Small Business

New Facebook Data: A Powerful Challenge to Fundamentals

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Queen of Hearts

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

What you knew yesterday may not apply today….

I hate that….you probably do to. In the land of social media and digital marketing it really is like what the Queen of Hearts said to Alice, “My dear, here we must run as fast as we can, just to stay in place. And if you wish to go anywhere you must run twice as fast as that.”  Drives me crazy…

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Across My Desk: The Best of the Month of Love & Presidents

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There are a LOT of great articles published this past month. Vetting them for you is a pleasure by which I learn more AND glean the “wheat from the chaff”, so to speak.

So here we go!!!!!!

Look at the Stats!

Look at the Stats!

Normally random statistics & numbers flow past my eyes without really catching on anything. These stats are worth looking at because they are recent AND may help you recognize the criticality of have a strategy for your social media marketing, the importance of getting some expert help in this area (that IS what my company does, you know!), and the fact that it likely applies to and impacts your business more than you know.

Facebook flex targeting

Facebook flex targeting

You probably haven’t heard of flex targeting on Facebook. Flex targeting lets you serve Facebook ads to people who share a highly customized combination of interests, behaviors, and demographics. It allows you even more refined and tailored targeting to ensure that your ads get seen by the right folks and don’t get lost in the noise of the other posts and ads.  This is a particularly helpful How-To article.

Keys to Success on Social Media

Keys to Success on Social Media

Major Keys to Success on Social Media

To those of you who have worked with me and with my company, Social Sapiens (or subscribe to my newsletter), the keys listed in this article will sound very familiar. Strategy, intention, discipline, community, #H2H, content…..the building blocks and road to success. If you’d like to check out another solid point of view, read on and enjoy!

Facebook: News Feed Algorithm Now More Influenced By User Feedback & Surveys

Any business that is fully engaged with their visitors, audience, customers and community on Facebook will wish to stay on top of ANYTHING that impacts the news feed. As it states early in the article, “Facebook’s News Feed algorithm is relying more heavily on user feedback and surveys, and not in the form of the traditional signals such as likes, comments and shares.” If you want to find out how this impacts your work on the channel, read on.

Top 10 Social Media Blogs - 2016

Top 10 Social Media Blogs – 2016

Top 10 Social Media Blogs: The 2016 Winners!

One of the biggest challenges of staying on top of what I’ll call “reputable trends” in social media is carefully choosing the voices to listen to. Fortunately, every year Social Media Examiner publishes a list of the top 10 Social Media Blogs from across the industry. The selections are made based upon input from social media professionals and influencers globally. If you wish to add a site or two to your regular “keep the business marketing improving” reading every month (or week), one of these may fit the bill.

Get this kind of information more regularly – sign up for my weekly Social Sapiens newsletter.

Want even more? Like and Share the Social Sapiens Facebook page, sign up for Notifications under the Like button, and add us to your “See First in Your Newsfeed” group.

Related articles

It’s Here: A Practical Way to Get Your Focus Back

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English: The spotlight model of attention.

The spotlight model of attention. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

“Come on!! FOCUS!!!”

I don’t know how many times I’ve heard that in my life in different contexts….in musical groups who have been rehearsing a tough section, in a classroom that was a bit too warm during a lecture (or lab) that seemed to go….on….for….ever…., or that internal voice when I’ve been staring at the screen for awhile working on research or a project and notice that my eyes have blurred and so has my mind.

You’ve probably heard it too…

As an entrepreneur, you put a ton of time, attention and energy into your business, both the business pieces AND the product or service delivery (then there’s the ongoing customer service and support bit, too…..). Staying of top of everything can burn you out, leave you sleep and life deprived, and make it much harder to do the A+ job you normally do. Even making a bit of space becomes a challenge since your brain doesn’t necessarily “walk away” from your business (even if you do), so you could be “taking a moment” but you’re churning away inside. If that’s going on, you’re not in the moment of rest and relaxation, you’re distracted and those around you can tell, aside from the fact that the restorative nature of a break is severely diminished.

If you don’t take care of yourself, your life, your relationships and your business suffer.

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What is the Truth about Now for You?

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“Well, that happened.”

That’s still one of my favorite movies quotes. It’s uttered (actually more “admitted”) by Bob Berrenger (Alec Baldwin) upon crawling out of an upside down car accident in the movie State and Main. He seems a bit dazed, but not very concerned, despite suffering from a bad cut on his head and, subsequently, walking away from the scene of the accident.  He’s not worried about his past actions and mistakes…..he just moves on. That comes back to get him, but I will let you check out the movie….it’s excellent.
Taking the context of that quote a different way, I’ve spent some time thinking about how this kind of detached view of my past and future can affect me and my business.

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Last Chance: Spotlight the Superior January Posts

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 January is nearly over!

You have already done all your planning, strategizing and begun implementation for 2016….right?!

Here are my top recommendations for articles that will absolutely impact your business this year and help you make the best use of your resources.

2016 Social Media Trends

2016 Social Media Trends

Top Social Media Trends That’ll Change Your Business in 2016

Needless to say, the social media landscape shifts and evolves frequently and keeping track of what will work, what won’t work and what always works (if there is such a thing…) can be time consuming and maddening. That said, this article provides some keen insight into what to focus on in your social media marketing for 2016. For keeping track of all the changes and mutations, well……you should probably ask for some expert help.

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The Truth About Revealing Your Customers’ Wishes

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Personalized MarketingHow do you crawl into the heads of your customers?
The answer to that question is what’s really at the heart of any successful business. There is an entire industry built around researching customers, numerous methodologies to discern what they see as a good, bad or “Meh…” experience or product, and how to improve that experience (or ‘manage‘ it, in the terminology of the industry). I marvel at the ambition and sheer chutzpah of companies and consultants who aim at controlling people’s behavior via marketing, sales and customer support. Big data, social psychometrics, networking behavior, deep psychological studies and historical patterns can give some great insights, but we’re talking about people….and people are notoriously fickle. In these times when a customer experience or journey takes them online and off-line, as well as through numerous stages of relationships with companies, trying to maintain the thread of great experience, moving to deeper engagement and eventual sales and referrals….well, needless to say, it takes a lot of work.

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Obsessed With Success for 2016? It’s Almost Here!

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Is there an actual name for the time between Christmas and New Years? If there isn’t, there should be…..it always feels just plain weird to me.

That said, it’s that time when I take a look back, past the shredded wrapping paper, immense amount of food and goodies, emergency trips and 2016 business planning to the Top Five Posts for December. There’s always a lot to be learned and reminded of, and these articles do the trick!

Lots O' Social Media

Lots O’ Social Media

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Exploit Social in 2016! 5 Unparalleled and Revealing Posts

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YOU MADE IT!

The big push for Black Friday is over, as is the Thanksgiving holiday (if you’re in the States…). Your business is now poised for the long haul to Christmas and whatever kinds of hours and effort that means for your business and you personally. However, the Internet never stops and, like any good business or professional, you’re thinking past the hats and champagne of the New Year towards 2016 business planning. My monthly 5 best of the best for November will help you. Read them all and then do what you learn.

runners

Paying real attention to your customers’ experience all along their journey will pay off. Customer experience (often abbreviated as CX) is quickly overtaking price and even product as the key competitive differentiator among brands.  This post by Larisa Bedgood of DataMentors touches on three key points you must attend to when moving with this trend.

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Do Your Audiences Have Faces? Can You See Them?

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Does it have something to do with the lighting?

Whenever I get to speak or perform in front of an audience, there’s this gentle tug-of-war between two opposites:

  1. Focusing in on a face, moving to another face and so on. I really want to see if I am connecting with each person. However, unless I have what I’m doing TOTALLY ingrained in my mind, I can “lose the groove”, so to speak, and end up either stumbling, heading “down a rabbit hole” in my story, or “vapor-locking” altogether (that is, stop with a total blank in my memory and delivery, and stand there like a tree…). None of those alternatives is very attractive.
  2. Kind of “defocussing” the individuals and scanning the group without any real attention paid to any one person. While this can aid in concentration and focus, it can advance the impression that I’m just “putting on a show” and am not interested in the group.  Believe me….they can tell.

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Why is Your Audience So Scary?

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English: Audience in the main hall of the Mobi...

English: Audience in the main hall of the MobileHCI 2008 conference. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

How uncomfortable are you with your audience?

I have spent a large portion of my life in front of audiences as a musician, as an educator, as a speaker, and, going way back, as an actor (think “the class play in junior high school“…), so I have worked with and observed audiences in a lot of different ways and scenarios. If you read my blog regularly you might think that my concept of an audience versus some other social construct is a little lower than, say, a community.

Not really…

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