Tag Archives: marketing tool

Is email dead, or has social media taken over?

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Is email part of you PR Marketing Strategy, or do you only use Social Media?

There have been a lot of discussions about the future and what role email will be playing. Some people, even the COO of Facebook, Sheryl Sandberg, thinks email is on its way out and people will rely on social media to communicate. This could be possible, but not in any near future. I doubt in my lifetime this will happen. As some writers said, like Chris Crum at WebPro News, all (most of them) social media requires an email to subscribe, or become a member. So that doesn’t sound like the system of social networks has or is ready to abolish email as the means to communicate.email and social networking

We can only wait and see what new methods of communication develop over the next decade. Who knows, we may soon just think our thoughts and send them through brain waves. “Beam me up Scotty!”

Ok, enough said. This now brings me to the second part of this blog. How involved are your PR Clients with social media? Do you have a plan? Do you have a campaign in place? Writing one blog, or using twitter once or twice a week is not getting involved in social media. Social media can become a powerful marketing tool for any pr marketing strategy. If and when done correctly, results can be very positive. If you need to refresher course, just refer to some of my blogs that discuss “How to Use Linkedin to Increase Traffic“, or “Learn How to Use Social Media for PR Clients“. Or just click on the archive files to see many other related topics.

When you are ready to begin and implement a campaign, then give George Carson a call at 949-477-9400. It’s the social thing to do!

Why you need a Business Blog Site

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Blogging is still one of the most required media when creating a social network program. PR Clients need to make sure their blogging is done on a regular basis. Business blogs are necessary and helpful. Companies can control what is said about their people, products and services and can use their business blog sites to better understand the needs of employees. When done correctly, business blogs can help pr clients target thier customers needs by “listening’ to what is said. In turn, pr clients should respond to any negative or positive comments so customers feel a connection, which builds trust.

So what is different from a business blog vs a typical blog site? blogging

This important pr marketing tool helps you to communicate more effectively to customers and potential customers as well. Last year in April, a blog I wrote listed of a few companies’ that have business blogs. These will give you an idea of how other company’s use blogging to improve their position and image:

• Gizmodo

• Google Blog

• Loosetooth.com Shop Blog

 If you need more reasons why a business blog can improve your company’s position and image, give George Carson a call at 949-477-9400. It could be the best call you make this year!

Are you using Twitter to improve your PR Clients ranking?

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Seems the popularity of Twitter is slowing becoming a follower’s site rather than a business site. Let me explain. Yes, Twitter is great for those who want to know what celebrities are doing, or what your friends are doing at the time. But for pr clients, it can be a great marketing tool to get higher rankings in Google, as well as get more traffic to your web site.social networking

The great thing about Twitter, you can be a local orange county business, or a national company, even a global business and get people to follow you. So why, if you are a pr client, wouldn’t you want followers? It is a great pr marketing tool! When done correctly, you can actually increase traffic to your site. But remember, the content in those 140 characters need to be inviting. Don’t try to sell junk, or build traffic to only sell ad space on your site. Followers can be an important factor in growing your twitter name and your business web site.

I read a study by Rapleaf stating “active” Twitter users studied (40,000) had this in their report: “The most followed users gained followers at a faster rate than less popular users, contributing to a growing ‘popularity gap.'”  Also, “Users in the top 0.1% have around 5x as many followers as users in the top 1% and about 40x as many followers as users in the top 10%.”

Basically this is saying that many top celebs are being followed faster, and that people are more interested in the following than building their own followers. One writer uses the words “popularity gap” to explain this. That’s where the business part is loosing ground with this powerful pr marketing tool. If you understand this, it can actually be a good thing. Because you can use Twitter to build an awareness campaign for your service or business before too many companies realize the “gap” in their pr marketing strategy. So all you pr clients, wake up. Now is the time to improve your branding and increase traffic with Twitter. If not, your competition will just “twit” past you and gain more market share.

Email Marketing. It creates your business reputation.

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Are you aware that each email a company sends to prospects or clients builds their reputation, good or bad? Did you know that email marketing could create positive or negative publicity?

Publicity is everywhere! I keep telling my pr clients and all publicity people that sending emails builds a company’s brand and image. If you typically send unsolicited emails to new prospects, make sure these are opt-in names. If you are constantly being sent notifications of spamming, then your reputation goes south. Even poorly written emails can establish a good or negative campaign faster than the publicity campaign you budgeted for the year.

Why is it then pr clients are constantly overlooking this aspect in their company? Because we all feel that email is not a real “business” practice and view it as a one-to-one friendly way of communicating with others. In reality, it is the most powerful tool we use daily. It is this tool that builds a company’s reputation, or destroys it. Just like blogging has become recognized as a powerful marketing tool, so is email. Yet we are more concerned what a blogger, or blog article says about a company or its products.  Not realizing that we may not speak as openly in an email, our style of writing, how we say things all add up to building the reputation.

Another viewpoint of email reputation can be found in an article at the iMedia Connection site. The article titled “Mind Your Email Reputation” has a different perspective on this subject that supports what I am saying. And if you still don’t feel your email reputation has nay affect, or effect, ask people outside of your company to read a few of the business emails. Better yet, follow up with a phone call to those B2B clients who haven’t responded, or ask your competitors what they think your reputation is. Sure, you may not get a true answer from a competitor, but why not ask them and or others in your industry.

Start building a solid email reputation by establishing guidelines that everyone in the company follows. From how the “subject” line is written to how you sign your name, each part will play an important role in your company’s reputation. Give us a call if you want an outside objective critique of how your emails are helping your reputation. Ask for George Carson when you call. He can be reached at Carson Marketing, Inc., 949-477-9400.