Social marketing is a relatively new concept
that’s based on a phenomenon that’s grown
despite the fact that no marketing experts
saw it coming, and it’s all based on social
networks, such as those brought into being by
MySpace and Facebook.
The idea with social networks is that
you have an online community where
you can connect and share with people
who have the same interests that you
do. For some, that might be an interest
in specific people or hobbies. For
others, the interest could surround employment
or education. What’s important is that a
social network lets you create a circle of like
-minded friends and acquaintances — also
called a community.For example, with MySpace, the
concept is to build a home page where you
and your friends can connect.
You can also connect with others who are
potential friends because they can
view your MySpace page and learn about
you and your interests.
If you’re marketing with social networking,
create your network, and as you have
something to market, share it with that
group of friends in your community.
They then share it with their friends, and
before you know it, a network that’s
far beyond the group you could reach on
your own knows what you’re doing.
Here’s the catch with social media marketing
though: If you develop a social
network specifically to sell something to
the people in that network, you’ll fall
right on your face. Really. Social networks
are created by people who have
something to share with other people who
think like them. If you barge into the
network with a sales pitch and nothing more,
you’ll be completely ostracized.
f you really want to see how social media
marketing works, check out some
of the organizations that have successful
sites on MySpace or Facebook —
Christian bands like Three Days Grace,
for example. To get to the point
where a social media marketing strategy
is successful requires a lot of effort
and attention, but the results can be very
much worth the time you put into
developing your place on the network.
AdSense allows website owners to earn money
from their sites in a way that they couldn't do
before. All they have to do is put the AdSense
code in their pages, and some visitors to the site
will click on the ads that are displayed. The more
visitors a site gets, the more people will click on
the ads, and the more money the site owner will
make. Because the ads are contextual, they match
the content of the pages they are displayed on, which
suits the advertisers because it drives people who are
interested in their topic to their sites, and they only pay
when people click on their ads.
Everyone is happy. Google makes lots of money,
advertisers get lots of targeted traffic and only pay for
ad impressions when someone clicks on them, Web
users can find more things that they are interested in,
and website owners can make anything from a small
amount of money to a very large amount of money.
Even the earnings from tiny websites can often offset
or pay for the upkeep of the sites - hosting, for instance.
Google created a system where everyone is a winner, and
if people hadn't taken advantage of it in ways that weren't
intended, everyone would still be happy.
Google announced a new ad format for Google AdSense
display ad units named magazine ads.
So instead of the display ad looking like a banner
ad with animation or various popping colors,
magazine ads are very minimalistic.
Google said they "designed with print magazine
ads in mind, putting a big emphasis on space and
typography and displaying a new look distinctive
from our regular text ads."
The ads certainly are more attractive
than the usual AdSense text ads.Google made it
"easier" to make AdSense ad units by refreshing
the interface and speeding things up within that interface.
The 300 x 1050 skyscraper might work on long pages,
but the 970 x 250 leaderboard seems a bit overwhelming.
And either one is going to look ugly unless it's a display ad
created for that size, as opposed to a slew of text ads or a
couple of 300 x 250 ad units floating in the space.
Traffic – We’ve covered this already in the series. You need
traffic, and specifically organic traffic, to stay competitive
and make the dollar bills go into your pocket.
Keyword Value – Specifically you need to understand how
much money you can make with keywords and how to evaluate their value.
Competition – You also need to understand and be able to
evaluate your competitive landscape and those that are
competing for the exact same keywords and ranks within the search engines.
