Masterlink Interactive Blog

It’s a place for friends to connect, to catch up, to plan parties, and to upload embarrassing and political-career-destroying pictures of said parties.

So just how much, really, can businesses, products, and brands fit into the ever-expanding and evolving Facebook landscape?

Google has been trying to explore exactly that question, and has dug up some interesting numbers from a study done by Chadwick Martin Bailey and iModerate Research Technologies. The gist? Those party-picture-posting people might be more interested in your business’ Facebook page than you might think:

Photo courtesy Google Retail Advertising Blog.

So while a slim majority of Facebook users don’t bother with business pages on the site, the fact that even 45 percent do (with 27 percent of users following three brands or more) is hugely significant. More than half a billion people now use Facebook, and 225 million of those willing to form at least limited virtual relationships with businesses on the site is nothing to sniff at — especially considering how carefully the free, formerly-college-exclusive networking site has had to tread about introducing both advertising and commercial interests.

So, with that in mind, perhaps more interesting (and useful) are the numbers showing why Facebook users “friend” or “like” a particular company or brand:

• 25 percent to gain access to promotions and discounts.
• 18 percent to show support for the brand.
• 10 percent simply because it’s fun and entertaining.
• 8 percent to be the first to hear new information.

In other words, draw them in with opportunity, and you’ll have their ear when it’s time to make a sale.

Regardless, it all shows just how important a robust social media element of your Internet marketing strategy has become. Tools like Facebook and Twitter allow you to control and spread your message, to give loyal customers “insider access” that creates incentive for them to repeatedly return, to explore and harness viral marketing opportunities, and to create healthy forums for feedback, customer service, and dialogue. It’s simply a great way to connect.

Contact one of our Dallas social media marketing experts for more information about how to maximize your social media presence.

Sick of social media, sorry it was ever invented, sad about the direction it’s taking our society, and skeptical about its importance for small businesses? Well… sorry.

According to Web Pro News:
Millennials are expected to make online sharing a lifelong habit, according to new research from Pew Internet and Elon University.

In an online survey of 895 technology stakeholders and critics, 67 percent agreed with the following statement:

“By 2020, members of Generation Y (today’s “digital natives”) will continue to be ambient broadcasters who disclose a great deal of personal information in order to stay connected and take advantage of social, economic, and political opportunities. Even as they mature, have families, and take on more significant responsibilities, their enthusiasm for widespread information sharing will carry forward.”

Some 29 percent agreed with the opposite statement:

“By 2020, members of Generation Y (today’s “digital natives”) will have “grown out” of much of their use of social networks, multiplayer online games and other time-consuming, transparency-engendering online tools. As they age and find new interests and commitments, their enthusiasm for widespread information sharing will abate.”

If there is a reduction in use of social media functions, it will most likely be in a backlash against negative over-sharing, not with the obvious benefits of social media that people will continue to reap. Think less teen girl gossip; more valuable information that people crave.
Most of those surveyed believed the sharing of personal information online has many social benefits as people open up to others in order to build friendships, form and find communities, seek help, and build their reputations. They said Millennials have already seen the benefits and will not reduce their use of these social tools over the next decade as they take on more responsibilities while growing older.

“The majority noted that new social norms that reward disclosure are already in place among the young,” said Pew Internet Director Lee Rainie.

“Some experts also expressed hope that society will be more forgiving of those whose youthful mistakes are on display in social media such as Facebook picture albums or YouTube videos.”

[...] “Some of the experts said an awkward trial-and-error period is unfolding and will continue over the next decade, as people adjust to new realities about how social networks perform and as new boundaries are set about the personal information that is appropriate to share,” said Janna Anderson, director of the Imagining the Internet Center and a co-author of the study.

All this to say, if you’re skeptical about the long-term importance of investing in an Internet marketing strategy (with a robust social media component), don’t be. Even if Twitter or Facebook fall out of favor, new platforms will almost assuredly rise to take their place.

People like easy access to information. People like the “bullhorn effect” of being able to control and broadcast information. People like community, and crave exchange. Social media sparks all of this.

Learn it. Know it. Use it to your business’s advantage. Contact our Dallas social media experts—we’ll show you how.

Apparently, providing 100 million people a free service with no way to make money from it isn’t a lasting business strategy.

Twitter (finally) began trying to capitalize on their enormous success when it rolled out a form of limited advertising last week. We’ve been expecting this move. Curious about it. Even rooting for it, because we assumed it would be something innovative that would change the Dallas Internet marketing landscape. And now it’s here.

Well… almost.

According to the TimesOnline:

Last week at Chirp, its first conference for software developers, the firm revealed it has almost 106m registered users and is adding 300,000 a day

Twitter’s popularity hasn’t been in doubt, but the firm’s management has been bugged by constant questions about how they will spin those tweets into gold. “As much as we want to tell people to shut the hell up, it’s important,” said co-founder Ev Williams last week.

Plan A is an advertising platform called Promoted Tweets that will serve up ads based on keywords in Twitter search queries. [...]

For critics, the plan doesn’t come close to justifying Twitter’s $1 billion (£650m) valuation. Promoted Tweets, however, is just the start. What Twitter does next is worrying many of the people who have propelled it to the top.

Basically, the move is just a first step. To understand how it works, take Starbucks for one popular example. Currently, if you Twitter search “coffee,” the first result is clearly identified as “Promoted by Starbucks Coffee” from the Starbucks Twitter feed. Even when new results pop up, the Promoted Tweet keeps the top spot. The ad changes whenever the company chirps out something new (every few days or so) specifically for that purpose.

Starbucks Sponsored Tweet

It works well for instant updates about promotions and catchy one-liner ads, and it takes a more subtle, conversational approach to advertising.

And it’s an interesting idea because, well, the ads are required to work. Twitter is leery of any sort of intrusive advertising that would slow the microblogging platform’s explosive growth, and it seems like it doesn’t want any sponsored dead weight clogging users’ search results. So if the Tweet doesn’t catch on (via retweets and click-throughs ) they change it. According to Twitter co-founder Biz Stone: “There is one big difference between a Promoted Tweet and a regular Tweet. Promoted Tweets must meet a higher bar—they must resonate with users.”

Let’s think about that — essentially, ads will only be allowed if they are effective. That might sound like an unusual burden, but it also reduces the risk of investing a bunch of money in a failing ad campaign. The success of this aspect is one we’ll follow closely.

So how you can make Twitter advertising work for your Social Media marketing strategy?

Well, so far, Twitter is experimenting with only a few highly visible partners, like Red Bull, Best Buy, Bravo, Sony Pictures, Starbucks, and Virgin America. And, so far, the ads are limited to search results. But all this could soon change.

According to Stone, Twitter is just taking it one step at a time:

“Before we roll out more phases, we want to get a better understanding of the resonance of Promoted Tweets, user experience and advertiser value. Once this is done, we plan to allow Promoted Tweets to be shown by Twitter clients and other ecosystem partners and to expand beyond Twitter search, including displaying relevant Promoted Tweets in your timelines in a way that is useful to you.”

“Since all Promoted Tweets are organic Tweets, there is not a single “ad” in our Promoted Tweets platform that isn’t already an organic part of Twitter. This is distinct from both traditional search advertising and more recent social advertising. Promoted Tweets will also be timely. Like any other Tweet, the connection between you and a Promoted Tweet in real-time provides a powerful means of delivering information relevant to you at the moment.”

So you’ll have to be patient. But, as WebProNews reminds us, Twitter can already be put to work for your business in a variety of ways:

1. Get in front of journalists. More of them are using Twitter and Facebook according to a recent study.
2. Use things like Twitter share buttons on content to promote sharing of content (once it’s been tweeted, it may get retweeted repeatedly).
3. Remember that brands on Facebook and Twitter are favored by consumers.
4. You can learn some things about audience engagement from Justin Bieber. Seriously.
5. Get found in real-time search (here are some tips for that).

Stay tuned. We’ll keep you updated here on the blog as well as on the Masterlink Interactive Twitter page. Follow Us!

Stuart Frazier | Operations Manager for Masterlink Interactive

Your tire company is having a big sale. What’s the best way to spread the news? Here’s a method that just got very, very important to understand:

In a (rather fitting) Twitter announcement a few weeks ago, Google revealed that public status updates from Facebook will now be included in their search engine’s real-time search feature. It’s just the latest step in Google’s quest to perfect organization of and access to what seems like all the information in the entire world (also check out Kimber’s excellent take on Google’s new Personalized Search).

Real-time search is, essentially, instant access to the latest information about a particular subject popping up all over the web. When people post an update, you can instantly find it (not in all cases). The technique has been the gold at the end of the social media rainbow for a long time, but finally broke through recently thanks to Twitter’s massive success. Google jumped in a few months ago, allowing users to search through aggregated updates from platforms like Twitter, FriendFeed, and more — and now Facebook status updates.

Here they explain why:

“Search is a natural starting point for discovering the world’s information, and we strive to bring you the freshest, most comprehensive and relevant search results over an ever expanding universe of content on the multitude of devices you use to access it.

Now, immediately after conducting a search, you can see live updates from people on popular sites like Twitter and FriendFeed, as well as headlines from news and blog posts published just seconds before. When they are relevant, we’ll rank these latest results to show the freshest information right on the search results page.

Try searching for your favorite TV show, sporting event or the latest development on a recent government bill. Whether it’s an eyewitness tweet, a breaking news story or a fresh blog post, you can find it on Google right after it’s published on the web.”

You can access these updates via the “options” link located at the top of the search results page.

Compare this to a regular Google search — the process we all know and love and spend hours and hours trying to understand in order to help businesses secure a spot high up in the results — where the search engine tries to return the best possible information, but not necessarily the latest. When it comes to Internet marketing, the latest can sometimes be as effective as the best.

WebProNews puts the business impact this way:

“This seems to indicate that brands should be getting a good amount of play for Facebook appearances in Google’s real-time search results, and possibly in the real-time search results in general (due to Facebook’s huge user-base). Right now, Facebook isn’t dominating the results, but that is bound to change with it being the largest (by far) social network on the web…

This should also lead to Facebook Pages getting more fans, due to the increased exposure. Beware, however, that running a promotion on your Facebook Page may cost you ten thousand dollars, because Facebook’s policy guidelines indicate that you must get written approval from a Facebook account rep. In order to get one of those, you must spend that much in advertising, according to Eric Eldon of Inside Facebook.

So how will this affect the Dallas Internet marketing community?

Primarily, it shows just how important establishing a social media presence — including Facebook — should be for businesses. Now, a public status update on your business’ page won’t just reach your Facebook friends and fans, but potentially anyone, anywhere in the Dallas-Ft. Worth Metroplex (and beyond) using Google.

For example: you post a Facebook update about a sale your company is having on, let’s say, tires. If someone searches “Tire Sale in Dallas,” the idea is that your update will pop right up. It could be that easy but while this is a recent release we have seen the success vary on our customer base but believe as Google perfects the algorithm that this will soon change.

It’s a huge base, and an interactive marketing niche we’ll be pioneering at Masterlink Interactive throughout the near future. Stay tuned.

Stuart Frazier | Operations Manager for Masterlink Interactive

A Cash-Flow Positive Facebook Helps the Industry

Facebook is making money. It shouldn’t be shocking, we know.

But let’s be honest—social media is an industry that’s been more often rich in potential than profits. And no social media platform embodies this gap more than Facebook.

Despite the site’s massive growth, Mark Zuckerberg’s enterprise—launched in a Harvard dorm room five years ago—has actually struggled to break even. 300 million users (traffic has tripled from just 100 million a year ago) means a massive advertising base, but it also means prohibitive bandwidth and operations costs (a growing percentage of users come from developing countries, where advertisers are reluctant to invest).

But for the first time since the site hit the mainstream, enough cash is flowing in for the ballooning site to cover its operating expenses and continue to expand. It’s not quite profit, and major questions remain, but it could be a landmark step in the right direction.

So how should we—the social media community—read this latest news?

Facebook as the “Bellwether”

A profitable Facebook is good for the social media industry, primarily because an unprofitable Facebook could be devastating.

Look at it this way: While Facebook’s success would signify a well-run, innovative company capitalizing on an unprecedented user-base, Facebook’s failure would say more about systemic, industry-wide limitations. If a massive, efficient, innovative, pioneering company can’t turn profits, how are smaller ventures supposed to earn investor confidence?

In other words, with 300 million users, Facebook profits seem to some almost inevitable. But if even Facebook falls short on the bottom line, investors could see the basic premise of social media success—profits via advertising embedded in free content—as too inherently flawed to overcome any significant amount of operating costs.

It all comes down to targeted advertising, and the fact that Facebook has appeared to finally figure it out bodes well for the rest of the industry.

Investment Capital is Coming

Improved confidence should only signal an easing in venture capital, and the hard numbers appear to be particularly welcoming: $240 million from Microsoft in 2007. $200 million from Russian investment group Digital Sky last May.

Overall, since its 2004 launch, the site has raised nearly $600 million, and — with expected revenues of $500 million this year — appears to be in much better shape for a potential IPO in 2010.

“This is important to us because it sets Facebook up to be a strong independent service for the long term,” said Zuckerberg on his blog.

Belief in the system — and belief that the potential can, in fact, turn into real profits — boosts social media and internet marketing ventures industry-wide. Bellwether Facebook is again leading the way.

Stuart Frazier | Operations Manager for Masterlink Interactive

Let’s say your suffer a blowout near Texarkana and need to find a tire store. A search engine could get you the urgent information you need…or it might just lead you to a website run by Texas senator and 2010 gubernatorial candidate Kay Bailey Hutchison.

Search engine optimization went mainstream in Texas political discussion three weeks ago, when the Austin American-Statesman reported that the www.standbykay.com site run by the Hutchison campaign had more than 2,200 such computer-generated “Hidden Phrases” written into its source code, with the goal of boosting search results rankings for each of the dubious search terms.

This meant that both the expected (”Texas Republicans”), and the bizarre, but harmless (”Cooper Tire Texarkana,” “What is a keg?” and “Why do we have knees?”) would help you stand with the senator. Political comedian Bill Maher made his way in via four different spellings of his name. Ron Paul earned more than 120 mentions, including an eyebrow-raising “Bad Things about Ron Paul.” Incumbent governor Rick Perry was represented 148 times including, most scandalously, the search term “Rick Perry Gay.”

The Hutchison campaign denied knowledge and eventually severed ties with the consulting firm credited with what we in the interactive marketing community call “black hat” SEO strategy-gone-wrong. But the damage was done.

The Hutchison campaign took an egg to the face. Modern politics entered another new bizarro realm of controversy. And we learned a hefty reminder about the risk of black hat SEO techniques.

Why Black Hat?

The idea behind black hat is simple: boost search engine rankings by means that are frowned upon by the larger SEO community. In practice, this usually means techniques like:

• Invisible text: Hiding irrelevant keywords by, say, writing them in white text on white backgrounds.
• Stuffing keywords: Skipping any effort to seamlessly fit the keywords into the text, and instead inserting long lists of keywords without any relevant content.
• Doorway pages: Building fake pages filled with keywords that the site visitor never sees (but which search spiders do).

The Hutchison site stuffed keywords under an invisible CSS <div> tag “display: none.”

At Masterlink, of course, we do not condone the use of black hat SEO techniques for three main reasons:

1. It’s ethically questionable, and creates a user-unfriendly search environment.

Search engines are powering the information age, and we all depend on their accuracy. Imagine a search world where black hat techniques were allowed to spread unfettered. You’d search for information about local schools, and get listings for sites selling knockoff Gucci bags from Bangalore. You’d search for a tire store in an emergency, and learn about, well, a gubernatorial challenger.

This just isn’t the game we want to play. And it too often comes back to bite the website that tries it.

2. At best, it’s a risky strategy.

Even beyond the press and blogosphere backlash, Google got wind of the senator’s SEO shenanigans. The omnipotent engine eventually dropped the site from its search results.

Black hat often achieves its desired results, but only temporarily. It is in the search engines’ best interests to keep optimization a fair game, and sites unfairly gaining an advantage almost always eventually get caught.

3. Above all, it’s unnecessary.

MasterLink’s internet marketing methods have provided proven, safe, efficient results, without using such misleading techniques.

Stuart Frazier | Operations Manager for Masterlink Interactive