Internet Marketing

As a fellow blogger I have become rather versed in the ways of social media. The Internet community has become so vast and grown so strong, that a set of rules seems to have been established to promote this "cohesive social living." The times clearly are a' changing when the traditions of hand written thank you letters and curtsying are being replaced with tweet backs and hoops & yoyo e-cards. Here are just a few basic ground rules for being well received on some of today's most popular social media outlets:

If you blog it they will come: If you're blogging about someones site or product be sure to link back to them. Not only does it make your blog heavier, but it will increase traffic to both sites. If you read a blog that you like, be sure to pass it along. Linking a blog to StumbleUpon, Google Reader, or Friendfeed are good places to start. Also, if you read a great post and want to comment try to say something more than "nice job!" Bloggers always appreciate it when comments provide constructive feedback.

Do not use Facebook to "over promote": There is nothing more annoying than having a Facebook inbox that is constantly flooded with invites to the same type of party, at the same club, by the same promoter day in and day out. If you start up a Facebook group for promotional purposes, do not bombard your members with constant messaging. Try to keep most of that stuff on the group wall or message board. And be sure to use good judgement when tagging your friends in pictures, incriminating or otherwise unpleasant photos should be kept private.

Follows is as follows does: The Internet community has gone afire with twitter, the social site built for microblogging and keeping in instant contact with your friends and followers. While you do not have to follow everyone that follows you, if one of your followers is in a similar industry it is typically common courtesy to follow them back. And while its fine to use twitter as a marketing tool, its nice to promote others from time to time just to change things up a bit.

Last week, I attended the PhoCusWright Blogger's Summit Workshop held at the ITB conference in Berlin, Germany.

The workshop was entitled "The Top Social Media Trends for Travel & Tourism" and featured a panel of 5 major bloggers. Each member of the panel was asked to provide his 3-5 top Social Media Trends for 2009:

Darren Cronian

• Mobile
  
• Twitter: companies are going to have to become more social and interact with the consumer
  
• Travel companies will start using more social media
  

Klaus Hidebrandt

• Social Media 2.0 is all about communication with the consumer. Companies need to know, understand, and execute social media at a top level.
  
• Get your CEO or top executive involved. Employees love it. Customers love it. There is no more powerful way to humanize your brand.
  
• The future lies in companies that adopt EVERYTHING: one brand and one media is best.
  

Kevin May

• Twitter: 974% of traffic in UK in 2008
  
• PR: people are thinking more cleverly in terms of PR. They are using different forms of media both online and offline for campaigns.
  
• Crowd-sourcing: making sure you know what is happening in a network digitally.
  
• Hyperlocal: creating niche services for a localized community
  

Martin Schobert

• Feedback 2.0: a lot of comments, learning how to communicate with a social internet
  
• Maps will be the new interface.
  
• More CONTEXT: the right content offered to the right person at the right time
  
• Do your homework. Define goals clearly with social web and have B2B conversations
  

Vasco Sommer-Nunes

• Volume of mentions will become part of a greater measurement metrix, such as "share of voice", to determine success in social media.
  
• Personal publishing on the web will continue to increase, thereby increasing the share of user generated content.
• Companies will react and hire a social media guy to listen, help and educate users
  
• Cross publishing will become stronger, i.e. publishing into several communities from one web site or mobile phone.
  
• The travel industry will embrace social media even more than other industries, because people love to talk about their vacation and show others where they´ve been!
  

After the panelists presented their trends, the audience was asked to interactively text in their picks to have a final list of 3. Although the majority of the panel's trends focused on social media sites, especially Twitter, the audience's choices end up being strategies.

Audiences Choices of Top 3 Social Media Trends with the greatest impact in the next year:

Twitter, the social networking and micro-blogging service, seems to be sweeping the nation. Twitter allows users to send and view others updates (called tweets) which are 140 characters in length. Like Facebook, Twitter originally started for others to be updated on the happenings of their friend's daily lives. The main difference between Twitter and Facebook is that Twitter encourages a dialogue, allowing opportunities to be built with people which would not have otherwise occurred. It has quickly shifted directions as now many celebrities have adopted Twitter, as well as businesses. Twitter is quickly becoming a communication medium of choice between companies in a variety of industries and their customers.

Twitter allows people to connect with your business on an up-to-date basis. The social media site can be used to increase your brand visibility and converse with your customers as up to the minute deals and information is posted. You can even make online Twitter coupons at twtqpon.

JetBlue, Crystal Cruises, Carnival, British Airways, and Virgin America are great examples of businesses that are using Twitter to keep customers in the know. Their Twitter posts feature sales and deals, travel tips, and current flight delays and cancellations, although Virgin America seems to be setting the bar in the Travel industry sector.

Want more travel industry Twitters? Click here for "50 great travel tweeters." (telegraph.co.uk)

The future of travel and destination marketing is online. Discussion boards, customer review sites, blogs, and social network sites dominate the internet today. They also play an integral part in the planning of travel.

"This year, 40% of all leisure and 35% of business travel bookings will be done online. By 2010 over 50% of leisure bookings are expected to be online. The percentage of meeting planners researching and booking online is also growing at a rapid pace. An estimated 89% of planners are researching event locations on the web, and by 2008, 41% of all groups and meetings travel revenues will come from the Internet." (HotelMarketing.com)

Facebook, a social media site originally for students attending Ivy League schools, has quickly evolved over the years and taken over the internet. Today, Facebook is used by all ages to get in touch with old friends and even make some new ones. From a marketing perspective, Facebook offers a way for businesses to reach more customers through groups, fan pages, notes, applications, and more. Facebook business pages are a form of social media marketing that allows a business to "create more targeted messages to individual niche groups and to leverage personal recommendations from your customers in order to create word of mouth marketing." (Creative Fusion Media)

Building a Facebook business page will attract customers of all ages and demographics. A Facebook business page offers a number of features to bring customers to your business. You can even build multiple pages to appeal to different groups of people, such as teens.

With a Facebook business page you can:

• Supply basic business information such as a website, company overview and physical address. You are also able to place a logo of your business on the page.
  
• Easily upload photos and videos. Your clients and fans can add photos as well.
  
• Engage clients in conversation using the discussion board or the "wall"
  
• Add notes (similar to a blog post) and post upcoming events or promotions that you may be hosting
  
• Have users become a fan of your company