Google tells business not to create Google+ profiles. Why?

Google has revealed that it is working on a Google+ experience for businesses and is asking brands not to create Google+ profiles just yet.

In a post and accompanying YouTube video on Google+, Product Manager Christian Oestlien says that the Google+ team is working on creating a unique experience for businesses that includes deep analytics and the ability to connect to products like AdWords. “How users communicate with each other is different from how they communicate with brands,” Oestlien argues.

As a result, Google is asking businesses to put their Google+ ambitions on hold for now,

“The business experience we are creating should far exceed the consumer profile in terms of its usefulness to businesses,” Oestlien says in his post. “We just ask for your patience while we build it. In the meantime, we are discouraging businesses from using regular profiles to connect with Google+ users. Our policy team will actively work with profile owners to shut down non-user profiles.”

Several prominent brands have already joined Google+, and while the new Google+ experience for businesses won’t be ready until “later this year,” the company intends to launch a “small experiment with a few marketing partners” to test the brand-oriented accounts over the next few months. It even has opened up a Google spreadsheet where “non-user entities” can apply for the program. It’s unclear when Google will shut down non-user profiles or how the process will work.

It's suprising that Google wasn’t more prepared for the wave of brands that have been joining its social network. The same thing happened with Google Buzz and has happened on Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare and countless other social networks. Brands like to go where their customers are.  I wonder if this will go the way of other new social tools back where it came from.

Ranking Factors Released from SEOmoz

Since 2005, SEOmoz has released a new version of the Search Ranking Factors survey every two years, a piece of content that many in the SEO world have used and referenced. This year, they've continued that tradition and added a whole new element of research, comparing the aggregated opinions of 132 SEOs around the world with correlation data from over 10,000 results in Google.

Ignore this at your peril because this is really the key to more traffic through higher search rankings. 


~Souce~  SEOmoz - The Daily Blog - http://seomz.me/mcRzE0

Top Facebook Brands - Jump on the Brand Wagon Now!

Steven Carpenter is an entrepreneur that writes the TechCrunch Teardown series that looks at the business models of consumer Internet companies. His last post looked at the top Facebook brand pages to see how successfully some brands were using social media to connect with their consumers.  We could all learn a lesson from what he found.
Sadly businesses, particularly small businesses are still not getting the most out of Facebook and Twitter, they continue to think that they can just bury their heads in the sand and believe that the social media revolution will just pass they by. They make a few half-hearted attempts to post a few words and sit back waiting for the masses to flock to them. But the larger brands know that they need to connect and engage people whilst they are not looking. They have realised the benefit in having conversations with their consumers about interests they have so that when they do want their products or services they already have a relationship with them.

*For the purpose of his research he only looked at companies with brand pages that had a fanbase of over 500,000 users in December in order to get the best measurement of this particular platform.


Top 10 Facebook Brand Pages “Like” Growth (Q1 2011)

Brand Page	Dec, 2010	Apr, 2011	Change
Coca-Cola	20,181,591	25,390,573	26%
Starbucks	18,647,055	21,016,173	13%
Oreo	15,530,714	18,370,449	18%
Disney	14,648,296	20,734,994	42%
Skittles	14,036,623	16,027,104	14%
Red Bull	13,973,519	17,555,541	26%
Converse All Star	11,729,775	16,020,477	37%
Victoria’s Secret	10,465,744	12,481,227	19%
Pringles	8,192,066	11,865,755	45%
Monster Energy	7,464,850	9,663,686	29%

Interestingly Facebook itself grew it’s users by 13.7% (from 585 million to 665 million, in terms of raw numbers of accounts) so you may expect to see the top brands seeing a multiple of this considering the nascent stage and untapped potential of commerce on Facebook. Conversely, if a brand page’s growth lags that of Facebook’s in general, it may be an early indicator of a stalled social media strategy.

He futher analysed the top 165 Facebook brand pages, and realised that many of the top brands on Facebook continue to experience strong fan growth (up to 245%) even those who had bases of multi-million fans.  Proof if ever the doubting Thomass' needed it that this marketing tool is nowhere near slowing down (in fact the opposite is true).
(See the full list here: http://techcrunch.com/2011/05/14/teardown-top-facebook-brand-page-growth/)

Here are Steven's Top 10 Takeaways:

1. Only 10 top brand pages grew their audience 100%+ last quarter and only three (Hollister, Sour Patch Kids, Trident Chewing Gum) saw 200% or more growth.
2. 31 brand pages (19% of the total) grew less than the overall Facebook growth rate of 14%. Starbucks, the 2nd largest brand page on Facebook, was the largest brand in the bottom 31. By contrast, Coca-Cola, Facebook’s largest brand, grew 26%, and Disney, the new No. 3 most popular brand, grew its fans by 42%.
3. Food and apparel retail are two categories of note that appear to be among the fastest growth areas. This is interesting considering consumption for these products mostly occur offline.
4. Apparel retailers, specifically, seem to be doing a better job of tying their retail store promotions to their Facebook presence. Interesting to note that Hollister and Abercrombie are No. 1 and No. 4, respectively, and are owned by the same company. American Eagle, Forever 21, H&M, and Zara are all doing something right.
5. Walmart was the No. 12 fastest-growing fan page, adding 2.5 million fans. Along with its recent acquisition of Kosmix, I believe Walmart will continue to invest heavily in social, commerce, and campaigns.
6. In the next decile, quick-serve restaurants such as Domino’s, Pizza Hut, In-N-Out Burger, and Wendy’s appear to signal another trend worth noting. The key question for these firms is how to drive restaurant visits and sales from these pages when food is, by definition, offline activity.
7. Fanning specific niche passion products (Olive Garden bread sticks, Sharpie markers, Swedish Fish, Cookie Dough) and seasonal items (Cadbury Eggs) may plateau when the initial novelty and/or the natural “audience” for those products is achieved.
8. Inter-category brand differences are evident and warrant further investigation. For example, why are Hollister, Abercrombie, and Forever 21 growing so much faster than Wet Seal (27%) and Pac Sun (42%)? And why do these same three brands have 3X-4X more fans than their competition?
9. An interesting brand story is happening right now in Dove soap. While Dove did not qualify for his initial analysis because it only had 271,000 fans in December, it’s 340% growth made it the No. 1 fastest 1-million fan brand page in my analysis.
10. As brands achieve critical mass and become more comfortable investing in their Facebook presence, they will become far more concerned with fan engagement, fan differentiation, loyalty and efficacy. The key question is: once they have an audience, what will they do with it?

That's the key question but smaller businesses do need to have a strategy in a smaller way because if these large brands are placing emphasis and importance on their popularity growth through Facebook then the rest must follow or get left behind.

To read the whole article from source please follow this link : http://techcrunch.com/2011/05/14/teardown-top-facebook-brand-page-growth/

New Clients for Web Star

We've not posted for ages and the reason why is that we have been busy getting new clients and designing some fantastic new websites.   The last two months have also seen some mega interest on the optimisation front and also social media marketing.

Websites need to be promoted......I'll say it again.......websites need to be promoted and that's just what we are doing we are promoting some websites and running campaigns to target followers for social media accounts such as Facebook and Twitter -  and here are some of our results:

• Facebook account - increased friends to over 1800 within a 3 month period.
• Increase in sales by 572% over a period of 3 months.
• Decrease in bounce rate over a period of 6 weeks from 62% to 28%.
• Increase in CTR (click through rate) on Adwords from less than 1% to over 8% in 4 weeks.

How did we manage to produce these amazing results?  Give us a call to find out.
Tel: 01625 821072     Mob: 07784 128016

Why use Social Media for your business?

Over the last number of weeks I’ve been coaching and advising a few people on using Social Media to promote their business. Normally when you mention Social Media people's eyes glaze over and you can see their thoughts turning to more interesting topics, such as paint drying or cleaning out the cat litter.

Because most people do not understand the energy (dare I say 'hype') and cannot for the life of them see why they would need 'online social media' to run a business - in other words Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or a blog, I believe that many are taking the “wait and see” approach and frankly hoping that it will all die a horrible death and go the way of other .com trends.

Sadly however much you resist this new sector you simply must keep up with the pace. Online communities are the prime weapon of choice for anyone under 30 and it is now seen as an acceptable and quick way to communicate to your audience. We live in an open society. Knowledge used to be power. Now sharing is power - are you sharing?

If you are still undecided then we will be posting some information about Social Networking in the next few posts to help you decide if it is right for you.......and here are a few reasons why you need to think about using social media for your business - don't get left behind because the consumer is in the driving seat here and if you don't jump on the wagon with them, someone else will.

Why use Blogs, Facebook , Twitter and LinkedIn?


You need a Blog to:
• improve your search results in Google - blogs can increase search results by up to 75%
• showcase your skills, services and products
• give up-to-the-minute news and events quickly to your readers
• promote yourself as an expert in your field
• engage in conversations with visitors to your blog


A Facebook page can help you to:
• chat more informally about your services and products
• listen to your customers
• share help and advice related to your business
• drive visitors to your homepage / blog where there are calls-to-action
• learn more about your audience

It’s great to be on Twitter to:
• chat more informally with customers
• listen to what’s being said about you and your competitors
• be on the look out for news that’s related to your industry=
• drive visitors to your blog or facebook page
• share useful and helpful information in a friendly way
• show a different side of your company personality


LinkedIn can benefit you by:
• acquire new customers through online recommendations and word of mouth
• find business partners to work with
• build an industry network
• get answers quickly from people you can trust
• win new business by answering questions in your area of expertise
• share unique blog content
• keep your friends close and your competition closer


If you need some help or advice getting started then give us a call - it's free to chat and we can help you decide if Social Media would benefit your business, or if you have a question email it to us and we will get right back to you.

Call on Tel:  01625 821072    |    Mob: 07784 128016  

Email: michelle@yourwebstar.co.uk

Strangers, Friends and Lovers - What does it mean?

Upside Down Marketing  - Because sometimes you need to turn things upside-down to see it clearly.

Say you think of your clients and potential clients in four simple categories:

• Strangers - a broad market, they don't know who you are.
• Friends - prospective clients, you've met, they know who you are, but they haven't bought from you so you're not that close yet!
• Lovers - current clients, who love you.
• Ex-lovers - ex-clients who have fallen out of love with you!

HOW TO BE CONVENTIONAL:

Most business budget their time and money as follows:

• 60%  -  Strangers
• 30%  -  Friends
• 10%  -  Lovers

They spend most of their marketing  effort focusing on people they don't really know.

NOW TURN CONVENTION UPSIDE-DOWN:

It's mad to spend most of your time and money on people who don't event know who you are.  It makes no sense at all.  If you were a betting person you'd only bet where there's the best chance of getting a result.  Yet you're betting all your time and money on getting the worst results possible.

What about this for a mad idea?  Spend your time and money like this:

• 10%  -  Strangers
• 30%  -  Friends
• 60%  -  Lovers

The greatest effort with the people who already think that you are great - they already love you, and by spending more time and money with them they will spread the word.  They will act as your ambassadors, your 'raving fans'.  They know your strengths and weaknesses; they can help by spreading the word or giving you warm referrals.

Top Tip:  Spend a little time considering this piece of upside-down thinking - in the right business this process will increase your marketing effectiveness tremendously - GUARANTEED! 

What's new at Your Web Star

Its' ages since we posted but we've been so busy which is great.  We've got some new clients and have uploaded some great websites.....so what's been happening?

Sale Domestic Appliances contacted us and need a website in a hurry. Their previous site had gone down and they had no web presence.  Sale Domestic Applicances sell, repair and install all kinds of domestic applicaces. The brief was to provide a simple website that would be able to develop into internet selling in the future. 

They wanted to be able to update the website themselves and add new images and information when it suited them so we provided a really simple CMS that they found really easy to use.
 
Visit their website and if you would like a website like this for your business.  Call us on 01625 821072 or email michelle@yourwebstar.co.uk

Bambooo Childcare contacted us and asked for advice on how to optimise their website.  We suggested adding a blog because blog posts get optimised and can get quick results without much expense.

We added a blog to their existing website and the cost was just £150.00.  After a few months they have reported that they are now appearing on the first page of google organically when you type in ‘nanny agency Manchester’ or childcare agency Manchester’. 

Visit bamboo childcare at:  http://www.bamboochildcare.co.uk/ and take a look at their blog.

If you would like to talk to us about providing a blog to your existing website call us on 01625 821072 or email michelle@yourwebstar.co.uk

Special People North works exclusively with children and young people with a wide variety of special needs.  They first approached us last year to optimise their website.  After looking at all the options they decided to develop a new site and update their image.

It was important to keep the logo,  but we changed the colour slightly to fit into their new design.

The easy CMS systems means they can update their website whenever they like and saving costly designer fees and a blog lets them pass on important information to the public, their visitors and their clients.

A tight budget meant we prioritised the work they needed doing immediately from development work which could be staged over the next year.

Their new site has been a hit with their target audience and early feedback has been good in addition their visitors are up by 33%. 

Visit their website at http://www.specialpeoplenorth.org.uk/ and if you would like to talk to us about a website like this for your business call us on 01625 821072 or email michelle@yourwebstar.co.uk.