Friday, August 29, 2014

The History of Social Media

By Erin Quinlan

We’re all familiar with social media today, but do you remember the early days of it?

Who remembers Classmates.com?

Early users couldn’t create profiles, but they could locate long-lost grade schoolmates. It was a hit almost immediately, and even today the service boasts some 57 million registered accounts.

In 2002, social networking hit really its stride with the launch of Friendster. Friendster used a degree of separation concept similar to that of the now-defunct SixDegrees.com, refined it into a routine dubbed the “Circle of Friends,” and promoted the idea that a rich online community can exist only between people who truly have common bonds.

Within a year after its launch, Friendster boasted more than three million registered users and a ton of investment interest.

Introduced in 2003, LinkedIn took a more serious, sober approach to social networking. Rather than being a mere playground for former classmates and teenagers, LinkedIn was, and still is, a networking resource for business people who want to connect with other professionals. Today, LinkedIn boasts more than 297 million members.

MySpace also launched in 2003. Though it no longer the top social media platform in many English-speaking countries, MySpace was once the perennial favorite. It did so by tempting the key young adult demographic with music, music videos, and a fun, feature-filled environment.

Facebook now leads the global social networking pack. Facebook launched in 2004 as a Harvard-only exercise and remained a campus-oriented site for two years before finally opening to the general public in 2006. The site currently boasts more than 1.3 billion active users.

One key to Facebook’s success was the “Like” button. Now you can “like” or “tweet” just about everything even when you’re not on Facebook or Twitter.

Realizing the power of social networking, Google decided to launch its own social network (Google+) in 2007. It differed from Facebook and Twitter in that it wasn’t necessarily a full-featured networking site, but rather a social “layer” of the overall Google experience. Within just four weeks, Google+ had garnered 25 million unique visitors, with as much as 540 million active monthly users as of June 2014.

Over the course of the past two years, smartphones, tablets, etc. have changed social networking and the way we communicate with one another entirely. Given the abrupt rise in mobile computing, it’s not surprising the most popular social media platforms of the past several years hinge on the capabilities of smartphones.
Photo and video-sharing applications such as Snapchat and Instagram, the latter of which has now garnered 20 billion images since the app’s initial inception in October 2010, exist almost entirely on mobile.

The same goes with platforms such as Foursquare, an application in which users use their smartphones to check in to various locations around the globe, and various matchmaking services.

Tinder currently boasts more than 10 million daily users, each of which swipes for potential partners based on their approximately in relation to their smartphone.

Mobile-based platforms also approach social networking in an entirely different fashion than their web-based counterparts. Rather than offering a comprehensive social networking experience like Myspace and Google+, they instead specialize in a specific kind of interaction service that involves the sharing of public images (Instagram), the private sharing of images sharing (Snapchat), augmented reality (Foursquare), and location-based matchmaking (Tinder).

People now exist on multiple platforms, and instead of fighting against this trend, companies are tapping into this new environment.

It appears that many people have high hopes that virtual reality will become the next blockbuster computing platform. The technology already exists, and with the consumer version of the Oculus Rift VR headset slated to go on sale in late 2014 for under $300, the potential for widespread adoption of virtual reality has never been greater.

Need help wrapping your head around all the social media trends?

Give The SilentPartner Marketing a call at 866-432-6456 or e-mail Kyle Reyes at kyle@thesilentpartnermarketing.com and we can help you out.



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Erin Quinlan is the Content Marketing Manager of The Silent Partner Marketing, a boutique marketing firm focused on helping businesses grow in an age of exploding technology. You can find The Silent Partner Marketing on Google+Facebook, and Twitter

Thursday, August 28, 2014

Top Reasons Why You Should Buy "Likes"

By Kyle Reyes

Why buying likes on Facebook is an epic fail.
Yeah, I knew that would get your attention.
There's a lot of excitement out there among many businesses who've found that they could buy "likes" and "friends" on social media.  
I'd imagine many of these people were the "cool kids" in high school.
So as I continue our "Fixing Your Facebook Failures" series, here are the top reasons why you should buy Facebook likes.
1.  You want to DECREASE the number of actual real people who see your post.
Until you achieve a high level of engagement from fans, each post only reaches 4-6% of your followers.  So do the math on that one.  Buy a 1,000 followers for $4.50, and watch as the number of actual people you reach decreases...and the level of engagement decreases as well.
2.  You want your paid posts to be a waste of money.
When you pay to "boost" your post (as opposed to a more targeted Facebook advertising approach through Ads Manager, you reach a higher number of your fans.  Let's think about this.  You've bought 1,000 followers for $4.50, then spent $20 to promote your post and have now reached 1,000 fans.  Congrats.  You've now wasted approximately $24.50.
3.  You want your level of engagement to drop.
The better your post, the more people will engage with it.  Which means the more people that will have it populate in their newsfeed.  But simple math here dictates that with these fake likes, even a higher level of engagement among fans will be a lower overall percentage than it would have otherwise...which means that Facebook won't be nearly as impressed as it would have otherwise been.
4.  You want Facebook to shut you down.
Buying likes is against Facebook's terms of service.  That means they can shut you down indefinitely.  And that's DEFINITELY not going to help your cause.

But is it ONLY purchased likes that are low-quality likes?  Nope.
Here's where I'm about to sound unappreciative.

Many people "liked" The Silent Partner Marketing on Facebook recently.  Not that I blame you.  We're sort of likeable.  But many of you did so only to ask for us to "like" you back.  Which, of course, we did.

But here's my question to you...and one you should ask everyone.  Why should I like you?  What value are you going to provide to me...as someone who may potentially live thousands of miles away from you?  If you aren't providing value...then my "like" is no different from one that you've purchased.

So what does it take to provide a high level of engagement?  Keep checking back.  Our next blog in the series will discuss adding value to your customers.
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Kyle Reyes is the President and Creative Director of The Silent Partner Marketing, a boutique marketing firm focused on helping businesses grow in an age of exploding technology.  You can find him on Google+Facebook and Twitter.  He's the Chuck Norris of marketing.  It's outrageous - we know.  That's kind of the point.

Wednesday, August 27, 2014

Why Your Business Needs a Digital Marketing Strategy

By Erin Quinlan

It’s clear that the internet is here to stay and if you’re in business, you’re going to need to use it to grow your business.

Do you have a digital marketing strategy?

If not – and even if you do – let The Silent Partner Marketing help you out. We can make sure that everything is fresh, relevant, and is being seen.

Why do you need to have a digital marketing strategy?

Many companies without a digital strategy – and even some that do – don’t have clear strategic goals for what they want to achieve online in terms of gaining new customers or building deeper relationships with existing ones.

Without a digital marketing strategy, you won’t know your online marketing share. Customer demand for online services may be underestimated if you haven’t researched this. You also won’t understand your online marketplace. The dynamics will be different to traditional channels with different types of customer profile and behavior, competitors, propositions, and options for marketing communications.

If you’re not devoting enough resources to digital marketing, your competitors will be able to gain a share in the market.

Digital marketing can increase your reach. With Facebook shares, Twitter retweets, e-mail forwards, inbound links, and other methods of digital sharing, your existing customers and fans can do the job of promoting you and your company for you.

That means you’ll reach new potential customers, simply by pleasing your existing customers and building their trust.

Also, consumers have access to huge amounts of knowledge and can compare products, prices, and services without ever leaving the house or talking to a salesperson. Almost 60 percent of the consumer’s purchasing process is done before they even come into contact with the supplier. This means that more than half of the purchasing decision is made through online research, typically starting with a search engine inquiry.

Without a digital marketing strategy, you won’t know your online customers enough. You need to use other forms of website user feedback tools to identify your weak spots and then address them.

Oftentimes, businesses don’t give the digital realm enough people or resources. Without this, it will be difficult to respond to competitive threats – or crisis situations – quickly or effectively enough.

Without a digital marketing strategy, you’re not effectively optimizing what you have. Every company with a website will have analytics, but oftentimes, people don’t make or have the time to review and act on them.

Ready to make the most of what you have? Need some help getting started?

Give The Silent Partner Marketing a call at 866-432-6456 or e-mail Kyle Reyes at kyle@thesilentpartnermarketing.com and we’ll handle it.



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Erin Quinlan is the Content Marketing Manager of The Silent Partner Marketing, a boutique marketing firm focused on helping businesses grow in an age of exploding technology. You can find The Silent Partner Marketing on Google+Facebook, and Twitter

Tuesday, August 19, 2014

2014 Manchester Chef's Challenge

By Kyle Reyes

One of the reasons our firm runs the marketing for a lot of restaurants is because at heart, my entire team is comprised of fat kids.

So when the opportunity arises to capture food on camera...and support a great cause...we get particularly excited.

This coming Sunday is the 2nd Annual Manchester Chef's Challenge.  Manchester restaurants will battle for top honors...and it means a feast for all of you.

The event will take place from 2-5pm at Cheney Hall in Manchester, Connecticut.

But WE got to film the battle that will lead up to that final war.

This year, our team kidnapped chefs from Villa Louisa in Bolton, the Manchester Country Club, CW's Chops 'N' Catch, Hartford Road Cafe, Main Street Pub and Brown Sugar Catering.  We brought them to Highland Park Market in Manchester, which gave them a budget of $50 to buy a boatload of ingredients.

The chefs each had 30 minutes - INCLUDING - shopping time - to prepare a dish.  The other little twist?  We waited until they started cooking to hit them with a mystery ingredient.

Want to see the mystery ingredient?  Watch the videos and see how your favorite chef did.  Click here to check out the Vimeo channel and watch the battle.

Then come down to the event itself.  Tickets are $15 in advance for adults, $20 at the door, $10 for seniors over age 65 and $2 for children under 12.

For more details, click here.





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Kyle Reyes is the President and Creative Director of The Silent Partner Marketing, a boutique marketing firm focused on helping businesses grow in an age of exploding technology.  You can find him on Google+Facebook and Twitter.  He's the Chuck Norris of marketing.  It's outrageous - we know.  That's kind of the point.

Monday, August 11, 2014

How Not to Use Social Media for Your Business

By Erin Quinlan

Social media is a great thing to use for your business, but there are definitely wrong ways to use it.

Want to make sure that never happens to you? Let TheSilent Partner Marketing handle all your social media needs.

Here are some examples of how not to use social media for your business.

When Kmart revealed that it would be open earlier than ever on Thanksgiving and would stay open through all of Black Friday, customers complained about the ethics of the decision. In response, the Kmart social team responded with over 100 robot-like statements. Ever heard of having personality and showing followers that there is person behind the account?

Few things hurt a brand more than an accusation of racism. So even though no one is sure if this tweet from Home Depot was indeed racist or simply stupid, the fact that people on Twitter were upset made corporate delete the tweet, apologize for two days, and fire the social media agency responsible.



After the Boston Marathon bombing, cooking site Epicurious thought they could help people calm down by promoting some recipes on Twitter. Just as a note, when there is a 
national tragedy, do not use it to promote your products.



A few hours after the Aurora shooting, the NRA tweeted, “Good morning, shooters. Happy Friday! Weekend plans?” It may not have been intentional, but when something this tragic happens, postpone your scheduled tweets if they could be controversial.

Also during the Aurora shooting, Celeb Boutique tweeted, “#Aurora is trending, clearly about our Kim K inspired #Aurora dress ;) Shop: celebboutique.com/aurora-white-p” because they saw “Aurora” trending. While it was not intentional, it doesn’t take much effort to check why a hashtag is a trending topic.

Tweeting from the wrong account – the company account versus the personal account – is also a common mistake. But really, take a couple extra seconds, pay attention to the details, and make sure you’re on the right account. Chrysler once tweeted, “I find it ironic that Detroit is known as the #motorcity and yet no one here knows how to f****** drive.” After this social media manager dropped the f-bomb, New Media Strategies (Chrysler’s agency) was fired.

Another thing to make sure you don’t do is go on a crazy, expletive laden rant like Amy's Baking Company in Scottsdale, Arizona did after being featured in a particularly grueling episode of Gordon Ramsay's "Kitchen Nightmares." When the episode prompted a wave of negative feedback, the restaurant's two owners took to Facebook in a legendary rant.

Want to make sure you never have these issues?

Give The SilentPartner Marketing a call at 866-432-6456 or e-mail Kyle Reyes at kyle@thesilentpartnermarketing.com and we can help you out.




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Erin Quinlan is the Content Marketing Manager of The Silent Partner Marketing, a boutique marketing firm focused on helping businesses grow in an age of exploding technology. You can find The Silent Partner Marketing on Google+Facebook, and Twitter

Thursday, August 7, 2014

Marketing Fails Not Limited to Small Businesses

By Erin Quinlan

We’ve all seen them – the marketing fails.

And it’s not just from small businesses, big brand marketing decisions sometimes lack logic or grace.

Want someone to help you with your marketing strategy to make sure that you don’t fall into one of those categories? TheSilent Partner Marketing can help.

Not sure what we mean by marketing fails? Here are a few examples.

One time, Belvedere Vodka referenced rape in an ad. After the fact, Belvedere did make a donation to RAINN, an anti-sexual violence organization, but it is an example of a judgment error that deviates from the typically clever, engaging social graphics.

Making light of mental illness? McDonald’s learned that this is not a good strategy and pulled this ad after intense criticism. 



Huggies once ran a campaign making fun of dads. People have always joked about women being great moms and men being fumbling fathers. It’s old, demeaning, sexist – and not true. Huggies found this out the hard way, when they launched a campaign poking fun at dads as being fumbling fools that didn't know how to take care of their babies. It didn’t go well. There's a fine line between parody and just plain making fun of people.

Social media is a great tool when it comes to marketing, but when used incorrectly, it can fail miserably. Take for example, when Susan Boyle released an album and announced she would be taking questions during an exclusive album listening party. She used the hashtag #susanalbumparty. It’s supposed to say “Susan Album Party,” but that’s not really what it looks like, is it?



Ouch.

These are just a few examples of where marketing strategies have failed and people have fallen on their faces.

Ready to make sure that isn’t you or your business?



Give The Silent Partner Marketing a call at 866-432-6456 or e-mail Kyle Reyes at kyle@thesilentpartnermarketing.com and we can help you out.


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Erin Quinlan is the Content Marketing Manager of The Silent Partner Marketing, a boutique marketing firm focused on helping businesses grow in an age of exploding technology. You can find The Silent Partner Marketing on Google+Facebook, and Twitter

Friday, August 1, 2014

An Open Bar At An Open House: Real Estate Marketing 102


Earlier this week, I shared with you a video that I used to promote my house when I listed it for well above "market value".
But having a video isn't enough - it needs to be a part of a larger marketing strategy.
It's like a poisonous spider that doesn't have fangs to with which to bite.  The venom is no good without the delivery method.
Once the video was done, I knew I needed to drive traffic to it.  So I took a page out of Joe Petrowski's book and included it in a blog on AOL's Patch.com.
The traffic to the video was incredible - bringing in tens of thousands of hits.  Boom - the carrot was dangled.  As you can imagine, my realtor wanted to have an open house.
"People saw your 'man cave' in the video," she said.  "They're going to want to see it in person."
I'm going to be honest - I've always been sketchy about open houses.  I know I might ruffle some feathers here - but I'm going to say it: for many agents, open houses serve the agents better than they serve the sellers - they are a lead generator.  I respect that...but with thousands of dollars of single-malt scotches hanging out in the man-cave, I was hesitant.
It was time for a little outrageous marketing.
I made a deal with my agent - I made her give me a shirt and a hat with her real estate agency branding on it and told her that I was going to play the role of "bartender" downstairs - and not let anyone know that I was the homeowner.
As you can imagine, she wasn't crazy about the idea.
She finally relented...and the open house began.
Enter: prospective buyers. 
Prospect: "My GOD who owns this place?  This bar is AMAZING!".
Me: "From what I hear, the guy is pretty freaking cool.  You should meet him.  And I hear he dumped about $75k into this pad before he decided to get married.  Personally, I think he's a fool for selling it at this price."
BINGO.  I got to hear some incredibly candid feedback that I was able to turn into some wonderful and simple changes that made the house even more appealing to prospects.  
In the spirit of full disclosure, although I wasn't supposed to actually serve cocktails...I sort of ignored that little "rule" and offered an open bar.  As you can imagine, it contributed GREATLY to the candid feedback.
And then...it happened.
A couple came in after seeing the video...and fell in love with the house.
It sold at asking price - $25k more than the "experts" said it would ever sell for.
Even though my wife and I are now settled into our new money pit....errr....we still look at listings.
Every house looks the same.  Every header and description read the same.  Videos?  Ha.  Every agency seems to think photos stitched together with music count as a video.  
It's time we stopped marketing in 1997.
Outrageous marketing - which is what our firm specializes in - doesn't have to mean ridiculous and over the top.  It just means doing something a little differently.
How are YOU changing the game?



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Kyle Reyes is the President and Creative Director of The Silent Partner Marketing, a boutique marketing firm focused on helping businesses grow in an age of exploding technology.  You can find him on Google+Facebook and Twitter.  He's the Chuck Norris of marketing.  It's outrageous - we know.  That's kind of the point.