Using New Technologies for Effective Marketing
June 8, 2009 by Rebekah King · 1 Comment
Marketing is a long-held and much-needed practice for business growth and development. Not to be confused with Sales (though always used together with sales) an effective marketing program draws in new customers, engages current customers, and builds a product or service’s reputation throughout the marketplace.
Technology is always advancing, and as it does can either improve the value of marketing, or make it even more difficult to get an effective marketing program across to the target audience.
Are you sending SPAM emailing or a valuable newsletter?
Does anyone read your emails? Read more
LinkedIn’s Latest Updates: Email addresses go private
March 23, 2009 by Rebekah King · Leave a Comment
Just a quick heads-up for all you LinkedIN users:
Sending Announcements
In response to overwhelming demand from group managers, we have created the ability for you to send group announcements directly from your LinkedIn group to your members, via email. Your announcement will also automatically be posted as a discussion within the group so members can comment on it together.As membership in LinkedIn groups continues to explode, we hear increasing concerns from our members about how their privacy is protected. Now that we have the Announcement feature, and in response to these concerns, we have removed the ability to download or view member email addresses.
RSS Feeds into Groups
Posting news items into groups has become very popular in the past couple months. So we’ve made it even easier for you to spark discussions around news and other Web content by enabling you to add RSS and Atom feeds to your group. You can pick up RSS and Atom feeds from your favorite sites around the web. News items from your feed will automatically show up under the News tab.
Managing Job-Focused Discussions
Group managers now have full control over whether to enable the jobs discussion capabilities within your group. The jobs area enables members to discuss job opportunities in these difficult economic times without cluttering the main conversation, and like all discussions it’s free.
LinkedIN’s made all email addresses private in groups – good for the group member but not so good for the group owner, especially if you were merging that group into your newsletter databases. The other thing we’re missing is the geographic management – I’ve got a colleague who has one group for her entire association – regardless of chapter preference – so now we’ll all get eachother’s notices… because she can no longer filter “only orange county” like she could in her email marketing platform. As is the case with upgrades, once they start they rarely stop, so I’m sure we’ll see more over the next few weeks…
Rebekah
Website: Is It Time to Redesign?
August 27, 2008 by Rebekah King · Leave a Comment
I’ve been working with a few companies in the last year as they ask themselves a complicated question: is it time to redesign our website? For some this is an easier answer – their content hasn’t changed in the 2 years since their last redesign, so why bother. Ignorance is bliss, no?
For those of us that know being in business is by no means stationary, the idea of not updating a website for 2, 4, or (gasp) 6 years is appalling. Apalling and Dismaying.
Before you go running away convinced that I’m one of the greedy monsters that want you to pay me $50k for imaginary work (how does something invisible cost SO MUCH??), take a deep breath and read on… Streamline before you Redesign
Social Media: The End of All Privacy?
August 24, 2008 by Rebekah King · Leave a Comment
At an event last week I was caught in a conversation with someone who felt the need to share (vehemently) his theory on the scam of social media.
This gentleman (lets call him Ed) is of the opinion that LinkedIN was created to gather people’s information under the guise of social networking… until the owners sell it – making boatloads of money and taking all your private information.
For me, as an educated (I try to be anyway) user who has sat on the sidelines watching the tool develop before jumping on the proverbial bandwagon, Ed sounds like Mel Gibson from Conspiracy Theory.
It’s important to note that Ed’s fears are not entirely unfounded. In late 2007 a social networking site known as Quechup received alot of bad press for allegedly sending spam emails to the entire contact list of each user (without the user’s knowledge). While Quechup denies these issues in a statement September 17th, 2007.
This is exactly why I encourage people to not be “early adopters” of technology in which you put your personal contact information. Wait a while, until you see a couple of buyouts or until people smarter than you are using and recommending the software (not to imply anything about your IQ – having friends smarter than you are is an integral part to staying safe in the technology age). Read more
Women I Admire: Kathleen Matthews
August 10, 2008 by Rebekah King · Leave a Comment
I’ve got to share this story with you on Kathleen Matthews I just came across this week. Here’s some of the story and a link so you can read the whole article yourself.
Matthews, a former award-winning news anchor in the Washington, D.C., market and wife of “Hardball” host Chris Matthews, is settling comfortably into a life of making news, as opposed to reporting it, for the somewhat staid Marriott brand.
Her charge as executive vice president, global communications & public affairs, is multifold, which is what appealed to her when offered the job 18 months ago. In addition to handling public relations, her role was expanded to encompass politics; social responsibility, such as Marriott’s green initiatives; and new media. New media, by the way, is using nontraditional channels to get a company’s story out, such as the social networking site, Facebook, plus blogs and online videos viewed on sites such as You Tube. Read more
New Technology: The Advantage of being a Slow Adopter
June 3, 2008 by Rebekah King · Leave a Comment
It’s been a longstanding fact that I self-label myself a geek when it comes to social networking. I’m a big believer in the power of the internet and in the transparency of the individual: meaning that I believe the more the internet allows private lives to become public, the less one can hide the reality of who they are.
If you’re a jerk, now the whole world knows it.
If you’re a nice person with jerk tendencies, now the whole world knows it.
Ping.fm: Twitter-ish tool of wonders
June 1, 2008 by Rebekah King · Leave a Comment
I succumbed to the twitter peer pressure about 3 months ago, not quite knowing why. After a couple of weeks of getting notifications of twits from my twit-witted friends while i was trying to sleep (like a normal person), I was about ready to give up on the whole thing.
So like a good nerd, I started researching other ways to use this new technology. I tried twitterific and twhirl and twillions of other twools that just made me feel lispy.
Meanwhile, I notice that all my other “social networking” tools are trying to get in on the action, with a series of “what are you doing” post options. These just added to the twitteration and twistication of my poor head. Being visible and “plugged in” is one thing…. but all of this stuff is just NOT WORK.
And then I found PING.fm
and my life was forever changed. Read more
Coupon Use: Survey Released in April
April 4, 2008 by Rebekah King · Leave a Comment
I stumbled upon this article today that said the following:
An economic downturn and technology advancements will lead to increased coupon usage among U.S. shoppers, according to survey results released today by Toronto-based ICOM Information Communications (ICOM).
Of the 1,529 U.S. consumers who responded to a recent ICOM survey conducted in mid-February, 67 percent said they are much more likely, or somewhat more likely, to use coupons during a recession. The breakdown was 45 percent much more likely and 22 percent somewhat more likely.
Which really seams like common sense. Interesting though was the breakdown included by age and by region, and this little tidbit: Read more
Networking Habits: Keeping up-to-date
March 24, 2008 by Rebekah King · Leave a Comment
A question posted on one of my linkedin groups this week caught my eye, and I thought I’d pass along the conversation:
Fellow MLPF friends,
I have a simple, very simple question: how to manage such a huge amount
of information when doing networking?
How many hours do you spend per day doing business networking? And hot
to manage that with our normal work?
Thanks in advance for all the answers and comments.
I hear you! Take heart though, I think feeling just a few steps behind is a good sign that you are actively networking – it’s that sense of drowning that I often take as a reminder to update my networking maintenance systems. Read more
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