Blog | Lead Generation, Online Marketing

What was the most significant development in social media in 2013?

Danny BermantFacebook, LinkedIn, SEO, Social media, Twitter

We are delighted to welcome some of the UK’s top online experts to the Brainstorm Digital blog, to share their insight into the rapidly changing landscape of social media. Today they tell us what trends they believe defined 2013 for businesses trying to grow online.

Check back here on Monday, to find out what trends they believe you must prepare for in 2014!

Danny Bermant: The Rise of Google+

Danny Bermant Google has tried for a number of years to become a serious contender among the main social networks with Google+, but had little success. In 2013, that all started to change because of something called "Google authorship". You can now link content that you publish on your website to your Google+ profile. When your website appears in Google search results, it appears with your profile photo and name (both of which link to your Google+ profile).

Having authorship not only adds a personal layer to your search engine profile, but has more credibility in Google’s eyes and so affects your website’s SEO ranking. Google has muscled its way into the social media market by stealth. If you want a top search engine ranking, you now have no choice but to use Google+

Is YouTube only for companies with large budgets?

Danny BermantSocial media, Youtube

Time and time again, businesses tell me that they don’t want to produce videos for YouTube because it costs too much money. This is a major strategic error, because YouTube is enormously influential – the second most visited search engine after Google, and the third most visited social media site after Facebook and Twitter.

No matter what business you’re running, in (virtually) every sector, YouTube can be a useful part of your marketing effort. The key is not your budget or special effects, but creating the kind of video that will resonate with the types of potential clients you are trying to reach, and promoting it properly so that they can find it.

With a good-quality HD camera, you can easily create:

An interview with your CEO, or perhaps with one of your grateful clients
A recording of your latest speech or performance
Footage of your team volunteering with the charity your business supports
A series of useful tips about your area of expertise
Demonstrations of how to use your product
A tour of a particularly interesting corner of your manufacturing plant, or behind-the-scenes in your shop
A ‘day in the life’ of one of your workers

5 ways businesses on social media can learn from journalists

Miriam ShavivSocial media

Journalist How do you produce great content for your social media programme?

It’s easy. Think like a journalist.

Now, I know what you are thinking. Easier said than done… I know nothing about journalism… Heck, I don’t even read a daily newspaper anymore.

So let me — the former journalist — help you out (yes, even if you’ve never set foot in a newsroom).

In recent years, it has become clear that one of the best ways to build your business online is to publish top-notch material that your potential clients really care about and find genuinely useful (usually on your blog). By giving them information they truly want and need, you build a close connection with them and eventually convert them into clients.

The industry name for this is “content marketing”.

The companies that are doing this best are effectively turning into online publishers – even if they are in a completely unrelated sector, for example selling soft drinks (watch Coca Cola’s inspirational content manifesto here ).

But even if you’re running a smaller operation, you need to produce regular, good-quality copy, and that’s where journalistic skills come in.

Should pharma abandon social media?

Danny BermantPharma, Social media

Pharma Social media is still quite new, and there are many companies — and entire industries — which are still unsure how to use it, are afraid of it, and are concerned that the whole thing is a fad.

One great example is this blog about whether pharma should abandon social media, by Zoe Dunn, an American digital strategist. Ultimately, she concludes that yes, pharma can use social media, but only if they commit to the long-term and have a proper strategy in place — and who can disagree with that?

But she doesn’t sound convinced of her own case. Along the way, she airs deep concern about whether social media is a suitable platform for “serious” pharma, and whether it is a sustainable strategy.

Help! Has Google suddenly killed my online strategy?

Miriam ShavivGoogle, SEO, Social media

At the Digital Marketing Show in London yesterday, one question came up again and again:

How does Google’s new search algorithm, Hummingbird, change our business’s strategy online?

We know what you’re wondering. What’s a search algorithm, and is this really something I need to care about?

which option The answer is that every so often, Google changes the way it calculates which pages are most relevant when people search for a particular term. If you want your website to show up high on Google, you need to understand as much as possible about how Google decides pages are important. That’s the algorithm.

In recent years, it has prioritised pages which contain appropriate ‘key words’ – so if you search, say, for ‘tall potted plants’, it will return pages which include that exact phrase. As a result, when people built their websites, they tried to figure out what their target market might search for – and included them in their content.

Hummingbird, which was announced in September, changes all that. Google’s new emphasis is on trying to figure out why you are asking the question, and then deliver the most appropriate links.

Is Youtube free advertising? Join the debate!

Danny BermantSocial media

video It’s well known that YouTube is a powerful and cost effective way to engage with your audience and convert them into sales, witness the famous Dollar Shave Club ad. By posting your videos to Youtube, your sales messages can reach an audience of thousands or even millions. So isn’t YouTube basically a form of free advertising?

To answer this question, let’s consider the pros and cons…

Is Youtube free?

It doesn’t cost any money to set up a YouTube account
All you need are lots of great ideas for videos that will keep your audience hooked. If you can come up with engaging content, your audience will want to share it with their friends
You can film Youtube videos with the majority of smart phones. Some models such as the iphone can even film in HD format
Most video formats are accepted. Just upload directly from your phone
It’s the worlds second largest search engine so if you have the right keywords in your video title and description, thousands or even million of potential customers can find you

The 3 Biggest Mistakes That Schools Make on Social Media

Danny BermantSocial media

Here is a copy of a presentation I recently delivered at the Education Facilities Forum

When parents and students are choosing a new school, they’re as likely to go to your Facebook or Twitter page as they are to your website.

BUT… unlike your website, they can talk to other parents and students and find out what you’re really like – or at least the picture painted by others.

If your establishment doesn’t have a social media presence, it doesn’t have a voice.

Why your company needs a social media spokesperson

Danny BermantSocial media

I’m going to talk to you about why you need a Social Media spokesperson.

A spokesperson really is the public face of your company. You may for example have a Twitter page or a LinkedIn Company page but you need a person within the company who is the public face, who essentially gives the official statements of what is happening at the company, shows the companies values and views and also that person really needs to set the tone on how everyone else speaks on behalf of the company. You need to think about who is going to be fulfilling that role. Very often you will have a Managing Director filling that role or a senior person in the company; the head of PR or something. What you need to think about is who is actually going to be doing that on a day to day basis.

Is Facebook dying? And should we care?

Danny BermantFacebook

old lady There has been a lot in the media over the past few weeks about how teenagers are abandoning Facebook. An interesting piece in the New York Times wonders whether it is no longer exciting enough, and whether it provides enough for teenagers to ‘do’:

Nathan Jurgenson, a sociologist who studies the Internet and was recently hired as a researcher by Snapchat, a mobile messaging app that is rapidly growing in popularity… said mainstream sites had evolved into a kind of "decoy social media." In his view, it has become akin to a yearbook or yellow pages – a static home on the Web that offers proof of someone’s existence, and perhaps little else. That might explain in part the popularity of a wave of new services like his company, Snapchat, as well as Twitter, Tumblr, Pinterest and even Vine. They have taken root, particularly among teenagers.

But does Facebook needs teens to survive? Let’s not forget they are the lowest spending socio-economic group.

Why your business needs a social media policy

Danny BermantSocial media

I’m going to talk to you about why your company needs a social media policy.

Regardless of what industry you are in or what business you are in you need to set up some clear, simple guidelines for your staff. They are going to be doing 2 things with your guidelines.

Is Facebook dying? And should we care?

Advertise Less. Book Way More

Discover the proven 3 step process that gets patients through your doors again and again.

Contact

Connect

Latest Tweets

Latest posts