http://www.azulcreative.com.au/ Sun, 20 May 2012 00:46:31 AZUL Creative Pty Ltd Articles http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Timeline-makes-it-harder-to-get-'Likes'-but-is-that-a-bad-thing?.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Timeline-makes-it-harder-to-get-'Likes'-but-is-that-a-bad-thing?.html The new Facebook Timeline layout has, according to some studies, made it harder for business pages to get 'Likes' or in other word fans. But is that such a disadvantage? The previous version of Facebook allowed for landing pages to be used to help encourage people to 'Like' a businesses page, often offering an incentive to those that did. This certainly resulted in a lot of new fans for pages, but that... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Is-there-too-much-emphasis-on-marketing-via-Social-Media?.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Is-there-too-much-emphasis-on-marketing-via-Social-Media?.html Are companies - particularly small to medium sized businesses - putting too much emphasis on social media marketing at the expense of more traditional forms of marketing? Well according to an article by Steve Allan on the Business 2 Community website they are: According to the most recent Nielsen figures, those 212 Million on-line Americans spend an average of an hour a day on-line. Further, they are on any given web page for... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Where-do-people-look-when-they-come-to-your-Facebook-page?.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Where-do-people-look-when-they-come-to-your-Facebook-page?.html Which elements of your Facebook fan page are most important from a visitors point of view now that the new Timeline has been introduced? Well according to this very interesting article by David Cohen from AllFacebook, your Cover image is number one. The article raises some interesting statistics on where people look on the ne Timeline pages as compared to the older page layouts and is well worth a read. http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Zmags-Launch-New-Goodies-For-Timeline-&-Pinterest.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Zmags-Launch-New-Goodies-For-Timeline-&-Pinterest.html Zmags, a provider of mobile media and social marketing platforms have recently launched new social capabilities for Facebook Timeline and Pinterest for digital catalogues, as well as a new iPad App. According to the company their Zmags platform now offers a multi-page layout option which is optimised for Facebook Timeline. This will allow businesses to publish things like digital catalogues on their Timeline, which when used in... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Facebook-Reach-Generator.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Facebook-Reach-Generator.html I have had a few businesses ask me about Facebook Reach Generator recently and specifically what advantages it might offer their businesses. Well the reality for most small to medium sized businesses is that Reach Generator is not designed for you or your business. It is more designed for those businesses with a LOT of fans and those with a LOT of money to throw at marketing on Facebook. Reach Generator as the name suggests,... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Facebook-the-Visual-Medium.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Facebook-the-Visual-Medium.html When it comes to Facebook posts we know that different content attracts different levels of attention. For example, we know that some people tend to click, comment, like and share more on photo posts whereas others tend to interact more with posts that contain links, whilst others like straight text posts and others still prefer video. So which should you be using? Well that all depends on your individual fans and only through rigorous... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Are-Google-and-Facebook-behind-the-times?.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Are-Google-and-Facebook-behind-the-times?.html Are employees of Google and Facebook leading too sheltered lives? Are they too hidden from the real world to understand the needs of us mobile mere mortals? Well according to Nick Bilton of the New York Times they just might be. It’s that working at these companies is like going to work on an all-inclusive cruise ship. The analogy is apt in terms of the luxury — and the isolation. An employee’s day... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Is-Facebook-penalising-third-party-tools?.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Is-Facebook-penalising-third-party-tools?.html It's a question that's been around for some time now - does content that is published on Facebook fan pages via third-party API's get the same amount of traffic as posts made directly into the Facebook page itself? Well according to a study by EdgeRank Checker late last year there was a discrepancy between those posts that were made by third-party tools and those made directly into Facebook. Then just a few... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Complete-All-Within-Facebook-Shopping.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Complete-All-Within-Facebook-Shopping.html Considering how Facebook want you spending more time within Facebook and less time clicking away into other areas of the World Wide Web, they must be thrilled with Wazala's new business page. Wazala, the socially integrated shopping cart, announced the release of their updated Facebook Pages online store, which allows for a full in Facebook shopping experience. Customers that land on a product or brand page, can browse products... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Artists-need-their-own-websites.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Artists-need-their-own-websites.html For some time now I have been explaining to clients that they need to get their Facebook fans onto a database through their website or squeeze page, and try to get their website visitors to also like them on Facebook. Paul from Digital Music News has similar ideas it seems: Well, you'd be shocked how many artists are sending all of the their fan traffic to Facebook - first - instead of to a site they control. But after sweeping... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Facebook-Considers-Adding-Trending-Articles.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Facebook-Considers-Adding-Trending-Articles.html It’s recently been rumoured that Facebook are considering introducing ‘Trending Articles’ into our newsfeeds, in a move that is certain to cause some angst among those users who are still coming to grips with Timeline. But whereas Timeline complaints were in many ways unfounded and users have not only got use to it, but many have actually embraced the change, ‘Trending Articles’ might... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Who-is-your-Facebook-fan-page-really-for?.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Who-is-your-Facebook-fan-page-really-for?.html There are a lot of theories floating around about who businesses Facebook fan pages should be built for. Many people say that fan pages should not be built for suspects or prospects, but instead should be designed to target existing customers. Whilst other people believe that fan pages should be viewed as a lead generation source and hopefully existing customers will become fans as well. So which group of people are right? Well I... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/The-Best-Websites-Don't-Get-Noticed.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/The-Best-Websites-Don't-Get-Noticed.html If someone is looking at your website, then chances are your website is poorly designed. Now you may be thinking that the goal of any website is to have people looking at it, but actually it isn't. For example I don't want to looking at my website, I want you to do what you're doing right now. I want you to read the content on my website. Many business owners get carried away with the overall visual of their... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/69-percent-of-websites-don't-sell.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/69-percent-of-websites-don't-sell.html The content of most business websites is crap. It's poorly written, boring drivel that tells the reader nothing, and fails to sell. Now I accept that many business owners have poor writing skills. I also accept that many of you are time challenged. But what I can't accept is that business owners don't have the commonsense to pay someone to write their website copy for them. Now some of you might be... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Become-a-marketing-guru-with-PPC.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Become-a-marketing-guru-with-PPC.html Would you like to know the secrets to becoming a marketing guru? How to write headlines and copy that you KNOW will get you results? Well read on further and you will discover the easiest way to becoming a marketing genius. Let's start by looking at a common scenario ... Imagine for a moment that you're about to place an advertisement into a 12 month telephone directory. Now assuming that you know just a little... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Proof-is-in-the-social-media-pudding.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Proof-is-in-the-social-media-pudding.html I often have business owners ask me if social media marketing is all it's cracked up to be; if it's really as effective as marketers like me say it is. Well the answer is yes, no and maybe of course, as there are a number of factors that come in to play and social media should not be seen as the one and only strategy for the vast majority of businesses. But it can be extremely powerful as part of an overall marketing... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Are-you-being-Social-in-your-social-media-marketing?.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Are-you-being-Social-in-your-social-media-marketing?.html So you're on the social media bandwagon; you have a blog as well as Facebook and Twitter accounts. You regularly post information on each of these mediums, but you still don't seem to be getting a response. Why? Well maybe it's because you're not really being social. I have met business owners who treat their social media campaigns like their other online or offline campaigns, in that they produce... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Pinned-articles---have-I-missed-something-here?.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Pinned-articles---have-I-missed-something-here?.html Ok, is it just me or am I missing the point of pinned posts? Let me explain why I ask that question ... I have recently read a number of articles about Facebook Timeline in which the authors seem to be critical of the fact that people reading posts on the new layout seemed to be unaware that the post was intended to be highlighted. This is apparently based on a number of studies where various groups of people are asked to look at... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Facebook-Action-Links-for-Timeline-Apps.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Facebook-Action-Links-for-Timeline-Apps.html Facebook has recently annouced the lanuch of Action Links for Timeline apps that run on the Facebook platform. Action Links enable users an extra option for responding to posts in their Ticker or news feeds. Facebook give an example of how this will work using a recipe app. If your friend was cooking a recipe from the recipe app a post would appear on their Timeline which would show up in your news feed. Then, in addition to the... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Facebook-Adds-Organ-Donation-Feature.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Facebook-Adds-Organ-Donation-Feature.html There are quite a few negative things said about Facebook - everything from it being a time waster to it being a greedy and manipulative online evil. And whilst you may think some of those things are true, Facebook have given themselves a bit of positive publicity by introducing a new Timeline feature - Organ Donation. Currently this appears to be aimed more at the US market, whereby people can go to their Timeline and click on Life... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/PinView:-Ugly-Offspring-or-a-Cherished-Union?.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/PinView:-Ugly-Offspring-or-a-Cherished-Union?.html If you're up to date with your latest apps you'll no doubt have heard about PinView - the new app that transforms your Facebook page into a Pinterest style layout. But is this a good thing? Well according to some observers it's potentially a good thing, particularly if you're an existing fan of Pinterest: Relatively new social bookmarking craze, Pinterest, has been all the rage for millions of... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Facebook-Fan-Profiles.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Facebook-Fan-Profiles.html Do you have fans who really love your brand? I mean REALLY love it. You do? Then has Offerpop got an app for you. Offerpop have just launched Fan Profiles that allow fans the chance to create 'fan profiles' right on your companies Timeline page. Now if you're like me you might be thinking 'This is pretty unlikely, are people REALLY going to want to create a fan profile on my page. But the more I... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Facebook-Timeline-sees-drop-in-fan-numbers.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Facebook-Timeline-sees-drop-in-fan-numbers.html Various reports and studies have shown a number of benefits for Facebook business pages since the switch to Timeline - things like increased interaction and engagement with content being one. But according to a recent article on Mashable it's not all positives. According to a recent study by Wildfire Interactive there has been an increase in the average number of likes per post, but a decrease in the number of comments and, perhaps... http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Content-is-everything.html http://www.azulcreative.com.au/articles/Content-is-everything.html A lot of people ask me what is the most important thing to have on their website. My answer is always the same - content, content and more CONTENT. Search engines use the content on your website to work out what your website is all about. Then based on their understanding of what your site is about, they will work out what keywords are relevant to your site, and therefore when your site should appear in their listings based on the...