Marketing

Social media marketing has two important aspects. The first, SMO, refers to on-page tactics through which a webmaster can improve a website for the age of social media. Such optimisation includes adding links to services such as Digg, Reddit and Delicious so that their pages can be easily ‘saved and submitted’ to and for these services. Social media marketing, on the other hand, is about building ways that fans of a brand or company can promote it themselves in multiple online social media venues. (from Wikipedia).

Communities: WeAreMedia ‘Spreading awareness and generating buzz’.

Networks: NTEN’s Emarketing for Good Affinity Group (free).

Consultants: Katya Anderson’sNon-profit Marketing blog; Beth Kanter’s How to Think Like a Non-profit Social Media Marketing Genius presentation; Jocelyn Harmon’s Marketing for Non-profits blog; Jon Rognerud’s Social media Marketing Beginner’s Guide; Webcredible’s Social Media Marketing Guide; Kivi Leroux Miller’s Non-profit Marketing Guide.

Organisations: NPower Seattle’s Tech-Savvy Communications: A Toolkit for Non-profits.

Blogs: Nedra Kline Weinreich’s Strategic Social Marketing for Non-profits post; Ben Willis’ The Five Pillars of Social Media Marketing post; Chris Abraham’s Online Social Media Marketing is a Must post.

Tools: Anywhere you have a profile or presence (a website, a profile page, or even a comment on a blog).

Data sources: Research and data from eMarketer; Cass Business School Centre for Charity Effectiveness Charity Marketing Survey Analysis conducted by RSM Robson Rhodes.

Publications: Social Media Marketing: An Hour a Day by Susan Bratton and Dave Evans;Advertising 2.0: Social Media Marketing in a Web 2.0 World by Tracy L. Tuten; The Social Media Marketing Manifesto: A Guide to Networking Branding and Awareness by Tamar Weinberg;The DIY Guide to Marketing: For Charities and Voluntary Organisations by Moi Ali; Purple Cow by Seth Godin; The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell; The Cluetrain Manifesto by Rick Levine, Christopher Locke, Doc Searls and David Weinberger.

 

10 Search Engine Marketing tips

By Lucy Langdon, Search Marketer at Distilled

Distilled are a vibrant online marketing company who specialise in online reputation management, search engine marketing and website design. www.distilled.co.uk

  1. Your website needs to be read both by visitors and by the search engines. Speak in your visitors' language, keep things simple, and you're well on your way to making your site search engine friendly as well.
  2. It's really important to check you're using the same keywords as your potential visitors. Otherwise, how else will they find you? Use tools like SEObook's keyword suggestion tool to make sure you've got your finger on the pulse.
  3. Title tags are very important for SEO. They appear in the bar of your browser and on the search engine results page. There are three basic rules: each page should have a unique title tag; each title tag should naturally include the keyword/s for its page; the title tag should be fewer than 65 characters.
  4. Like title tags, header tags tell your visitors and the search engines what's important on each particular page. Again, three rules: put your most competitive keyword for the page in an h1 tag; only have one h1 tag per page; put your other keyword/s in h2, h3, h4 etc tags.
  5. There are no golden rules about how many times to use your keywords in on page copy. If you write naturally for your visitors, the copy should naturally appeal to the search engines as well.
  6. Visitors and search engines need to be able to find their way around your website. Make sure the navigation is straightforward; links should be prominent and, if possible, they should use the keyword of the page they are pointing to.
  7. Search engines need to know they can trust your site and that their users will appreciate finding you. One of the ways they do this is by looking at that sites link to yours- it's a bit like a recommendation or endorsement. Think about how and where you can get some natural links from around the web.
  8. Google is the main player when it comes to search engines. If the traffic it sends to your site is important to you, you should play by its rules. There are lots of 'guidelines', but here are the two most important: Don't pay for links and don't cloak content (show different content to users and search engines).
  9. Visitors and search engines alike have a relatively short attention span. Be concise. Try and put all your most important information close to the top of each page.
  10. There is a lot to learn about SEO. SEOmoz.org [http://www.seomoz.org] is a great repository of accurate information and will keep you up to date on all the industry news.

How to make the most out of Google Adsense

By Manny Hernandez, TuDiabetes

If you run your network on Ning, there is a good chance that you will choose to control your own ads, to help you monetise your network.

One of the most popular options for running ads (though certainly not the only one) is Google AdSense. A lot has been written about this, so I am focusing these tips on the things that have worked the most for me:

  • Include your Google AdSense code in a place where the ads get as many impressions (pageviews) as possible.
  • Place your ads code where the ads will get a higher chance of being clicked on: it is clicks on ads, not impressions alone, that will result on revenue for you.
  • Try to balance placement of your ads with a healthy member experience: if you make your ads too intrusive, you may alienate a few people who may find your site too annoyingly commercial.
  • Grow your network and make sure there is relevant, fresh content on it. This is important because Google Ads are contextual, so they ‘feed’ of the topic being written about on the page and serve ads that are pertinent to it.
  • Keep an eye on the ads: occasionally unscrupulous advertisers will pay their way to get their ads positioned among your network's Google Ads. You can make use of AdSense's Competitive Ad Filter to get rid of the offending URL.