Market Your Business By Sharing Your Knowledge

How often do you find yourself taking time to read about or listen to information that can help you improve your business?  I bet it's quite often.  In fact, you're probably reading this blog because you want to learn more about marketing and advertising your business.  You're not alone.  There are millions of people surfing the web, looking for answers that can help them to do everything from cooking gluten-free meals to studying for state certification. 


You can gain valuable exposure for your business by offering your expertise to a highly targeted market of web surfers.  As I discussed in a previous post, sharing can be a very important step in building your business. Offer your expertise as a free service, whether its answering questions directly, posting how-to videos, writing articles, blogging or producing podcasts.  Helping others to learn can be an important part of your marketing strategy.   


I'm not speculating about the benefits of knowledge sharing.  For years, marketing gurus have used this technique to build name recognition and grow their businesses (think of the many free videos and ebooks that are available). Creators of good quality free content not only position themselves as experts, but build trust for their brand, and can increase conversion rates from website visitors to customers.


Give it some serious thought.  And don't fret about giving away too much information.  The important thing to remember is that you want to be able to share in a way that helps others and creates interest in your business.

Facebook Launches Another Interesting Ad Option: Featured Stories

(Happy New Year! Having completed my latest project, news-op.com, it's time to get back to sharing information that can help small and mid-sized businesses enhance their marketing and advertising efforts)

Facebook, (which in my humble opinion is one of SMBs greatest web resource) has done it again.  By now, everyone is familiar with the recently launched Sponsored Stories.  These are similar to regular Facebook ads, in that they are fee-based, but they differ because they are about your Friends' and Pages' activities on Facebook--stories that are already eligible to be in the news feed.  However, Sponsored Stories are almost always in the ticker, and identified as being a  "Sponsored Story".  But still, Sponsored Stories are a step above a regular Facebook ad.


But wait, there's more. Today, Facebook launched it's Featured Stories. Now we're talking about ad exposure!  Featured Stories will be embedded in the news feed and will not be identified as an ad.  In other words they will look like any other posts.  Users will only be able to determine the "post" as ad by the word ‘Featured’, which is greyed out underneath the post. When you hover over the word it will show you exactly why a particular post has been featured in your feed.  Facebook is guarding against flooding users' news feeds with paid ads by promising that just one Featured Story will appear each day in a users' news feed.


Undoubtedly, this new advertising option will drum up debate, both pros and cons. But for the small and mid-sized business owner, let's welcome another opportunity to advertise on a larger, yet comparatively inexpensive scale.

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This Saturday's Video: Playing with Poop?

Ok, like most other girls, I went through my Barbie phase.  I also love cute little doggies. And I try to be environmentally responsible.  But today's video leaves me wondering, was Mattel really targeting our little brothers with this one?  Check out this commercial from Mattel featuring Barbie and her dog Tanner.  And tell me, who would this appeal to most, boys or girls?

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What's In a Brand?

Just pick up any marketing or advertising trade publication, or visit the numerous websites focusing on these industries, and you'll come across endless articles about the brand.  I've have read many definitions of what a brand is, even what it is not.  I've also found that there are as many different definitions, or interpretations of what constitutes a brand, as there are experts.  My own definition is really quite simple.  A brand is the essence of your business, represented distinctively and consistently.