WinM@il-WinBlogger

Creative Strategies - Internet Branding at No Added Cost

It is so fantastic to see your name or your brand meander from source to source, leaving a searchable trail as it travels, logging trackable records good for measuring and reporting.

I searched my name and specialty at Google recently and found myself all over the place! 

Today I'd like to report my name appears at Voddie.com - I never heard of Voddie.com, but it is really cool. It is an internet & marketing company managed out of England.  The reason I am there is an article I wrote on Email Etiquette.  Read my article here >> http://www.voddie.com/blog/2008/03/11/email-etiquette%E2%80%94use-it-or-lose-business/

I am referenced at TCEWorld as a source for a similar article - read their article and find me at the bottom >> 
http://www.tceworld.co.in/index_files/tmm/new/kma/mkt/mc/mc_020408.htm

Today I got busy and updated "what I am doing" at LinkedIn, Plaxo, Twitter and my 3sixty account. 

None of these appearances on the Internet stage cost me a dime, and all of them are trackable, searchable, and focused on my area of expertise. 

Now why wouldn't someone dive in and begin building a social network, an internet persona. 

Search me!

Best Practices - Writing for Email

Emails are unique.  A well-structured business email will:

• Contain more content than a social media message like those posted at Twitter or LinkedIn
• Use correct grammer and spelling
• Present less information than a business document, often sent instead as attachments
• Present the most important idea at the top (See this nice demonstration from Yale >> )
• Use bullets

Make your emails more effective - write effectively, efficiently and correctly.

Email Style & Etiquette - Reply to the question

It is true we usually scan email messages rather than read them. 

This is no excuse, however, for overlooking the most important question asked within a business inquiry.

How much time is wasted repeating a question via email - I asked the question in the first email, my contact replied to my email without answering the question I asked.  So I need to reply again with the same question.

This is a business etiquette issue because it wastes the time and patience of your professional contacts.

Be reminded: Scan the ENTIRE email before replying.

Cool Marketing Resource - Social Media

It's the rage, there are webinars, seminars, white papers, and loads of tweets on how to use social media for marketing. 

I attended a presentation by Hillary Brown (@hillabean) on social media marketing strategies, and I am finally sold. 

There are two valid reasons to monitor and participate in social media marketing:

1) Search engine rankings - the more your brand appears online, the more likely your brand name will appear in search findings.

2) Viral marketing - the online form of word-of-mouth marketing.  If your business has flourished as a result of good customers talking good things about your business, those same good customers are now likely twittering, blogging, facebooking, and posting comments about your business. 

The tools exist to track your brand name across these social media platforms.  Want to know what people are saying about you?  Moreover, would you prefer to contribute to the positive image your brand name already enjoys?  Join Twitter, create a Facebook page, build a blog...

The time has come.

For more on social media marketing, keep up with Hillary Brown at www.lavarow.com