The Hub of Your Social Media Marketing: Blogging

 

Best Social Media Marketing Strategies

If you are reading this, you either, have no idea what blogging is, but know you should. Or, you know what blogging is, but don’t know how to use it. Don’t worry. I’m going to address both issues here. Blogging is one of the most effective social media strategies you can use to promote your business.

Just Words on a Page

First, let’s just get this out of the way. “Blog” is just short for “Web Log”. See, you’ve already learned something. Its purpose is typically used to inform, educate and entertain. For example, if you are a car dealer, your blogs may consist of DIY projects, like “How to Change Your Own Oil”, or “5 Ways to Prolong the Life of Your Car Battery”. Now, I know what the next questions you are probably going to ask are: “Why should I commit time to blogging?” and “How is a blog going to help me”?

Sticking with the car dealer example, let’s say that you wrote those blogs. Now what? Post it to your Facebook page, of course! If you don’t have a Facebook page for your business, stop reading here and call us immediately…you have some catching up to do. But of course, you are a modern business owner are well aware of the power of social media marketing. Fantastic! Post a link to the blog you just wrote on your Facebook fan page. One click and your fans are now reading your blog. Oh, did I mention that links to your website will be embedded in your blog? So, just by using this extremely simple example you’ve created original content and increased your SEO, you’ve engaged with a reader whom you’ve educated and shared information with and, ultimately, given them the opportunity to visit your website and use your services. With a consistently written blog, you are able to share potentially valuable information and demonstrate a valuable knowledge set to potential customers.

I Don’t Have Time For This…

Now don’t get too excited at the simplicity of a good social media marketing presence. This stuff takes a generous amount of time and consistency. It’s not a sprint; it’s a marathon. Plus, you have to remember that online marketing is as important as your traditional advertising, and should be treated as such. With traditional advertising, you don’t just sell the “Steak”, you sell the “SIZZLE”. Well, with a solid blog and Social Media representation you sell the “Steak” and the “SIZZLE”, but then you talk about “how it was prepared”, “what farm the meat came from” and probably end up following the rancher who raised the cow…you know, because he also has a blog called “Happy Cows Ranch”.

If you have any questions on how we can make a blog work in concert with your social media platforms, just contact us.

Facebook Likes Being Deleted for Businesses

You all have probably seen something similar to the picture below. I bet you even liked or shared that businesses status if you like getting posts from their page. The truth is you did not have to do it to continue to get content from that business. As you may recall their have been similar Facebook hoaxes with similar themes over the years. Combine this with the Facebook announcement from earlier this month and you have lots of businesses panicking and putting posts like below on their pages. So is Facebook deleting likes from business pages?

Facebook Likes

 

The Truth

Facebook did announce changes to the business likes policy and yes it will delete specific types of users. What types of users you ask? Let’s hear it straight from Facebook.

“Businesses use Page audience data to understand what their followers care about. To make audience data even more meaningful for businesses, we’re updating the way Page likes are counted by removing memorialized and voluntarily deactivated accounts from Pages’ like counts. This change ensures that data on Facebook is consistent and up-to-date. 

Over the coming weeks, Page admins should expect to see a small dip in their number of Page likes as a result of this update. It’s important to remember, though, that these removed likes represent people who were already inactive on Facebook. 

Going forward, any accounts that are voluntarily deactivated or memorialized will be removed from a Page’s like count. If a deactivated account is reactivated, the account will be re-added to a Page’s like count.”

Only accounts that are voluntarily deactivated or memorialized will be removed from a businesses Page like count. So this means that if you are an active user on Facebook you don’t have to worry about being deleted from a page’s feed subscription and, if you are a business, you don’t have to worry about losing legitimate active users on Facebook.

But my business lost 500 likes.

Some businesses have lost many likes over the last month. It is very alarming to see your likes plummet overnight and I imagine that business owner are going to want to know why this is happening. There are a couple of factors that could be in play here.

  1. Purchased Likes  – If you have a wide net and decent budget you can accumulate likes very quickly. The downside to this is you do from time to time get bots that like your page and are not legitimate likes. These bots don’t interact with your page and can inflate your numbers. Facebook is constantly cracking down on these accounts and deleting them, thus deleting your like. The best advice to correct this is to limit your campaign to as specific as you can get to avoid this practice. You may not get there as fast, but you have a better chance of having real people who are legitimately interested in your business.
  2. Customers Died – Life goes on and people die. You cannot market to a dead man and you don’t want them potentially taking up that valuable organic 10% that sees your posts. Facebook is doing you a big favor by getting rid of these likes on your account.
  3. Deactivated Accounts – As hard as it is to believe, some people don’t want to be on Facebook anymore! Facebook allows them to deactivate instead of delete so if they change their minds they can resume their activities. This means that all of their likes that were taken away this month will be reinstated when they come back. This means that lost like in March could be a gained like in May.

What does it all mean?

For most individuals the recent Facebook changes will not effect your likes or your feed. If you do get one of those posts that beg for a like or share, it can’t hurt, go ahead and do it. After all you liked that business for a reason. For those businesses who lost a lot of likes, really the only thing you can do is tighten up your Facebook ad campaign. Make sure you are casting a smaller net that focuses on a specific target group and run multiple campaigns if needed. As always, Baggies Web Solutions can help your with your Social Media Ads, just give us a call.

Is Internet Explorer Dead?

 

If you’ve read the news and seen the posts on Facebook, then you’re probably wondering what all the hub-bub is about Microsoft dumping Internet Explorer. Fear not! They won’t just hand over the reigns to Chrome or Firefox as the #1 most widely used web browser. So, is Internet Explorer Dead? Not quite.

Then what is all the fuss about?

With the news that the Microsoft team is working on their newest operating system, tentatively titled Windows 10, they have made reference to abandoning IE. As happy as that made many die-hard Mac fans, the news is somewhat misleading. In Microsoft’s case, they won’t be abandoning the browser itself, just the name. Currently, IE browsers are responsible for a whopping 56.64% of all website traffic. For Microsoft to stop making a program that has that much market share would be foolish. A simple rebranding and a redesign, hopefully from the ground up is what needs to happen.

Over the years, Internet Explorer has gotten a bad rap due to poor security standards, slow loading times, and clunky website rendering. Any website designer will shudder when you mention the disaster that was IE 6. We still, to this day, groan at having to troubleshoot the problems in one of the most widespread incarnations of the most popular website browsers. Thankfully, IE 6 now only commands a 1.31% market share.

What is Project Spartan?

With Microsoft renaming their web browser comes (hopefully) a new era of the PC version of Safari. Yes, every Windows machine has IE on it, but that doesn’t stop you from downloading Chrome, Safari, Firefox or even Opera, for that matter. Let’s hope that this new era of the Microsoft browser won’t be a mistake. I for one kinda want to see what it does. After all, when Firefox came out, it was the neatest thing in the world, then Chrome came out and it superseded it. After all, from early reports, the working title is Project Spartan. That’s a bold name for any project. Surely, Microsoft knows that in order to keep that 56% market share they will have to make some big jumps in usability and give users something that they’ve never seen before. Otherwise it’ll be more of the same and could go the way of the Zune.

Top 3 Reasons Not To Stop SEO

Many people think that you can do SEO for a few months and then quit. Quite the opposite actually, SEO is a marathon, not a sprint. Here are top 3 reasons not to stop SEO for your website.

1. Algorithm Changes

 

 

Google and Bing are unquestionably the leaders in search and they conduct algorithm changes on a regular basis. Sometimes weekly, sometimes more often. These algorithm changes affect the way your website ranks for the keywords and phrases that you want to rank for. For instance, in April 2012, Google released the famed Penguin update. This particular update caused havoc in the SEO industry because they changed the way Google saw links and how they were factored into rankings. So if you spent many months cultivating links, you would have woken up one day and your traffic would have been cut in half or more.

Staying on top of trends and algorithm changes insures that your website can recover from any changes made to the search engines.

2. Competitive Advantage

 

 

 

Your competition is always changing, and that means that the keywords and phrases you are using today, may lose steam. Your rankings and your traffic will start to suffer as your competition moves in and they start to pilfer your much-coveted traffic. Stay on top of your keyword research and competitive analysis and don’t lose those rankings!

3. Fresh Content

 

An effective SEO strategy means your website is being updated with new content, and keywords. Fresh content is one of the many factors in your organic search engine rankings. By keeping up-to-date analytics, and ranking statistics, you can keep track of what keywords are working and what isn’t. If you stop your SEO campaigns, then you run the risk of losing valuable space on the search engine results page (SERPs) and revenue generating traffic.

Hope Clinic of Waxahachie Fundraiser 2014

Hope Clinic of Waxahachie hosted its annual Seeds of Hope fundraising event Thursday, Nov. 7 at the Midlothian Conference Center.  For the last two years, Baggies Web Solutions has sponsored a table at the event to support Seed of Hope and the Hope Clinic of Waxahachie.  Morris and his wife attended the event and enjoyed wonderful evening.  After the delicious meal, some of the patients at the clinic told their story of hope and success during their time with the Hope Clinic of Waxahachie.  The staff at Hope Clinic of Waxahachie also took to the stage to express their passion  of helping those who need affordable healthcare in Ellis County.

Who is Hope Clinic of Waxahachie

Hope Clinic offers caring, medically-certified care for the whole family and the whole person in a faith-based environment.

We have extended hours during the week, making our services accessible to all, with same day appointments available in many cases. Many of our staff members are bilingual, and translation assistance is always available.

For the uninsured, Sliding Scale fees are calculated based on the patient’s ability to pay. We also accept Medicaid, Medicare, CHIP, Ellis County Indigent, and private insurance.
In addition to Dentistry, Pediatrics, Women’s Health, Adult Medicine, and Behavioral Health, Hope Clinic offers free benefit counseling, helping our patients to locate and apply for appropriate benefits such as Social Security Disability, Supplemental Security Income, Medicare, and Medicaid.

Members of our staff are also available to pray with our patients and their families at any time.

Baggies Web Solutions ask that you consider supporting this worthwhile organization as they seek to provide good affordable health care to the citizens of Ellis County. You can click here to donate, visit their website Hope Clinic of Waxahachie, or visit their Facebook page to find out how you can get involved.