AlignGo Answers Some Difficult Social Media Questions

More businesses are exploring the advantage of using social media tools and sites to help grow their business.  Many of these efforts aren't effective, that may be due to many businesses simply misunderstanding what social media is also why it's so important!

First, what exactly is social media? Asking 10 people might get you 10 different answers, but to keep it simple, lets say that social media is a group of tools that let you create and share content online. Blogs, social networks, and video's are the common forms of social media that most of us are at least somewhat familiar with.

The problem that many businesses have, is how they view social media.  Many businesses (of all sizes) see social media sites as new channels to publish content into. In other words, they view social media as being marketing channels.

In reality this couldn't be further from the truth.

Notice in the above definition of social media, We said that these sites and tools are ways to create and share content. Why use the word 'share' instead of 'publish' or 'distribute'

Because sharing implies interaction. Publishing and distributing implies one-way channels. Social media is rooted in sharing content. It can be content you have created, it can be content that someone else has created, but as a whole, social media sites and tools are so popular because of how people are sharing and interacting with content.

So then the question becomes, how can businesses use social media effectively?

By creating more value for the people that interact with your content, than you receive back from them.

So your focus changes from 'what can I get from social media', to 'how can I use these tools to give value to others?'. It sounds completely counterintuitive, I know. But remember again that social media is rooted in sharing. In order to start sharing, you have to create content that others can FIRST find value in. That prompts them to want to share that content with other people.

Hint: That content isn't advertising. For example, we won't find much value in a blog post telling us about the sales your nursery is having on lawncare products this week. But if you post 'Ten Ways to Have a Gorgeous Lawn by the Fourth of July!' on your blog, THAT is content that we can find value in. Since we would likely find value in your second post, that makes it far more likely that we will share that post with other people, which helps promote your lawncare business.

You create value for us with the 'Ten Ways' blog post, which prompts us to promote your post (and by extension, your business), and that creates value for you.

If you want to use social media to grow your business, always remember that your goal is to use these tools and sites to create more value than you receive. Think sharing instead of publishing. Think communication instead of marketing.

The more value you can create for others with social media, the more value you will receive back as a result. But it all starts with creating and sharing value, not extracting.

Websites for Iowa businesses' Free at That......

Google’s Iowa Get Your Business Online program makes it easy
for Iowa businesses to build an online presence.

DES MOINES, IA - Today Google joins with the State of Iowa and a host of other national and local Iowa partners to launch Iowa Get Your Business Online. Designed to help drive economic growth, the new program provides Iowa businesses with the tools and resources to establish a website, find new customers, and grow their businesses.

Iowa Get Your Business Online provides a fast and easy way for Iowa businesses to build an online presence. Google is partnering with Intuit to provide its popular Intuit Websites offering for free, which includes an easy-to-build website, a customized domain name, and web-hosting for one year. Participating Iowa businesses will also receive a local business listing on Google Places, along with free tools, trainings and resources to grow their business online.

Getting online represents an immense economic opportunity for Iowa businesses. While 97% of Americans look online for local products and services, 59% of Iowa small businesses do not have a website. That means that many small businesses are virtually invisible to potential customers looking online. One reason many small businesses haven’t taken the first step is the perception that getting online is complex, costly, and time-consuming.

“One of the best ways we can help small businesses and the economy is to help Iowa businesses increase their visibility online,” said Lieutenant Governor Kim Reynolds. “This enables them to find new customers and sell more products and services. Google chose to invest $600 million dollars in their state of the art data center in Council Bluffs because it continues to be a center of commerce. As part of their ongoing commitment to Iowa, they have decided to bring this event here and help Iowa businesses grow.”

“Today’s consumers are looking online for products and services, and it’s so important for Iowa’s small businesses to meet those customers online,” says Mary Himinkool, Head of Global Entrepreneurship Outreach at Google. “We’re here in Iowa to not only show business owners that there’s a huge opportunity to expand their business online, but to also provide the guidance to help them do it successfully.”

“As a leading provider of small business solutions, we have witnessed the growth small businesses have seen from getting online,” said Ralph Matlack, Group Product Manager at Intuit. “We are excited to offer Intuit Websites for free to all the wonderful small businesses in Iowa and to help them create a customized presence that represents their unique brands.”

“Technology and the internet are becoming very important to the growth of small businesses in Iowa. The Iowa SBDC is proud and excited to partner with Google and other Iowa resource partners to help Iowa businesses take advantage of the power of the internet” says Jim Heckmann, Iowa SBDC State Director.

"Every day we see more and more people realize that meeting face-to-face to collaborate is by far the best way to get things done." said Mary Telesco, VP of Meetup. "There are thousands of Small Business Meetup members helping each other succeed every day by connecting with one another, in-person. That is exactly why we are thrilled to partner with Google on this initiative —–-— small business owners getting online together better than going at it alone!”

Businesses can get online by visiting www.IowaGetOnline.com, or by attending one of the many Google-hosted events throughout the state.

The first of several events for small businesses will be held in Des Moines on September 12-13 at the FFA Enrichment Center, in Council Bluffs on September 15 at the Mid-America Center, in Waterloo on September 16 at the Waterloo Center for the Arts, in Cedar Falls on September 27 at the University of Northern Iowa, and in Pella on September 30 at the Royal Amsterdam Hotel. At these events, small businesses can attend sessions from Google, as well as ongoing workshops from Intuit that walk attendees through the process of setting up their free websites in real time. Iowa businesses who cannot attend the events can visit www.IowaGetOnline.com to quickly and easily get online today. The program will be available online for a year.

The Iowa Get Your Business Online program is made possible by Google in partnership with Intuit, Association of Small Business Development Centers, Meetup, SCORE, Iowa Association of Business and Industry, Iowa Chamber Alliance, Iowa Economic Development Authority, Iowa Small Business Development Center, Central Iowa Chapter of the National Association of Women Business Owners, Council Bluffs Area Chamber of Commerce, Des Moines Area Community College, Greater Cedar Valley Alliance and Chamber, Greater Des Moines Partnership, Iowa Area Development Group, Iowans for Social & Economic Development, John Pappajohn Entrepreneurial Centers, MyEntre.net, Southwest Iowa Coalition, University Northern Iowa Regional Business Center, and VentureNet Iowa.

About Iowa Get Your Business Online

Iowa Get Your Business Online is a joint initiative by Google, Intuit, Association of Small Business Development Centers, Meetup, SCORE, Iowa Association of Business and Industry, Iowa Chamber Alliance, Iowa Economic Development Authority, Iowa Small Business Development Center, Central Iowa Chapter of the National Association of Women Business Owners, Council Bluffs Area Chamber of Commerce, Des Moines Area Community College, Greater Cedar Valley Alliance and Chamber, Greater Des Moines Partnership, Iowa Area Development Group, Iowans for Social & Economic Development, John Pappajohn Entrepreneurial Centers, MyEntre.net, Southwest Iowa Coalition, University Northern Iowa Regional Business Center, VentureNet Iowa and other business organizations providing complementary resources to help small businesses get online and take advantage of the economic opportunities offered through the Internet. The program aims to help tens of thousands of Iowa businesses get online over the next 12 months. Via  original site here

Ten Reasons To Google Places

 

 

1. Online advertising like Google Places is the way of the future, and it will soon replace paper phone directory listings that cost thousands of dollars per year.

2. Google Places is free.

3. When your Google Places listing is optimized properly, your business listing appears on the first page of Google.

4. You can offer discounts and coupons for one day, one week, or one month.

5. Your website, physical mailing address, and your phone number are displayed in your listing, which allows customers to find you more quickly and to get the information they need.

6. Mobile phone users can find your business listing immediately, and they don’t need a computer to do it.

7. You will receive more traffic and new customers.

8. You don’t need a physical retail or warehouse location to get accepted into Google Places.

9. By using citations and reviews, your Google Places will move up in ranking. With high ranking, within eight weeks, rather than eight months or eight years, your free advertising with Google Places will bring you more targeted customers faster than traditional organic methods.

10. Finally, and the most important to your financial goals, is that because it is so easy for customers to find your business listing, you will make more money than you did before your business was listed in Google Places.

You Can Be The Change Take it From Foursquare Co-Founder

Get a real Site

Web development is a passion for me. I enjoy learning about new technology each and every day. I make good websites... I don't ever settle for second best, and I won't let you settle either. Whatever you need to get done, I will do it for you or I will use my network to get someone to get it done.

When it comes to designing webpages, I have been told I am a natural.

I have been designing for 9 years now. I have been developing in various web technologies for just as long.

I have a passion for learning new web design and development tech, and I always keep up to date on current trends. I have a bachelor's degree from the University of Nebraska.

Contact me for a new design for your website or updates to your existing design.

I have worked extensively with the technologies listed below. If you need anything related to something on this list, I can definitely take care of you!

* Node.js
* Express.js
* Socket.IO and Dnode
* MongoDB, Redis, Riak and Couchdb
* 960 Mobile grid CSS frameworks
* jQuery/Zepto
* Nginx and Apache
* cPanel/WHM
* Git
* WordPress
* Drupal
* Magento
* Kohana
* CodeIgniter
* MySQL

Hire a real professional for your next web project.

A recent study ON SOCIAL MEDIA

   

 

A recent study by Chadwick Martin Bailey showed that 60% of people who are Facebook fans of companies or brands and 79% of people who are Twitter followers are more likely to recommend those brands and companies since becoming fans or followers, and 51% of Facebook fans and 67% of Twitter followers are more likely to buy products/services from the brands and companies they follow or are fans of.

And, on the flipside, NOT having a social media presence can have an equally impactful negative effect. This same study found that the peoples' opinions of brands and companies that had no Facebook, Twitter, and other digital social presence was overwhelminigly negative - with respondents feeling that these companies were "out of touch" and "didn't care" about consumers, and they "doubted the relevance" of these brands and businesses.

At Online Advantage, we can handle your social media presence every step of the way, from establishing your accounts, building your following, and maintaining that all-important ongoing relationship with your customer base.

Search Engine Optimization

When people do a Google search, they are already in "information seeking mode" or "buying mode." In other words, they are ready to take action regarding whatever they are searching for. In either instance, their minds are already several steps ahead in the purchasing cycle than they are when they are in "socializing mode" - which they are when they are on social networks. This is why developing a robust Social Media profile is good for building your brand and Search Engine Optimization is advantageous for gaining clients directly.

At Online Advantage, the strategy we employ is to always be working on ranking for a combination of easy, medium, and difficult competition keywords. In this way, you are capturing some traffic immediately via the easier keywords, but also putting effort into the long-term bigger rewards of high traffic, high competition keywords.

2wks Ahead of Schedule for facebook Page

Consumers are not listening

The days when marketing and advertising consisted of unilateral broadcasting of an advertising message on the part of the company or brand and receiving on the part of the consumers have disappeared with the dust of the one-way messaging system. The advent of social media has put an end to traditional methods of advertising that no longer work in our dynamic social media environment. Marketing has changed drastically since the days of the flashing banner advertisements and pop-ups and other intrusive marketing methods. In the past, fewer ads reached and were viewed by more people with undivided attention than the ads today which bombard the consumer with messages. They reach fewer people who are paying lesser attention. Statistics show that the recall value of an advertisement viewed on television during evening primetime hours for an adult male viewer has dropped to 10% from the nation average of 1965, which was 35% Reasons for this phenomenon include product proliferation, media proliferation, access proliferation and the digitalization of media. Users today are spoiled for choice. There are millions of products to choose from, fragmented media to listen to and a multitude of devices from which information can be gained instantly and easily. All of which lead us to draw certain conclusions: Consumers are not listening to the messages we want them to listen to Consumers are choosing to ignore interruptive advertising They are creating and publishing their own valuations of products via social media Consumers are getting organized and leaving advertisers behind They are selecting the messages they want to hear and discarding the messages that do not appeal to them These five conclusions I have mentioned are merely the tip of the iceberg. They indicate the revolution that has been brought about by social media. Consumers have become creators of content and they are changing the way they react to advertisements. Advertisers and brands must realize that one-way messaging no longer works in today's scenario. Messages must be interactive and inclusive. As consumers, we don't want to hear what you have to say - we want to talk about how your brand will fit into our environment, how it will adapt to our created actions, and respond to our concerns. Advertising can no longer be static; it needs to become dynamic. Like the consumers it targets!

Wanna Block Calls From Your Google V..

Global Spam Filtering makes it possible to automatically redirect calls, texts, and voicemails from any of the numbers in the Google database that have been identified as spam directly into your spam folder. To enable this feature simply:

1. Click the wrench icon and select Voice Settings.
2. Click the Call tab.
3. Check the box next to Global Spam Filtering.

If a number ends up incorrectly marked as spam, you can easily unblock it by selecting the message and clicking the Not Spam button in your spam folder.

Spam from Individual Callers

If you get unwanted calls, you can choose to send the caller directly to voicemail, treat all calls from a particular number as spam, or block the caller. Follow these steps:

1. Go to your Contacts list in Google Voice.
2. Select the checkbox next to your contact's name.
3. Click Edit Google Voice Settings and select the second radio button under the 'When this contact calls you:' section, next to the drop-down menu.
4. Choose one of these options from the drop-down menu:
   
   • Send to Voicemail: None of your phones will ring, but the caller will be prompted to leave you a voicemail message.
   • Treat as Spam: The caller will hear ringing and then be prompted to leave you a voicemail message. None of your phones will ring. The voicemail will be automatically marked in your inbox as Spam, and you won't receive a notification for the voicemail.
   • Block Caller: The caller will hear a 'Number not in service' message when calling your Google number. None of your phones will ring. The call will be marked as 'Blocked' under 'History' and 'Missed.'

If you've marked a call or voicemail as spam on the Google Voice website, any future calls from the caller will be sent to your voicemail, and your phones won't ring. The voicemail will be automatically placed in the Spam folder. Just find the call or voicemail from the caller, select the checkbox next to the call or voicemail, and click the Report Spam button. 

You can also mark a caller as spam when listening to your voicemails; just press 8 at any time during the message.

 

He who has the Gold

See the full gallery on Posterous

The price of gold struck a record high above $1,700 an ounce on Monday with dealers flocking to the safe haven metal as Asian stocks tumbled following Standard & Poor's downgrade of US debt. The price of gold reached $1,704.30 an ounce in Hong Kong trade. "People are just taking their money out 1/8of other markets 3/8, especially from the dollar and euro and investing in gold and the Japanese yen," a Tokyo-based trader told Dow Jones Newswires. Asian markets were sent spinning on Monday after S&P late Friday cut the United States' AAA rating by one notch, citing deep divisions in Washington over its long-term fiscal standing. The turmoil has led investors to seek out less-risky gold at a time of economic uncertainty. S&P's downgrade compounded already weak sentiment amid fears that the eurozone debt crisis will spread to other nations, while the United States has posted a series of poor data indicating an economic slowdown. It has led some analysts to warn of another global financial crisis that could even be worse than that of 2008-09.

One Pot or Two?

One of the first decisions any couple will have to make is whether to pool assets or maintain financial independence and keep separate accounts.

While situations like second marriages, previous holdings or bad financial habits may warrant the division of money, most financial planners believe a new couple should have a joint account.

"The benefit of a joint account is that both people get all of the information, so that is very beneficial," said Adriane Berg, financial expert, elder attorney and founder of Generation Bold. "Both should be watching carefully and both should be sharing responsibility so it is much easier in a joint account. It informs everybody of what is going on."

To allow a certain amount of flexibility, however, experts also suggest small separate accounts or regular allowances to take care of lunches at work, small discretionary purchases or gifts for your significant other.

"Money is a very emotional issue and trying to make financial decisions about every little purchase can cause a lot of friction in a relationship," said Nathan Gehring, certified financial planner and owner of Couples Financial Planning & Coaching, LLC. "Having that pot of money for this situation takes that concern away."

Read more: Financial Planning for Young Couples | eHow.com http://www.ehow.com/feature_8402093_financial-planning-young-couples.html#ixzz1U8JTxX3t

There are 4 zones of awareness.

White, Yellow, Red, Black
When you are in the white zone you are in the zombie state.  The world around you is made up of fuzzy white noise.  You aren’t exactly clear about where you are at.  If you’ve ever driven from home to work and had no awareness of the drive you know exactly what I’m talking about.
In the yellow stage you are aware of your surroundings.  In the red zone you are sensing you need to pay attention.  The yellow and red zones represent the levels of awareness you should experience in any selling situation.  In the yellow and red zones you are cued in on what’s going on around you and alert to the potential opportunities around you.
The black zone is a state of super heightened awareness.  In the military this represents the zone you are in when you are ready to kill anything that moves.  If you need to protect your own life or the life of those around you this is an appropriate state of awareness.
However, when you get desperate to get a client… desperate to pay your bills… all too often you cross over into the black zone.  The black zone does you no good if you are trying to get clients.  The black zone is a very dangerous state of awareness for the wrong situations.
It’s why yelling “fire” in a crowded theater is so dangerous.  When you yell “fire” even a perfectly logical, intelligent, and capable person gets trampled trying to get to the exit.  Otherwise polite and considerate people will kill anything that gets between them and the exit.  Even though finding an exit would easy in a calm state… in the black zone you transition into a blind panic… the black zone is harmful for both you and those around you.
No one sets out to get themselves in the black zone.  It just kind of creeps up on you.  It happens because you get on this roller coaster where you keep doing the same things experiencing both highs and lows.  Eventually the highs get fewer and farther between and the lows get deeper and more frequent.
Some people never get off this roller coaster until they force to because they crash.  The hairier the ride… the steeper the lows… the more likely you are to get and stay in the black zone where you are determined to literally force people into becoming clients.  You set your jaw and refuse to leave until you have a check in hand.
Others realize you can’t keep doing the same thing and expect different results so they make a commitment to get off before they crash.  Those people are in the yellow or red zones.  They are paying attention to the cues that are telling them something has to change and soon.
The problem is… sometimes selling your services feels a little like playing Blackjack with a dealer who’s stacked the deck.  You study all the cards.  You watch each hand dealt. You watch the dealer closely… yet you lose hand after hand.  At one point, in utter frustration, you grab another deck slam it down on the table and demand you play with this new deck.
Yet, you continue to lose because what you didn’t realize is the new deck is missing a few cards.