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Tag: Twitter

5 for Friday: New Apple Gadgets, Net Neutrality, And Twitter Says Buy, Buy, Buy!

1. Apple’s Big Reveal
-Mashable

This week, it’s impossible to ignore Apple’s big unveilings. While the new iPhone 6 may come with some interesting upgrades, for me, “the big reveal” was all about the Apple Watch. The new gadget is very slick looking and appears to be packed with features. Apple aims to put our entire social networks on our wrists while combining a fitness tracker, texting and voice capabilities, as well as a ton of fun apps. Check out this article, which talks about the technology behind Apple Watch.

2. Twitter’s Advances Its E-Commerce Plans
-TechCrunch

As the ever growing competition between social media giants continues, Twitter explores alternative revenue options other than advertisements. The Nathan Hubbard, Twitter’s head of commerce, says of the microblogging platform, “[We] want to be a bridge between a consumer wanting something and getting it.” While still in the testing phase, the “Buy” button is a big step for Twitter in a series of initiatives built to generate more profit from its 271 million users. How do you feel about the option to buy goods from within Tweets?

3. Facebook Converts Higher Value Into Better Marketing Services
-Bloomberg

While on the subject of social media advertising, check out this article on Bloomberg, which talks about Facebook’s incremental improvements to its array of advertising services. Marketers today are willing to spend more money for better conversion tracking, innovative new promotion options (such as video ads), and improved mobile ads.

4. Social Networks for Net Neutrality
-TechHive

Over a dozen large websites, such as Netflix, Foursquare, and WordPress, joined “The Internet Slowdown Day” protest on Wednesday, looking to garner public support in the fight for net neutrality. Citing big Internet providers as the enemy, the websites simulated what the fast and slow lanes of the Internet would look like by displaying the loading page icons on their home pages. As September 15th approaches (the deadline for second-round comments on FCC proposed net neutrality rules), the conversation about Web traffic regulations is as pertinent as ever.

5. Are You Using All Possible Keyword Sources?
-Moz.com

This highly informative post by Neil Patel uncovers some of the potential sources for your keyword research that you may not have thought of previously. While you may already have a preferred tool, the author suggests several unorthodox ways to supplement your research and, ultimately, lead to a better SEO campaign.

Image Sources:

Save the Internet Image

Twitter Buy Now Button

App Filled Five Image

September 12, 2014
5 For Friday – Amazon Ad Challenge, Facebook Changes, Twitter Spam, & Google’s Snafu

1) Amazon Takes on Google Adwords – Wall Street Journal

The war for Internet supremacy rages on between Google and Amazon. The increasingly competitive relationship between the two giants has grown even more strained as of late, but their tenuous relationship has survived largely because Amazon is one of Google’s largest advertisers for text ads. But that may change.

Amazon is working on a competing in-house platform, and testing could commence as early as later this year. Using the plethora of shopping data the online retailer has amassed, the program could almost instantly become a major force against the search engine’s online ad dominance.

2) Despite More Ads, Facebook Promises, “We Will Not Show More Ads” – Digiday

Speaking of Internet giants, Facebook is in the news again. In a rather quiet update earlier this month, Facebook amended its advertising policy to allow marketers to show ads more frequently in users’ News Feeds.

The update allows advertisers to show the same ad twice a day, as opposed to the previous once a day restriction. The new update also allows advertisers to show users two News Feeds ads per day from a page that they did not explicitly “Like,” again up from just one.

Facebook emphasizes that you will not see more ads from various companies, just possibly more ads from the same company. A Facebook spokesperson said of the change, “This does not change ad load. We will not show more ads; rather, we are updating the spacing between ads, and relaxing some of the parameters around the insertion of ads.”

Hmmm… more ads is more ads, no matter who they are from.

3) More from Zuckerberg & Co: Facebook is Finally Cracking down in Upworthy-Style Click Bait – Gizmodo

We’ve all seen it – an annoying, attention-grabbing headline like “No One Would Help This Little Girl from Being Bullied. What She Did Next Will Shock and Amaze You.”

Of course, these headlines are designed only to generate clicks, but dang, am I intrigued. I mostly refuse to click them simply on principle, but even when I do succumb to the temptation, I am always disappointed.

Thankfully, Facebook is finally taking steps to eradicate this spammy click bait by looking at how long people actually read the articles they click on as well as comparing the click ratio to comments, “Likes,” and shares.

Facebook also announced that links should be posted in a “link format” instead of shared in the status update and captions of photos. Posts that have links in the captions will be given less priority in the News Feed.

4) Meet Twitter’s Spam-Fighting Tool – Marketing Land

And now, a word from that other social media juggernaut: Last week, Twitter gave an inside look at their super spam-killing system known as BotMaker. Since launching the system recently, spam metrics have dropped 40% overall.

BotMaker is designed to prevent spam content from being created, reduce the amount of time spam appears on Twitter, and reduce the reaction of new spam attacks. To accomplish this, Twitter uses a combination of systems that detect spam at various stages: Scarecrow (real time), Sniper (near real time), and Periodic (over extended periods of time). What makes it even more effective is its ability to adapt quickly with new models and rules to combat the ever-changing production and proliferation of spam.

To learn more about the creation of BotMaker and how it works, feel free to dig in deep over on the Twitter Engineering Blog.

5) Moving to HTTPS: Good or Bad? – Wall Street Journal

Google recently announced it would be giving a boost in search rankings to encrypted websites. But in an effort to push site owners to switch to HTTPS, Google overlooked the fact that many web components, including its own Trusted Stores and AdSense, are not completely compatible with those types of sites yet.

To protect sensitive info, sites were already required to have their checkout pages encrypted, but the announced rankings boost spurred many sites to try and convert all of their “non-sensitive” pages as well.

This caused a bit of a problem with user experience. Trusted Stores is not compatible with basic encryption, meaning that the required badge cannot be displayed. Without this badge, Google will not accept HTTPS sites into the Verified Stores program.

As for AdSense, Google now acknowledges that “if you convert your HTTP site to HTTPS, ads on your HTTPS pages might earn less than those on your HTTP pages.” This is because the HTTPS ads don’t compete in auctions with HTTP ads, which lowers rates. Whoops!

Image Sources:

Amazon in Browser

Do Not Push Button
“Oops my bad”

August 29, 2014
Five For Friday: Facebook Mobile Ad Tracking, Promoted Video Tweets, And More.
Facebook rolls out new way for advertisers to track engagement with mobile ad campaigns. User suspicion on the rise as updated Messenger app gains greater access to personal information stored on mobile devices. Twitter begins testing promoted video posts for brands. Yelp and Bing join forces in the name of breaking down international language barriers. New addition to Google guidelines marks the end of guest blogging. Get the scoop with this week’s Five For Friday.

1. Facebook introduces new ad data tool – Marketingland

Facebook announced on Wednesday that they would begin allowing advertisers to track the click through rate of promoted posts and sponsored ads on mobile devices. According to a white paper written for Facebook by Altimeter Group titled, “Why Mobile is Essential for Brand Marketing,” users spend an average of 40 minutes per day on the Facebook mobile app. The white paper also revealed that users check their mobile phone nearly 150 times per day, and that 51% of mobile users say they prioritize checking their notifications over other messages. Aside from confirming the fact that most people are more attached to their smartphones than their own shadows, the research reveals just how important it is for businesses to be able to reach their target audience with mobile ads.

Conversion tracking helps businesses measure the return on investment for their Facebook Ads. The conversion reports on the actions people take after viewing and interacting with an advertisement. Marketing Land discusses the implications of the new cross-device feature, including that it enables advertisers to closely track mobile browsing behavior and allows them to better understand how customers are reacting to their campaigns. While Facebook already allowed for advertisers to target specific users, the new cross-device report amplifies an advertiser’s ability to view more detailed metrics on mobile conversions.

What does this mean to you? Now, using this cross conversion report, businesses can track the success rate of their ad campaigns. Ads that were previously unsuccessful among PC users may be working well as a real-time mobile marketing tool. These ads can be tracked based on location as well, so get excited for better campaign analysis!

2. Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook Messenger spy game – Mashable

You’ve probably noticed a recent influx of paranoia popping up on your news feed, this time about the “permissions granted” required to download the new Facebook Messenger app. The concern is based on suspicions that the app can access your smartphone camera and microphone along with a plethora of other private information stored on your device. Considering the PRISM program’s deal with Facebook, as revealed by Edward Snowden just one year ago, the public is beginning to feel more aware of apps having increased access to personal information. The origin of these suspicions seems to be based off a 2013 Huffington Post article. Some of the app’s new capabilities include:
- Facebook can read your phone’s call log, including info about incoming and outgoing calls. Who have you been calling? How long did you talk to them?
- Facebook can actively track your GPS location, approximate location, or precise location.
- Facebook can actively record video and audio from your phone and take pictures as well as view all files stored on your phone.
Mashable breaks it down for us in a different way, explaining that a lot of the permissions allow the app to have all of its convenient, user-friendly sharing capabilities:
- Facebook Messenger requests permission to access your camera and microphone so the user can share images and record videos right from the app.
- Facebook allows users to directly call people with the app. It needs permission to access your device’s call log so that it can identify who may be calling you via the Messenger app.
- Facebook requests permission to access your GPS location so that you can check-in and share your location with friends and in posts.
Now that we’ve walked through two perspectives on the issue, what do you think? Is this just a ploy to monitor the 250 million users on Facebook, or is it another step toward providing an optimal user-based experience?

3. Twitter introduces promoted video sharing – Mediabistro

Twitter has introduced a new nifty feature where businesses can better communicate with their followers using promoted video sharing. According to the Twitter blog, “by using Promoted Video, it’s easy for brands to upload and distribute video on Twitter, and to measure the reach and effectiveness of this content.”

What does this mean to you? As a business, you’ll have more options when it comes to competing for user attention and interaction. If your business is already actively using Twitter, statistics have shown that promoted videos gain more viewers than ever before. The cost-per-view ad model includes ample opportunity to see viewer analytics, including organic as well as paid posts. Overall, this means a much more engaging Twitter feed and increased opportunities for businesses to reach targeted audiences.

4. Yelp introduces Bing translation– Marketing Land

How nice would it be for everyone to communicate with each other as needed, especially about food? Well, that day seems to have arrived, as Yelp has now introduced a Bing translator capability, according to Marketing Land. Yelp can now translate up to 15 languages, which is sure to help travelers that can’t seem to navigate through restaurant menus, reviews, and directions that are posted in different languages. For international eateries looking to attract tourists with local customer reviews, this app update is perfect.

5. Google updates guideline violations – Search Engine Land

With the ongoing battle for good content, Google+ has now updated their listed standards for determining what is considered spam. Guest blogging, a common practice used for SEO purposes, is now on the Google radar. Search Engine Land reports that guest blogging has been used as an attempt to cut-corners around Google’s algorithm, so if you are using low-quality guest blogs to increase the results of your Google page search results, then it is definitely time to stop. Certain guest blogger sites have already been removed from the Google-ranking loop, as reported by Search Engine Land back in April.

This update is just another example of Google’s ongoing mission to deliver meaningful, authentic content to Internet users. If you haven’t already, take the time to review your business’s blog and website. The real moral of this update: Consider the ways your products and services cater to your audience’s needs by publishing content that is unique and informative!

Image Sources:

Red Five Image

They’re Trying To Read My Thoughts Gif

Tony Hawk Twitter Video Gif

Belle Tasting Food Gif
August 15, 2014
Five For Friday: Tweets Within Tweets, Foursquare Gets A Facelift, And More!

1. Personal Preferences Killed The Check-In
-Mashable

Once upon a time, Foursquare made “checking in” at a location cool. But as of its latest update on Wednesday (8/6), the app has completely removed that feature. Now, those who want to broadcast their location to their social media spheres can do so with Swarm, Foursquare’s spin-off app that debuted in May.

So what does that mean for Foursquare 8.0? Well, the app has a completely remodeled user experience: new colors, new logo, new layout, and new functions. Once you login, the app asks about your preferences (Are you into Pho? What about Chai Lattes?), then uses those preferences to provide recommendations just for you about places nearby. The app also provides filters to help you narrow down your findings. By using these filters and profiling users’ tastes, Foursquare has successfully become a more personalized version of databases like Yelp, and could potentially change the way people explore their cities. Pretty epic.

2. Get Your Google Reviews On Your WordPress Blog
-Blumenthals

For those with WordPress blogs and websites, there is now a plugin that allows you to share your Google reviews on your page! Google Places Review lets WordPress sites embed Google reviews in two ways: The free, basic version provides a widget in the sidebar showing up to 3 of your most recent Google reviews. The pro version, which is available for $20, provides up to 5 reviews on any page using short codes. The pro version also allows you to filter by star ratings, offers optimized widget caching, and includes a customizable feature for collapsing and expanding reviews. Presumably, posting your reviews on your site can help boost consumer confidence, while providing easy exposure to your good reviews. A recent study by Dimensional Research found that 90% of consumers are influenced by positive online reviews, so get out there and show the interwebs how great you are!

3. #Tweetception
-MediaBistro

For those who feel that retweeting simply isn’t enough, there was an interesting update from Twitter this past week: you can now embed a tweet within another tweet! All you have to do is copy and paste the URL of the tweet you want to embed, and then Twitter takes the wheel. The embedded tweet acts as a link that takes you through to the full version of that tweet (you can see my own #tweetception example below). The best part of this feature is that embedded tweets only use up the same amount of characters as any other shortened link, so you have roughly 115 free characters still left at your disposal.

If you want to get really fancy, the tweet-ception can go even further: you can embed a tweet that includes an embedded tweet into a brand new tweet (!) – and they all link together in a chain. For now, this feature only functions on twitter.com and the official Twitter iOS and Android apps.

4. Facebook Goes Down, So Does News Site Traffic
-Marketing Land

Last Friday (8/1), there was a brief Facebook outage that led to some interesting information. Chartbeat, a service that produces analytics for web publishers in real-time, announced that the overall traffic on news sites fell 3% during the downtime, which was ultimately less than an hour. What’s even more interesting is that the entrances to news sites via mobile devices dropped 8.5% during the outage, further proving just how important Facebook is to driving mobile traffic to online publishers. Another interesting factoid provided by Chartbeat shows there was also a “9% increase in homepage direct traffic,” meaning people look at homepages more when they don’t have Facebook to tell them what they should be reading. While all this information may seem fairly expected, it highlights just how powerful Facebook is as a news source.

5. You Can Now Delete Google Analytics Properties
-SEO Round Table

This week (8/5), Google made a quiet announcement on its Google+ Page stating that you can now delete Google Analytics properties within your various accounts. In the announcement, Google explains that this was not previously allowed due to how the accounts, properties, and profiles were all associated with one another. According to Google, they are “excited to bring this additional flexibility and consistency to our users, which is the first in a series of improvements to managing deletions in Google Analytics.” If you want to delete a property, all you have to do is go to the property settings within admin view, then click “Delete Property” at the bottom right of the page.

August 8, 2014
Five for Friday – Google Launches Click & Drag for Maps, A New Twitter Record, & Pinterest Gets Even Easier!

Marketing Land publishes new research on tweet indexing in Google search results. Google Maps rolls out handy “click and drag” update. Why your content needs images to get the attention of engaged readers. The most talked about World Cup game breaks a Twitter record. Big brands begin testing a new way to interact with Pinterest followers.

1. Twitter A-Listers Are More Likely To Have Their Tweets Indexed In Google Search Results
-Marketing Land

It’s official: your tweet will never be on Google search. A study by Stone Temple Consulting reveals that Google will likely only index your Tweets if you have over one million followers. After analyzing 963 Twitter accounts, the study found that tweets from accounts with a million+ followers were indexed 30% of the time. As the number of followers increased, so did the indexing percentage. Although there were a very small percentage of tweets indexed by Google from accounts with fewer than a million followers, the amount is negligible compared to Twitter’s heavy hitters.

On the bright side, we can all rest assured knowing the wit and wisdom of Kanye West in 40 characters or less is only a quick Google search away.

2. Click And Drag To Measure Distance In New Google Maps Update
-Search Engine Journal

Do you often take the road less traveled, only to be frustrated by not being able to measure just how far you’ve gone? Relief has arrived! Google announced a Google Maps update this week that allows users to click and drag to measure distances.

Google might call me a perfectionist, but I’ve already thought of five practical applications for the new feature:

1. Settle the argument whether you or your friend lives closer to your favorite hangout, and see if it’s truly in the middle (shortcuts finally included).

2. Calculate how long it will actually take to detour from your road trip to see the world’s largest ball of twine.

3. Get an accurate distance when Google’s driving directions fail because you know Maple Street is closed for repairs but it insists on sending you there anyway.

4. Enjoy your next run (or bike or leisurely stroll) sans Nike app and still be able to calculate how far you went.

5. Answer the age-old question: how far would it be if I wanted to walk in the shape of my name through this park?

3. Use Images (Not Just Words) to Turn Your Distracted Visitors into Engaged Readers
-Copyblogger

It’s an adage as old as time: a picture is worth 1,000 words. Pamela Wilson makes the very relatable analogy of the oversaturation of words in content marketing to an overstimulated child (if you don’t have kids, think about the one throwing a temper tantrum at the park last week). We are visual people, so why aren’t we incorporating images while producing content online more often?

Her tips vary from basic (remember to actually use images and not just words) to creative and insightful (doctor up a purchased stock photo to make it more unique). Much like the sight of an image itself, lost in a sea of text, the blog is refreshing in its take on reaching your audience through content production.

4. Germany’s Stunning World Cup Win Over Brazil Is The Most-Tweeted Sports Game Ever
-TechCrunch

The spirit of Brazil’s soccer team wasn’t the only thing broken after Tuesday’s World Cup match against Germany; the game was the subject of 35.6 million tweets, breaking the record for the most-discussed single sports game on Twitter. At the peak of the Twitter fury was Sami Khedira’s goal against Brazil to bring the score to 5-0 Germany, which resulted in 580,166 tweets per second.

The record replaces this year’s Super Bowl, which garnered 24.9 million tweets.

5. Pinterest Makes It Easier to Follow E-commerce Brands
-Adweek

Pinterest has been busy working towards winning the title “Big Brand’s Best Friend.” Following the release of its API in November, they’ve now tweaked the “follow” button to make it easier for consumers to connect with eCommerce sites.

Currently being tested by Wayfair, Whole Foods, ModCloth, and GoPro, the new “follow” feature improves user experience by pulling in the company’s latest pins in a pop-up window instead of taking the shopper off-site.

As a lover of Pinterest, I say bring it on! Anything that lets me connect with my favorite brands quicker and more easily is a winner in my book.

July 11, 2014
#Ibelievethatwewillwin #Ole! #WorldCup

As the world gathers in sport bars across the globe to watch the gorgeous and very talented FIFA team members, I’ve realized that the World Cup is kind of like the Super Bowl, just bigger, better, and hotter!

Besides the commercials and the fact that the Super Bowl is only something America partakes in, one distinguishing difference between the World Cup and the Super Bowl is the branding. While the Super Bowl has consistent branding and logos every year, the World Cup continuously changes. For example, the Super Bowl uses a consistent hashtag (#SB14) that is created by the NFL and encouraged by fans to use in the days leading up to the big night. With the World Cup, there is no consistent branding. Which is ironic since this is the one sport the world comes together to participate in and cheer on — the original football league. Which got me thinking, sports franchises should be treated just like any other business, as should the structure of their social media campaigns. The leagues should maintain a consistent brand, continue to publish content throughout the series, and encourage fans to get engaged.

1) Consistent Branding

It’s funny how one word can change your branding so much!

#football vs. #soccer
#brazil vs. #brasil

Regardless of which country a team is from, the league should constantly present their branding on a worldwide scale. T-shirts, jersey logos, mugs, soccer balls (or footballs) and of course, hashtags. The most commonly used hashtags for the World Cup is #worldcup with a 71.8% of tweets containing #worldcup in content published on Twitter. Other popular hashtags include:

#brazil – 31.5%
#fifa – 17.22%
#football – 19.09%
#fifta2014 – 13.29%
#brazil2014 – 3.8%
#soccer – 3.8%
#brasil2014 -3.8%
#france – 3.5%
#fifawordcup – 3.5%
And my favorite #Ibelievethatwewillwin

Although the league has no control over what countrymen and women are going to post or which team they are going to support, encouraging a hashtag is one way to control the branding of your business.

2) Content is king

The biggest social network participating in the World Cup is Twitter

With 645,750,000 people on Twitter, fans are just waiting for the latest tweet by a team member or the team. Publishing content to keep fans informed is key to a successful social media campaign. Publishing updates to the team’s status such as posting superstitions of the game results, or posting pregame photos, is what the soccer fans want. Don’t forget that your employees — or team members! — are extensions of your brand too. Encouraging employees to publish content and post pictures is also important to the overall brand image, and its success.

3) Keep ‘em engaged!

In addition the informational content, make sure you are keeping your fans engaged with your brand. Many brands encourage engagement by asking fans to participate in poles, questions, or even contests. One of the biggest World Cup sponsor’s, McDonalds, jumped on this bandwagon in their offline “Peel, Play, Ole, Ole” campaign.

For those businesses that aren’t FIFA sponsors, engaging with fans on Instagram and Foursquare are great for brand awareness. Asking fans to post pictures with your product, or check-in specials at locations are easy ways to increase a brand’s presence while engaging with fans.

Regardless if your business is in a worldwide event that only comes around once every four years, or if it is the neighborhood corner grocery, these three tips can benefit any social media campaign.

So y’all get ready Russia! #fifa2018 #worldcup #fifarussia #USA #USA #USA

June 23, 2014
5 for Friday – Twitter and Facebook Duke it Out, Social Signals’ Effect on SEO, and the Power of Nofollow Links

1. Mobile Site Call Conversions Now Available in AdWords – PPC Hero

It’s finally here! Adwords now tracks click-to-call conversions on mobile devices. This can easily be added to a specific landing page with a little bit of coding. This feature will allow you to track calls through the same venues as your other performance metrics and customize the value of the incoming call. This blog post has step-by-step instructions on how to implement this new feature on your site!

2. Google Wallet’s 2-Click Instant Buy Checkout Comes To iOS – Tech Crunch

This week Google Wallet released its Instant Buy API for iOS apps. This was first released for Android apps a year ago. This free service can be accessed with your Google+ login and stores your shipping and credit card information. Merchants can then use the information to complete the transaction. Google Wallet aims to eliminate the frustration of mobile device shopping and decrease shopping cart abandonment.

3. Facebook and Twitter Want You to Talk About the #WorldCup on Their Field – Marketing Land

Facebook and Twitter are engaged in a Battle Royal almost as intense as the World Cups itself. With yesterday’s commencement of the Fifa World Cup, these two social media powerhouses pull no stops to be become the No. 1 platform for Fifa fans to electronically engage.

Facebook’s campaign provides fan with a Trending World Cup Page. Here fans can access the latest scores, view highlights and interact with a global map to pick their favorite teams

Use #WorldCup and #WorldCup2014 to access Twitter’s World Cup landing page. Here you can create a Fifa-specific profile and choose a cover photo and profile picture to support your team. Don’t forget to include your HashFlag. Introduced during the last World Cup, these three-letter hashtags can be used by fans to unlock an image of a country’s flag.

Which social media platform will reign supreme? Only trending numbers will tell. Let the games begin!

4. Social Signals and SEO – Blind Five Year Old

While the power of social media seems encompassing, Google is currently not using social signals, even from Google+, in its algorithm to calculate search results. You might be asking yourself why you’re putting so much effort into social now. Fear not! Maximizing the potential of a Google+ listing and other social outlets does have benefits. The Blind Five Year Old breaks down social media activity to explain that its not necessarily the activity itself, but the result of that activity that matters.

5. The Hidden Power of Nofollow Links – Moz Blog

Link building is an integral part of all SEO campaigns. They can help build your company’s brand, build public awareness, increase profit and, of course, lead to more links. Links can also help build your site’s authority in the eyes of search engines. But what about nofollow links? While they seem unfathomably dreadful, this blog posts offers a silver lining and techniques to utilize those nofollow links.

June 13, 2014
#HowTo: An Overview of Using Vine for Brands and Businesses
Facebook, Twitter, Google+, YouTube, the list goes on…

Everyone knows keeping up with the current trends is important when it comes to marketing your business, especially on social media. It seems like each year there is a new social media craze that everyone is using, and it sometimes gets difficult deciding which platforms are the best for your business.

Most social networks perform in a way where businesses can share written or visual content with their followers. Think of how Facebook and Twitter perform – brands share interesting text or pictures in hopes that followers will “like” “comment” or “retweet” the posts.

However, there is nothing quite like watching an interesting, funny, or moving video. That is where Vine comes in. Created by its parent company Twitter in 2013, Vine brought a whole new way to market your business through videos.

Well, Isn’t That What YouTube Does?

Vine Profile

Vine is similar to YouTube in that they are both platforms where users and brands can share video content with their followers. However, there are many differences that make Vine unique.
- In the same way that Twitter limits users to 140 characters per tweet, Vine limits videos to a mere 6 seconds. This causes users to be really creative in getting the message across to viewers because there is such a limited time.
- “Vines” are looping videos, meaning they will continue to play continuously as long as you are watching them.
- Vine also has stop-motion capability, allowing users to record a portion of the video, stop recording, then start again at a different time.
- Also similar to Twitter’s retweet, Vine has “revine” capability that allows users to share videos that they think are interesting to their followers.
Interestingly enough, because of the creative nature of the app, many ordinary people have become “Vine Famous,” acquiring millions of fans since its inception in 2013. However, many businesses have also branched out and started using Vine to market their brand.

How Can Vine Help Your Business?

Vine can be beneficial for both new and loyal customers of your business.

For new customers, you can gain awareness for your business through Vine. Millions of people view the popular pages and the trending #hashtags each day. Participating and getting your Vines exposed to more people could introduce your business to someone that didn’t know about it previously.

For already loyal customers, Vine can offer a different way for them to see your business. For example, if you are a clothing store, making Vines of backstage action at a fashion show would be interesting to people who already have an interest in your brand.

Tips for Getting Started

Now that you know what Vine is and why it is important, here are a few tips to help you get started!
- Use Hashtags: Join the conversation with other users on Vine and make videos relevant to the trending hashtags. An always popular one is #HowTo. Getting your business seen on these trending subjects increases the probability of your video getting seen, liked or even revined by other users.
- Cross-Post Vines to Twitter: Vine is still such a new technology that not everyone is using yet. You can post your Vines to your brand’s Twitter account to get even more exposure.
- BE CREATIVE: Vine is not the platform to just make videos just for the sake of making them. Because of the looping and stop-motion features, you can really make something unique and interesting that other people will find shareable. The best Vines are the ones that are funny or extremely visually appealing (think optical illusion or magic).
Have A Call To Action When Applicable: Contests on Vine are popular. Have your followers create a unique video of themselves using your product, and revine the winner! This makes loyal customers feel special when their favorite business is actually acknowledging them.

Above you can see an example of a great Vine from GE. They encouraged their followers to be creative and make a #6SecondScience video, and in return they would revine a winner.

Finding out how to use Vine can be difficult at first, but finding your niche and posting to this app can definitely be beneficial when it comes to keeping loyalty among customers and finding new ones. However, just like any other social media platform, it is important to keep up with the updates of the app and stay current with this ever-changing technology.
May 29, 2014
5 For Friday – Backlinks, Knowledge Graph, And Privacy!

1. Matt Cutts: Google Won’t Devalue Links Anytime Soon

-Search Engine Watch

Well, you’d certainly hope this is the case with the way Google is initiating hundreds of thousands of manual actions every month…But in Matt Cutt’s recent video, he explains the value of those quality links while Google continues to better understand and define what determines quality content. As it stands, Cutts sees the value of quality links to be a relevant ranking factor for the time being. So fear not, if you are working to improve the quality of your content along with improving and diversifying that backlink profile with authoritative links, you’re certainly protecting yourself from future menacing Penguin updates.

2. Google’s Knowledge Graph Expands into Google Maps

-Search Engine Land

Google’s knowledge graph is expanding from organic search results into their map results. Much like the results from regular search queries on google.com, the knowledge graph will now pull information cards with quick facts about certain places searched in Google maps results. But hey, don’t just take Search Engine Land’s and my word for it, run a maps.google.com search for New Orleans’ own St. Louis Cathedral and check it out for yourself!

3. European Court Requires Google to Delete Personal Info

-Search Engine Roundtable

Hey SEOs! Reputation management just got easier! If you live in Europe that is. In a recent ruling, a bill so cleverly titled “the right to be forgotten” requires that search engines, such as Google, Yahoo, and Bing must remove links from search results for a person’s name if that person requests to have that result removed.

4. How to Dramatically Improve Your Google Authorship

-KISS Metrics

This article provides some great tips for improving your Google authorship. As with any authorship improvement tip article, though, do keep in mind that excessive guest blogging is a definite no no. Keep the list of sites you contribute to condensed and featuring only those important and authoritative sites you write for. Guest blogging, if done incorrectly, can be seen as a spammy link-building tactic. A definite highlight of the tips provided in this article was “feature your most flattering picture…you don’t have to be good looking. You just have to…’put your best face forward.’” So no worries—you don’t have to be Brad Pitt, Ryan Gosling, or Jon Hamm. You just want to ensure your thumbnail image is clear.

5. 5 New and Improved Twitter Features Marketers Should Use

-Search Engine Watch

This article is a fantastic overview of those new Twitter features and how they translate into tactics marketers can utilize. A particularly interesting, stand out feature is that Twitter now allows for engaging tweets to appear larger than others. Now “all” you have to do is make sure your tweets are always relevant, engaging, and interesting to your audience.

May 16, 2014
Clear Your Case Of Social Media Acne – Ugly Picture Links

You can go far on 140 characters, but as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words. For the past year or so, Twitter has been enriching users’ experiences by allowing pictures and videos to be directly displayed on the feed, and with the introduction of the new profile design, it now allows users to visually enhance their profiles as well. As Twitter increasingly becomes a multimedia-friendly social media platform on both web and mobile, research shows that Tweets that include photos or videos receive 5 times more engagement than simple text tweets.

Owly? Oh No! (The Terrifying Discovery)

This week, while doing my routine account manager duties, I was looking over a client’s Twitter account and I noticed that our social media scheduler, Hootsuite, was still displaying images as ow.ly links.

One Does Not Simply Address Hootsuite (Or Does One?)

As a social media fanatic, I did what I do best and voiced out my anguish @hootsuite.

Thankfully, Hootsuite knows the value of connecting with users via social media, and they were quick to respond with a solution.

A Brief & Wonderful Solution To All Our Problems (& World Peace)

As I did more research behind the solution Hootsuite provided, I found out that just 2 months ago, the social media scheduler rolled out the option for Pro and Enterprise users to post photographs via the native pic.twitter.com functionality. This feature will allow any photograph scheduled via Hootsuite to be automatically displayed on Twitter’s timeline, and it will also be included in a user’s photo gallery.

You Too Can Have Beautiful Picture Links

Ready to make the switch? I know Search Influence is! The steps to change your image upload service on Twitter are quite simple, and as studies continue to show us, the rewards of doing this will be quite grand.

Voilá! Your scheduled Tweets will now be posted with multimedia showing up on users’ feeds.

May 13, 2014