Recently I’ve had several people ask about being over the 5000 Friends limit on their Facebook page and voiced concern that they couldn’t add any followers.
Now you may think you’re not going to get to the 5000 Friends limit so this doesn’t apply to you, but the Follow button (formally called the Subscribe button) actually provides several benefits at any level of Friends, especially if you use your Facebook Personal Profile page for your business in any way.
The Follow button, when added, will be located just beneath your large timeline cover photo in the small applications area and will display the number of followers (not friends) you have. Make sure you place it as one of the top four to be viewable.
When the Follow button is in place, people who want to connect with you no longer have to send a Friend Request and wait for you to confirm them to see your information.
They just click the Follow button and they will receive your information.
Now hold on, don’t panic. They can only receive what you post as Public. If you’ve created any family/ friends/business associates, etc lists that you also post to, these people that clicked the follow button don’t see any of those posts. In fact, they are not even added as Friends. They just “Follow” your public posts to get your information.
Here’s a quick video to show you how to add the Follow button:
With adding the Follow button, the 5000 Friends limit is in essence…gone and now you can have an unlimited number of people viewing your public posts.
The Follow button also removes your concern that people you really don’t know will be able to see your posts to friends and family.
If you’ve set your privacy setting as you want them and/or have created Facebook lists for who sees what, the only thing connections from the Follow button will see are what you are posting that anyone can view (public post).
***NOTE: Several things may keep you from having the option to add the Follow Button: 1) You must be at least 18 years old and your birth date must reflect that in Facebook. 2) It is not for a Facebook Business page…only for your Personal Profile page. 3) If you still are having problems or not finding the option, you will need to do a Google search OR contact Facebook help, directly. Good luck!
I’d love to hear your views on this video and post. Just scroll to Reply below and leave your comment.
We’re living in a digital world today. Internet, mobile websites, social media, video’s and the list goes on.
With consumers need for speed, smart phones are flying off the shelves. Enter the age of Video marketing. In fact, Mari Smith, the Facebook marketing expert, has dubbed “2013 The Year of the Video.”
Video marketing is simply a technique for utilizing videos to market your new products, new services, and even new companies. In fact, video and online marketing is considered to be one of the most influential tools for promoting sales and advertising, regardless of your business niche.
So what are some of the benefits to video marketing?
Search Engine Optimization = Higher Rankings
Looking for a way to get higher SEO rankings? A Forrester conducted research found the odds of a web page is 50% higher to appear on the first page of Google when it contains a video! This means your site is ranked higher, you’re found faster which may increase your business leads, and ultimately helps you gain new potential prospects.
More Conversions
The whole point in marketing is leading to some type of conversion. Whether it’s a landing page, a sales or products page, webinar, teleseminar, or an email if it contains a video it’s conversion rate ranks as much as 25% higher than a promotional item that doesn’t contain a video. A higher conversion rate is reason enough in itself to merit using videos.
More Emails Opened
Want more of your emails opened? Studies have shown that Subject lines that contain the word “Video” are more likely to be opened 2 to 3 times more.
Not all email programs will allow video in their emails. To work around this, capture a picture of your video and insert it into your email message. Then include the link to your actual video…could be a sales page, sign up page, webinar/teleseminar or even live event …or directly to YouTube for viewing the video. When your viewer clicks on the link, they are taken directly to your video.
These are just three of the many benefits associated with using video. Don’t get left out. If you’d like to explore adding video marketing to your promotional and advertising strategies, I’d love to talk with you.
Are you already using video or want to start? Scroll down Reply and leave a comment. I’d love to hear from you!
Did you know that Twitter is considered to be one of the most effective and impressive ways to increase traffic?
As an Internet marketer one of your main promotional goals should be to dominate social networks and what better way to access the global market than through Twitter. Simply by attracting (quality) followers and making friends you can quickly build a list of valuable leads.
Many people use Twitter simply to send tweets to one another and keep in contact with friends and family, but as an Internet marketer you can use it to draw a serious amount of traffic to your business sites if you know how.
Just imagine, with the increased traffic to your blog and other social sites, you can gain more subscribers and leads, and later convert them into paying customers ultimately leading to increased income.
First, you need to spread the news that you’re on Twitter. You will want to include your Twitter URL/icon in your email messages, post blogs and on your websites. That way, everyone will know that you’re using Twitter. Examples: http://www.twitter.com/Livvie_Matthews OR @Livvie_Matthews
Regularly updating your tweets is a must to help you draw more traffic to your site. Avid Twitter users like people who post tweets regularly. If you want to gain active followers through your tweets you will want to set up a schedule for posting and do your best to stick to it. Consistency is Key when posting.
You’ll also want to make sure that you reply to the tweets addressed to you. I don’t recommend that you stay on the site all day or spend long hours tweeting away your time. Just pick a good time once or twice a day and login.
Always make sure you check the @Connects area on your toolbar to see if there are any tweets directly mentioning you or possible Retweets and respond if there are.
If you have a mobile device, all the better because you can sync it up with your Twitter account and you won’t have to worry about being away from your computer. Sesmic and Hootsuite are both very good mobile apps to use.
Don’t worry if your followers don’t become active right away. It may take some time, but they will begin to notice the times that you are more active and after a while they will join in your conversations, which is one of your main goals.
Remember your social sites are your online storefront and will take time to build just like a real storefront business.
A good rule of thumb to follow is to keep your tweets full of helpful content and limit your promotional ones. This way you’ll keep the followers that really matter.
Learn to balance your tweets. Avoid sending out to many personal or unrelated tweets because it can actually cause you to lose followers. After all there aren’t too many of your business contacts that will want to hear that you took a shower today or what you had for breakfast every morning, so keep your tweets focused! Add personality yes, but keep it focused and professional.
By taking the time to build good relationships with your followers, you will be laying the ground work for converting them into lifetime customer for your products or services.
Establishing a good relationship with your followers is vital if you want to take advantage of the massive flow of traffic that pours through Twitter every day.
Here is a little checklist that you can keep handy:
- Let everyone know that you’re on Twitter.
- Send tweets regularly.
- Retweet good content.
- Reply to the tweets addressed to you.
- Pay attention to the kind of tweets you’re sending.
- Make the tweets personal, but not too personal.
- Most of all, build good relationships.
Using Twitter is fun and easy, that’s why is has such a big draw. I’ll be honest, not everyone who uses Twitter as a marketing tool will be successful because it takes time, effort, and patience to see effective results. But if you follow these simple steps regularly you should see an increase of activity and conversion.
What tips can you add for using Twitter to maximize your traffic? Just go to Reply below and type in your comment.
The New Year always brings a new beginning, a clean slate, a fresh new page to write on. Hit the ground running this year and be a better online marketer. Use these four New Years Resolutions to help you reach your 2013 goals and increase your traffic.
1. Interact More On Facebook: Get serious with your Facebook Business page. A big mistake many businesses make is putting up their business page and leaving it or visiting once or twice a month. A Facebook Business page is your online business storefront and should be treated as such. You wouldn’t open your neighborhood storefront business and then just just be there…open for business once or twice a month. No, you would be there everyday during store hours, giving customers tips, answering their questions, placing orders – interacting every day. You must “be there” every day on your Facebook Business page. Ask and answer questions, give tips and strategies, comment and reply. create videos, put up motivational quotes and images. Use your post scheduling feature for future posting, but remember to be there “in person” at least one time a day to respond and reply to messages. Increase your interaction and you’ll see a big difference. After all it is “Social” media.
2. Go Mobile: Mobile marketing is huge and out performing computers 5 – 1. Decisions for purchasing are being made right in the isles of the stores due to mobile apps! Tweet ahead for reservations and even GPS based ads. Add to that 85% of the people today are searching online for who they are going to do business with. When you can’t be found online you are invisible – you don’t exist! Would you run your business or practice without a telephone for direct contact and talking to your callers? Of course not! Then in this electronic age and mobile era why are you closing your business to all the online exposure, contact, and conversation a mobile online presence presents for your business? Websites are not the complicated, intimidating monsters they used to be. They are much easier to set up and your content can even be changed right from your office. Convert your website to a mobile website and then add a mobile app so your site can be accessed by all those on the go! Come on…you can do this…you can ‘go mobile’!!
3. E-Mail Marketing: By far one of the easiest and most effective ways to stay in front of your viewers, increase traffic, build relationships, and increase sales is email marketing. Sending periodic newsletters, promoting occasional sales and specials and announcing product launches or events is not nearly enough. You need to be communicating on a regular basis with customers, not just periodically when you have a special. Make it a priority to start sending every two weeks - once a week is even better. But don’t just send out a sale or a special you’re running. Send fresh, simple, digestible content that solves your viewers problems and send “light” personal and add humor from time to time. Be real…Connect. Become their “go to person” in your area of expertise.
4. Add More Content: Search engines love content and nothing increases your SEO faster than fresh content on a consistent basis. Content can be in the form of a blog post, a video, a Q&A interview with an expert, a resources section, or even adding additional sections/pages to your blog. This resolution will add a positive impact on your site in the eyes of Google search engines.
These are just 4 ways to hit the ground running for becoming a better online marketer in 2013. What are some of the ways you could add? Go to Reply below, I’d love to see your response.
Facebook is changing the image requirements… again. As of January 2013 the text overlay portion of your cover photo images, photos in pages, and News feed ads cannot be more than 20% of the image area.
Previously when Facebook restricted the call to actions elements in covers it was vague [...]
Facebook is changing the image requirements… again. As of January 2013 the text overlay portion of your cover photo images, photos in pages, and News feed ads cannot be more than 20% of the image area.
Previously when Facebook restricted the call to actions elements in covers it was vague and not always followed through on or enforced. But this time, Facebook has advised that it is also preparing tools that will help advertisers be more compliant.
The Inside Facebook blog states:
Ad Guidelines Section III.D now says:
“Ads and sponsored stories for News Feed that originate from Pages may not include images with more than 20% text.”
These new policies are set to go into effect Jan 15 and are geared towards those page posts that are turned into Promoted Facebook Ad and appear in the News Feed. All images from page post ads that are eligible for News Feed will be reviewed for text overlay.
Pages are still allowed to post images with more than 20 percent text, as long as they don’t plan to pay to promote them in News Feed. These posts can be turned into page post ads that appear in the sidebar of Facebook, but they cannot be promoted in the feed unless the amount of text overlay is reduced.
Here is the link to Inside Facebook’s post regarding the New 20% text guidelines. What do you think of the new guidelines limiting the text in the image? Just scroll to Reply and start typing. I’d love to hear your opinion.
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