I ran across an interesting study the other day that surveyed how consumers use the Internet to obtain health information. One part of this Pew Internet & American Life research project (in partnership with the California HealthCare Foundation) looked at how consumers obtain information about Hospitals and Medical Facilities and seemed to suggest it might be time for a fresh look at online healthcare marketing.

Actually, I was rather surprised that there weren’t a higher percentage of people using the Internet for this. The same study found that 61% of American adults overall look online for health-related information. Then I peeled back the layers of this information and some interesting insights emerged, such as:

• A significantly higher percentage of women sought information about hospitals and medical facilities than men.
• 45% of Internet Hospital/Medical Facility searchers have checked online review/ranking information relating to the facilities.
• Younger, or better educated, or more affluent consumers were more likely to use the Internet to obtain Hospital/Med Facility information.

Finding solutions for rising healthcare costs and coverage is one of the largest social and economic challenges of our era. Hospitals and medical facilities are particularly hard-pressed to do it all.

Online Healthcare Marketing to the Rescue?

Well, perhaps at least a significant assist. Internet Marketing is generally faster, less expensive and more measurable than classic marketing channels.

Moreover, the Internet is also becoming increasingly more relevant as a communication channel of choice — particularly among younger, more educated and affluent sectors which may favor Internet channels to the exclusion of traditional channels (such as newspapers, TV, direct mail, etc.).

Now, here’s the rub: you still have a significant percentage of your community that have not yet come to The Dark Side (aka The Internet) for information.

So, creating the optimal mix of traditional and online healthcare marketing plans becomes an important skill set for hospital marketing to be more relevant and budget-friendly. There are some additional nuances to take into consideration as well, for instance:

1. Much of classic marketing is interruption-based — meaning you are sending messages to a target audience that may/may not be remotely interested in your subject (also referred to as Push Marketing). You’re interrupting consumers from whatever they were doing with your message. Whereas, much of online marketing is intention-based where the consumer actively intends to get information on your topic and you presented your message while they were seeking it (Pull Marketing). Nice.
2. Another nuance to consider is the constantly growing array of Internet channels (Search Engines, Social Networks, etc.), media (Video, Audio, etc.), interactive capabilities (Polls, Online Calculators, etc.) and devices (Smart Phones, iPads, etc.) at your disposal.
3. Yet another nuance is the growing range of opportunities and challenges that User Generated Content presents and how that fits into the communication and engagement plans for your website and relevant online channels.

You can well imagine that the same Classic and Internet marketing mix that worked in the past for healthcare marketing (and hospital marketing in particular) may now be squandering resources in outdated channels. For instance, consider how the relevant communication channels for hospital marketing have changed over the last several years when targeting prospective parents with a message about a new hospital birthing facility.

It’s beginning to look like you need to be an Internet Marketing Surgeon to do effective Online Healthcare Marketing.

My Father used Old Spice. I can still remember the smell wafting out with the steam from his shower when he cracked open the bathroom door. It was, simply… wonderful.

Many years ago (Before Social Media Marketing).

When we asked Dad what that smell was, he said “frou-frous” and encouraged us kids to get some for him for Father’s Day or Christmas.

Of course, I didn’t know it then, but Old Spice had a brand image that most companies would kill for — then or now. Yet Old Spice had languished in the face of new fragrances that were accompanied by hip, megabucks marketing campaigns; their brand seemed dormant. Until two weeks ago.

Old Spice Guy - Social Media Marketing Icon

Old Spice Guy Video

As it turns out, you can indeed teach an Old Dog new tricks if you have the right creative team and willingness to test social media marketing.

Old Spice launched an aggressive social media campaign as a follow-on to their successful Super Bowl commercial featuring Old Spice Guy. In a matter of a few days they cranked out over 180 YouTube videos that have “Gone Viral” (viewers are telling their friends, who tell their friends, etc.). Heck, just go ahead and watch them for the sheer fun of it — they’re really entertaining!

Then, Old Spice Guy engaged in banter in key online communities such as Twitter, Facebook, Reddit and blogs. The “engagement” included celebrities such as Demi Moore, Ellen DeGeneres, Apollo Ohno and Kevin Rose (founder of Digg) that drew in their huge fan base as well.

You now can even get a “customizable” Old Spice Guy voicemail generator created by an enterprising entrepreneur.

What’s the secret to this runaway social media marketing success?

• Creativity
• Talent
• Smarts
• Chutzpah!

It turns out there’s a lot of sniping online that the campaign was all well and good, but Old Spice (Proctor & Gamble) was rumored to have lost money. Not so. The campaign cost was as near to zero as you can get, their YouTube channel alone has over 11.6 M views at the moment and Old Spice has already seen a 107% increase in sales.

What’s more, Old Spice Guy (Isaiah Mustafa – previously under-employed actor and former NFL football player) has just signed a contract to appear in a movie with Jennifer Aniston, Colin Farrell and Jamie Fox. The creative geniuses behind this social media marketing coup will, no doubt, be able to name their own future as well.

SWAN DIVE!

I felt like titling this article “The Good Guys Win.” The Good Guys win because there is empirical evidence from a recent study that ties outstanding customer service to increased revenue. Really… being a good corporate citizen pays.

It turns out that Excellent Customer Service pays dividends — according to recent research sponsored by American Express, a majority of customers report spending 9% more with companies that provide excellent customer service. AMX recently published findings from its Global Customer Service Barometer research and there is great news here for businesses.

In this economy, you’d have to work awfully hard to increase customer spending at any level, let alone 9%. If you do business globally and serve India and Japan, the news is even better — 11% and 10% increases respectively.

American Express Global Service Barometer

Moreover, a majority are reporting that this matters more to them in our current down economic climate — just when you might think that the price would rule.

Good News for Online Competition?

While not specifically geared toward online buying — there are two additional insights that may help companies that compete online to gain a competitive advantage:

• Mind the Gap

The study reports a significant gap between the willingness on respondents’ part to spend more and the numbers of companies they believe deliver on that level of excellent customer service.

Additionally, repeat business — aka The Holy Grail of Business — goes through the roof when you provide outstanding customer service. 81% report giving a company repeat business when they have provided good customer service, whereas 52% say they will never do business with them again after a bad customer experience.

Minding the competitive gap between those that deliver outstanding customer service and those that fall short and scooping up the spoils while competitors are asleep at the switch (one of my Dad’s favorite expressions) seems like a winning strategy.

• Online Blowback

48% of the survey respondents’ reported “always” or “often” using online review site postings or opinions in blogs to get information about a company’s customer service. Great, you say. Except here’s the Online Blowback — they believe negative reviews more than the positive ones.

Once again, monitoring and managing online reputations matter to your bottom line. Negatives mattering more than positives (particularly when it seems as though just about any crackpot can then do damage) is a tough nut to deal with yet it is always better to know the impact and work from a position of knowledge.

So, being one of the Good Guys that simply believe Excellent Customer Service is the Right Thing to Do just got a little better, didn’t it?

How do you get in front of customers in a down economy where budget is doled out with an eyedropper? Executives and marketers need every ounce of creativity they can muster to see their company through these challenging economic times.

Trade show attendance has dropped and companies just can’t afford the cost anyway. Other traditional tactics historically used to build a sales lead pipeline are less effective as well. More companies are turning to online lead generation tactics — and seem to like what they see.

If spending is a barometer for what works, data from Outsell’s Annual Advertising and Marketing Study 2010: Total US and B2B Advertising (as cited by BtoB Magazine and eMarketer) sheds light on alternative ways B2B companies get in front of and engage prospective customers using Social Networking, Webinars, Search Engines and Company Websites.

From the look of the research results, these online lead generation channels must be working out.

In fact, all of those channels represent great ways to reach your target audience, build reputation and trust. As of late, I’ve become more and more intrigued by Webinars as a reliable, manageable tactic for B2B lead generation. Webinars leave less to chance and provide you with control and predictability for building a robust sales lead pipeline.

That sentiment was echoed in a recent audio podcast we did with UEVision‘s CEO, Sarah Kling: Generating Internet Business Leads: Webinars. Sarah’s team has achieved significant success using Webinars to attract interested prospects, educate them, establish UE Vision’s bona fides and then follow up with qualified leads to nurture them in the sales lead pipeline.

While Webinars represent a cost-effective, highly controllable tactic, bear in mind that success doesn’t begin and end with producing the Webinar. We’re researching best practices in this area now, however, it seems clear that successful online lead generation will at least include:

• A strong upfront marketing plan to register members of your target market
• Aggressive reminders to registrants as you get close to the Webinar
• Proactive follow-though with leads and nurturing communication to participants

Are Webinars worth the effort? Do the math. In fact, do the math and calculate the internal resources and energy you’ll need to figure out a projected break-even point. If your break-even estimates show even the possibility of a winner, wouldn’t trying Webinars as an online lead generation tactic be worth testing?

How many times have you been in a conversation with someone about Facebook, LinkedIn or Twitter to hear them proudly tout how many people follow, friend or connect to them? Herein lies the basic problem. After all, if you ONLY had 5 “followers” but those followers were:

• The Dali Lama
• The President of the United States
• The Queen of England
• The Pope
• Bruce Springsteen (I can’t help myself sometimes…)

wouldn’t you think that was pretty awesome? And well you might — because, it is not HOW MANY — it is WHO, how ENGAGED they are with you and whether they contribute to the GOALS you set out to meet with those Social Networking channels in the first place.

If one of the above luminaries blogged about what a terrific product/service you offered, would it not change your results, just a little? Connecting and engaging with Key Influencers online in your markets or industry is far more valuable than simply building up a large group of subscribers who have little ability to help meet your bottom-line goals.

While how many people subscribe to you is a good statistic to track, it is not usually THE definitive statistic that matters. What matters is how the people you connect with through Social Networks contribute to your goal success.

In addition to tracking THE definitive goal statistics, you’ll also want to track milestone metrics along the way (such as how many follower by channel). This will give you the raw intelligence you need for performance management. If all you track are followers, expect disappointment.

And, while I am on this topic – let’s talk about goals. Most organizations don’t set them at all as though merely the act of showing up in those networks were the goal. Those that do set goals often do not ask enough of their Social Media Marketing — aggressively connecting the actions to results will help you see where more can be acheived. Here’s  a partial list of some of the goals you might consider: Sales, Lead Generation, Search Engine Ranking, Online Reputation Management, Customer Insight, Customer Support, Product/Service Research, Competitor Tracking, Thought Leadership and Brand Management. There are more.

If you’ve been holding back because you thought that it won’t work  for B2B, you might want to take a look at the chart below from recent eMarketer research that reports a planned 43% increase in Social Networking spending for 2010 among B2B study respondents. You might say that getting into Social Networking and measuring your results is becoming a new competitive baseline for good business practices.

Also interesting is the strong spending increase B2B marketers project for webinars (+ 26%), a topic that we covered in Generating Internet Business Leads: Webinars — a recent podcast with Sarah Kling, Founder and CEO of UEVision. This podcast covers how her company successfully uses webinars to build a robust sales lead pipeline and the role Social Media Marketing plays in that success.

Bear in mind a basic human instinct is to trust peers, colleagues and friends more than advertisements or marketing communication from people they have no relationship with or trust established. Social Networking gives us all unprecedented ability to do just that with ease and speed.

Social Networking is steadily growing as mainstream activity for personal and professional use. Getting a measurable Social Media Marketing Strategy & Plan in place with a performance management system that tracks the right metrics is rapidly becoming an essential component of remaining competitive.

Most companies are concerned with improving the volume and quality of their business leads and ensuring a predictable flow of qualified new prospects enter their sales lead pipeline. Building the sales pipeline with qualified Internet leads has the advantage of being faster and usually less resource-intense than you can achieve with more conventional tactics.

Business lead generation becomes even more of a challenge when your product or service is highly sophisticated, requiring some levels of customer education to convey value and establish trust in your capabilities.

That’s the challenge that Sarah Kling, founder and CEO of UEVision faced along with a need to do it in an expedient way, mindful of  time constraints.

Sarah’s company works with organizations to enhance the user experience and usability of their software products and websites.  As you can imagine, getting prospects to understand the value that great user experience can deliver for their results has to happen early in the sales buying cycle.

UEVision decided to experiment with Webinars and haven’t turned back… their results are outstanding. When we heard that their results were so strong that they couldn’t keep up with the demand for follow-on in-person meetings (a situation they quickly remedied) we wanted to learn more!

We asked Sarah to tell all – and she was highly informative. Tune in to learn what she has to say about:

• Using webinars for online lead generation
• The role of Live and On Demand webinars
• Webinar marketing promotion tactics
• Competitive advantages gained
• Webinar surprises & advise
• Marketing follow-up
• Results

Whatever goals you’ve set for your business website, there’s usually a constant need to gain greater online visibility to accomplish them.

You’ll want to make sure you have a workable plan to secure that growth. The first step you need to take in building that plan is to Identify your Online Competition.

This generally comes as quite a surprise to people we work with – who quite naturally believe they’ve got their competition pretty well scoped out. You may find some surprising — and aggravating — differences in how you need to think about competition online.

Any entity that stands between you and the top ranking positions online are now your competitors for visibility. And you will find that some of them aren’t competing with your products or services at all yet they own the high-visibility space you want.

More specifically, you need to take into consideration two distinct classes of competitors:

1. Businesses and organizations that compete against your products and services — your classic competitors.
2. Entitles that may not represent direct competition to you, yet they “hog” the top ranking positions in Search Engines.

Why does this matter? If a linchpin to your organization’s success is to drive higher volumes of relevant prospects to your website, you need to know which online channels represent the least degree of difficulty. This may mean thinking differently about Search Engines as a primary channel.

Some of these non-traditional competitors represent formidable obstacles that you might want to avoid — at least initially.

How do you know if the degree of difficulty is too high? Non-traditional competitors may be ceded great credibility and authority in the Search Engines, which is a factor in their ranking algorithms. They may have significant popularity, incoming links and media (again, ranking factors) that you will need to match or beat to get the visibility you want.

Examples of Non-traditional Online Competitors for Visibility:

• Government Entities, such as National Institute of Health (NIH)
• Professional Organizations, such as National Education Association (NEA)
• Educational Institutes, such as Stanford University
• Major media outlets, such as The New York Times or CNN
• Significant online portals, such as Wikipedia

Take a look at who owns the top positions for keyword phrases you want in Google, Yahoo! and Bing. Dissect their success. How many incoming links do they have? Do they have a lot of content that the Search Engines value, such as blogs, videos, and interactive elements? Is there evidence of thoughtful Search Engine Optimization (SEO) activity? You may want to read Smart Keyword Marketing for some fresh ideas.

Getting to the top of the Search Engines is a laudable goal. After all, you can attract many searchers who are quite possibly engaged in their buying consideration process — Nirvana! Yet competition and your situation may necessitate a different strategic approach.

Your Internet marketing strategy may need to factor in a more creative mix of online channels. With the phenomenal growth of Social Networks and the ease/low cost of creating new media, there has never been a better time to diversify your mix of Internet marketing channels.

Many businesses are consumed with the notion of driving targeted traffic to their website through Search Engines and Social Networks as though that was the goal. The goal is not traffic… the goal is conversion. Conversion of the traffic to take the actions you want, that is.

The term “traffic” is marketing jargon — they are people who visit your site. And while we’re thinking about those visitors, let’s acknowledge two facts that often get lost:

1. Most people will only visit once.
2. Almost none of them will take action on the first visit.

Inherent in keeping those two facts in front of you is the need for a plan to entice more visitors to become “regulars” on your site and subsequently convert. I think of it as a Conversion Runway. You need momentum to pull away from the boarding gate and successfully liftoff.

Momentum is achieved by offering visitors fresh, non-promotional content that is useful, engaging or entertaining. Hopefully, your website brings measures of each to the visitor’s experience.

It is also helpful to frame their experience to have as little friction as possible. Friction being any distraction that takes them off message or interrupts action you want them to take. Here are a couple of tips to help with that:

Internet Marketing Tips for a Smooth Conversion Runway:

• First, take a baseline reading on how many visitors come to your site, where they come from, how many return and convert. Google Analytics (GA) is a good tool for this and it’s free.
• Locate the “hot spots” on your website with high Bounce Rates. Improve those pages to make your visitors experience a better one. (Use GA)
• Make sure your site looks as it should in the top browsers — not just Internet Explorer. Try Browser Shots to check this out. Free.
• Is your “housekeeping” in order? No broken links and site maps that work for starters. A useful tool to help with this is Google’s Webmaster Tools This, too, is free.
• Do you offer site search to help your visitors out? It’s also a great tool to learn where you are frustrating them. Google offers a tool that is good — the free version carries adverting, though.
• Do you require visitors to fill out forms to get more information from you? What’s the abandonment rate on those forms?

Frequent updates to your website with well-optimized content will put you in front of a larger audience and build credibility. Reducing friction once they are there will improve the likelihood that they will take the action you want.

Improving your conversion runway with these tips will go a long way toward shortening the sales cycle and improving both the conversion rate and volume of conversions.

Meta tags represent a unique opportunity for website owners to control and shape their destiny beyond simply optimizing for Search Engines. First, a couple of definitions:

Meta Tags – Coding (usually in HTML or XHTML Language)  not directly seen by site visitors  on the visible web page.

On-site Optimization — The use of techniques you control on your site that improve a web page’s ability to rank well in the Search Engines for targeted keyword phrases that can also influence Click Thru rates to your site.

Most businesses recognize the value that Meta Tags deliver in terms of improving their ranking. This is a well-known on-site optimization tactic. Yet ranking well is only half the battle. Every day I see web pages displayed in high ranking positions in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) that no one would visit because the snippet that describes the page is not compelling — in fact, frequently downright awful. Check this one out:

Search Engine Meta Tag "Snippet" - Bad Example

Would you feel compelled to visit this site? Contrast it with this one:

Search Engine Snippet from Meta Tag - Good Example

The value that smart use of Meta Tags contributes to a web page’s ranking can pall in comparison to the value they deliver in terms of motivating searchers to actually visitor the site. Meta Tags control the snippet the Search Engines use to describe your web page; the snippet then performs like a free ad. Better, really, because you are right in front of interested searchers. How good does that get?

There are two ways this can go wrong:

1. Not using the Meta Tags – this means that the Search Engine will grab content from your site and display it. And that content can be anything – and mostly it is not the content you would choose.
2. Improperly Using Meta Tags — not fully capitalizing on the logistics of how you can create a Meta Tag that will present a snippet about your page that motivates searchers to click thru to your web page.

Like so much in life, the secret is in the techniques you use to create these tags. It sounds complicated, yet it is not. In fact, it can be fun. Click here for more detail on how to do this in Internet Marketing Tips: Optimizing Meta Tags and build an advantage over your competitors.

There’s a ton of information about Internet marketing strategy floating around online. Yet precious little of that presents the practical elements needed for a viable online strategy.

It’s a pet peeve of mine — and a couple of these elements just aren’t found in B-school textbooks. When these practical elements aren’t done right or included (often the case), everything else under-performs, requiring unplanned course-correcting measures to get back on track.

1. Balance

Balance in all things — a balanced mix of areas factored into your Internet marketing strategy and a pragmatic balance of the internal resources needed to build, launch and performance manage execution of the strategy.

2. Online Branding Presence

Organizations need to go way beyond Internet brand advertising and think about how the brand (and its representatives) participate and come across in key online marketing channels — most notably Social Networks.

Are you transparent? Are you perceived as authentic? Is this more than an internal slogan? Check our podcast with Linda Popky What’s the Value of Online Branding for more ideas.

3. Keyword Research

OK — this is really my pet peeve. If you talk to rock-star Internet marketers they will all tell you one thing — they really, really, truly really to the max obsess over their keyword list. And, their obsession is not a one-time event.

Keyword phrases are how people who don’t know about you find you… get very, very serious about this. Check out Internet Marketing Best Practices: Smart Keyword Marketing.

4. Conversion Functionality

The vast majority of businesses stop short of defining this in their online marketing strategy. An online strategy that only factors in driving traffic to the website is missing the point — what actions do you want them to take once they get there?

My experience? If you don’t spell out the conversion functionality expectations for your website in the strategy, don’t expect the planning and execution to deliver great results.

5. Online Competition

Ahem… I said AHEM! Hello? What’s your competition online doing? It is SO easy to reverse engineer your Internet competition and develop a strategy to eclipse them and build a competitive advantage.

While we’re at it, PLEASE understand this: competitors are any entity in a higher position than yours in the Search Engine results pages for your targeted keywords. When you consider that the #1 position on Google gets 42% of the clicks and the #2 position drops to 12% — you quickly start to think differently about what constitutes a “competitor.”

Some of these elements get overlooked because they’re “soft” items — looking at Balance elements such as: time constraints, internal skills vs. outsourcing, organizational temperament, etc. A solid Internet marketing strategy includes these items to drive attainable results they can count on for success.

Recently I sat down with Linda Popky — The Marketing Master and President of L2M Associates — for a wide-ranging discussion about Online Branding and recorded that conversation for our OnCompeting podcast.

Linda’s take on Online Branding as a component of Internet marketing was thought-provoking and filled with great insight and tips.

In case you were wondering if online branding really matters — here’s an interesting factoid: recent research showed that 20% of Twitter communications have a brand mention.

A monumental shift is taking place in how people get healthcare and medical information. These changes are so profound that ignoring them could upend healthcare providers.

Consider this: a 2009 Pew Research Center study, The Social Life of Health Information, finds that 61% of American adults look online for health information. There’s even a new term for these folks: e-patients. 20% of e-patients use social networking sites and websites that foster participation with medical professional and patients

This PEW research study is just chock full of insight on how behavior is shifting to favor Internet sources for all types of health-related learning and decisions. It’s a must-read for healthcare executives and marketers.

There’s also plenty of anecdotal information pointing to  the growing popularity of the Internet for healthcare information:

• iPhone Apps –  such as: WebMD Mobile, GivUp, Natural Cures, Eat This, Not That! and my favorite — Am I Pregnant Quiz
• Audio Podcasts – such as: Nutrition Diva, More Attention — Less Deficit, SCCM Podcast — iCritical Care
• Video Podcasts – such as: Oprah’s Health & Wellness, Good Morning American Health, Health Matters at Work
• Websites & Blogs – such as Patients Like Me, or Booster Shots
• Social Networking Sites – such as Daily Strength, or eHealth Forum
• Rating & Review Sites – such as MDJunction, or Health Grades

These represent a small fraction of the endless channel opportunities that include YouTube, SlideShare and more. Clearly the Internet is becoming “a contender” for healthcare marketing resources.

Opportunity abounds — particularly if your competitors have not yet caught up with this shift. Healthcare marketers should be giving the numerous online channels serious consideration in their marketing strategy, budgets and plans. Indeed, Internet Healthcare Marketing is becoming a matter for all healthcare executives to embrace.

First — in case you don’t know what Meta Tags are — they are discrete pieces of information you add to the behind-the-scenes coding that tells Search Engines about your site and how to display it.

Specifically, I am referring to the title you designate for your web page, the description you assign to it and the keywords that you want to be known for. This Internet Marketing Tip is super-easy, no-cost and highly effective.

Why are Meta Tags So Important to Your Success?

• The vast majority of prospects who learn about your business find out about you (or check you out) via Search Engines. You can control how your site is presented in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) by informed development of your Meta Tags — they therefore function like advertisements for your business.

• Search Engines use Meta Tags in their ranking algorithms. So, when you build those tags using your targeted keyword phrases, you improve the likelihood of obtaining a higher ranking position.

If you don’t develop great Meta Tags for you web page, the Search Engine spider will just grab the first thing it “sees” on your page and use that. That can be really ugly — not compelling, sentences cutoff mid-point, lacking context, etc. You’ll squander a great opportunity to put your best foot forward and make a great impression — and you completely control this.

Meta tags can be a great performance management tool as well. If you are already in a top ranking position for your targeted keyword phrase yet are not seeing a robust volume of prospects come to your site one of the easiest ways to kick that up a notch is to change your Meta tags and make your title and description more compelling.

Adding keyword-rich Meta Tags to your site is super easy as well. If you have a Content Management System (CMS), you can readily add/change your Meta tags without knowing website coding. If you do have to add it directly to your website coding you’ll need a bit of upfront guidance, however, you’ll quickly pick it up and be off and running. Here’s what the Title and Description tags look like for this article to give you an idea of how easy it is:

<title>Internet Marketing Tip: You STILL Need Meta Tags for Your Site</title>
<meta name-"description" content="Don't miss this great Internet Marketing Tip that makes the case why you STILL need great Meta Tags for your website. An easy, no-cost way to influence your success." />

With just a little bit of guidance on how to build the tags (which you can readily find on the Web), you can take charge of your own destiny. Take the time to get guidance, as there are nuances to building powerful Meta Tags that can make a difference in your results.

Do this — Go to Google and put your favorite target keyword phrase in Google’s search box. Now, notice what comes up on the Search Engine Results Page. Do the titles and descriptions of the WebPages presented make you want to click through to the site? What good would it do you to be in a top ranking position if it didn’t drive strong targeted traffic to your site?

I don’t know about you but whenever I can influence ranking for my target keywords and control what people see about my business I think that’s is a good deal.

Last Item: if you’d like to see what the Meta Tags produced for this web page, go to Google’s search box and enter the title of this article. You should then see the title and description that I created with Meta Tags for this article in their SERPs. Neat.

2009 brought a seemingly unending array of new and noteworthy Internet marketing advances. Noteworthy, for sure, are the tools that make Internet marketing affordable and accessible to anyone who cares to expend the effort to learn.

Yet I think the big 2009 marketing story is this: Consumer Control. Consumers, in growing legions, are finding a “voice” in Internet forums, review and ratings sites, social networks and the like — and they are using these channels to express their opinions and preferences.

Why Does This Matter to You?

People are listening. Research is now consistently showing that people increasingly turn to and rely on online opinions and ratings to inform their decisions for person AND business use.

Classic marketing approaches geared toward shaping awareness, interest and reputation are increasingly less effective.

Conversely, understanding how to go with the flow of Consumer Control can represent tremendous opportunity.

Moreover, this is no longer just about deciding which consumer electronic gadgets to buy. These “citizen journalists” are shaping the fate of healthcare providers, charitable donations, business and personal reputations, organizational vitality, elections, restaurants, telecommunication providers, high tech sales and much, much more.

Why has Consumer Control reached a Tipping Point in 2009? A confluence of several factors:

• Unprecedented Publishing Access
• Ease of Use
• Social Networking Growth
• Abundant Multi-media Opportunities
• Erosion of Trust (in traditional channels)

Depending on your perspective, this can be a good thing… or not. Certainly, it should NOT represent business-as-usual. Success now relies on embracing this major shift, developing a new marketing philosophy and adopting Internet marketing strategies, plans and tactics that enable you to succeed in this era of Consumer Control.

Have you ever had the itch to prove your point? The folks at The Fun Theory (an initiative of Volkswagen) have a point to make: You Can Change People’s Behavior for the Better by Making it FUN. As they say “be it for yourself, for the environment, or for something entirely different, the only thing that matters is that it’s change for the better.”

And, to prove their point they have created the Fun Theory Award – winner to be announced in Sweden on December 15th.

Fascinating idea, yet even more interesting for those of us engaged in Internet Marketing is how the combination of Creative Ideas + Fun generates viral marketing momentum. For example, consider the case of the group in Odenplan Sweden that tackled the issue of how to get folks to take the stairs instead of the escalator in this Fun Stairs video.

The video has gone viral — as of the time I’m writing this article it garnered over 8M views on YouTube alone (it’s in other places). Consider this: the topic of the stairs is B-O-R-I-N-G. Boring, boring, boring. The juxtaposition of extremes — taking a boring topic and making it giggly-fun and then loading that into Web 2.0 and social networking channels is a winning combination.

The recipe for going viral in this mini case study:

• Creative Idea
• Creative Execution of the Concept
• Creative Use of Internet Marketing Channels

Internet Marketing Tip: make some of the less sexy aspects of your product or service fun and demonstrate it in Web 2.0/social networking channels.

How will you capture this and leverage emerging Internet marketing channels to give your message “wings?” The gauntlet is down.

A growing cadre of hospitals in the U.S. are embracing Social Media and Social Network Marketing — as shown in the graphic below.

Hospital Social Media Marketing

This information comes courtesy of Ed Bennett, Director of Web Strategy at the University of Maryland Medical Center, who is gaining renown for his research into the confluence of hospitals, healthcare and the Internet. According to his research, at least 402 hospitals in the US are using Social Media in varying forms to accomplish their goals.

Moreover, research conducted by Ad-ology Research’s Media Influence on Consumer Choice Study (available for purchase $495) as reported recently in Marketing Charts provides additional insight into the growing need for participation in these channels and establishing a robust website/web presence. Among their findings:

• Almost 40% of recent hospital/urgent care patients said that Social Media influenced them.
• More than 50% of the 25 – 34 year-olds reported that Social Media influences them. (Forums & Discussion Boards had a particularly significant influence on members of this demographic recently visiting for maternity.)
• Hospital & Urgent Care facility websites most influenced 18-24 year-olds.

And yes, they did also find that a significant number of people were influenced by traditional media such as direct mail, television and newspapers ads (!!).

The growing influence of Social Media in hospital marketing is just the tip of the iceberg. When you peel back the stats represented here and start reviewing some of the creative approaches used by some truly innovative marketers, it really starts painting a “healthier” picture for healthcare marketing — and in particular hospital marketing — in a cost-effective, relevant way.

Readers of this blog may recall a couple of months ago we published an article — Think Online Reputation Doesn’t Matter — Ask United. This was a story about how social media can immediately challenge your reputation and cause endless amounts of work to contain the damage.

Dave Carroll, a Canadian musician, took a major unresolved grievance with United to heart. The grievance? United damaged his Taylor guitar. Dave wrote a song about his unsatisfactory experience, loaded it up on YouTube and went from relative obscurity to fame as Everyman with a Voice.

His YouTube video (which he did with his band — Sons of Maxwell) has been viewed almost 6 million times — and that was just the first video! People who never would have heard this story listened to Dave and the band sing their story. They listened and shared online… and along the way millions of negative impressions about United Airlines were created.

In case you missed that great video — here’s the link to United Breaks Guitars.

Not only did the story/song go viral, traditional media outlets tripped over each other to interview him and give the story “legs” offline as well. This story had so many legs it put a centipede to shame!

His saga struck a chord with all of us who have ever been on the short end of the stick trying to get satisfaction with the Airline Lost Baggage folks. It doesn’t hurt that the song and video are snappy, either.

Credit: Vancouver Sun

In an incredible stroke of bad luck, just a few days ago United again messed with the wrong guy and lost his luggage somewhere along the way on a trip he took from Calgary Canada to Denver. When he arrived at Denver — no luggage. United employees told him he had to wait around; US Customs told him he had to leave. He left. And, three days later his luggage showed up.

Here’s the fun part: He was on his way to a speak to a conference of customer service execs about – United Broke My Guitar! It really just doesn’t get any better.

Once again United is in the middle of another PR disaster as one media channel after another — online and offline — retell the story of Dave at United’s expense. And they all seem to relish pointing out that Dave was on his way to speak to customer service execs.

The moral of this story? Manage the Beforemath, not the Aftermath… online reputation management is a reality for businesses today.

Two very potent forces are converging in the marketplace: economic turmoil and surging Internet use. Businesses that continue on as before will experience difficulty; those that adapt will stand a chance. Organizations that demonstrate creativity and innovation can gain competitive advantage.

This is a time when your competitive field can go Topsy-turvy and you can come out ahead.

That’s what the Creative Internet Marketing Stories series is about — real life stories about companies and people succeeding through creative and innovative use of Internet marketing as in the following story.

Creative Healthcare Marketing: HealthPartners Petey & Pokey

Healthcare is in the spotlight. Major understatement – no? Healthcare is also fairly notorious for rather conservative marketing. And, for good reason — personal and legal stakes are extremely high.

Even if the economy was booming, major shifts in consumer behavior favoring Internet information and influencers represents a seismic change to status quo marketing strategy, planning and tactics. So, when creativity and innovation happen to capitalize on that shift it’s worth taking note.

As in the case of HealthPartners and their marketing campaign “A New Way to Look at Healthcare” creating two unlikely characters: Petey and Pokey. Here’s the rub: Petey is a specimen pee cup and Pokey is a needle.

Healthcare Marketing Campaign Mascots

• Company: HealthPartners — 2 hospitals/25 clinics/~1 million members in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area.
• Goal: Increase adoption rate of their Online Services (prescription refills, test results, medical records, appointment setting, bill payment, etc.)
• What: HealthPartners created two characters as part of the overall marketing campaign to increase adoption of their Online Services — Petey and Pokey — they are wildly successful. They were innovative in their use of emerging Web 2.0 capabilities and Social Media channels.
• Challenges: Not everyone associated with HealthPartners felt that this irreverent duo was appropriate for the serious nature of healthcare.
• Key: HealthPartners employees were early champions enthusiastically promoting Petey & Pokey, which in turn got viral growth rolling.

Petey & Pokey are fun, memorable mascots that appear at events, in advertisements and communications. HealthPartners integrated Petey & Pokey in a variety of classic offline and online marketing tactics.

That integration combination works – they are frequently seen “in-person” around the Minneapolis/St. Paul area in addition to a range of HealthPartner events AND they have their own accounts in key social media channels, such as Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn and Twitter. Offline events encourage fans to “friend” Petey & Pokey’s social media pages to get the latest on them. Online social networking promotes their offline events. Nice.

Petey & Pokey were so popular that they “went viral” (meaning word of mouth marketing set in within their target market). I’m pretty sure that the HealthPartners marketing team would tell us that Going Viral is not as accidental as it sounds. There are 3 basic elements at work here that facilitate that success:

1. Entertainment Value
2. Target Market Engagement
3. Relevant Education

These 3 elements — Entertainment — Engagement — Education — are the Secret Sauce that helps them build a strong Social Media following. As popularity of these characters spread (along with the messages they conveyed), so did the adoption of their Online Services.

HealthPartners then uses these social networks to update highly receptive fans, educate them about the value of their Online Services and send messages about upcoming events such as a the Grand Re-opening celebration for one of their clinics.

Their fans and friends in social media can then easily forward news, videos, pictures, event announcements or messages featuring Petey & Pokey to their own networks. In fact, they often don’t even have to do anything — the news automatically updates to their friends. Again, more publicity and goodwill for HealthPartners Online Services. How good is that?

HealthPartners Internet marketing team keeps trying new ways to leverage the popularity of Petey & Pokey. To see a list of the various channels they use, get ideas, and follow links to specific examples, check out our expanded coverage of this Creative Healthcare Marketing Idea.

Stay tuned… we’ll keep following the progress of this campaign and report back.

Local Internet Marketing is a great way to accelerate your business growth. One of the key tactics available to you, Local Search Engine Optimization (Local SEO), is also one of the easiest, quickest and least expensive tactics available to your business.

And, from my experience, it is among the most underrated and least understood online marketing tactics.

Why Local SEO Rocks for Your Business:

• Local Search is not just for “brick and mortar” retail storefronts. In fact, you don’t even have to have a physical location or product at all.

• Almost every business or organization markets their services locally — even if their primary target is global. For example, our business — based in San Francisco & Silicon Valley — also has clients in Seattle, Los Angeles, Japan, etc.

• Many people prefer to do business with local providers even though they could use a company anywhere in the world these days.

• Often the competition for top ranking in the “classic” Search Engine Results Pages (SERP) is prohibitively expensive and difficult. Local SEO is faster, requires far less specialized expertise, resources and intense oversight.

• Technology advances among the top Search Engines (most notably their ability to derive searchers geo location roughly 50% of the time) and the growth of mobile devices means more of the top results will contain local results.

• You now have the ability to go to the top of the search results and hold a competitive advantage over larger, deep-pockets businesses by virtue of your local status — and your application of the far easier “rules of the road” that Local SEO success requires.

I can just hear some of you thinking “I’m already in the local search results.” And your business may, in fact, be there by default. You don’t even need a website!

The top tier Search Engines — Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft (Bing) — know there is enormous financial opportunity for them to become the “go to” resource for people needing all sorts of local information. So, even if you haven’t registered your site with them, they have made it their business to find information about your business and add it to their index.

Courtesy: http://www.Wordle.net

However, you are not truly at a competitive advantage to simply let it go at that. Why not? You have not controlled how your business is being presented, you have not optimized your registration and website for maximum exposure in local results and you also may need to step up to some pretty aggressive online business competition and “trick out” your business listing. More about that in future posts.

So, how can you take control of this great opportunity? The first thing to do is register your website(s) with the top 3 Local Search Engines — its free:

1. Google Local Business Center
2. Yahoo! Local Listings
3. MSN Local Business Center

All three Search Engines require you to have accounts with them, which are free. In Google’s case, you access the Local Business Center through your Google Accounts Hub so you will not likely see a direct reference to Local on that link’s landing page.

Take the time to make sure the business description you use for your Local Search Engine submission is keyword-rich and compelling. Think of it like an advertisement, which it is.

Validation of Your Local Search Engine Submission Authority

You will need to validate that you are the owner of the website being registered or an authorized agent of the business you are listing. Google and MSN/Bing will provide you with a PIN code for that purpose; you then paste the code into your registration to complete your registration. Yahoo! does not require a PIN.

Generally you have the choice of getting this code in one of two ways: the Search Engines will call and provide you with the PIN code or they will send you snail mail with the code. The larger your company, the more difficult it is to make the phone call option work — unless you can guarantee that anyone who answers the phone when they call will diligently write down the code and get it to you or your webmaster. Snail mail is usually a better option for larger companies (and have them send it to your attention or to your webmaster), however, it does take longer.

Submitting and completing your site’s registration with the Local Search Engines is an important first step to growing your business success using Local Internet Marketing tactics.

That’s right, you read that correctly: Sentiment Analysis. And I think it’s going to be BIG. It is, however, a tool that is highly subjective and subject to the limitations of context.

A Working Definition of Sentiment Analysis: Sentiment Analysis (SA) is a tool that operates at the macro level, collecting real-time online communications about a company, product or issue and assigning a positive or negative value to the collective thoughts of the online commentary. Call it Market Insight.

Powered by technologies such as natural language processing, text mining and proprietary algorithms, SA search spiders retrieve communications from the growing host of Social Media sites on a real-time basis, score them using their proprietary algorithms and assign a value to the collective consciousness.

I’m using the term “conversations” here quite broadly to range from actual online conversations to things like ratings, and reviews retrieved from Social Media sites such as: Blogs, Business Portals, Microblogs (think Twitter), Forums, Message Boards, Review Sites, etc.

by Stablio Boss

As covered in previous posts, the world of citizen journalists can be pretty snarky, uninformed and downright mean-spirited at times. Staying on top of this can be daunting; companies and individuals need tools to help manage their online reputation.

Sentiment Analysis, as a nascent industry, is not perfect by any means. Industry insiders themselves say that the current state of performance has around 70-80% accuracy. Yet Web 2.0 has unleashed a monster. Easy to use Web 2.0 functionality enables pretty much anyone to weigh in with opinions on everything under the sun putting businesses and individuals (celebrities, thought leaders, etc.) at the mercy of this new capability. It requires new skills, processes and tools to manage.

Sentiment Analysis is a next step tool that expands upon the growing army of Online Monitoring tools and Online Reputation Management Strategy & Planning to aid organizations in their online reputation management efforts. Start-ups have sprung up to capitalize on the growing need for businesses, organizations and even individuals to understand the collective consciousness that can define their online reputation.

How is Sentiment Analysis Changing Online Business Competition?

• Actionable Intelligence – businesses can see what the concerns are AND get a qualitative handle on how much of a problem they have.

• Immediacy – informed by the collective zeitgeist; learning about and managing a problem in its infancy rather than in a full-blown crisis and put a rapid response plan to work correcting the problem.

• Competitive Intelligence – think of the tremendous advantage your sales and marketing team would have if you had the scoop on what customers thought about your competitors’ products and services.

• Brand Management – what if your sales are down for non-product related reasons such as concerns about the company or your key executives? Learn all about that with SA tools, get improvement programs underway and put your PR department to work.

New companies are popping up to claim your heart, mind and wallet as well as stalwarts such as SAS. Visit our Online Reputation Management Tools area for a list of companies – from free to $$$ — that offer Sentiment Analysis tools.

Yes — that’s the SEC as in Southeastern Conference — university athletic programs in the Southeastern United States. LUCRATIVE athletic programs in many cases. Big Money.

You have to wonder whether these folks ever took college business courses that covered case studies about the Horse & Buggy companies that failed to understand and adapt to (then) cataclysmic marketplace changes. Earlier this month the SEC attempted some really drastic suppression of Social Media use by fans at their games to protect broadcast contracts with CBS (reported to be worth $3B over 15 years) and their own interests.

They apparently see the fans use of Social Media, such as Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, etc. to be online business competition that would negatively affect CBS returns. Yikes! What planet have these folks been on? Well, there are many things going on here. Digital Rights Management issues are always troublesome, but they are missing a fundamental grasp of what’s at work here.

Round 1 — earlier this month the SEC produced this edict: “Ticketed fans can’t produce or disseminate (or aid in producing or disseminating) any material or information about the Event, including, but not limited to, any account, description, picture, video, audio, reproduction or other information concerning the Event.”

Well, as you can imagine, that didn’t go over so well with the fans. In fact, they were forced to back off that. After all, most of the people in the stands are not doing anything but networking online with their pals.

The SEC really wasn’t out to control casual fan use – but they did show an abyssal lack of understanding about major changes in consumer behavior when a smarter move would have been to encourage, facilitate and capitalize on fans viral marketing on their behalf. Presumably what they were really after was the growing body of professional & semi-pro Internet entrepreneurs who piggyback off of the high-quality material that strategic partners like CBS produce, add more to it, and then use it for their commercial purposes on fan sites, etc. It’s big business.

Round 2 — by mid-month the outrage among the fans caused them to back off that draconian edit, to a lesser stance prohibiting real-time distribution of photographs and video of their games. They let their fans become fodder in their larger online business competition battle — who controls the digital rights to myriad aspects of spectator sports. That won’t get resolved easily, it’s a battle that rages at all levels with some really stupid behavior involved, like this.

What I find most interesting is this: They Don’t Get It. Social Media can be a real Bonanza to any business when it is creatively leveraged. Fans that send live pictures of a great catch to friends who then all start chatting it up are what most businesses dream about — engaged customers who evangelize to others and get them excited as well. Think of the possibilities… $$$

Yes, new digital technology and how it may erode their control of the revenue coming from sports is a big issue — but there are probably far more gains to be made from creative leverage of that activity – at the fan level and with outright business competitors — than losses. At any rate, no one has ever won in the long run by trying to suppress technology advances. (well… unless you count oil companies )

The consumer is in the catbird seat now. And yes, that creates some different competitive challenges. This is not going away and you can’t ram edicts down the throats of those consumers caught in the middle and expect them to meekly obey. So much more pleasant to join them.

What are they doing? They’re doing a Twitter Opera!

The London Royal Opera House is asking Twitter users to help develop the libretto (the words) for an opera it commissioned to be performed live in September.

Why is this newsworthy? Because it is brilliant online business competition. Competition for Audience, Money and Creative Creds.

Courtesy: maelstrom4ever

They primed the pump with this beginning: “One morning, very early, a man and a woman were standing arm-in-arm, in London’s Covenant Garden. The man turned to the woman and he sang…”

Twitter users are requested to suggest the rest. In case you are interested in participating, you can contribute via the Opera House’s Twitter Feed.

So — What’s the Online Business Competition Angle?

• Audience — the arts have been hurt, along with the rest of the world, in this “recession.” Folks are just plain cutting back and someone has to lose in a category. Yet “the show must go on.” Stiff Upper Lip and All That Rot. How interesting that an organization as traditional as the Royal Opera has found a way to get a leg up on their competitors by broadening their audience appeal.
• M-O-N-E-Y — budget cuts galore in all organizations and yet the Royal Opera has rather brilliantly come up with an online viral marketing tactic that costs them, let’s see… nothing? No doubt it is also stimulating ticket sales, too. Cheerio!
• Creativity Creds — Well, it was pretty daggone creative but not original — Washington’s National Symphony Orchestra tweeted Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony a few weeks ago. I also read accounts of at least 7 other Twitter operas documented on YouTube. Nonetheless, it is pretty creative and tremendously engaging. I think they’re onto something that clearly differentiates from their competitors.

What’s this have to do with your business? You’ve got me — but surely this gives you some food for thought to prime your creative pump and build competitive advantage. Put another way — get there before your competitors do.

I’ve been focusing a lot lately on the potential damage businesses suffer when they don’t pay attention to their online reputation management Ps & Qs. Now, a new wrinkle in the evolution of this growing area of concern – Businesses Fighting Back.

Citizen Journalist may want to take a second before hitting “Send.” I’ll bet this one was sorry she did.

In a widely reported story, Horizon Realty sued a micro blogger using Twitter to make some rather unflattering comments about their property. In fact, they are reported to have sued Amanda Bonnen, a Chicago area resident, for this tweet: “You should just come anyway. Who said sleeping in a moldy apartment was bad for you? Horizon Realty thinks it’s okay.”

The amount of the lawsuit: $50,000.

If you know anything at all about Twitter, you know that she was limited to 140 characters (this is called micro-blogging) AND that it is rather important to understand how many followers the person tweeting has. Followers being their theoretical “readers.” Horizon decided to take aggressive action to defend their reputation. Bad Move.

Why was this a Bad Move? Because Ms. Bonnen only had 12 followers on Twitter. I’m guessing at least a few were relatives. In short… no one was paying attention. Their lawsuit, however, created a furor and drew national attention. Now everyone is wondering whether they want to EVER stay in one of Horizon’s properties.

Here’s the lesson for every business that have been maligned in Social Media (fairly or not):

• Assess the potential damage before you act.
• Don’t bring out the Howitzers to kill an Ant.

You and your Howitzer may make the issue become Front Page News when the reality was it was headed for the Obits.

Methinks that Horizon got all excited about the hype around Twitter’s growth and influence and incorrectly assumed that ALL of these folks were dialed into Ms. Bonnen. Hardly.

In fact, Ms. Bonnen had the audience equivalent of a group of people in a coffee shop… at a small table. Until Horizon gave her a Bully Pulpit, giving her a massive audience, creating a PR nightmare along the way.

What this does show is that businesses need to have a basic understanding of what is going on in Social Media so that they can take appropriate and measured proactive or reactive actions.

Why is it that so many people claim they “are not really all the competitive?”

I certainly am competitive. In fact, I think it is A Good Thing. However, my husband no longer will play monopoly with me… or as he says “Killer Monopoly.”

Competition is a subject that has always fascinated me. And so, when I ran across Psyched Out in The Economist – I was intrigued. It was tailor-made for me.

What’s it All About?

It’s about a study done by two behavioral researchers seeking to learn if the number of participants in a competition had an effect on the behavior of the competitors.

The Net/Net? They found that the level of individual competitive effort declined as the number of competitors involved increased. Very interesting.

If there were many competitors (or a perception of many competitors), participants in a competitive situation had a tendency to assess their odds as less favorable and scale back their efforts. In other words, they gave up hope for a strong win.

By: gfrphoto

The Takeaway? When assessing your business competition — online or offline — it might be good to evaluate the number of participants in your competitive field. Fewer competitors? You may need a different approach than you would with numerous competitors.

For Online Business Competition, consider these actions in tight competitive markets:

• Develop more sophisticated competitive intelligence observation skills
• Use bleeding edge competitive intelligence-gathering technology & tools
• Assume fast response to your moves — contingency plans anyone?
• Assess each competitive move and “checkmate” key moves — fast
• Be wary of price-down efforts that can permanently kill your profits
• Dealing with irrational competitors? Don’t go over the bridge with them!

Perhaps it goes without saying — yet if you find yourself in a larger competitive field — take advantage of this mental shift and move aggressively to build a competitive advantage for your business while the rest of your competitors hang back.

Citizen Journalists strike again. Or should I say Citizen Musicians? Once again the consumer is finding Web 2.0 Social Media sites of value — at least for venting their frustration.

Frustrated United Airlines passenger, Dave Carroll, used his native talents as a musician to strike back after repeatedly trying to get United to address claims for his beloved Taylor guitar which he alleges United baggage handlers damaged. What — baggage handlers damage… baggage?

Taylor Guitar

Dave has two grievances: guitar damage and indifferent customer service. Apparently it was a valuable guitar — $3,500 — and critical to the way he makes his living as a musician. United should have paid attention.

After repeatedly attempting to get United to address his claims, Dave and his band — Sons of Maxwell — struck back. Dave and the Sons composed a song about the kerfuffle and recorded a video performing it, which they then posted on — you guessed it — YouTube. And it is pretty entertaining while getting his story out there: check Dave's YouTube Revenge. It’s really worth a view, they are entertaining AND talented.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, United Airlines now has a full-blown PR problem. It looks like at least 150,000 people have viewed the video as of 7/8/09 and it is really going viral now. Dave’s story is also getting coverage in respected media sources such as the LA Times Online. THAT, in turn, is stimulating tons of online comments from the masses, war stories about other perceived and actual United misdeeds, etc. (Btw, not all of the comments support Dave & Sons.)

Whether their claim is just or not is actually not as much the issue as United’s failure to handle the situation better and forestall this kind of retaliation and the aftermath they now face. The song on their video is catchy – these guys are GOOD and LIKABLE — this can’t be good news for United.

Online reputation management is a growing problem for businesses, particularly for consumer-facing, service-oriented businesses like United Airlines. Business as usual in terms of PR management won’t work here.

Last – I was interviewed recently on the topic of online reputation management by Linda Popky, President at L2M Associates, for her Marketing Thought Leadership show. This short interview ended with some resources that you might find helpful in your own reputation management efforts. Online Reputation Management: What You Don’t Know CAN Hurt You! Thanks to Linda — it’s always fun to chat about something you’re passionate about and this sure gets me jazzed!

Most of the world is not familiar with a strategy that is reasonably well-known to Internet Search Marketers: The Long Tail Strategy.

The Long Tail Search Marketing Strategy means that you target getting a high ranking position in the Search Engines for search phrases that use 3 or more words. They are known as the “Long Tail.”

Why should you care to learn about this strategy? Actually — a couple of really good reasons:

• The strategy works for all kinds of businesses. (But it really can be a bonus for those with more brains than budget.)
• Long Tail searchers are generally more relevant to your business.
• Long Tail search now represents the majority of online search activity.
• Kinder competitive waters.

Now there is even more reason than ever to focus on Long Tail keyword phrases. A new piece of research from Hitwise shows over half of all searches involve 3 or more words in the search phrase. Even more interesting is the growth of search activity using 8 or more words!

Frequently, average or new businesses that do not have deep pockets or deep Search Engine Optimization (SEO) expertise simply cannot come up with the time, money and expertise required to break through to top Search Engine positions for highly competitive 1 – 2 word search phrases. Long Tail offers a path to success that is attainable.

Moreover, searchers who use longer keyword phrases are usually more relevant and more intent on finding specific information and/or solutions. Wouldn’t you like to be in front of them?

Further, it is actually easier and more affordable. The competition for top ranking positions for 1 – 2 word searches is fierce and far more of these searchers are not relevant to your business — too generic.

Even so, most businesses (read: your competitors) still target 1 – 2 keyword phrases, drawn to this approach like a moth to a flame and not particularly cognizant of how difficult it is to gain ranking or how irrelevant much of this search is to their goals.

So, I have always liked working the Long Tail area — when you get searchers using longer keyword phrases you are just more likely to be successful and actually generate a sale or lead.

CGG38HFPFSGA

This past week I gave a workshop in Silicon Valley for the Marketing Education Series for Entrepreneurs (MESE) titled: Growing Your Business Fast Using Social Media and Web 2.0 Marketing.

Whenever I speak with people about Social Media there are some recurring themes that I keep hearing:

1) How can I do that AND my day job?
2) Where’s the value in it for my business interests and me?
3) Isn’t it really just for big companies like Dell or Zappos?

The subtext seems to be: What About the Rest of Us?

While preparing for the workshop I tried to find insight to answer those questions and ran across a LinkedIn case study that fit that task. In case that case study missed your radar screen let me tell you about it — it’s a great story as well as instructive.

This is a story about a man named Henck van Ess, a Dutch technology consultant who found happiness on LinkedIn.

Henk was grousing in a couple of his LinkedIn Groups one day about the super-short battery life of his 3G iPhone (I can relate – an incredible invention yet the battery life is horrible).

Before he knew it, he heard from another member of one of his LinkedIn Groups — someone from a Chinese manufacturer — who suggested that they might have a solution.

He tried out the solution, liked it and bought it. You might think that was the end of the story and it would have been sufficient value right there. Yet so delighted was Henk that he again used the LinkedIn — this time the “What am I Doing” section — to crow about his “find.” And he found a wellspring of interest from others on LinkedIn who read his post.

This piece of serendipitous research (albeit not scientific) gave him so many positive responses that he became a distributor, put up a Web store and took orders from 1,200 customers on the first day of business!

The Chinese Manufacturer and Dutch Consultant further collaborated to improve upon the original battery extension solution: 3GJuice is born!

Then Henk told the LinkedIn crew about it and some publicity happened. The NY Times picked up the story… more publicity!

So, we have a LinkedIn member who wasn’t really trying to build a business yet stumbled into one using LinkedIn. Along the way Henk:

Not a bad tally for Social Media’s ability to add value!

All of the wonderful predictions we have been hearing for years about how the Internet will democratize society seems to have finally hit a Tipping Point with the election of Barack Obama as 44th President of the United States and the masterful web marketing strategy that made it possible.

In Marin County in California, where I live, 91% of all eligible voters turned out to vote in the election, many galvanized by innovative Internet marketing outreach from grass roots supporters who frequently used tools provided by the campaigns.

Internet Marketing 2.0 and beyond represented a major force in the campaign. Participatory media, multiple media choices (particularly video) and a sea-change in how people communicate, learn and make decisions were at work here. The candidate who best understood these forces leveraged it to fuel success. In fact, at times it was riveting.

John McCain was so far removed from understanding these massive changes that he could not effectively direct his campaign. He famously did not even use email! A Case Study: The Barack Obama (Web Marketing) Strategy made publicly available (courtesy of Paul van Veenendaal & Igor Beuker) on SlideShare, with YouTube video inserts, is a real eye-opener.

According to the PEW Research Center:

46% of Americans used Web, email, or text messaging for news about the presidential campaign

35% watched online political videos

10% said that they logged onto social networking sites like Facebook & MySpace to get engaged in the election

2008 Presidential Campaign Internet Highlights:

Fair disclosure: I did support and vote for Barack Obama. I also have in the past supported and voted for John McCain. This is not about who I voted for, though, it is about who “got it” in terms of a successful web marketing strategy.

There’s so much more to dissect here – another time. For now, just sink into this election and the transformations at work. You’ve got to ask yourself… can this only be about politics and entertainment? Can I continue to think that our customers are not using Interactive Web 2.0 in their buying consideration process? More to come…

I watched the news this Thanksgiving weekend and it was both horrifying and fascinating. The horrific news involved a Wal-Mart employee on Long Island who was trampled to death by oblivious Black Friday shoppers who broke down the door to get into the store and the reported bargains.

The fascinating part? All the media counting down to what was presumed to be the worse holiday season for retailers in over 20 years. Did the media create a self-fulfilling prophecy that whipped people into this frenzy?

It left me wondering how life got this far out of control.

What kind of financial pressures could these folks be feeling to even want to stand outside all night long waiting for some impersonal Big Box retailer to open their doors at 5 am? What kind of stress is so crushing that you are oblivious to another human being trampled to death as you walk over him on your way to a bargain?

So, I started thinking about the less hyped holidays that I knew as a young child in Ohio. I recalled how I saved money all year long in my “Christmas Club” at my community bank. How I looked forward to cashing that check and going shopping. And what a delightful and civilized experience it was. Now we are in the age of instant everything — including instant banking in a world without Christmas Clubs (at least that I know of).

Banking these days involves a growing slew of online banking services, including my favorite – remote deposits. Instant information, instant access and instant gratification is now moving into community banking as well as the big guys who see remote deposit banking as an entre into local communities. Will the local community banks survive?

Will local banks be able to fight off Big Box Banking? Will they help us to retain our sense of community, caring and civility that was so lacking at the Long Island Wal-Mart? In some way they seem emblematic of local communities’ fights to retain their identity and values.

As a web strategist and marketer I don’t see many local banks taking advantage of online marketing to help them grow deposits and retain existing customers in the face of Big Box competition – and it makes me nervous. I think we need them as much as they need us.

A Pew Internet & American Life project showed that fully 53% of the U.S. Adult Internet users (39% of the entire adult population) were banking online by September 2007. Local banks seems to be offering a growing array of online banking services, yet I do not observe a commensurate increase in the use of highly effective online marketing tactics.

How then will community banks be able to maintain a competitive edge over Big Box Banks if the big guys offer the same services that local banks offer online AND they are more effective in using web marketing to take local customers away?

Local Banks — Time to Wake Up. The fabric of our community needs you. And you need you to become more sophisticated at web marketing to remain competitive.

It happened again. I heard from yet another client about how a “Blue Bird” (aka unexpected sale) happened via their website. What’s so unusual about that – after all isn’t that what a website is supposed to do?

The unusual part is what happened to the visitor after they got to the website. And, I should hasten to add that it usually happened over several visits to the site.

What happened is they started to ‘go steady’ with the company; except the company was not aware of it. They started to assign attributes of a relationship to the business such that by they time they finally engaged and connected to them there was a bond already established in their mind.

So, I keep getting reports from clients that usually start out with some variation on “an interesting thing happened…” and then they tell me about their new customer and how incredibly easy it was to land them. In fact, some of them actually felt like their customer landed them!

What’s happening?

In all instances someone came to their site and found generous, relevant, useful information. So useful, that they kept coming back. The information was part of a web strategy to use content to increase their presence in search engines, build relevant traffic to the site, and keep people engaged when they arrived.

Because the information that they valued was also written by an identified person, they developed some level of trust and a cyber-relationship with the author of the material (in most cases the author was listed as the CEO or other senior executive).

What’s more, it didn’t seem to matter how they got to the site – in some instances it was because they read content that the author published elsewhere online that then drove them into the site. In other cases, it was through a search engine. The channel was interesting but not necessarily relevant to what then occurred.

What occurred was an upending of their normal sales process. New customer acquisition that used to take weeks or even months was happening right away – sometimes immediately.

The customer was pulled into them instead of the company pushing their message out and then having to spend time building the necessary credentials and trust to even get close to the final round of consideration. The prospect (soon to become customer) already trusted them and assigned a level of competence to them; they were fans.

Another important caveat: I do not work with super-large companies. Most of my clients are fast-growing small/mid-size businesses. They do not carry the baggage of a large, impersonal brand and so it is probably a lot easier for this to happen.

The unexpected consequence was this incredible cyber-relationship that transcended normal behavior and produced such powerful results for them in far less time than normal with significantly less effort.

Can we depend on this for steady-state online marketing? I don’t think so – but it sure beats all when it happens.

We’ve been taking an increasing number of calls over the past few months on a rather interesting topic: reputation management. To be more precise: online reputation management.

As it turns out, nothing can kill your prospects for fast growth much quicker than a few unkind words posted by an alienated employee, “wronged” customer, devious competitor or malicious prankster. (Speaking of which, isn’t there a special place in Hell for those pranksters who do nothing but destroy?)

Why is that?

Because of the multiplicative effect, ease and anonymity of online communication. What’s more, if the comments are in high traffic interactive communities like the growing army of social media sites, they can spread like wildfire and be very hard to put out once the fire is raging.

Putting the fire out before it gets out of control is usually not what goes on, however. Most companies and executives don’t have any level of online reputation monitoring. They simply don’t know until random events make them aware of the problem – or some Good Samaritan.

So, now companies that were previously doing a full-court press for growth all of sudden have a new, very ugly problem that sucks up their precious time and energy. The funny thing is most of the cases I know about were also unjustified.

Even if everything is humming along in a positive vein there is worthwhile intelligence to mine out of the mentions your company, products/services and key executives get online. Intelligence you can use to strengthen your business.

Yet, one simple thing that a company can do will help you identify the problem and enable you to take corrective measures before it gets out of control: monitor your online reputation. Most businesses are not monitoring their reputation online – and that is a big mistake.

Put in place an online reputation monitoring system. Those systems can range from free Do-It-Yourself systems to sophisticated highly automated monitoring programs offered by a growing army of companies.

Do yourself a favor – go to Google Alerts now, set up an account (it’s free) and put some keyword phrases into their monitoring system. Use keyword phrases like your company name, products/services, and top executives. Set the frequency for delivery of the results and take time to read them.

That’s at least a start to getting your new online reputation protection program underway.