pic or your default image. When visitors come to your MySpace page, it will be the first thing they see and it will also be the image displayed on your friends MySpace pages.)

•Videos (this is optional if it relates to your business. The Video Section can be a launch pad for some valuable word of mouth. If you create a video that boosts your business while offering something entertaining or educational, it can be picked up and spread by several potential clients.)

•MySpace Blog (Blogs are as wide-spread as social networking sites, in offering an informative, personal and entertaining way to provide information about your online business. Use this section for company news, as well as information related to your product offerings. Try to keep this area up-to-date and consistent.)

•MySpace Business Page Layout (We will be creating a MySpace Business Page Layout so kindly describe what do you want in your layout such as colors, fonts, and style. Please choose those that match that of your product offerings.



Twitter – With over a quarter of a million new users every month, the fastest-growing social networking phenomenon on the Internet today. Twitter is without a doubt the best way to share and discover what is happening right now.

Needed:

•Username that will relate to your business

•Explain in details your target audience (demographics and geographical location) used for searching your business “followers” and “following” option

•Email address personal or business

•A photo for your profile (probably 1 or 2)

SEO Poetry

I stumble upon this SEO Poem last 2007 but since I didn’t have SEO Toast at that time I just keep it on my bookmarks. I found it quite amusing that SEO work can push someone to create something creative and I’d like to share it to all of you.

Here it goes…

The SEO Gurus poem

Am I alone as I survey that vast wilderness outside,
Sat at home every day fettered by my own foolish pride,
I may believe I can conceive stunning cunning plans,
Yet I perceive the web I weave is lacking vital strands,

It may transpire my destiny is to conquer virtual space,
But I must wire the best of me to another spidery face,
For although knowing everything about business and site,
To grow means throwing other experts in to get it right,

So even this experienced spider who spins webs so fine,
Needs for bliss a guider to show the whole world online,
His creation, born bred and reared , now standing serene,
Will evoke elation and be revered if it can only be seen,

There's no point in Picasso no mike in Michelangelo,
If the joints a no go and the sound man doesn't show,
So that treasure you're concealing from total global view,
Measures up and has meaning with others helping you,

We all have inborn talent and also inborn failings,
So often scorn a balance, chained to our own railings,
And our world misses a website that deserved to be a star,
But not unfurled in all its might, merely cowering from afar,

Why not take your Van Dyke, or Rembrandt seen by few,
And let us make it see the light, exposed to global view,
Don't hide them in shadows behind barriers of your mind,
Where pride and jealous arrows make them hard to find,

Instead turn to experts just as good as you would like to be,
Who you'll learn to trust, and who will set your website free.

by: John Fowler

------------------------------------------------------

Ranking Lovin'

I'm getting some rankings now
titles and metas helped
content gave the message
but links had to be developed
external linking growing
I'm getting anxious and can wait no longer
two months have gone by now and finally the traffic is getting stronger
look at all these orders
it was all a matter of time
the search engines updated their index and the profit is all mine

by: Anonymous

Which of the two SEO poem do you like best?

Possible SEO Questions

I have been tasked to do an interview for our company because we are currently hiring SEO Specialist to help me with SEO work. Such thoughts are part of what prompted me to think of possible questions I'm going to ask for SEO applicant.

If you're inclined to pursue an SEO career in anyway, one of the most important obstacles you'll need to get through is the outpouring of interview questions that will be thrown at you.

You need to be prepared before going to your interview, a company background check and of course some possible SEO questions to prepare with. These might be some questions to be familiar with before you head into it.

Possible SEO Questions:

1.What do you think of PageRank?

2.Explain to me what META tags matter in today's world.

3.What SEO tools do you regularly use?

4.What do you think of using XML sitemaps?

5.What areas do you think are currently the most important in organically ranking a site?

6.Explain various steps that you would take to optimize a website?

7.Rate from 1 to 10, tell me the most important "on page" elements.

8.What is the difference between SEO and SEM?

9.How many target keywords should a site have?

10.Do you currently do SEO on your own sites? Do you operate any blogs? Do you currently do any freelance work and do you plan on continuing it?

11.How do you handle a client who does not implement your SEO recommendations?

12.Are you familiar with any blackhat SEO techniques?

13.Do you know who Matt Cutts is?

14.What industry sites, blogs, and forums do you regularly read?

15.What are some challenges facing the SEO industry?


Above are the most important questions in an SEO interview for me. If you have other suggestions feel free to post it in my comments thanks.

Search Engine Optimization Process

Though I am not directly talking to our clients but as an SEO Specialist I mostly do the website optimization and oversee clients ranking factors and all. I also have the opportunity to optimize the site from the ground up which presents significant benefits when compared to optimizing an existing website that may have persisting issues that are a bit difficult to overcome.

As an SEO Specialist also I was asked to generate a SEO Checklist by my Account Manager , just a quick guide for us and I would like to share this to all of you. Although this will seem, to many of you, a very generic list of SEO tips but you may be surprised to see how many SEO specialist and consultants forgot these basic steps when optimizing existing website or launching a new site.

Planning your Search engine optimization strategy can help you to gain your desired business. There are a number of steps for SEO process but we are recommending to you the most important and necessary ones.



Search Engine Optimization Understanding:

1.) Client requirements - involves the understanding of the client requirements before starting any SEO work.

2.) Set up Google analytics - (for new clients who doesn’t have Google analytics) create an analytics account and install the code on every page where you want to track the performance. Web Analytics acts as an important source of information to refine the optimization and determine which changes provide the best results.


3.) Website analysis - This steps comprises of Website review, Competitor analysis, Current site positioning. This step involve the in depth analysis of our site which we are going to optimize for search engine.

4.) Keyword research - This step involve the Initial keyword listing, Keyword list expansion, finalizing the keyword list. Search engine drive traffic to your website if you will achieve the top ranking for your targeted keywords.


5.) Website Optimization Process - In this step, we will develop a search engine friendly website as an essential part of onpage optimization process. Developing a Search Engine Friendly website is an essential part of on-page optimization. It Involve new Navigation Plan, HTML Code optimization, Removal of unnecessary Flash and JavaScript, On-page updates like Title Tags, Meta Tags, Internal Links, Headings, Images and ALT Tags Addition of Site Map.

6.) Content Writing/ Content Optimization - This step involve the content writing process for new sites or content rewriting for existing website after the keyword research process. Search engine spider considers the content as an important for ranking a webpage or to the whole website.


7.) Generate a sitemap.xml file - XML Sitemap provides a great way to help SE spiders to find all the pages in the website and determine their relationship/importance to each other. Create an XML sitemap and submit it to major search engines to provide a clear structure to your site.

8.) Create a robots.txt file - This file tells the search engine spiders what they can and can’t crawl on your website. If you don’t want them to look at certain directories, this is where you would specify that. One way this might be useful for SEO is as a way to avoid duplicate content on your website.


9.) Submission of the Website to major search engines - This step involves the submission of your website to search engines and web directories which is a good way to obtain one way links. Submission to these directories and search engines allows quick indexing of the website and its pages.

10.) Submit your sitemap - The same benefit as telling the search engines what your URL is applies to your sitemap as well – it will just help them find your website and content easier.

11.) Link Building - This step involves finding quality link partner, contacting to them, replacing dead links. Links can also help drive traffic to your website from other web pages on the Internet.

12.) Reporting - This step comprises the information which we have to inform to the client about our work progress. Reporting allows us to show our progress to the client on a regular basis. Keyword Ranking Reports Website Traffic Reports Link Popularity Reports Targets and Goals Achievement

No matter what you call them, what everything on this list has in common is that they’re extra value that clients are receiving for their financial investment. It’s something that I communicate to them when giving a cost estimate for their project because it shows both how I’ll be spending the time and what they’re getting for what they’re paying.

Meta Keyword Tag Not Important In SEO?

How important is Meta keyword tag for you? When it comes to achieving top search engine rankings how large of a role do keyword tags actually play? Simple question but not easy to answer right?

Although for the last few years we’ve known from testing and experience that the Meta Keywords tag has no or little influence in Google’s search engine rankings. It is only now that this has actually been confirmed by, Matt Cutts.

“Meta keywords are still given some weight by Yahoo! and Bing (Well that’s an assumption for Bing due to history with MSN. I haven’t tested Bing specifically). Meta keywords are also a recommended practice for web design by the W3 consortium.”
Now look at the SERPS and notice that only in Yahoo does the site appear number one. It is not even listed on Google or MSN. The takeaway is that while the importance of this tag is minimal, Yahoo still gives it some weight.

While Google have declared they no longer use the meta keywords tag in their ranking algorithms, the meta keywords tag still remains a useful way to reinforce the terms you think are important on the page. The meta keywords tag allows you to provide additional text for crawler-based search engines to index along with your body copy.

My suggestion is to try this test to your own website. Make up a keywords or keyword phrase and add it to your source code. Be patient because it will take time to see the result. Wait for a couple of weeks or months and then do a search on the major three search engines. Now you will know the true importance the keywords tag plays in SEO.