2010 Predictions and Observations that will Resonate #IN 2011 @SpeedSynch

These 2010 Predictions and Observations that will Resonate #IN 2011 have been posted on @SpeedSynch or WordPress blogs. 

Cheers,

Nick @SpeedSynch  nick@scenario2.com

Spam, Social Media and the future of Search 

Search engines and the advertisers they serve have a big problem with Social Media; they can’t shape its content and appear to have innovated beyond spam and PR with the follower.

  

The future of internet marketing and search is the follower.

  

Social Media and the Follower

 

The follower is like a heat seeking missile that follows targeted people in social media–usually ‘influencers’ because social media　bloggers, influential or not, have become immune to　subtle　efforts of advertisers to promote their products or generate content to attract people that like content generated by specific bloggers.

 

It seems that once a blogger is identified as being influential or a blog as a gathering space for bloggers of influence one or more followers are dispatched to blogs to offer content that interjects the stories important to their patrons, the advertisers.  This is natural and easy as blogs are content generation engines.

 

Avoid Social Graphs and Super Bloggers

 

In my experience the real value of the ‘super blogger’ is directly related to sending your content out and others re-sending or posting, just like a chain letter.

This is done with the hope of boosting search engine visibility–leads and sales are a bonus, but not the main objective.

 

It’s not a popular view, but I would think that if you had the time to find the most influential bloggers you would be at the back of a long line and when you get to the front of the line, you would be disappointed with the result.

 

However, if you must take this path, think about these questions;

1. Do they reach your prospective customers or markets?
2. Can or will they help you and at what cost, $ or time?
3. What is the desired outcome from engaging the super bloggers?
4. Can they understand your products or customers or markets?
5. Will they just re-send your story or modify it for their own purpose?

 

Good luck with it and it’s always better to talk to someone you can serve with your content or product rather than an agent.

 

The Biggest Social Media Success Stories

 

Social Media is a hunk of software and software is created for two reasons; 

• Compliance
•  Speed up processes

Success of software tools depends on if it fits the need of the person typing and the person reading what that person typed so the ‘biggest’ stories will be about how many millions of people signed up to a website so they could do something faster (Twitter) or that the website they use is ‘trusted’ (LinkedIN) or just plain old fun but a privacy nightmare that sells as much information as dumb users will enter (Facebook).

 

Don’t Invest Time or Money in SEO

 

SEO is about giving Google money and there are other options, either way you need to do this; 

• Understand keyword themes of the reasons your customers buy
•  Analyze keywords used by your competitors

Options–Establish presence where Search Engine Spiders don’t matter–

• Find blogs or social media sites favoured by your customers
• Go to blogs that use competitor’s clients
• Pay per click, no fuss, saves time.

Search has moved past 90% of SEO experts with Google’s purchase of Metaweb last month so all the time you spend figuring out how to do SEO will be much better spent with your family.

 

The Tweet below is an answer to a question rather than an observation or prediction.

 

Explain Social Media Authenticity in a Tweet “Any words used in similar spaces share meaning.”