If  you’re new to LinkedIn Groups and want to leverage this powerful feature, check out the Linkedin Groups video below. There’s some very useful tips on finding groups and interesting discussions in your niche. I’ve started a few LinkedIn groups for clients in the financial services industry & found them to be excellent educational marketing tools. You can now make your group “Open” so anyone can join or limit it to members-only by approval, which is my preference for now.

You can also use groups to find leads and jobs. Click “Like” below if you found this post helpful.

LinkedIn Groups Video Tutorial.

Posted under Marketing Trends, small business marketing, Social Media

Here’s some interesting Facebook facts I ran across recently thanks to Paul Hughes.

Did you know that women aged 55 and up are the fastest-growing demographic in America? Now I know a lot of them are on Farmville & checking family photos, but there’s plenty out there shopping and networking. If you’re marketing to this group, you might just want to give some advertising a try within Facebook.

Image provided by Paul Hughes of Online MBA.

Posted under Marketing Trends, Social Media

Top 10 Twitter Marketing Tips for Small Business Owners

By Robyn Levin

If you’re like most business owners, you’re super busy figuring out ways to be profitable, however, you feel compelled to join the social networking world. One question that comes up frequently is, “What should I tweet about and how often?” Think about what you want to share when you see the box, “What are you doing?” Be strategic so you’re using your time effectively. Twitter has been proven to help drive traffic to your blog, website and even trigger a phone inquiry like the one I got this week. It’s a good idea to observe 1st and notice what other tweets appeal to you. How often? Once or twice a day works for me. If you have a dedicated social media marketing staff, tweet more frequently. Keep these top 10 Twitter Marketing Tips & suggestions in mind and remember; give value and you’ll get quality followers. Things to “Tweet” about:

1. Hosting an upcoming event or Webinar
2. Writing a new blog post
3. Writing an article
4. Writing a press release
5. Networking & looking for groups or people in your niche
6. Sharing breaking news, industry trends, etc.
7. Re-tweet someone else’s tweet or link
8. Announcing a special offer
9. Sharing a new video
10. Sharing recent & interesting stats

* Big TIP here– include a link to your blog or website and track your results using http://budurl.com

Feel free to “Re-tweet” this post on your Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn accounts.

Posted under Marketing Trends, Social Media

Cocktail Napkin Marketing Plan™  was featured this week in Inc.’s online Toolkit for Entrepreneurs. Here’s an excerpt from the author, Howard Greenstein after his interview with Robyn Levin last week.

“A movie magnate was once quoted as saying “If you can’t fit your idea on the back of a business card, you don’t have a clear idea.” Brevity is popular these days – try Twitter. And then there’s the somewhat timeless metaphor – entrepreneur writes out her ideas during a meeting on the back of a cocktail napkin – and success soon follows. There’s entrepreneurial wisdom in brevity.

As a marketing and PR veteran for over 20 years, Robyn Levin found the Entrepreneurs and startup marketing teams she was coaching were missing a simple way and brief way to create a focused marketing strategy.” You can read the rest of the article on Inc’s Blog.

Posted under Marketing Trends, Social Media, The Cocktail Napkin Marketing Plan™

Social Media Marketing in 30 Minutes A Day

Read this article to learn how you can promote yourself using social media marketing in just 30 minutes a day.

“Thought article was dead on and just what the doctor ordered for me. I get too involved with trying to do everything at once.”

Social Media Marketing in 30 Minutes A Day
Are you overwhelmed with all the social networking sites (e.g., Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube) and trying to figure out how to incorporate these tools into your marketing mix? You’re not alone. Many clients often ask me how much time should they devote to social media marketing for business purposes and what’s the ROI. These are very good questions. My suggestion is to devote 30 minutes per day to social networking for brand building, getting referrals and to test the waters. You can’t possibly know if something is effective or useless until you try it for your own business. Best marketing practices include using a combination of social networking sites and other tools like online video, PR, blogs and Webinar marketing, and you’ll improve your results. The key is to think strategically and make it meaningful.

Most professionals want to increase sales and online visibility and those of you in this category should consider using Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube as your main social networking choices. Facebook has some good applications too, like Facebook Connect, however, I’ve found this to benefit big brands in particular. For example, Ben & Jerry’s promotes new flavors and solicits votes for brand building and to drive traffic to their stores through their “fan” page on Facebook. If you can think of a promotion and tie it into a major cause, this could be effective for you. Remember how CNN promoted the presidential election campaign using Facebook and Twitter to disseminate information to their audiences? CNN’s screen still says, “Follow us on Twitter” and, by following, I’m able to keep track of breaking news….

Sign up in the yellow box on the top left to receive the full article and other great tips on Internet Marketing!

Posted under Marketing Trends, Social Media, The Cocktail Napkin Marketing Plan™

iPhone Users Watch More Video… and are Older than You Think

According to Nielsen News this week–

“Upon Apple’s announcement of a new iPhone – the iPhone 3G S, slated to be available June 19 – Nielsen takes a look at iPhone insights on its users and usage.”

As of April 2009, Nielsen estimates that there are 6.4 million active iPhone users in the U.S., up from 2.1 million a year prior.

I thought this was particularly interesting about online video- 37% watch video on their phone (6x as likely as the typical subscriber) That’s why you should consider creating videos in your marketing mix, if you’re not already.Take a look at the chart below. Click here to read the full article, http://budurl.com/iPhoneVid

iPhone Users

Posted under Marketing Trends, Social Media

From Fremium to Premium–a new Internet Marketing Trend?

More and more businesses are discovering many ways to reach and connect with their prospects and clients using Twitter and now, Twitter confirms paid pro accounts will be next for ” commercial power users or companies.” Click to read the article from Business Insider here,

Posted under Marketing Trends, Social Media, The Cocktail Napkin Marketing Plan™

According to eMarketer, “56.7 million baby boomers make up the largest group of users in the US Internet population.” You can view Baby Boomer Social Media Statistics here: http://www.emarketer.com/Report.aspx?code=emarketer_2000546

Think about your own behavior when you’re conducting research or browsing the Internet. Are you going to YouTube or LinkedIn more frequently?

Here’s some other interesting social media demographic data, thanks to twitter.com/neenz that called my attention to this on his tweet (post on Twitter.)

“A new report from the Pew Internet & American Life Project finds more people are embracing social networking, but those Web sites remain most popular among the young.

Roughly three-quarters of U.S. adults go online, and 35 percent of those use social networking sites such as MySpace, Facebook or LinkedIn, according to the report”  Read the Social Networking article here:

Nowadays, it’s pretty easy and FREE to test various methods of communication and that’s what social networking is all about. Follow me on Twitter to get some tips and ideas to improve your marketing using social networking.   http://twitter.com/robynlevin

Posted under Marketing Trends, Social Media