Social Media At Alltop

While working on Social Media many a times you may need information to know what is taking place on the Social Media world map. At other instances you may want ideas to boost your thinking when you are about to write a blog post. There are couple of spaces on the net which can enable you to have good matter for your content. One such space is alltop.com .

Here you can search for a range of topics and get to know the answers to your questions. What's more alltop has information on other fields as well. So go on check out alltop and share you views on what you think of this space.

I work as Freelance Social Media Network Online Professional. We have an active Social Media community at my Facebook Business Page. You can experience / see demonstration of Social Media and Community Management at http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia . To discover, share, interact, network, have question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia  http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia

The Difference Between A Casual Usage And The Professional Usage On Social Media

Community Management on Social Media sites like Facebook is not just about having a Fan / Business Page set up. A Social Media professional cannot use their Facebook Page the way a casual user consumes Facebook.

There is a definite difference in the way [reason] a casual user consumes Facebook as against the Social Media professional. The obvious difference is that a casual user logs into Facebook to know what his / her network is doing 'what's up!?'. The casual user is more into 'checking out' on latest happenings with their connections. Will be passing on /sharing of photos, videos. They will be commenting on posts and liking other people's comments and posts, photos and videos and so on.

What is the different thing that the Social Media professional would be doing? On the face of it we would say the same things. Well both seem to be doing similar things, reason being that the site provides certain functionality and both use it to the optimal benefit.

The difference is in the motive, the difference is in the objective the difference is in the reason to be there.

The professional utilizes the site's functions a little more optimally than the casual user. The casual user is not too much into RnD on the site. While the professional will check for developments and try to find out new things so that they can connect better with their community members. For instance take a look at the tabs - our casual friend will not be so concerned while our professional will be checking on ways to enhance their Page.

The conversations are flowed towards the Page's thoughts and philosophy by our Professional while the casual user will start and intersect on any conversation. Even sharing of photos and videos are planned by the Professional.

Social Media professional has a marketing objective. Understands customer relationships and manages them. Listens into the talks and makes them into engaging conversations. They portray the brand personality and try to live up-to the brand print / philosophy. They understand the principles of direct marketing and at the same time they know that they do not need to do hard sales and shout their sales messages as a one way communication.

Just because there is an active user on Social Media sites does not make him / her a Professional. 

We have an active Social Media community at my Facebook Business Page. You can experience / see demonstration of Social Media and Community Management at http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia . To discover, share, interact, network, have question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia  http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia
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Emails Are A Part Of Our Lives - Social Media

An old news:
For most people who have access to personal computers, email has rapidly overtaken 'snail mail' as the preferred means of sending written communication, both business and personal. The near-immediate delivery and low cost of email are hard to beat.

Emails are a part of our lives - we use them for business, we use them for personal reasons and ofcourse we get spammed by them as well. Many a times am asked if one would identify emails as part of Social Media. What is your take on this - would emails be a part of Social Media? Well yes, emails are a part of Social Media. Emails are engaging medium, they are very involving and most of the time form two-way communication.

You know that engagement is the core of Social Media. Engagement via the Social Media sites like Facebook, Twitter and others is very essential. Email would also be a good part to engage your customer sets. Would you consider email as part of Social Media? Well in all probability yes, people do interact via email, they do get involved and hence email does enable engagement.

Email does have limitations when it comes to typographic finesse. Many a times one gets an email with typo in bold and upper case and the feeling that you may have got is - why is the person screaming! What am trying to share here is that email do convey a lot at times and they could be misinterpreted. With the result while you may have sent the upper case and bold writing thing that the other person should not miss out on details and the information that you are sharing - the other person could interprette this as angry email.

Fonts and Formatting: It's tempting to format outgoing email with different fonts, point sizes and colors, and to punch up your text with the use of italics and boldface. Unfortunately, what you send is not necessarily what your recipient gets. Some email programs don't read special formatting, including fonts that your reader's computer doesn't have. And many allow the user to set preferences for plain text instead of rich text, which includes styling. The result: your carefully formatted email is reduced to plain text, or worse, littered with 'alien' characters.

What's the solution? First, stick to system fonts, such as Arial, Times, Verdana, Trebuchet or Geneva, which virtually all users have. And, unless you're certain that the recipient can read your formatting, keep it simple and use only keyboard characters and styling that won't get lost in translation. For emphasis, try surrounding your important text with *asterisks*. ALL CAPS is another option, but one to be used sparingly. Remember that CAPS are considered SHOUTING in the cyberworld!

These simple Social Media tips and etiquette take you a long way. What do you think?

We have an active Social Media community at my Facebook Business Page. You can experience / see demonstration of Social Media and Community Management at http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia . To discover, share, interact, network, have question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia  http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia
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Easy Steps To Write Blog Posts For Your Brand And Business - Social Media

One of the skills that you need while managing Social Media is to be able to write quick posts. Posts that are in context to your ongoing communication and posts that are relevant for your customer sets / readers.

• It is important that you maintain a diary - a list which has dates and topics that you will be covering on your blog. Having a ready schedule list is a great way to be on track.
• What you also need is having a very clear definition on what is the tone of voice that you will maintain. The brand that you may want to write about requires to be insync with its pre-determined personality. This is critical as all customer touchpoints should have same brand behavior, attitude and personality. Your blog is definitely a space where your brand meets your customer and hence it is crucial that this touchpoint also maintain the similar flow of personality. The reason to have a single brand personality is so that when the consumer comes across your brand on any platform they relate to you and thereby you become more familiar to them. Thus you go a step further in their mindset to be considered and be their preferred brand. Hence you need maintain the same tone of voice that you have maintained for your brand across other mediums.
• Be very clear on how your brand should react when you receive a comment. It is important that comments are addressed. Each comment should be respected and addressed. Please stay clear - away from copy paste jobs. Do not come across as a robot. When addressing comments do maintain the same brand personality. Many a times I have noticed that while commenting the brand personality is not being reflected. Avoid this situation.
• Decide on keywords. A very critical part of blogging is keyword optimization. SEO is the method by which you improve the ranking of your site on the search engines. While working on Social Media you will have heard about Meta Tags and Keywords. These are the things you build into your web / blogs / Social Media pages so that the search engines find your site and rank it favorably. You should also know that there are many dozens of off-page criteria that the search engines (SE's) look at as well - this is more of technical side though.
  
• Omit all unnecessary words. Please do not start to populate your posts with the keywords such that the very meaning of the post is lost out. Aim at keeping your posts between 250 to 450 words.
• Include complete thoughts in headlines.
• Keep sentences and paragraphs short.
• Never lose your sense of humor.
• Write like it counts.
• White space is your friend. It is not critical to cover each and every portion of your blog.
  
• Use the simplest possible word and sentence structure.
• Read your post out loud and make sure you don't get stuck on complex construction.
• Use bulleted points whenever you can.
• Use subheads every few paragraphs, even in a 300 word post.
• Use bold text and italics for emphasis on words and phrases.
• Make sure your posts are easy to scan.
• Don't be afraid to voice opinions. You cannot be good to all persons. You need to take a stand.
  
• You need lots of skill to get your writing to a higher level. This is feasible. Yes very much possible.The keyword here is exercise. So, how does one do this? Just the way you need to do exercise to maintain and enhance your body, similarly, for the brain you need brain exercise.

Your turn: Have any interesting pointer? Do add them here.

We have an active Social Media community at my Facebook Business Page. You can experience / see demonstration of Social Media and Community Management at http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia . To discover, share, interact, network, have question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia  http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia
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Brand Power On Social Media

The 'Power' of the brand is defined by:

• Experience of a brand
• Feeling about a brand
  

Together they form PowerBrands.
The relation of rise and fall between these two show PowerBrands

When a brand starts falling either in experience or feeling, it seizes to be a power brand

Facebook would be one of the great places to demonstrate this aspect.

We have an active Social Media community at my Facebook Business Page. You can experience / see demonstration of Social Media and Community Management at http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia . To discover, share, interact, network, have question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia  http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia
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Myths That Entrepreneurs Need To Understand - Social Media

Many a times there are pre-conceived notions about how should a business unit attract customers on the net. Below am sharing some common traps and myths that new online entrepreneurs fall into on the Internet.

• Build it, and they will come: This is one of the biggest fallacy that you will notice on the Internet. A common misconception that if you put up a Web page, you do not have to do anything else. It is incorrect to believe that merely having your own site is enough to keep the traffic coming and that your product will sell on its own. In order to have a popular site, you've got to offer something of value, that the visitor finds relevant. Add to this your content is to be fresh. Your customer may end up coming to your site once, but to keep them coming back you've got to have fresh original content and product offerings that they can use and find relevant.
  
• Give it for free and they will come: Sometimes the business units have a wrong understanding that if they incorporate a freebie onto the site - then this is it - there is nothing else to be done. No doubt psychological research has shown time and again that the word 'free' is an amazing word across. However imagine if your visitor comes more than once and sees the same freebie and same content. Why should he / she come more frequently?
  
• Get rich quick on the Internet: Well by now almost all persons surfing the net, know and understand that this is not working. Infact the very word 'dot-com' failed because they held the false belief that having a flashy web site is enough to solicit people financing and buying into your amazing scheme to make money. By giving out affiliate programmes, and business opportunities you are only making people go away.
  
• Send emails to an "opt-in" list to people who are 'anxious' to receive your product offerings: The word "opt-in" list is a very abused term on the Internet. You will find lists being openly sold. You will send out to this list your product information, what you are heading towards is a negative image of your brand / business.
• Have a Page on sites like Facebook and have lots of followers: This is a trend, it is assumed that more the followers more will be the product / business sales taking place. However there is absolutely no requirement to have a huge people subscribing to your page and having no interaction with your page.
  

What's your take? Do join in here and share your experience.

We have an active Social Media community at my Facebook Business Page. To discover, share, interact, network, have question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia  http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia
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Key 7 Parameters To Arrive At Your Social Media Strategy!

A quick memory jogger for all who want to know the key skills that are to be remembered always when you practice Social Media work. These are not only key skills but also parameters and steps that will lead you onto your Social Media strategy as well.

Social Media requires below skills [random order]:

1. Professional Socializing Skills
2. Brand Understanding
3. Direct Marketing
4. Knowledge Of Social Media Sites And Their Functionality
5. Consumer Mindset Along With U / A Knowledge
6. Flexibility
7. Be And Behave As A Human
   

What else...??

We have an active Social Media community at my Facebook Business Page. To discover, share, interact, network, have question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia  http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia
Share this Page with people who require Social Media help for their brand and business.

How To Chat On Twitter - Social Media

Chatting on Twitter is a little cumbersome for most.  On your own Twitter account when you chat you have to scroll through other Tweets. So basically you do stand a chance to missing out a Tweet or loosing interest. Do you usually face this situation? There is another way out - which is via direct messages onto the Twitter account itself. None of these would actually give the feel of a chat taking place specifically if we have a group of persons participating onto this.

Twitter chats enable you to increase your social influence and network with like minded persons. It is very helpful to business specially small business units.

There are special schedules / timing on the internet when people start / enter the conversations. People with similar interests hop onto these spaces and converse. The conversation are guided. The chats are given hashtag # this same hashtag is used to pull the conversations out on Twitter search for instance.

Anyone can participate. The rules are mentioned for certain chats so you may want to be well prepared before joining the chats. You need to be aware of rules and you need to be aware on the topic. No spamming allowed.

You will find the chat schedule at: http://goo.gl/CLqIt

Have you hopped onto this chat? What is your experience. Do share...

We have an active Social Media community at my Facebook Business Page. To discover, share, interact, network, have question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia  http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia
Share this Page with people who require Social Media help for their brand and business.

Neglecting Your Page Is Equivalent To Neglecting Your Brand - Social Media

If you build a Page on the net remember you need to have fresh content on a consistent basis. This goes for any Page, be it a Blog, Facebook Fan / Business Page, Twitter and other Social Media sites.

Many a times when you browse the various sites - especially the Facebook Pages - lots of Pages give a feel that there is no admin looking after it. It looks deserted with no caretaker. When you run through these neglected spaces you will observe that the last post dates back to a couple of months, add to this the unfortunate scene of spam is taking place. Spammers would be looking at these Pages like a open ground. There are all kinds of posts; all non related to the topic of the Page.

By building a Page brand managers should not think that they are doing work on Social Media and that a part of their marketing strategy has unfolded itself into the most talked marketing tactic - being present on Social sites.

Infact you probably would be undoing the good that would be done by other mediums and what other customer touch points would be doing for your brand. Neglecting your Page is equivalent to neglecting your brand, you are giving clear indication that your brand is not being cared of and is not being nurtured.

To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia
  http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia
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Google Brings Us To Speed On Web - Social Media

Web can be a little overwhelming for small business and people who would like to venture onto this for the first time. Web has become a part of our lives and it is already becoming a part of our business and marketing efforts as well. Web enables us to keep in touch with our friends, relatives, customers, colleagues and clients. It enables us to find our old friends and new customers and clients as well.

Since web is becoming an important part of our lives it is essential to understand this medium. It is critical that all of us are brought to speed. The powerful online experiences that we experience are all feasible and possible due to an open web that can be accessed by anyone through a web browser, on any Internet-connected device in the world. Yes we are all connected world wide. It is feasible to do business at an international level and connect with friends as well in real time world wide.

In order that we understand and know what is the browser all about and what is web Google has taken a good step towards this. Google has brought out the ebook for all of us so that we all can be brought to speed with similar understanding of the web.

Google has brought out the ebook called "20 Things I Learned About Browsers and the Web" - it is a short guide for anyone who's curious about the basics of browsers and the web. Here's what you'll find here:

So go on check here: http://www.20thingsilearned.com/
To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia
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Social Media Landscape For Your Business

Hi! Hope this note of mine finds you in best of spirits! 

Have you used the Social Media landscape for your business? Did you find it useful? Have you used Facebook for your community development?  

Social Media is about engagement and relevant conversations. It is about building a positive rapport and thereby good relationships. It gets into good CRM and one to one direct marketing space. 
 
Hope you have been benefiting from the Social Media Conversations that you have subscribed to. 

If you are already connected with us on our Facebook Page then please ignore the below - but if you have not joined us then you could be missing something! 

We have an active community at our Facebook Page: http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia . Am looking forward to you participating at our Facebook Page for more fuller experience of Social Media.

On this Page we could enhance our Online Social Media activities so as to generate response and a call to action from the various customer sets that we connect with.

Request you to join in here and actively participate in the various topics and discussion. You could start by introducing yourself in the 'Discussion' Tab.

This space is open for corporates, agencies, brand managers, social media professionals, public relation personnel, for people who would like to market their own name and their own business. It works great for freelancers to market themselves on the online space as well.

I wish each of my reader a very best in life.

In case if you have not as yet joined us there then please do click here: http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia

Share the Facebook Page with people who you feel could add value and benefit from Social Media conversations.

Regards
Pervara

To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia

  http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia

What Does Re-Tweet Mean - Social Media

We, all are aware of the micro blogging site called Twitter. Most people on Social Media sites eventually have an account on Twitter. Most turn out to be active Tweeters while others remain passive. Almost 95% of people who initialize their account on Twitter start off with similar comment - confused. Twitter as a site does clearly indicate on how one is to use it, to the extent they have a video as well. However because it is new way of communication a newbie is at a loss in the beginning - till he / she starts and remains at it.

There are a couple of functionality that you could avail of when you have your account on Twitter. The functions are messaging, mentioning and re-tweeting.

What is re-tweet?
In simple terms re-tweet means sharing / to share. The short / abbreviated form of re-tweet is RT. Which means that you enable a message to spread and at the same time you enable your network to gain the message as well. So at one end you become a good influencer while on the other hand you help others to gain knowledge / information and so on.

How to re-tweet?
Hover the cursor over the message that you would want to share. On doing this you will see the re-tweet icon / word. Click this and your messages is re-tweeted! Add to this in case you realize that you wish to undo the re-tweeted message then all you have to do is again hover the cursor over the same re-tweeted message and there you will see undo re tweet. Click on this and your message is withdrawn. 
 
What does re-tweet mean?

• When you re-tweet a message you would have really appreciated that message - as the message goes to your people from your end.
• Re-Tweeting is a way of respecting and to a very large extent openly announcing your approval / appreciation / agreement with regards to that message.
• It means taking the onus of the message and responding to the conversation that may take place as you re-tweet a message.
  

Good manners for re-tweets:

• When you re-tweet be clear that you are re-tweeting someone's message. Be open about this - thankfully now re-tweets cannot be edited. So the template of re-tweets remains the same.
  
• When your message gets re-tweeted you need to thank the person. Remember the person has taken onus and is carrying your baggage, and spreading your message. This gesture requires a thanks and acknowledgment that you appreciate this gesture. 
  

Your turn - what do you think of re-tweets?

To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia
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SEO For New Google Instant - Social Media

We know that Google Search has updated its version and has brought to us Google Instant. This shows results as you type. What is your take on this? Do you find this useful?

Google has shared that with the Instant enhancements you will receive faster results, smarter predictions thus leading instant results. It is claimed that with Google Instant you save 2-5 seconds per search.

With the Google Instant comes the Google Instant Preview. This enables you to preview the page without going onto that page; you get to view an image / screen shot of the page.So you may not need to actually click each link to figure out if that is your destination of search, you can click on the magnifying glass icon and you will be able to view the search page right there. Ofcourse the screen shot is not as yet geared to let you read all details on the page due to the size restriction. However you can view images, and main headers to a large extent; thereby you get to intuitively know if you need to click onto the page.

Having said this, does the Instant enhancement affect the regular SEO work that one would be doing so far? Before we discuss this lets be clear that Google has never shared all of its logic and algorithm of search for the purpose of having a fair and correct result - naturally the moment one knows the working one could have rigged and be on top of search engines. It is still going to be a discovery on how SEO should meander to cater to the new Google Instant lets try to understand the basic SEO that one could look at.

• Looking at the screen shot preview one can immediately mention that use of flash is a total no-no. Flash from the beginning was never a real favorite of search engines though Google did try a little partnership with Adobe especially for Chrome. Anyway leaving that aside the preview version as of right now does not enable flash - it is a screen shot that you are viewing hence a static image ofcourse. 
  
• Next is visual appeal - with a screen shot you need great visual appeal to walk right into the eyes of the visitor. This means that the page requires to look good and easy on the eye. If it has heavy text only then maybe it will be skipped for some other page that has better navigation. The game has shifted a wee bit - it is not only important to be found now it is important to be clicked as well.
  
• With preview you need to have better text in header and sub heads - this probably will be the only part of your text that the searcher will be able to read from the screen shot. 
  
• And ofcourse the rest of SEO still stands true like Meta Tags etc..
  

Your turn! what would you share on this list?

To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia
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Quick SEO Tips For Your Page - Social Media

We know that SEO means Search Engine Optimization. We also now that SEO is important for us to rank higher on search engines. This is a  a process wherein you administer and focus on how you are going to bring your Page higher on chronological search of Google for instance. In this post we will consider on-page SEO techniques. The on-page SEO does not need you to know technology in depth, neither do you need to know the programming language / software script.

Lets go through this quickly:

• First step is to do a search on the net to check and see what are the various search words utilized to search for brands and products within your category
  
• Next is to check which all search words lead to your page [if your page is in existence for over 10months you can hope to find this].
  
• On a single site page try to concentrate on very few keywords - please do not use more than three to four.
  
• Use the most important keywords in your headlines, subheads, description, meta tags - while doing this take care that you do not use the words repetitively. People who arrive on your page need relevant information hence you will require to be creative to write what they seek.
  
• Join forums and other spaces that relate to your work - join people of your field and also join the sites where your customers and clients would dwell. In this way you will be working towards two long term benefits - one you will get credibility and the second part is you will start to leave back-links.
  
• Change content and share fresh content. It is very important that you deal with fresh content and have a schedule for this. You are to post fresh content practically two to three times a week. Many a times you may run out of ideas here you may need help.  Content curation if done properly and ethically can be a very positive effort from your end that could reward you in the future.
  

The above tips could be good to start with. Simple? So go on and make your page go higher on search engines. Have a question? Do join me at my Social Media Network Page on Facebook. Do add your SEO tips as well!

To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia
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Are You Missing Out? - Social Media

Hi! Hope this note of mine finds you in best of spirits! 

Have you used the Social Media landscape for your business? Did you find it useful? Have you used Facebook for your community development? 

Social Media is about engagement and relevant conversations. It is about building a positive rapport and thereby good relationships. It gets into good CRM and one to one direct marketing space. 
 
Hope you have been benefiting from the Social Media Conversations that you have subscribed to. 

If you are already connected with us on our Facebook Page then please ignore the below - but if you have not joined us then you could be missing something! 

We have an active community at our Facebook Page: http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia . Am looking forward to you participating at our Facebook Page for more fuller experience of Social Media.

On this Page we could enhance our Online Social Media activities so as to generate response and a call to action from the various customer sets that we connect with.

Request you to join in here and actively participate in the various topics and discussion. You could start by introducing yourself in the 'Discussion' Tab.

This space is open for corporates, agencies, brand managers, social media professionals, public relation personnel, for people who would like to market their own name and their own business. It works great for freelancers to market themselves on the online space as well.

I wish each of my reader a very best in life.

In case if you have not as yet joined us there then please do click here: http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia

Share the Facebook Page with people who you feel could add value and benefit from Social Media conversations. 

Regards
Pervara

To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia
  http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia

Social Media Triggers Us To Be Helpful!

Well at the start let me confess that I myself am glued to the world of Social Media Network Online. So much so that apart from my personal life I have made a profession out of it and am into freelance Social Media Network Online which also takes us to the Online Reputation Management System. And so I lead my life on the Social Media Network Online.

You may have received panic chat messages to loot a certain Bangkok bank on 'Mafia Wars' to which you simply cannot disregard but end up helping. Sometimes a panic message seeps in to help harvest in 'farmville' or for a pet that needs a home in 'petville'. To which you may start to search frantically and help. This help could be to a total stranger. Irrespective of time and day if you are online you are helpful. Your concern levels are high and you cannot ignore your own pet in 'petsociety' who is starving and needs food and a little cleanup as there are virtual flies all around it.

It is difficult for most to sleep and call it a day without a peek at the Facebook and Twitter status. And ofcourse what we login to for a quick peek ends up being minimum an hour and so on. We are logged in and very concern about someone else frame of mind. Our own state of mind is not understood by us till we broadcast a post and then we also along with the world understand what is happening to us, what we like and dislike.

Viewing the profile of friends and strangers has become our prerogative online and we even go to the extent to encouraging others to post, incase they have not for a long time we may even remind them by a simple click on Facebook that says 'reconnect'.

When we do not do the above, our mind unconsciously starts to remind us about our various online commitments; starts to make us a wee bit uneasy and we start off having withdrawal symptoms. Maslow in today's world would have added Social Media Network Online as one of the basics that one needs to survive apart from food, clothing, shelter, security etc.

Well the online world enables us to be what we could not. In web 2.0 online societies you can be an astronaut, a doctor and many other avatars. No need for anything just register and select your avatar and then go about daily activities online and get caught up in this too.

With such a state of mind and so much more openness would any brand or marketer dare to miss this world of opportunities? Online Social Network is all about meeting people in a state and scenario that they are most comfortable in. It is the right time to share with them and gently lead them to your end.
To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia
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Does 'Like' On Facebook Lead To Purchase? - Social Media

Many a times am asked by brand managers that, if a person clicks 'like' on Facebook Fan / Business Pages then does it mean that the person will buy also? Before we start to answer this lets as first step try to understand what exactly is 'like' and why people click 'like'.

What is 'like' and why people click 'like':

• 'Like' is so far the only way to get an entry onto the brand / company / business Page. So basically it is a 'connector'. Had the 'like' word been anything else as connect, contact, join, same amount would have joined! What do you think!?
• Just because the site has called the connector as 'Fan' and keeping this as the only connection button / click it does not mean that people clicking are Fans by the true definition of Fan.
• It is universal truth that people like discounts and freebies - this is since the time currency came into society and barter system was out. Maximum people join Facebook Pages to receive these.
• People also join to get inside information,to receive updates, to be the first to know, to be seen and to show that they support a brand / cause, for fun and entertainment and so on.
• There are certain segments who find it convenient to complain, give feedback etc also.
• There are those who join because it is recommended to them by someone.
  
• And, yes there are those who would like to interact and share.
  

Coming back to the question does 'like' on Facebook lead to purchases - not really. However the good part is that it works extremely  well as influence and getting into consideration mindset. And this over period of time leads towards preferring the brand / business / company.

Now your turn: according to you would clicking a 'like' button take us to definite purchase? What is your take?

To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia
http://www.facebook.com/pervarakapadia

When To Use Facebook Pages And Facebook Groups - Social Media

We are aware that Facebook enables brands and companies to have connectivity to their customer sets respectively. With the recent announcement on Groups from Facebook quarters we know that Facebook Groups was in news in a big way. Facebook Pages has been around as well. Given this scenario I have been asked many a times that if we already have Facebook Pages then when do we need the Facebook Groups?

A justified query, the reason being that if you have put in time and energy in developing the Page then are we to dissolve everything and start getting people on-board onto Groups? And why so. The introduction of Facebook Groups is not done with any intent to dissolve the Facebook Pages. Infact Pages become more stronger with Groups as add on.

Groups can be used primarily for varied purpose. Like for instance:

• Have family based Groups: so when you put up photos and messages not all of your Facebook friends / list can be disturbed and interfered with.
  
• Have closed friends Groups: here you will have your privacy and just have your gang / group of friends communicating without the world really interfering onto your team.
• Have colleagues team up on a task / project: If your work environment suggests that you have a team then enable the Groups to have updates and status reports come up on the Groups wall for all to view at same time; comments will be seen and interacted / acted upon as well. 
  
• And so on, Facebook Groups have a reason to exists.

Coming back to the question - when we already do have Facebook Pages then why should we have Facebook Groups? To understand this we need to step back and recap on what is Facebook Pages. Add to this, we are to understand that Pages have people, I repeat all people, from all walks of life connecting to you via a single Page. Now lets assume [or maybe you have already experienced] a situation wherin your Facebook Pages has a broad value. Say for example if your Page philosophy / intent / purpose / reach is broad based and people who have joined your Page get very involved. You may now see that there is a reason to bifurcate into smaller groups. The reason being that certain people are addressing a particular issue. For this you need not create another Fan Page what you need now is to create small Facebook Groups. 

So in business you need to create Facebook Groups strategically. Such that while you have your main Facebook Page as umbrella, the various Facebook Groups could be created to address more in-depth conversations  / issues. 

Share in your reasons as well to let people know how you use Facebook Groups and Facebook Pages.

To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia

Meta Tags And Keywords In Social Media

While working on Social Media you will have heard about Meta Tags and Keywords.

These are the things you build into your web / blogs / Social Media pages so that the search engines find your site and rank it favorably. You should also know that there are many dozens of off-page criteria that the search engines (SE's) look at as well - this is more of technical side though.

How does a search engine know that a page has relevance to a particular search term? They use one or more of the following on-page criteria [this is also known as on-page SEO].

• File Name
• Page Title
• META Keyword Tag
• META Description Tag
• H1 Headline
• Keyword Density
• Links
• Image Alt tag

While various search engines rank the importance of the above criteria differently, you should be consistent in applying all of them to your pages for increased website traffic. 

Determining keywords that are profitable is one of the most important techniques you can master as you bring your small business online.

What is keyword?:

Any time someone uses a search engine, they type in a word or phrase. This word or phrase is known as a keyword. The search engine spiders [script / programme] goes out and retrieves all the web pages that focus content on that particular keyword or keyword phrase. 

The more relevant the web page is to the keyword, the higher the page ranks in the search engine. Each web page contains a place in the HTML coding to insert these keywords. This helps the search engines determine page content. This is a bit of a simplification as search engines use many other criteria to rank pages. However, keyword focused content pages are the most important on-page criteria. 

When you may write poor content that is not keyword focused and you will have a difficult time ranking highly in any search engine.

So, how do you know / choose the proper keyword for any particular web page? The answer is quite simple. You research keywords that pertain to your business and choose the ones that have a high demand and low supply. 

The Demand of a keyword is a measure of the number of times people have searched for that keyword in a particular period of time. The Supply of a keyword is a measure of how many total web pages focus on that keyword. Keywords with a high demand and low supply will allow your page to rank higher in the search engines and will drive more traffic. 

The best way of determining keywords is to use a good keyword research tool. The purpose of these keyword research tools is to allow you to enter a specific keyword related to your business and then see how many times people searched for that keyword [keyword demand] as well as how many web pages are focused on that keyword [keyword supply.] 

In addition, a good keyword research tool will come up with new keywords related to the initial one you typed in, giving you ideas for branching out and coming up with dozens of other high quality keywords. 

 

Find this interesting?  

To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia

Twitter Is Part Of Your Customer Care

Many a times we may observe that companies are trying to see how best they can use Twitter to promote their products and services. Unfortunately not many get the basics right. The fact is a few good tweets can also provide great customer service.

There are various topics that you could Tweet on. For instance:

• Tips on how to maintain your products. Since you have been in your industry over quite some time you will know the nitty gritties of your product as well. Your years of experience can help you gain credibility on Twitter as a leader in your profession. 
• If there is new arrival taking place provide a sneak peek. Announce new arrivals of inventory. These tweets can be particularly effective when targeted to customers who have registered their product preferences.

Twitter isn't the sole solution to beating the competition, but it can be one of the many strategies you employ to reach new and current customers.

What should you take care of when you plan your Tweets?; What are the various ways you can use Twitter in your marketing?: There are several ways you can use Twitter but here are some which can help you immediately:

• Build an audience: This is most important as you want to build an audience of followers who are interested in what you're sharing via your Tweets. As suggested above if you have a special going on? Send a Tweet. Is there an important news event in your industry that you wrote about? Send a Tweet pointing to that article. Give lots of value and make conversation, not selling.
• Monitor what they say about you / your brand / your company: Find out what people are saying about you and your industry. This is one of the best ways to stay on top of what is really happening.
• Monitor what they say about your competitors: You need to be aware of what is happening in the world. Using Twitter is one of the best and fastest ways to keep up with what is going on today.
• Become a resource, not a salesperson: One of the cardinal rules of marketing with Twitter and other Social Media sites is to be a resource of information and not an annoying, pest selling stuff. Hey, there's nothing wrong with selling and I believe everyone is selling something. However, today you have to do it in a conversational, problem-solving way. Provide lots of valuable information and people will want to be around you.You do not loose by sharing.
  

So go on, Tweet your way to customer's heart! How do you go about doing this?

To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia

Article Marketing - Social Media

Article submission is a great way to do propaganda about your business, your blog, your website, or yourself too. 

If you are writing about your business or your blog a good authentic article fetches you a great number of traffic.If you are writing about yourself then it gets you the 'expertise' value. Many search engines crawl and hook onto the keyword and keyword phrases of a site to put it in their results list. If your content contains a good number of keywords and keywords phrases, your site gets a higher position in the search engine listings. Ofcourse this does not mean that you keep stuffing the article with key words and phrases just about unnecessary. 

Content for certain subjects need in-depth knowledge. This can be done with research. Today research is just a click away in most of the cases.

If you are bent on getting traffic to your site and you do not have the time to write the articles then you can take the help of ghost writers.

Keep in mind to not plagiarize. Copy and merely pasting of part or whole of the content is known as plagiarizing. This is definitely not advised. If you don't have the time or the right resources then wait. There is absolutely no need to hurry. Content is the key to getting the reader tuned into your article and retaining the reader too. 

Almost all of the time a plagiarized article submitted will never be released. Add to it if you have an account with that particular website then a plagiarized article can lead to suspension of your account. So be very careful.

To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia

Email Etiquette - Social Media

You know that online engagement is the core of Social Media. Engagement via the Social Media sites like Facebook, Twitter and others is very essential. Email would also be a good part to engage your customer sets. Would you consider email as part of Social Media? Well in all probability yes, people do interact via email, they do get involved and hence email does enable engagement.

An old news:
For most people who have access to personal computers, email has rapidly overtaken 'snail mail' as the preferred means of sending written communication, both business and personal. The near-immediate delivery and low cost of email are hard to beat, but the technology does have limitations when it comes to typographic finesse. Here are some dos and don'ts to ensure that your electronic communication is received with its message intact.

Fonts and Formatting
It's tempting to format outgoing email with different fonts, point sizes and colors, and to punch up your text with the use of italics and boldface. Unfortunately, what you send is not necessarily what your recipient gets. Some email programs don't read special formatting, including fonts that your reader's computer doesn't have. And many allow the user to set preferences for plain text instead of rich text, which includes styling. The result: your carefully formatted email is reduced to plain text, or worse, littered with 'alien' characters (more on that below).

What's the solution? First, stick to system fonts, such as Arial, Times, Verdana, Trebuchet or Geneva, which virtually all users have. And, unless you're certain that the recipient can read your formatting, keep it simple and use only keyboard characters and styling that won't get lost in translation. For emphasis, try surrounding your important text with *asterisks*. ALL CAPS is another option, but one to be used sparingly. Remember that CAPS are considered SHOUTING in the cyberworld!

These simple Social Media etiquette take you a long way. What do you think?

To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia

Simple Philosophy In Social Media

Watch your thoughts; they become words.

Watch your words; they become actions.

Watch your actions; they become habits.

Watch your habits; they become character.

Watch your character; it becomes your destiny.

To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia

How To Write A Blog For Better Engagement In Social Media!

Blog writing is a very important area in Social Media. You need to have a good schedule of writing blogs and have a good list of topics that you may want to cover. The most realistic way of writing blogs would be to concentrate on what is relevant to your reader. Once you have understood and know what is relevant your  reader you then need to have a focus on what is feasible from your end. Reason being that whatever focus you take up you will need to be consistent with your posts on your blog. For this you will need to select topics that you would be passionate about so that in critical and busy times also you can dedicate yourself towards blog writing.

So how do we write blogs?

• Omit all unnecessary words
• Aim at keeping your posts at about 250 words
• Include complete thoughts in headlines
• Keep sentences and paragraphs short
• Never lose your sense of humor
• Write like it counts
• White space is your friend
• Use the simplest possible word and sentence structure
• Read your post out loud and make sure you don't get stuck on complex construction
• Use bullet points whenever you can
• Use subheads every few paragraphs, even in a 300 word post
• Use bold text and italics for emphasis on words and phrases
• Make sure your posts are easy to scan
• Choose your voice and keep it consistent
• Don't be afraid to voice opinions.

What is your take? Please add more parameters to this.

To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia

How To Use Social Media In Your Small Business

For small business owners the Social Media landscape could be slightly overwhelming and daunting. With other tasks at hand you may require a special person dedicated to your Social Media requirements.

In order to help you in working towards your brand exposure on Social Media am sharing a couple of pointers for your to start working towards:

• People do business with people. Hence what you need to make sure is that there is human touch to your entire online activities. Social Media is not and should not be a constraining factor to any business. The logic is very simple here on how to determine if your business should take the Social Media path. First and foremost check on who is your target audience. Your target audience decides if you should be on Social Media or not: If your customers are online then you 'may need to consider Social Media'. However this plain understanding is not enough to decide that you should be on Social Media space.
  
• Have a blog. Blogging is just not for personal usage. It is useful in business as well. Plan what is it that you will blog. Have a planed schedule as well of the topics that you will be blog about. Business blogging is a complex topic, and there will never be one magic formula that applies to all companies.
• Let your followers feel special. Allow them a peek preview at various things happening at your organization / brand.
  
• Share and be transparent. This is very essential in Social Media. Do not be anonymous, make it a point to reach out to your people online.
• Have fresh content. Have  a schedule wherein you have  marked out well before hand on the content and be consistent at posting. While working on Social Media it is important to maintain integrity and ethics. Blatant copy pasting someone else's hard work is just not correct. It could mar your professional credibility. You could loose out on potential clients and start to give out an image of yourself as not being genuine. Content curation is about appreciating and synthesizing work of others. Allow me to repeat myself: it is not about copy pasting someone's hard work;  It is reviewing and filtering it is all about synthesizing. Content is the an additional main criteria. Know and understand what is relevant to your target audience. Mark out your topics well in advance on what you would want to discuss on the Social Media sites and blogs etc. Decide on what you want to be perceived as.
  
• Decide on keywords. It is essential for your to know your target audience and decide on the keywords that you are to maintain throughout your interactions online. Use on-page SEO [Search Engine Optimization].
  
• Have an escalation matrix to handle complain. Also have a plan of action for negative and rude language that people might use online with regards to your brand / business. When the comments are directly towards you at a personal level you may tend to re-act a little more strongly. When it is towards your business or brand then you at first step try to plan but yet could have a strong urge to re-act. Have a plan for spam that you will have to face.
  
• Interact and respond to people on your blog / Social Media sites. If you do promise to revert then make it a point to get back with appropriate information.
  
• Reward people. Your active and loyal members will enable your messages to spread. They will help you to see the correct perspective during discussion as well. They are precious, preserve them.
  
• Encourage members helping each other. When members interact they get more involved. Allow them to interact. Encourage this.
  
• Listen and monitor. This is extremely critical. Have tools and and have access to software that enable you to know who has written what about your business and brand.
  
• Connect and bond with persons of your industry. This is essential. Share knowledge. Our knowledge does not decrease if we share.
  
• Understand and know the various Social Media sites. To know their functionality and work within this is essential. For instance Twitter requires 140 characters however if you want that your matter gets re-Tweeted then you need to have 120 characters to be on safe side.
  
• Note that it is not the amount of followers it is the quality that matters. Remember that we have human beings connecting to us, so we need to approach our contacts on a humane level. Avoid copy pasting similar messages.
  
• Have tools to measure and track your activities. It is important to measure the ROI [Return On Investment].
  
• Keep in mind that Social Media is a good investment though it starts to reward you over a period of time. It is not a quick conversion getter. Establish yourself and your brand on the relevant Social Media sites.

Social Media is a consistent and constant efforts. Let us 'never' think that once the basics are set up it will all generate talks on its own. People always need a little push and a little nudging. Social Media no doubt catches momentum, but one has to keep the momentum going. We cannot say that without an 'active driver' the Social Media will continue to create and achieve our objectives.

Your turn: share your pointers as well to enhance small business endeavor on Social Media.

To discover, share, question answer sessions and converse on Social Media do join me at facebook.com/pervarakapadia