MarketMeSuite, a social media marketing dashboard for small- and mid-sized business, has teamed up with high-quality  business card production specialist MOO to offer a new breed of customizable ‘Social Cards’.

The ‘Let’s Actually Talk’ Social Card is a fresh approach to the traditional business card that provides an opportunity to transform offline interactions into online conversations; leading to deeper engagement via social media channels.

Each MarketMeSuite Social Card centers around the holder’s most valuable social media contact information. By sharing social channels with new contacts and prospects, MarketMeSuite Social Card holders can manage further interactions through social media engagement, in addition to traditional emails or phone calls.

MarketMeSuite’s partnership with MOO offers the first 50 cards free at http://bit.ly/MarketMeSuiteMoo to anyone looking to equip themselves with this new type of customizable business card. Each card pack can contain up to ten different color and content variations.

Tammy Kahn Fennell, CEO of MarketMeSuite said: “Social Cards are an offline invitation to online collaboration. Sometimes people find it easier and more valuable to communicate on social in 140 characters or less vs. more traditional methods. Modern business networking is social; it’s all about engagement. A follow-up conversation on LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter can be more engaging, especially when combined with MarketMeSuite’s Inbox For Social^TM.

Fennell concluded: “The initial spark for Social Cards came when I accidentally ordered a batch of business cards forgetting to include my phone and email contact information. My colleagues said I was ‘bold and edgy’. After the initial shock wore off, I felt the same and wanted to share it as a tool to help MarketMeSuite’s small business and professional customers boost their social engagement by leveraging their offline interactions.”

MarketMeSuite and MOO believe that small businesses and professionals will use Social Cards to help close sales cycles, nurture long term leads and capitalize on opportunities over social media that would otherwise be missed by filling the social gap between offline meetings and online conversations.

Rebeka Fluet, Senior Marketing Manager at MOO said: “MarketMeSuite and MOO are both committed to creating genuine connections.  For small business owners, it’s imperative to continue the lifecycle of offline networking to online channels to move the needle. With our partnership, we are creating a vehicle to drive key relationships along.”

Will you by trying the social card? Let us know by commenting!

The new privacy policy and terms of service documents add a few new elements like new arbitration rules and rules for  affiliate sharing , but do not contain any of the advertising language that led many users to get up on arms about Instagram of trying to sell their photos without compensation.

Here’s that language that Instagram attempted to put into their privacy policy, but has be been removed:

Some or all of the Service may be supported by advertising revenue. To help us deliver interesting paid or sponsored content or promotions, you agree that a business or other entity may pay us to display your username, likeness, photos (along with any associated metadata), and/or actions you take, in connection with paid or sponsored content or promotions, without any compensation to you.

According to the latest blog post from Instagram:

Here are a few key updates:

• Nothing has changed about your photos’ ownership or who can see them.
• Our updated privacy policy helps Instagram function more easily as part of Facebook by being able to share info between the two groups. This means we can do things like fight spam more effectively, detect system and reliability problems more quickly, and build better features for everyone by understanding how Instagram is used.
• Our updated terms of service help protect you, and prevent spam and abuse as we grow.

This is just a small preview. Our new Privacy Policy and Terms of Service will be effective on January 16, 2013.

 What Do You Think?

Are you more comfortable contributing to the photo sharing site? Were you ever uncomfortable? Share your thoughts by commenting below!

Save the Blogging for Facebook

Your professional website site is where you will have all the slick ad copy, graphics and cool themes.  Your Facebook page is where you want to do your blogging, post news happenings and so forth.  This is your friendly page, hence the term social networking.

That said, do actually blog on Facebook.  Nothing is more of a turnoff than to visit a company’s Facebook page and see that it hasn’t been updated in months, or years even.  Some companies create a Facebook page with minimal information and then forget about it.  Why even bother?  They are losing out on the opportunity of a lifetime.

Post a really good bargain on your Facebook page and encourage your customers to share it with their friends.  You’ll get new customers without having to pay for any advertising.  And since you’re not paying for the advertising, you can afford to make it a really enticing bargain.

Don’t Spam Your Customers

If you post too often on Facebook, friends and customers may not go so far as to unfriend you, but they will turn off your posts, which is like unfriending you without you knowing it.  We all have friends who seem to have nothing better to do than update their status on Facebook, and they’re just plain annoying.  When a business does it, we have no compunction with turning them off.

Every other day is about the most frequently a business should post updates to Facebook.  Posts should be interesting and of real value, as well as short and to the point.  Some good topics for Facebook updates are significant discount offers, brand new products available, expanded business hours, addition of a new employees, as in a new hairdresser at a salon or masseuse at a spa, or anything else that might be of actual interest to the customers.

Social Media is a Two-Way Street

The great thing about Facebook and other social media sites is that your customers can give you feedback.  Be sure to respond to customer comments right away.  This shows that you’re active on your site and that you care.  And don’t delete the occasional negative comment.  Customers hate that; it’s like hanging up on them.  Instead, respond as reasonably and politely as you can.  Remember, the customer is always right, even when they’re wrong.  Other customers will see crabby remarks for what they are and admire your tactfulness and restraint.

 Don’t Make it All About You

Your Facebook page is not your website, it’s a forum.  It’s a place where you can engage your customers in interesting, relevant discussions.  Bring in fresh content from other sites, the news, wherever you can find it.  Let your customers get to know you, by showing them what you’re interested in.  They don’t need your curriculum vitae, although you can put relevant qualifications on your information page, once.

Mind Your P’s and Q’s

We’re not talking about please and thank you here, but punctuation errors and questionable grammar.  Rather than typing your blog posts straight into the Facebook page, try composing them in a word processing document, one with some form of spell check.  This will allow you to come up with a thoughtful, well composed post and make sure that it’s grammatically correct at the same time.  Cut and paste your finished post into your Facebook page.  Save a document with all your posts for your own records.

Facebook and other social networking sites are a great tool to develop a successful relationship with your customers, but like any other tool, it needs to be used the right way and for the right purpose!

Image Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/stoneysteiner/5713704415/

“With the Poke app, you can poke or send a message, photo, or video to Facebook friends to share what you’re up to in a lightweight way,” says Facebook in a blog post announcing the new app.

Twitter-style messages

Ycan choose from a set of icons at the bottom of the screen to send a poke, but you can only type a 120-character message (similar to Twitter’s own 140 character limit).  You then open the camera to snap a picture (you cannot choose an existing photo from your camera roll, but you can add fun doodles or text on top of the picture you do take), or shoot a 10-second video. You can choose how long other person can see your message or photo (1, 3, 5 or 10 seconds), add a location if you like, then choose one or more of your Facebook friends from the list and hit send.

When you receive a “Poke” you tap and hold until the little countdown clock in the corner runs down, and the message is “gone” forever. You can see a list of who send you messages, but not view them again.

According to Heather Kelly of CNN:

“The app Poke shamelessly imitates is Snapchat, a photo and video-sharing service that has surged in popularity over the past year year. It’s no mystery why Facebook is jumping on the temporary message bandwagon. Snapchat says it has millions of users who send around 50 million messages a day. It is also popular with the highly valuable younger age group, though it doesn’t currently have ads or any other way of making money off of its service. The Facebook Poke app is also ad-free for the time being.”

Privacy Concerns

The messages are meant to be gone forever, but what if you take a screenshot?  Both Poke and Snapchat warn the sender when the recipient has grabbed a screenshot of their message.

“If you ever see something you’re uncomfortable with, you can click the gear menu and report it,” says the company in the post. In the app’s help center there are instructions for what to do when someone takes a screenshot against your will. That section helpfully links to a post on what to do when an adult is making you uncomfortable, and another on what to do when someone requests nude photos.

The is not the first iOS app to join the main Facebook app. There is also Facebook Messenger and Facebook Camera.

Generation C

To be clear, “Generation C” is not delineated by a decade of birth, as with Baby Boomers or the Millennials–but it’s an umbrella term for a generation of consumers connected through social media and mobile devices. Your son who helped you program your smartphone is a member of Generation C, as is your bachelor uncle who stays on top of developing technologies. The key to this new generation is the connectedness of its members. There is a developing sense of social influence among Generation C and those who use tools for social media marketing. The idea of clear, transparent communication and advocacy of brands and ideals has rapidly grown online.

Image Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/donkeyhotey/6967029762/

Activism

The idea of advocacy through social media has changed the idea of social activism. Those who are wary and don’t understand the changing landscape are quick to use the term “slacktivism,” but a sharing of ideals online can serve as a gateway to action. This tendency is a great opportunity for social media marketers who know how to communicate to the online ego of Generation C. By developing your company’s online presence and interacting with users, you cultivate a relationship that will hopefully turn a simple fan into a true brand advocate.

Sharing

The reason critics are unimpressed by today’s brand of activism is due to its simple nature – a click of a button and a status update constitute “taking a stand” in many minds. However, this habit of sharing what we had for lunch, where we went after dinner, who we saw and what we did are powerful habits to be used in a social media campaign. Once you’ve cultivated a relationship with your consumer, many are more likely to share your company’s message and become brand advocates, powerful word of mouth social users. While you may be appalled by the amount of personal information that is shared on Facebook and Twitter, do not underestimate its power as a means for marketing. It is ripe with users who need to hear about your company and can also provide you with some easy customer data for future campaigns.

The Internet has changed almost every aspect of modern life. Those who have embraced the social aspects of the digital world comprise a unique segment of the population that is comfortable sharing their location and data with their friends and followers. Cultivating positive relationships with these powerful users can result not only in repeater customers, but in new business when done effectively.

Instagram is no longer allowing Twitter users to view its photographs in tweets in an effort to drive more people away from the rival social media company to its own website.

Kevin Systrom, the CEO of the photo-sharing service that was snapped up by Facebook earlier this year, announced today that Instagram has turned off support for ‘Twitter cards,’ signaling a deepening rift between two of the web’s biggest brands.

Twitter users started to complain earlier this week in public messages that Instagram photos were not displaying properly on Twitter’s website.

Clarifying the situation today, Mr Systrom released a statement saying: ‘We believe the best experience is for us to link back to where the content lives.’

Bitter Rivalry?

The rivalry between Facebook and Twitter was perhaps not helped when Facebook outbid Twitter to purchase Instagram in a cash-and-stock deal valued at the time at $1 billion.  (Due to Facebook’s stock drop, the acquisition eventually closed in September for roughly $715 million.)

Facebook wasn’t the first to block, though. In July, Twitter blocked Instagram from using its data to help new Instagram users find friends, so perhaps we shouldn’t be shocked. But Zuckerberg did state, in his blog post after the acquisition: “

‘We think the fact that Instagram is connected to other services beyond Facebook is an important part of the experience,’ Mr Zuckerberg wrote. ‘We plan on keeping features like the ability to post to other social networks.’“

Strictly speaking, users can still do this. The only feature being disabled is the ability to view it in the tweet stream (photo left). In the future, users can upload to Twitter and a link will be posted, allowing the user to click and view the content on Instagram itself.

One has to wonder if this is really about feuding with Twitter, or more about Instagram transcending mobile to create a more web-based network. Until recently, unless you were on your phone, you couldn’t interact with anything on the Instagram site, which you now can.

What Do You Think?

Knowing that you Instagram pictures will no longer be embedded in your tweets, will this affect your use of either platform?

What does this mean for you? 

Well, get ready to sit down for at least 30 minutes while you stroll down memory lane.  In testing the effects of this glitch, I’ve noticed a few interesting things.

It’s not only groups you’ve joined…

Facebook still has an option to add someone to a group. It is then up to the user to leave if they are not happy.  This is still the case today. An unfortunate side effect of this glitch is that it’s also bringing those groups people have added you to (even ones you swiftly left) back from the dead. Here at my office, some of the gang found it pretty funny going through the list, especially when one male co-worker was added  (in what must have been a joke at the time) to the group entitled “I hate getting my period.”

According to Facebook’s own privacy statement:

 Can I prevent people from adding me to a new group?

Facebook may have tipped its hand a bit about what data they store.  It’s reasonable to assume that when you leave a group, it is forgotten, but clearly it is stored in the rich data history Facebook has for each and every member. I suppose this is not a big surprise, we all know Facebook hoards a lot of data, but it’s slightly unsettling.

No Multi Delete

A lot of this could have been saved if Facebook put in a multi-delete button at the top of the groups page. Simply being able to select all at once and removing would make this task take about 3 minutes tops.

Moving On…

We may wake up tomorrow and find out Facebook sorted the problem and everything is back to normal, but in this fast paced rapid development world, I wouldn’t count on it. Chances are you’ll be left to take care of it yourself. I suppose it’s a good reminder that humans make errors, when even Facebook engineers make mistakes! So, sit back, and enjoy the trip down group memory lane…  I’m sure you’re having a better day than whoever is responsible for the glitch at Facebook .

Header Image Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/opendemocracy/5811017623/

Having spent the last 5 years focusing on how Social Media can increase sales and brand awareness, I wanted to share with you some great case studies that have happened to me over the past four weeks that proves how successful a multi-channel experience can be.

First, I used an online application called Slideshare which allows users to upload and share publicly or privately PowerPoint presentations, Word documents and Adobe PDF Portfolios. I spent over four hours creating a Facebook for Business presentation for one of my trade show seminars. Once I had finished it, I uploaded it to Slideshare. After three days and 115 views, I noticed on my twitter mention stream, the below tweet.

Slideshare had actually chosen my presentation as “Presentation of the day”. They have over 73,000 followers on Twitter alone. Within three minutes of their tweet, my presentation went from 115 views to over 8,000. This one tweet was so powerful from Slideshare because some of their community went on to ‘pay it forward’ and the presentation now has grown to 12,500 views. (Picture below)

I then went on to write a blog based on the Slideshare presentation which further validated the power of social media. The “Facebook for Business” blog attracted more attention from my readers and as show below, it was shared over 130 times, generating more views of the presentation via the blog.

In the blog, I shared a link to a Facebook for Business webinar, based on the original presentation. I took this blog and ‘pinned it’ to my Pinterest account. This was then picked up by one of my followers and ‘repinned’ to their board.

Not only did that person sign up to the webinar, and attend; one of their followers who saw the ‘pin’ on their board, signed up to the webinar. This allowed me to capture their email address and add that my database. The same happened inside of Twitter. One of my followers retweeted my tweet and she, along with two of her followers signed up to my webinar.

I then received an email from an event organiser in Slovakia who saw my presentation from one of their followers who retweeted it, and contacted me. I am now asked to speak at their event later this year. I was also contacted by a TV personality who has asked for my help in generating traffic to their online store. I also shared the presentation on my Facebook Fan Page and Google+ Profile.

After seeing how much interaction I had around my Social Network accounts, I decided to check my Klout score. I was pleased to see my score had jumped up and I had become a strong influencer of Facebook.

This marketing was 100% free and started in one place. Social Media works as snowball effect if utilised to its fullest. I have proved that anything is possible with Social Media if you use the right networks and the right tools.

Header Image Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/29148810@N05/5440728466/

Why social media works

Social media is a new development when it comes to online marketing and many companies are still exploring different ways to connect with customers on social media networks. What we do know is it’s an excellent opportunity to create another point of contact. Cross-channel marketing focuses on a company’s ability to connect with potential customers over many different mediums, including mail, social media, stores and commercials. Of all the offerings, social media seems most promising to create successful cross-channel marketing because of its peer-to-peer accessibility. Marketers have explored numerous exciting strategies with social marketing, such as giving discounts or prizes to users who retweet messages or “like” your status. Doing this, you learn a lot about your customer—what their interests are, how willing they are to learn about your service or product—and you can communicate more effectively with them using that data.

Image Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/smemon/5167671844/

Why email works

Email marketing creates a direct path between you and potential customers. While people feel connected with social media, a person’s email remains a direct, more personal link. Because of this, small businesses still value email marketing the most and have witnessed impressive results. Social media can be especially useful to learn how people respond to content you provide on a whole, but email marketing gives you the ability to target specific interests. Opt-in email forms, through which customers provide their email address to your company, are the optimum connection your business has with customers online. What experts have called marketing gold, permission to email means the potential customer is willing to listen to your message and expects you to contact them. The key is to know what kind of content they will respond to best.

How social media and email work together

Web entrepreneur Edwin Huertas recommends an easy six-step plan to connect social media and email, suggesting companies use information and data gathered from social media responses to generate a newsletter that focuses on the content customers initially responded to. In this way, social media acts as a learning device to better articulate your message in emails. In other cases, experts suggest that email is the best way to connect with your customers and social media is the best way to spread your message.

If you streamline your message and create content based on the information you’ve received from your customer base, the order in which you communicate your message shouldn’t matter. The goal is cross-channel marketing and to maintain a consistent presence in multiple mediums. Get to know your customers better and make changes to meet their needs.