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PageLever Offers Sophisticated Facebook Analytics
Oct 25th
Facebook Pages for Business are sometimes a black box. Facebook Insights gives you some sense of what’s happening, but to really dig in and understand how you can grow your business on Facebook, you need a more powerful tool set. This review of PageLever, which offers a deeper level of analysis of Facebook accounts and pages, should help in your marketing and sales.
I couldn’t have said it better than their tagline: “Add steroids to Facebook Insights.” Facebook will give you some basic numbers and a bit more. They will tell you how many “active users” you have, but that’s only how many people see your posts. It doesn’t include demographics or locations of people actually engaging with your content. PageLever shows demographics of people who see your status updates, and the demographics of people who engage with your status updates.
They support custom tagging of status updates, so you can tag a bunch of posts in a particular campaign or topic. For example, how do promotional posts perform compared to informational posts? They even autotag some posts, for example, so you can see how posts targeted to one city perform compared to posts targeted to a different city.
So, how is this different than Facebook Insights? Lots more data. Facebook Insights has about five graphs. PageLever offers more than 30. I think it is like comparing the horsepower of the Honda Fit with that of a Ferrari.
What I really like:
- Probably my favorite feature is the ability to click on any data point on any graph to immediately see a report of everything that happened that day.
For example, I was looking at the daily number of removed fans for my page, and I noticed a spike on a particular day. I clicked on the spike and PageLever showed me a report of everything that happened that day, including where the fans left. They all left via the newsfeed, which suggested to me that I posted too often that day. Sure enough, that same report showed that I’d posted four times that day. Lesson learned.
The speed with which PageLever allowed me to focus in on the spike allowed me to quickly shift from “What happened?” to “Why did it happen?”
- My second favorite feature is seeing how long my posts last in the Facebook newsfeed.
PageLever recently ran a preliminary survey of 20 status updates from five pages that had more than 2 million fans and found the average post lifetime was 22 hours, 51 minutes.
- I appreciate that they give suggestions for what works.
For example, the service tells me that instead of simple status posts, I should ask more open-ended questions. It is easy to dive deeper into which post types are working for you–that is, which receive the highest engagement–so you can post more of that kind of content. Watch to see if people become “immune” to a certain type of post and the engagement rate dwindles. You can see in the image below various data points including standard stuff like fan growth, likes, comments and impressions.
You may be asking: “Well, what exactly constitutes engagement?” Daily Engagement Rate is the total number of engagements (which may include multiple posts) for that day divided by the number of daily impressions. If you want to go deeper, then PageLever is for you. Very few providers offer the holy grail of analysis: measuring engagement.
What I’d like to see:
Small jest: On the area where PageLever explains what payments they accept, they invite you to email them if the payment mechanisms they offer don’t work for you and to make a suggestion. I wanted to see if they’d trade out for 15 chickens a month or goat’s milk. Let me know if they accept your payment offer.
I’d also like to see more reports specifically analyzing post performance so I can fine-tune my posts to make sure they reach the right audience, at the right time, with content that they want. Compared to the competition, PageLever does an excellent job. Compared to the possibilities, though, PageLever has a long way to go, and that’s a good thing.
One last important note I’d like to make. Where does this data come from? The data comes from the Facebook Insights API, so PageLever shows you the private stats about your page, not just the public stats. Unfortunately, you can’t get these stats about your competitor’s pages—only pages for which you are the administrator/owner. They also pull from several other data sources. They state on their site that they closely follow privacy rules and restrictions.
Overall, PageLever is worth testing if you manage a Facebook Page. There is a 14-day free trial (with credit card); plans start at $34/mo.
Learn more about PageLever.
PageLever Offers Sophisticated Facebook Analytics
View full post on Small Business News, Tips, Advice – Small Business Trends
Macuk Offers High Quality Products At Great Low Prices
Sep 26th
High Quality Products At Great Low Prices!!! Affiliates Make $$! Week After Week!
Macuk Offers High Quality Products At Great Low Prices
Black Business Secrets Offers Tips to a New Generation of African American Entrepreneurs
Aug 20th
Many young African American leaders are giving the economic foundations of the African American community a reboot through entrepreneurial success. One standout is Dante Lee (@dantelee), CEO of Diversity City Media and founder of BlackPR.com and BlackNews.com. His book Black Business Secrets: 500 Tips, Strategies, and Resources for the African American Entrepreneur breaks new ground by fusing insights from past leadership with those from new entrepreneurs who have staked successful claims. I learned about his book while browsing a bookstore, and picked up a copy for review.
All-in-one small business coaching
Lee opens the book with history and statistics on minority startups, then segues into a Q&A with established business leaders such as Bob Johnson, founder of BET, Wally Amos of “Famous Amos” cookies, and George Fraser, founder of the FraserNet conference. He also wisely highlights Frarah Gray, the youngest black business millionaire outside of entertainment; Tom Burrell of Burrell Communications; Nadine Thompson, founder of Warm Spirit; and Gwen Richardson, founder of Cushcity.com. There’s also a foreword by Randall Pinkett, author of Black Faces in White Places (see the review), so a cross-generation of leaders appears throughout the segment and book.
Black Business Secrets is written to coach a person starting out in entrepreneurship. It is not extremely deep in subject matter, but as perspective-packed as it is in a 289-page paperback format, it’s not supposed to guide your every step in a specific industry. Lee offers a number of resources appropriate to the topic, be it freelancers, consultants or those seeking government grants. Secrets is a great gateway for readers who are approaching business building from many lifestyles.
Understandably, Lee’s forte–online media–shows in the chapter on cyberpreneurs. He clearly understands today’s entrepreneurial landscape. For example, Lee cautions against obsession with hits, an argument I have read many times online, but Lee frames the right explanation of how measuring hits has no relationship with serving your customers: “Nobody cares how many hits your website gets.” Moreover, the suggested resources are perfect for businesses looking for an African American online audience but unaware of which sites are best for potential engagement.
Gain entrepreneurial acumen in down-to-earth language
Some of Lee’s advice can seem too anecdotal, especially in the opening segments, but it is meant to summarize material that may be best studied in a longer book. Take, for example, a comment about offering a product or service that can be copied by competitors.
“Running a business that can be easily duplicated is dangerous…the real solution is to lock it down.”
Lee does go on to describe five ways to lock it down. But books like Service Innovation, which examines how to dissect services to discover new offerings to customers, expound using actionable details and methodologies.
Yet the advice that is better served with further detail segues into meatier, straightforward segments on best business practices, finance, and marketing tips. Lee grounds these tips with seasoned business acumen. As a result, chapters read in down-to-earth language and convey brilliant experience, rather than the “Top 10 blogpost outtakes” found in many books today. The business grant information is particularly useful, eliminating the myths and highlighting the facts.
Lee’s best comments provide answers to situations with detrimental outcomes. When addressing family and friends who want the free “hook up” he provides a solution:
“Create VIP discount passes for friends and family. Explain that they are truly VIPs because they are committed to helping you create a strong foundation for your business or professional services.”
Another tip directs our attention to bad clients and the value of time to good clients:
“Most of us – particularly those who offer services instead of products – seek loyal customers, but loyalty is overpriced when it begins to consume too much time and energy – and thus destroys profits…. Consider how much business he actually adds to your bottom line versus how much he really costs your company – be the cost money or time spent in expensive do-overs or mediating unnecessary dramas.”
Lee also offers splendid tips aimed at authors who seek media promotion for their latest release. How-tos on press releases also provide value. And Lee also includes contributions from other professionals. In the case of the client value comment, he adds a few words from G. Richard Shell, a professor of legal studies at University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School.
With Lee’s straightforward advice, Black Business Secrets unlocks the entrepreneur mind-set in its readers. So if you are a new small business owner, add it to your reading resources. You’ll find your odds for success improve with each page and will soon begin taking each word to heart.
Black Business Secrets Offers Tips to a New Generation of African American Entrepreneurs
View full post on Small Business News, Tips, Advice – Small Business Trends
The Big Book of Social Media Offers Excellent Tips for All Organizations
Aug 13th
Let me share a thought that I am sure you’ve entertained at some point in the past year: Social media can feel overwhelmingly commercial. Many tools have been introduced to entice advertising agencies and their clients to develop every campaign and measure every engagement. With marketing budgets shifting to digital media, and a cultural embrace of social media at every turn – I’ve seen newscasts showcasing a Tweetdeck feed in the style of BET’s 106 and Park – the online buzz can make the casual observer forget that websites can be .orgs as much as .coms.
Now let me introduce a book that truly brings the social back into social media: The Big Book of Social Media – Case Studies, Stories and Perspectives by Robert Fine. A Ph.D. candidate at George Mason University, Fine is editor of The Social Media Monthly and creator of the Cool Social Conference World Tour and Government 2.5 events. Fine has compiled a compelling series of cases meant for nonprofits and civil organizations as much as for small businesses. I met him at his booth at the Blog World Expo in New York City in May. He generously provided a copy of his book for this review, and as I delved into it I was further impressed. I think you will be hard pressed to find an equally encompassing resource that naturally blends the human spirit and commercial how-tos of social media.
Learn the best uses of social media from experiences all over the globe
I loved the scope of the book, and easily tore into the appropriately named segments: Business and Social Media, Technical, Verticals, The Media, Government, Employment, Nonprofits, The Artists, Global Perspectives and Moving Forward. No section contained a used-car-salesman-with-a-’70s-jacket hard sell on social media. Instead, the cases are crafted and arranged as seamlessly as parts on an Aston Martin – all working in concert to create a premium experience. These honest descriptions of human interaction with social media are made compelling by Fine’s effort to bring so many voices into the book.
Some of the highlights:
- The segment ConnectedCOPS by Laura Stevens covers the double-edged sword of how criminals have used social media as beneficially as the police have.
- A short case on JobAngels, a grassroots nonprofit that helps the unemployed find jobs, is meant to show what one person can do by simply being helpful.
- The Quantified Tweet – Healthcare and Social Media provides 140 ideas for using Twitter for health-related messages. Author Phil Baumann, founder of Health Is Social, wishes for better synchronization among essential information relevant to health:
“It’s the non-social uses of digital technologies, including social media, which will reveal to us worlds of opportunities perhaps only envisioned in science fiction. We are only beginning to understand how these social technologies can be used in health care….what we need, however, are the processes which enable the right kinds of interpretation of the data which radiates from our skin to the deep core of our invisibly glowing hearts.”
The subject does not delve into specifics on how that sync is established or associated concerns such as data security. But thoughts are expressed so well as to inspire new ideas.
Is the world flat for all?
International perspectives are represented as well. Twitter Evolution in India by Shrinatg Navghane notes the increase of social media among the 18-to-35 age group in that country. He shares how Skoda reached out to him through Twitter and explains the marketing efforts of Hippo, a new snack brand attracting many members of India’s burgeoning middle class.
#TeAmosEcuador (I Love Ecuador) by Alfred Naranjo reveals a movement to tweet about August 10th, a historical date of independence for Ecuador. Naranjo, a systems engineer and father of three, coordinated other Ecuadorian Twitter users into a 200,000-tweet movement around the hashtag #TeAmosEducador. The stats on the country and its Internet access are astounding. Says Naranjo, while noting the contrast to Thomas Friedman’s concepts in the book The World Is Flat:
“With a population of about 14 million inhabitants, just about 16 percent of the population of Ecuador has Internet access. Very low compared of other South American countries: 64 percent in Argentina, 52 percent in Uruguay or 50 percent in Chile.”
Social media measurement cases show more than counting tweets
The Big Book includes some basic “be authentic” messages and social media tips, but the reminders come from fresh faces and other luminaries. Shashi Bellamkonda, director of social media for Network Solutions, offers a case study of his company’s movement past outdated data and suggests ways to develop a conversation-and-listening strategy. The tactics can inspire those who know to listen online, but don’t yet know which tools would help. An analytics review from Pek Pongpet explains measurement basics with wonderful graphic details, and can easily complement books like Social Media Metrics.
There’s still that .com perspective in some of the cases. And in-depth details would have helped round out some sections, as in the health care case. Nonetheless, Fine has given all a voice. For example, Small Nonprofit Wins Major League shows how a women’s nonprofit attracted interest from large organizations, namely Major League Baseball, the right way. This is uber-useful for small businesses that have few resources yet want to operate like the big dogs.
A friend shared a great snippet reminding how a vocal minority can distort conversation and why being informed on a broad range of topics over parroting narrow interests is essential. The Big Book of Social Media does a splendid job of including perspectives on social activism and public service. Even more wonderful, a second book and specialty versions aimed at public organization are forthcoming. Given the corporate fixation on digital tools that has consumed the Internet like the viral cloning of Agent Smith in the Matrix series, the arrival of this series is as warmly welcomed as Neo coming home to Zion. This book arrives just in the nick of time.
The Big Book of Social Media Offers Excellent Tips for All Organizations
View full post on Small Business News, Tips, Advice – Small Business Trends
Google+ Offers Great Business Potential
Jun 29th
Google+ Offers Great Business Potential
This content from: Duct Tape Marketing
News in the online world this week has been dominated by Google’s unveiling of their long anticipated social play dubbed Google+. Headlines wonder if this is their answer to slow Facebook’s growing dominance in the social space.
The company is rolling Google+ out in limited trial, so it may be a while before everyone can gain access.
My view is that no one thing can slow Facebook, they’ve simply grown too large and too important for too many people. Facebook is a social network, built from the ground up for that purpose, by a company that does nothing else.
Google+ is a form of social network, built by a company that turned search into an ad platform and realizes that if they don’t tap people’s social, local and real time interactions as part of search, the cash machine will be at risk.
However, at first glance I think Google+ has a lot to offer businesses and I could see a few of the features of Google+ being baked into the Google Enterprise offering.
A lot of business folks are still leery of mixing Facebook’s personal profile with business. Google+ might just offer business folks a way to start a pure business play, fresh and away from the the more personal aspects of Facebook. Of course this only works if business people embrace the Google+ approach.
The major difference with Google+ is that it’s not a place to hangout, it’s a set of tools accessed through your existing Google account and delivered through a toolbar that also gives easy access to all of your Google tools.
Google has produced a series of 11 videos that highlights the features on Google+
Below is a quick overview of the key features of Google+
Circles
This is how Google wants to let you organize your network. The idea here is that you have many different circles – business, friends, family, coworkers, etc and calling them all friends and sharing everything with all is a fundamental flaw in the Facebook network. Facebook does have grouping, but I think circles could make it easier for people with large personal Facebook networks to segment their business activity much more easily by moving all business networking to this different platform.
Hangouts
Essentially this is group video chat done right that uses HTML5 instead of flash. This tool lets you tell your circles that you’re online right now if they want to jump in and do video chat. My guess is this will be very popular with friends and family types and could poke a hole in Microsoft’s new baby Skype. The business application, teams to interact, groups to collaborate or people to quickly present new information, is immediate. This might be one the best features.
Sparks
This is the Google+ sharing function that let’s users identify and share stuff related to topics they care about. It’s much like a bookmarking tool with social sharing in your network added. This could be a great way for a business group to highlight, distribute and discuss important industry news, research or competitive analysis.
Instant uploads
Google+ has a strong mobile side to it – something that Google is obsessed with and rightly so. Instant Uploads takes your photos and videos, shot on your mobile device, and automatically uploads them to YouTube and Picasso via an Android or iPhone (coming) app.
Huddle
Huddle is a group text chat feature and should also have strong business application as a way for a group of folks trying to come together on something to all get on the same page (or is it steam?)
View full post on Small Business Marketing Blog from Duct Tape Marketing
Better Business Bureau Offers Enhanced Business Review Listings
Jun 6th
The Better Business Bureau has long been a reliable resource for reviews of businesses for consumers. Now BBB is taking a page from Google and Yelp by offering enhanced business reviews. Not only can customers post reviews, for better or worse, on a company’s profile, but the company can also upload videos, photos and details about the business.
It’s no secret that the more places a business is online, the more traffic its site will enjoy, but the rise of review sites has given some businesses a competitive edge. While not all companies fill out the details on a site like Yelp! or Google, instead letting customers shape the company profile based on their experiences, BBB’s new review pages allow your company to actively engage with customers through information and response to any customer complaints. There’s also a helpful video with instructions on how to edit your BBB business review.
Businesses can now include the following on their profiles:
- Map and directions
- Return and exchange policies
- Products and services
- Hours of operation
- Areas serviced
Businesses that are accredited by the Better Business Bureau can proudly display a tagline listing how long their company has been accredited. Companies can also include videos, awards and certifications, as well as create customer coupons and a button to get a quote directly from the BBB profile.
Customers can post reviews and have the option of sharing them through Facebook and Twitter.
All in all, the BBB is hopping on the bandwagon of the way businesses and consumers are interacting these days. Kudos, Better Business Bureau.
Better Business Bureau Offers Enhanced Business Review Listings
View full post on Small Business News, Tips, Advice – Small Business Trends
New Survey Offers Glimpse of SMB Ad Outlook
Mar 29th
Earlier this month local advertising firm Borrell Associates released its annual Outlook survey for 2011, which attempts to gauge where small and medium-sized businesses fall with investing in online advertising. This year’s study was particularly interesting, noting that SMBs actually make up for 95 percent of all local advertising online. They may not spend much on average (the average SMB spends less than $12,000 on all advertising; of that, $2,300 goes to online advertising), but their sheer numbers make them a demographic that everyone is trying to reach, which may help explain why Google has become increasingly aggressive in marketing to SMBs over the past year.
Overall, the numbers are promising and demonstrate a clear shift from offline advertising to online.
According to the survey, 29 percent of SMBs said they will increase their online ad spending in 2011, using that money for creating or maintaining their own websites, building email marketing campaigns and getting involved in social media. Creating a Web presence via a company website appears to be the SMB owner’s preferred way of online advertising. The survey estimated that 86 percent of SMBs had their own website in 2010 and that the number will grow to 91 percent in 2011. (Personally, I have a very difficult time swallowing those numbers. Either the audience surveyed in the report is majorly tech-skewed or we’re being very loose with the definition of “website.” As much as I’d love to believe that nearly EVERY small business owner has taken the initiative to market themselves online, I simply don’t think we’re there yet. Not even close.)
Building on that, the survey also reported that two-thirds of SMBs who have a website also say they’re participating in social media, which is promising. It makes sense that a SMB that has taken the initial step of putting their brand online would complement it via other avenues. Of the 14 percent of SMBs that still don’t have a site of their own (get one!), more than a third say they’re maintaining some type of social media presence, likely a Facebook page or Twitter account.
Perhaps not surprisingly, as small business owners invest more in the Web and social media to market their businesses and aid in lead generation, they’re not upping their traditional budgets to the same degree. Whereas SMBs say they plan to increase their online advertising budgets 29 percent in 2011, they’ll only up their print Yellow Pages and direct mail buys by 4.5 percent.
Perhaps they’re simply upping their online budgets to match what they’re spending offline, but I imagine that instead, SMBs are looking at the Web to do the bulk of their advertising for them. With the arrival of Google Places, Twitter, Yelp, Facebook, etc., SMBs have much more effective tools for reaching out and communicating with customers.
While I don’t necessarily think the audience surveyed by Borrell Associates represents the average small business owner, I do believe it’s indicative of the direction in which marketing budgets are headed over the next year. As business owners become more familiar with the tools available to them online (creating company websites, social media, email marketing, etc.), they’re investing fewer dollars in traditional areas like local directories, local magazines and local newspapers.
What do you think of the report? Does it fall in line with your own budget? What do you think of the claim that 91 percent of SMBs now have a website?
To check out the Outlook 2011 study, you can download the Executive Summary for free via their Web site.
New Survey Offers Glimpse of SMB Ad Outlook
View full post on Small Business News, Tips, Advice – Small Business Trends
LGN Prosperity Report Offers Unique Marketing Perspective To Struggling Internet Marketers Looking To Create Momentum…
Oct 12th
| LGN Prosperity Report Offers Unique Marketing Perspective To Struggling Internet Marketers Looking To Create Momentum Beyond… |
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Front Page PR Offers Free Public Relations/Internet Marketing Whitepapers on How to Build a Cost-Effective PR Program to…
Oct 11th
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Facebook offers new tools, changing way users share information | Social Media
Oct 6th
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Facebook engineers have been in a… off some of those new tools, showing how they’ll change the way users of the social networking site share information. |
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