@BasilPuglisi

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Business Networking

The ABC’S of Networking Follow Up

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Most of us have attended numerous networking events. We make it a point to meet and greet many people with the idea of building a relationship for potential business. So, why don’t we follow up?

How often after an event have you found yourself with a dozen or more business cards only to put them in or on your desk to collect dust. Weeks may go by before you look at them again and forget who they are or where you met them. Well, that is why, right off the bat I suggest to put your picture on your business card. It does help when people see your picture to remember who you are. That would be my first suggestion.

Next, I would suggest you ask yourself what your goals are. Are you going to these events to become a card collector? I know in some industries it’s a numbers game but then that is not really networking. Networking is about building relationships not necessarily transactions.

So many of us put so much time and effort into networking but fail to follow up. Did you know that follow up should actually begin shortly after the introduction? You should instinctively know during your conversation whether or not you would like to speak or meet with them again. (Remember don’t just look at them as a potential client but rather a potential referral source.) So, you might want to say something like “I really enjoyed speaking with you and would love to follow up with this conversation. Would you prefer I contact you via telephone or email?” At that time, they will either say:

  • Response A: “I enjoyed speaking with you as well but I am really busy right now – maybe we will run into each other again.” (meaning – they are not interested in networking with you) Keep in mind that doesn’t mean it’s over simply wait until you run into them again and let things happen naturally.
  • Response B: “The best way to reach me is via email or ….”

At this time, you may want to make some notes on the back of their business card to help remind you of some key points in the conversation for your follow up.

The only way to see the “ROI” on networking is by putting in the time. Successful people know the importance of a strong network.

According to Dr. Ivan Misner, the founder of BNI – offers 2 tips – 1 for networking and 1 for follow up meeting:

1. A one-page flyer – Have a brief overview of your business ready to pass along at all times in case you meet someone while networking who wants to quickly pass along your information to a prospective client he/she knows. You should have a hard copy to fax and an electronic copy to email.

2. Question-and-answer sheets – One of the quickest ways to learn about a person’s business as a networker, and for him or her to learn about yours, is to make the initial meeting as organized as possible. A sheet with questions that you can each ask each other can ensure you don’t forget to find out the information that could lead to a quick referral.

A great article to read, by Dr. Ivan Misner, is “Don’t make this networking mistake” He explains how to go for the “long-term relationship” and not the “short sale.”

Try to follow up from immediately to up to 72 hours while the person and conversation is still somewhat fresh in not only your mind but the other persons mind as well. Hopefully, during the initial conversation you did most of the listening this way you can offer something of interest to them based on things they have said. For example, they may have said they love golfing – so maybe you can let them know of a golf outing that is coming up or an interesting article you may have recently read about golfing. You want to look for a solution to a problem they may be having. Your follow up can include:

  • An article or a book you read
  • An expert opinion
  • A contact or introduction
  • An invitation to an upcoming networking event or target event
  • Refer to a commonality you both may have. For example:
  1. Could be You came from same town
  2. You share the same hobby
  3. You Vacationed at the same location
  4. Your both reading the same book

Just remember to be genuine and real and do not try to sell unless they showed an expressed interest in your product or service.

  • Visibility comes with being present.
  • Credibility grows during the follow ups.
  • Conversations create stronger relationships.

For a more personal follow up, which will help you stand out from the rest, send a personal handwritten note or a personalized card from sendoutcards.com.

During the course of a conversation, you may want to ask if they utilize social media. You may request to connect on facebook. If that is too personal, ask if they have a business page that you can become a fan of or try connecting on linkedin. Start building the relationship before you actually need them. Suggest a date to meet explaining how you would like to know more about their business. People like to talk about themselves so be sure to ask open ended questions.

You need to feel out the person you are following up with. Be mindful of their time. Become someone they enjoy talking to. In order for your follow up to work you need to follow through. Remember it’s not about “chasing prospects” it’s about “building relationships”

There are guidelines or campaigns for your follow ups – one is reaching out with the 8 x 12 method – meaning – you reach out to potential prospect 8 times over a 12 week period which is more for a sales follow up. Networking follow up is a much longer process to building relationship that you hope to keep for most of your career.

You may want to break down the cards into 3 catergories:

  • Prospective clients
  • People you will refer to others
  • People who will pass referrals to you

As the saying goes “The Fortune is in the Follow up” speaking of which, there is a recently published book out by Heidi Sloss called “The Fortune is in the Follow up” I have not had the pleasure of reading it yet but I may soon.

To help you stay more organized with your contacts and follow ups there is a site called jibberjobber.com – it is a personal relationship manager that can help you organize and track personal & professional relationships. It is free to set up and free to use or you can upgrade to a premium package for a low monthly cost but it is not necessary.

Don’t forget to reconnect with old business relationships, clients / customers because they too can become a good referral source.

Appropriate and sincere follow up will ultimately lead to meaningful and fruitful relationships

Here is a great guide for sales follow ups – creating a great follow up with your clients in 7 simple steps by followupsuccess.com

Statistically speaking – for sales…..

  • 48% of sales people never follow up with a prospect.
  • 25% of sales people make a second contact and stop.
  • 12% of sales people only make three contacts and stop.
  • Only, 10% of businesses make more than three contacts. This means they’re losing a small fortune.

Because…

  • 2% of sales are made on the first contact.
  • 3% of sales are made on the second contact.
  • 5% of sales are made on the third contact.
  • 10% of sales are made on the fourth contact.
  • 80% of sales are made on the fifth to twelfth contact.

Back in January, 2011, I wrote about Networking 101. This article is a follow up to networking 101 on how to follow up.

Sources:

Ezines Articles: Networking 101

“Don’t make this networking mistake”

Creating Great Follow Up With Your Clients in 7 Simple Steps

Social Media Management Tools Keep Updating: So Be Informed

Social Media Saturday:Management Tools

 

#Ignition2011: Sheryl Sandberg Shares Concerns for Facebook and Women

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At the recent Ignition Conference Sheryl Sandberg shared that Mark Zuckerberg’s greatest fear is lack of innovation. She mentions that the two factors are fueling that fear.

  1. Google has as many job openings as Facebook has current employees.
  2. Facebook lacks the resources of many of its direct competitors.

Sheryl understands that one of Facebook’s immediate concerns involves their need to rely on less product launches in favor of those that have bigger impact. Facebook has a current focus targeting the balance of moving forward in their business growth, while still protecting user-privacy.

Sheryl’s Advice to Career Focused Women

Voted in at number 7 of 10, Forbes awarded Sheryl Sandberg the status of one of the world’s Top Ten Power Women of 2011. Sheryl has some very sound advice for other power women as well. She shares that a woman’s most important career choice is who they marry. She encourages women to find a partner with whom they can share their lives 50/50. She reminds them that in general, men lean forward or continuously focus on the growth of their careers, while many women seem to lean back, and let others take the re

Check out this video with Sheryl’s top three pieces of advice for women who aim to reach the executive suites in their careers.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=18uDutylDa4]

She also notes that when it comes to an individual’s GPA, the women tend to remember their numbers as slightly lower than they really were, while men remember theirs as a tad higher. She also admits that it seems in general, people like men who are in power, women – not so much. However, people do actually seem to like Sheryl Sandberg which is proven by the number of people, men and women alike, who flock to events where she will be a key speaker.

The Google vs Facebook Battle Continues

Although she initially deflected questions from Henry Blodget about a Facebook phone at the Ignition Conference, she later relented. She has a desire to see Facebook users able to snap a photo on their smart phone and upload right away to an album, wall, or page. She is worried though that Google’s Android may be a factor in preventing that.

“If you buy a phone, you should be able to share pictures and upload your photos with Facebook, we care that Android works and does that,” she said. “Android has made a public commitment to openness, and we want to see that commitment kept.”

She also mentioned that Facebook is thoroughly committed to providing an app that will work on all phones. She shared that she is currently actively working towards this with every single phone manufacturer to see that it happens. Citing that she believes that all consumers should have a choice, when asked by Blodget about whether or not Facebook is currently building a phone, she answered that she would not speculate on the topic. Although this is by far a mysterious and obscure comment, coming from Sheryl Sandberg, it’s definitely worth giving some attention and perhaps a bit of closer inspection.

note: Special Thanks to Business Insider for hosting such a wonderful event and having DBMEi as their Guest.

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LinkedIn Groups: Analytics, Stats, the data

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LinkedIn is by far the biggest professional social network and the second, after Facebook, in the total registered users in the social network world. 120 million register users as of August 2011 in about 200 countries and in 10 languages.

What started as a place to connect those who are hiring with those who are looking for work, and to do that based on personal contacts and recommendations, offers now much more than that. Users can upload photos to help in recognition, they can follow different companies and get notified when a job in one of those becomes available, and they can form a Group. As of 9 months ago, there were 870,612 groups, most of them employment and business related.

Group enables a limited discussion area and moderation by the owners and managers. It can be accessible to members only, or open to all. It is an effective way for B2B advertising, building leadership and driving traffic to your site.  Groups draw users for a longer session, experts say, and thus enabling a person to introduce himself and become noticeable. This has become a way for a person to establish himself/herself as experts in their field, on top of being a wonderful way to target customers.

Up until now, users only knew the number of people in a certain group, but this month LinkedIn added Statistics to the Group function to show in a very visual way, the most important facts about the group; a summary, the demographics, the growth and the activity of the group.

Within those tabs you can see the information in greater detail; where, geographically, are most members located, how many active members the group has, the discussion rate and how many people joined recently.

This kind of information, LinkedIn thinks, will give new members more in depth information and make the decision process, whether to join or not, much easier.  In marketing, this information gives the business owner information that he did not previously have. If you are a local business owner, the location of the people in the group you are targeting is an important factor.

The statistics shows the growth of the group, a great tool for the group manager, which enables him to see the daily activity and response to ad campaigns.

LinkedIn have been paying attention to its Group function in the past few months, unveiling new features. In November their numbers grew to 131 million members  worldwide and 1 million groups.

Why data?

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akLmMAnQDVk]

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IGNITION: Future of Media Conference

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This two day conference is coming to New York City November 30th through December 1st, 2011. Exploring the future of media business, IGNITION brings together executives and key stakeholders to discuss what is happening in the here-and-now.

We all understand that the definition of media has begun to expand to include games, local, social, and real-time communications that include sharing and other forms of data exchange. However, this also means that the lines between advice, business, and entertainment, has begun to blur.

Business Insider’s founder and CEO, Henry Blodget, will host IGNITION. One of the goals of IGNITION is to discuss how what is happening now, will affect your business. For this reason, a long list of top-notch speakers covering many media industries will be attending.

  • Glenn Beck – Founder and CEO, Mercury Radio Arts
  • Deep Nishar – SVP of Products and User Experience, LinkedIn
  • Sheryl Sandberg – COO, Facebook
  • Eliot Spitzer – Former Governor, New York
  • Sarah Bernard – Director of Online Engagement, White House
  • Adam Bain – CRO, Twitter

Business Insider designs their conferences the same way they design their media: intriguing and straight to the topic at hand. Discussions are kept short and each moderator or speaker will quickly get to the point. The fast-paced schedule will keep all attendees connecting while learning. IGNITION is expecting an impressive list of 400 to 500 entrepreneurs and executives from all facets of media including print, TV, digital, music, radio, and entertainment.

Attendees should arrive ready to strategize and create new business.

Adam Bain – CRO Twitter

Before he was CRO of Twitter, Adam Bain was the president of Fox Audience Network, or FAN, where he administrated strategies that would help to monetize Fox’s digital properties. He got behind Fox’s largest acquisitions of IGN, Scout Media, Photobucket, and Myspace. Before he held that position, he was the EVP for Product and Technology for Fox Interactive Media.

Bain began at Twitter just as they were gearing up to launch new monetization efforts. Although Twitter has executed minor experiments with advertising, they now want to increase their revenue significantly. With Bain’s proven abilities in that exact area, it seems to be an incredibly good choice for Twitter and for all who use it.

Get Ready for IGNITION: Future of Media

If you plan to attend IGNITION, register now and make sure to input dbmei15 for 15% off the price of admission as a DBMEi subscriber! This IGNITION Discount Code has been created exclusively for dbmei.com readers.

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Professional Spotlight: Robert Basso

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On Tuesday, November 15th, a group of everyday entrepreneurs who have proven track records from building their own successes, came together to share how they had achieved those goals on their own terms.

Some attendees included:

  • Joe Corcoran, Founder of Joe Corcoran Productions
  • Selena Cuffe, President of Heritage Link Brands
  • Jeff Hoffman, Co-founder of Priceline.com family of companies
  • Steve Davies, President, The Alternative Board – Nassau
  • David Becker, President, PhilippeBecker

Robert Basso, the author of The Everyday Entrepreneur, is a well-recognized business leader and advocate. With an entrepreneurs eye for spotting opportunities, Rob has a long list of achievements from founding investor in Empire National Bank to owner of Advantage Payroll Services. Rob frequently contributes on Fox Business as well as other national programming such as Entrepreneur. Rob has also submitted to interviews with USA Today, AP, and CNN Money. Rob also hosts a web program called Basso on Business which features businesses and entrepreneurs.

The Everyday Entrepreneur

The Everyday Entrepreneur is loaded with powerful strategies and important objectives for defining, setting, and achieving goals for your own entrepreneurial success. Revealing how its readers can learn to apply their own ambitions to their desired goals and gain an understanding on how to proceed on their own, this book provides realistic goal setting ideas that can lead to successes that may have eluded you so far.

The Everyday Entrepreneur is unique from other available books on the market in that it supplies palpable entrepreneurial strategies for business owners. The contributions of The Everyday Entrepreneur allows for business owners to build their own wealth, financial freedom, and success regardless of age.

In The Everyday Entrepreneur, Basso explores other innovative entrepreneurs like himself and discovers what encouraged each one of them to push the limits and find their own genuine successes on their own terms.

You can also expect to learn:

  • Valuable lessons regarding how to drive business growth
  • How to best hone entrepreneurial instincts
  • How to reawaken your sense of adventure in your business endeavors

So much more is covered here but we can’t share it all. The Everyday Entrepreneur provides a roadmap allowing readers to follow the success stories of a variety of individuals who all hail from very diverse backgrounds. Take a walk with Basso as he shares the stories of each entrepreneur while they find the answers to achieving their own successes and surpassing goals unimagined.

My Take on Robert Basso

In a room full of professionals this picture speaks but a touch of the moment and what Robert Basso conveyed as an Entrepreneur, Professional and Parent. At the start of the event Robert thanked a few people, something you expect from most at such an event, but the moment to see Robert’s character came forward when he called his children to the front of the room.

“You might not quite understand this yet, but it’s my hope that you will someday” Robert Basso told his two children.

A moment that was so passionately about a father conveying an important message to his children that he had to be instructed and nudged by others to turn so they could get the photos they wanted. One could try and say that this was possibly staged, but if you had seen it first hand, you’d know the sincerity was without question.

My short interaction with Robert leaves little to argue about the long term experience of knowing or doing business with this professional, but if how he cares and treats his family is any indication, then clearly he is a professional worth knowing.

THE EVERYDAY ENTREPRENEUR

Published by John Wiley and Sons, Inc.

Publication date: October 24, 2011

$24.95; Cloth; 175 pages; ISBN: 978-1-118-10644-0

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Google+ Pages Open the Doors for Brands and Businesses

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This past June, immediately after Google launched it’s highly anticipated Google+ social network, internet savvy businesses like Ford, Dell and Mashable.com rushed to create pages for their brands. Only to have them removed a few days later. Google’s announcement soon followed: “In the meantime, we ask you not to create a business profile using regular profiles on Google+. The platform at the moment is not built for the business use case, and we want to help you build long-term relationships with your customers. Doing it right is worth the wait. We will continue to disable business profiles using regular profiles. (Christian Oestlien Ads project manager on Google+)

One hundred days later Google delivered on its promise. On November 7, 2011 Google+ announced the grand opening of Google+ Pages worldwide.

Google+ Pages allows businesses, brands, and organizations create their own page and establish a circle of like-minded people who enjoy the brand and want to talk about it. Not only does the page allow having a conversation with brand representatives in a way of personalized customer service, it also allows the group of followers to have a conversation with each other.

As Google+ puts it, when it talks about the customers: “…we want to make sure you can build relationships with all the things you care about—from local businesses to global brands… this means we can now hang out live with the local bike shop, or discuss our wardrobe with a favorite clothing line, or follow a band on tour. Google+ pages give life to everything we find in the real world. And by adding them to circles, we can create lasting bonds with the pages (and people) that matter most.” (Google’s blog)

Not only brands and businesses are involved. Google+ wants to enlarge the circle of users to local business, products, corporations, institutions, organizations, arts and entertainment, sports teams and more. They have been working with businesses since the launch in June to understand the needs and requirements of brand names. You can see the pages of these businesses already active:

  • Dallas Cowboys
  • Macy’s
  • Pepsi
  • Toyota
  • Anderson Copper 360
  • X games
  • Zen Bikes
  • The Muppets

Having pages for brands and businesses is nothing new, but Google+ has a few advantages over the competition:

  • People can recommend the brand easily by pressing the +1 button, and start sharing immediately.
  • A brand can have more than one page. A car manufacturer, for example, can have a page for each of its models.
  • Although Facebook has over 500 million users, and Google+ has, so far, about 50 million, the biggest advantage of Google+ has to do with the billions of queries made every day on the search engine, most of them looking for businesses or services. Google will include Google+ pages in its search results.
  • Direct connect – The easiest way to find a band you like to follow or a product has been amended as well. Typing the sign + before the query will take the searcher straight to the brand page. (Try it with + Angry Birds)

The official announcement on Google’s blog ends with these words: “With Google+, we strive to bring the nuance and richness of real-life sharing to software. Today’s initial launch of Google+ Pages brings us a little bit closer, but we’ve still got lots of improvements planned, and miles to go before we sleep. So stay tuned.

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Facebook Ad Campaigns – Are They Working?

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A World Obsessed with Facebook

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJXOavGwAW8]

With so many potential customers on Facebook, Facebook ads should be a profitable and beneficial to your business. With over 850 million users, and 225 million of those in the United States, there is quite an audience to target through the use of Facebook ads.

How Facebook Ads Work

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yhn0-MrDR18]

The Facebook Ad Marketplace

Like other online advertising options, Facebook ads are a type of marketplace where the user bids on how much they are willing to pay to reach their prospective consumers and how much they will pay if those consumers take action.

Facebook has become a common place for businesses who are using customized Facebook Fan pages to increase the amount of fans on their page, thereby increasing their consumer base. Fans are simply customers waiting to happen. So how do you make sure you are getting a good ROI from the investment on the ads?

Basic Marketing 101 – ROI

To determine your ROI you should take your gross profit, subtract the capital spent on your Facebook ad campaign, then divide by the expense. This should give you a good comparative measure in which to determine which of your marketing expenditures are most effective for your business.

Has Anyone Had Real Results from Facebook Ads?

If you watched the video above, you heard from Bob Ford, a representative for Papa John’s Pizza. He describes how an ad placed on Facebook increased their Facebook fans by 130,000 fans overnight with a one day engagement ad.

Starbucks ran their own event on Facebook ads for World Aids Day and had an overwhelming 950,000 people who agreed to attend the event. Alex Wheeler, a Starbucks PR rep shares, “I think it (Facebook) is really effective because its part as the content experience that people have on Facebook. They can interact with it. They can actually participate. We can have these shared ideals with our customers.”

The Value in a Facebook Ad as Part of Your Marketing Campaign

The ultimate benefit, just as the Facebook developer in the video states, is that Facebook itself provides not only the venue to advertise to direct demographics, but that its very nature encourages other Facebook users to share the content with their network. This means that with an effective Facebook ad campaign, many of your connections could be made for ‘free’ in the form of users who willingly share your content with others. This digital version of ‘word-of-mouth’ advertising has proven to be highly effective for some.

“The conversations are happening, with, or without the brands participation.”

Do you want to be a part of the conversation?

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#SMWF: How Hilton Does Social Media

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Hilton has one message from their industry that rings true into their social media campaigns. Hospitality is social. If it isn’t, the execs at Hilton think it should be. Their studies into how social media integrates with travel accommodations has shown:

  1. Those who travel often are commonly also active on social media networks.
  2. Those who use these channels do expect their favored businesses and locations to be listening, available, and willing to respond via these networks.
  3. Those using these venues are not only interested in deals, but often also travel advice, and to deal with customer service issues.

Hiltons Wide-Reaching Social Network

Hilton has made finding information on an incredible variety of things on social networks of all types, quite easy. They regularly post interesting videos on YouTube that show a myriad of benefits for choosing Hilton accommodations when you head out for your next vacation.

Check out this video about a spectacular special drink created by one of Hilton’s own bartenders at the Hilton Hawaiian Village® Waikiki Beach Resort.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v4xZJbW5uBY]

Not only does this create an interest in this location and its amenities, it also builds upon true customer engagement by giving them a real taste of what to expect on their next trip, but also a familiarity that many can appreciate.

None of the above even takes into account that not only does Hilton engage their customers with this type of open information but they have also effectively engaged the employee. It looks like Hilton has taken the proactive stance that many other businesses have by utilizing their current staff to share the big picture through social media networking.

@HiltonSuggest

Social Media Guru for Hilton, Vanessa Sain-Dieguez, helps implement training for their employees on how to use social media to help take care of their customers. In a comprehensive study on using social media with their guest, they noted one very important issue, customers do not just expect their favored businesses to be ‘listening’ to them, but they also expect them to act.

A highly active Twitter account known as @HiltonSuggest stays on the lookout for those who Tweet messages like:

Although none of these Tweets specifically mentions Hilton, @HiltonSuggest still doesn’t mind offering immensely helpful suggestions based on exactly what folks are looking for in the Twitterverse. Also noticable is the fact that not all of the blurbs thrown into the Twitterverse have hashtags, which shows that Hilton is really listening, the replies show that they are also willing to act, even when it doesn’t mean a direct consumer experience for their industry.

It turns out that dbmei author had written an article that had personally touched him and his family, and yes Hilton was behind it! Check it out here.

Defining Social Media in the Hotel Industry

A panel co-hosted by HVS Executive Search and ESSEC Business School Paris was held on February 7th, 2011 to discuss what the rise in social media means for the hotel industry. Attendees were students, hoteliers and other staff, all of whom declared they are active on at least one social media network.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhg4vug1yZM]

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Social Engagement Statistics 2011 [Videos & Infographs]

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How has social engagement helped to create marketing opportunities for building brand awareness? One reason that seems likely is that when social networking first came into our digital lives, many had no idea how to take it, how to monitor it effectively, and how to aggregate its contents to be the most effective use for each account owner.

Tweetdeck, TheTweetedTimes, and Summify are great ways to keep in tune with trends and news on your social network sites and can supply you with a smaller method of mining your own social engagement statistics.

Think Social Media is a Fad?

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLXegacAnwE]

Think Again!

The internet has grown by 14% since 2009. There are 1.9 billion internet users worldwide. As of December 2010, there were 255 million websites. There are 152 million blogs around the net.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3SuNx0UrnEo&feature=related]

Timing Matters

Facebook Statistics

  • Facebook has over 800 million active users
  • More than half of them log on daily
  • The average Facebook user is connected to at least 80 groups, pages, or events
  • Facebook users install apps over 20 million times each day
  • Over 350 million Facebook users access the site through a mobile device
  • Facebook beats Google Weekly news in traffic in the US
  • Facebook users post 60 million status updates daily

Studies by KissMetrics have shown that the best time to share content on Facebook is at noon and then again at just a bit after seven pm. The best day to share is on Saturday.

Some Facebook users increase their following by utilizing aggregators such as YouLikeHits,  Get FaceBook Friends, or sites like Get Fans Fast for Facebook Fan pages.

Twitter Statistics

  • Twitter is the most popular among working adults
  • There are one billion tweets per week
  • That is a 280% increase over tweets in 2010, so far…
  • There are currently over 460 thousand new accounts created every day
  • Mobile Twitter users have increased 182% since 2010
  • Twitter marketing jumped from 3% of businesses in 2008 to 49% in 2009

Statistics show that the best times to tweet are between 9 to 11 am ET and 1 to 3pm Eastern Standard Time. Even tools like Timely can help users to figure out the best times to post for their particular crowd and then schedule them for tweeting.

The optimal time of day to get retweeted is between 3 pm and 6 pm, while the best day for it is on Friday.

Twitter users often utilize sites like FollowMania, Twiends, and TwitterShuffle to gather more followers for expansive networking.

LinkedIn Statistics

  • LinkedIn has over 120 million users, in over 200 countries, and more than 2 new members signing up every second. This equals one million users every 12 days.
  • Almost 2 billion people searches were conducted on LinkedIn in 2010
  • More than 2 million companies have LinkedIn Company Pages

The best time to publish content on LinkedIn can always vary from network to network. Since many networks may be exclusive to their own locale or country, general optimal time to post during US times can be early morning, around 7 am Eastern Standard Time for those who are coming into work and checking status updates. Again in the early evening starting between 5 pm and 6 pm  catches many users at the end of their workday.

The best days to post on the business networking site are Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Do not post on Mondays when at all possible. Friday is considered an ineffective posting day as well. While some laud the benefits of weekend post, you can expect many users will only read or research so deep during their own personal downtime. Post light reads or quick updates on weekend days.

There are many groups on LinkedIn that offer increasing connections and open networking for businesses looking to expand their local networks into global entities.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5e-6psDk8U]

YouTube Statistics

  • YouTube has more content uploaded in the average 60 days than three of the major television networks have created in 60 years
  • YouTube may have the broadest demographics of the big four social networks with users averaging between the ages of 18 and 54 years old
  • YouTube is the second largest search engine in the world
  • YouTube receives over 100 million views per day
  • 84% of internet users view videos online

Sites like TubeIncreaser and Gain YT Views that can help YouTube channels increase their viewers and subscribers. While sites like these have legitimate benefits utilizing them overly can have negative effects. The fact is, many YouTube viewers will not even expend the time to check out a video if it has little or no views, so increasing views on your videos can actually increase the views on your video. Make sense?

However, nothing goes further when creating videos for your business than to go by helpful guidelines during the creation process. Keeping top tips in mind is the best guarantee that your content is relevant, high-quality, and a source of leveraging brand awareness for your business.

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Google+ is Open to ALL and Google+ Leading Mobile Development

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Today Google plus went live and open to everyone. With 20 million people engaging in the first three months in its trail stage, the Google+ platform now hopes to capture the masses.

While some writers like Robert over at BundlePost are betting against Google+ and predicating it to be the threat to Google, I am confident that Google has secured itself in the mobile and cloud space. This move by Google to capture mobile so early is what will have Google on top for a very long time. Google+ is in a safe place, capturing Social Media engagement and tailoring to the mobile trend.

Google Leading in the Mobile Space:

While I will give credit to Apple and Facetime for being the first to the mobile video market, the wifi limitation left users feeling like video chat was still more Sci-Fi then reality. In comes T-Mobile and 4G with the MyTouch4G, now you can use video even when not on a wifi signal, however the user interfaces are scattered and the experience doesn’t seem to capture the social feel to being in a room with a real person.

Google Hangout is introduced on PC and groups of people start to engage, converse and learn about each other in real time in a social setting that makes you rethink about your daily appearance.  One of the first things I noticed was the trend of individuals who previously relied on a single picture having to rethink the way there where dressed, the room there where in and what was behind them. Communication skills kicked back into hi swing as the most important communication indicator was alive and kicking, body language.

This move to get a fully functioning communication tool in the hands of the largest growing market in the world should be enough to secure Google’s future.

Android & G+

When you take a look at how Android has performed in market penetration, you can’t help but realize that Google is just getting started. It’s the little things that are setting Google apart from the competition, i.e. Google Cloud contacts from the release of the G1. Androids first phone was cloud ready as anyone who stored their contacts on their google account never again had to worry about lost phones, moving contacts to new phones etc. This was done without wires and with no need for a PC or software.

Flash, love it or hate it Android got it. You almost wonder why Apple left the door open like this, but Flash adopted by the Google into Android mobile technology was the nail that broke the growth rate of the iPhone and then later allowed Android devices to surpass iPads in global sales and users.

Google+ brought lots of new features, in addition to the latest Hangouts, the G+ app allowed you to upload videos and pictures in real time to the google+ account meaning that in addition to ease of sharing, you could lose your phone during the day and still save your memories, promo photos etc.

In the end, google is innovating for the future, not just today. That’s the sign of a strong company, one I am sure my grandkids will love and hate, long after Apple and Facebook are gone.

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