An Incredible Guide to Use Social Media for Business

Remember how "Paper Boat" created a mass engaging campaign on social media last year? It actually made them become one of the brightest stars of the startups in India. Not only the newbies, but the well-known companies like Make My Trip, AirBnB and Nike plus Social awareness groups like Deepika Padukone's Live Love Laugh Foundation used the power of Social Media to create ripples on the World Wide Web. If used in a right manner, Social Media can give a massive upsurge to your business.

Let us see how

Using Digital Media is an inexpensive deal. If your brand is cool, it can get cooler with the hype you can get on Social media. Considering the rise of internet usage in India, we are adopting the digital trends with a really fast pace. So, it has become really essential to have a digital profile.

Make sure to use these Social Media tips in your campaigns

Post videos: The rate of video engagement is really very high. There are predictions that digital videos can replace the ads on TV. Keeping this in mind, if you invest on videos, you can get true engagements on social media. Live video streaming, creating personal stories as web series, vlogs and making engaging videos related to your business can help you gain more traffic.

Upload personalized content and creative pictures: If your content and images are catchy, unique, personalized and speaks of the brand's story, you can get more likes. People are bored of the monotonous and old fashioned stock image of brands. Posts including fresh content and creative pictures related to real activities help in gaining more traffic on social media.

Concentrate more on Mobile As we all know that Smart Phones are slowly replacing internet usage on desktops. So, create the content which is mobile friendly. Also, create posts for the local audience and distribute it according to the right format, time and location. It will help you in targeting maximum people.

Create technology driven posts No matter how and what we think about Artificial Intelligence, we are curious about it, and we love to read and discuss it. As we all are embracing the machine culture to our everyday life, putting it on Social Media can create interesting engagements. Creating posts related to technology, innovations, facts related to technology and Artificial Intelligence can help you gain more traffic. You can club technology with travel sector, health care, education and even the daily activities like using home appliances and equipment. It not only makes life easier but can help you grab more likes.

Hire a professional Handling Social Media for business is a little different from posting from your personal account. You should always hire the professionals for the job, if you think you are not handling it correctly. People who are professional understand the trends, they know how to make strategies and how to deal with issues coming on the way. They know how to get more engagements on your content and they can create impressive digital marketing posts. They have the knowledge of the major platforms and they can offer a seamless lift to your current status on the web. You can also outsource your digital media to the agencies working in the field.

Be available There is no particular time on which a potential customer can visit you and look for business. So, it is always suggested that, be available to your audience, if not 24x7, at least during your work hours. Reply all the questions asked by your visitors, if you cannot do that on the spot, make sure to tell them to wait and once you can, answer the questions. Having conversations with people who pitch you on digital media can help you in getting recognition. Reply to your messages and comments. Be thankful when they share your posts, it will create communication and improve your social media reputation.

Use meaningful Hashtags Hashtags are popular and you can get a lot of traffic to your digital media profiles with the use of this powerful tool. It helps in categorizing the posts and making your content noticeable to people who are looking for similar stories. It will also help you in discovering the posts from your competitors. With the help of hashtags you can connect with various brands and people of similar interest and create an engagement. Using hashtags, which are related to your business can bring a massive traffic.

Now, when you know the tips for making engaging posts, creative images and impressive content for your social media campaign, let us check where to put these posts.

Here are the popular platforms for social media

Facebook: As we all know that Facebook is one of the top social networking sites in the world and it tops in India, it can give you great business. Ever since Facebook came, more and more people are joining it. You can create your business account on Facebook or start a fan page. It is one of the best platforms for any business to get global audience.

Facebook Messenger Also known as Messenger, it offers text, voice and video communication and you can use it for the promotion of your brand and also for telling your customers about the new things happening in your company.

Google Plus People were not very sure of its success when it was launched in 2011, but today there are more than 500 million users on Google+, which is also known as G+. You can easily add people of similar interests and organize your connections with this platform. It has a global reach and you can post and share your images, texts, videos and web links on G+. Being a product of Google, it helps in indexing the content on Google really fast.

Twitter It is a micro-blogging site which offers a unique feature of sending your messages in 140 characters. If you can be miser on characters and you know how to build unique and catchy content, you can advertise your business effectively. You can interact, communicate, pass information, talk about the latest news and target your audience with your products by using Twitter. It is a powerful platform where you follow people and they do the same. You can like or re-tweet posts which you find interesting and send personal messages on DM (Direct Message).

LinkedIn It is a professional community where people can build their business or professional profiles. If you want to connect with professionals working in the similar field LinkedIn is the perfect platform. Here you can check the profiles of professionals because it has their education qualification, past work experiences, business network. Also, if you want to build a network of local professionals, you will find countless registered users.

YouTube Founded by three former PayPal employees, YouTube is the most popular platform for video sharing. Each month, more than 1 billion visitors hit the website. You can upload your videos and reach maximum potential clients through video advertising on YouTube.

WhatsApp Messenger For instant texting, WhatsApp is a great platform which you can use for your business. You can share texts, images, videos and voice clips through your Smart phone or Tablet. It is an effective platform for instant communication with your customers. You can also run your company's ad campaign on WhatsApp.

Instagram Instagram is a Social Networking platform where you can upload your pictures and videos. It has an amazing feature of filters through which you can edit your pictures and this makes Instagram a unique platform loved by millions of users. Instagram came in 2010, and Facebook bought it in 2012. Since then, the number of people on Instagram has up surged in a very high pace (as Instagram is linked to Facebook profile). Popular for its hashtags, Instagram can help in getting your business content viral instantly.

If you are not a part of these platforms, you must join these and start uploading your stories. It will not take much time to reach your target. So, you know what to upload of Social Media, where to post your content, your work will not end here, you will have to monitor your activities and the results. So that if you are not getting the desired traffic or result, you can change the strategy or work harder.

Managing and monitoring Digital Media

It is not an easy task to manage all your accounts for Social Media and it is a time consuming task to login and log out from each of the sites. To make your task easier, you should start using Hootsuite and to manage your multiple Twitter accounts Tweetdeck is a perfect option.

Hootsuite It is one of the amazing options to monitor your postings on social media. It helps you in checking any activity involving your company or name. It also shows the areas of your interest.

Tweet deck If you use Twitter, you must not miss this resource. It will help you in managing multiple Twitter accounts plus it helps in organizing the mention and other engagements. You can jump into any topic of interest by searching it instantly.

Analyzing your social media insights

To analyze the insights of your social media for business, you can use any of these services:

HubSpot If you want to see how far your social media efforts have gone, you must use this resource. It will let you know all about your social media posts.

Facebook Page Manager If you run a Facebook fan page, you must check the insights. It will help you in monitoring the traffic. You can check the most popular posts, from where the traffic comes and you can also connect with your audience by replying to them directly.

Seesmic For those who want to manage all the Social Media accounts from a single resource, this is a great application. You can use Seesmic on your desktop as well as a Smart Phone.

Klout Another amazing platform to check your Social Media reach is Klout. It helps in checking the most popular hashtags, posts and your overall progress of the Social Networking Sites.

By Shivee Sirmauri  |  Source

5 Crazy-Simple Social Media Hacks

These are super easy to pull off, yet so effective you'll be kicking yourself for not using them sooner...

LinkedIn - See Restricted LinkedIn Search Results

When you search for people on LinkedIn, you might not see the search results you're looking for. This is because results can be restricted based on your membership level.

But there is a way around this...

The majority of LinkedIn profiles are indexed on Google.

Thus all you have to do is search Google to find what you're looking for, like this:

Site:LinkedIn.com "name of person"

And let's say you're looking for social media managers in New York. Type this into Google:

Site:LinkedIn.com//pub "social media manager" New York

Now you can find the information LinkedIn is hiding from you.

Sweet!

Twitter - Send Tweets Longer Than 140 Characters

No, we don't mean send readers to another site to see what you have to say. We're going to keep our readers right there on Twitter by doing this:

Send out your tweet just like normal, ending it with a (... ) or a cliffhanger.

For example,

"Did you know you can send out a Tweet that's longer than 140 characters? First you tweet like usual. Then... "

Reply to your own tweet from your own stream. Seriously. Remove your @name so you don't look like you're talking to yourself (which would be weird!) Like this:

"... you reply to your own tweet in your Twitter stream. Remove the mention of your name and finish your tweet."

Visitors see either tweet in your stream, click on 'view conversation' and see the full length tweet.

Facebook - Reduce Attack Posts and Salty Comments

The Internet can be a rowdy place, especially in social media. But if you go to the Page Moderation section of Page Settings, you'll get some relief.

Simply enter common inflammatory words such as "unlike," "clickbait," "idiot" and so forth.

Then when a banned word is used, the comment will be hidden from the general public.

The comment still appears to the person who left it who is none the wiser. And their friends will be able to see it as well, but no one else.

You can also hide comments from trolls after they're posted. The troll will still see the comment, so unless he compares his account with someone else's he'll never know the comment is hidden.

And it's better than deleting the comment and banning the troll, since they'll then email you and complain you're stepping on their freedom of speech.

YouTube - Research What Viewers Want

It can be difficult to move viewers off of YouTube and onto your website.

But now you can use YouTube cards to poll your audience and find out what they really love.

Ask the right questions and you'll discover what will make them go to your website and opt-in to your mailing list.

Then simply present them with the strong call to action they need, and they're yours.

Any Social Media Platform: Vastly Increase Your Social Media Followers

Share for Share or Shoutout for Shoutout (S4S) is basically forming mutually beneficial partnerships with other people in your niche.

You post each other's content with a reference back to them. Sort of like emailing your list to tell them about another email marketer (also called a solo ad) only it's done reciprocally on social media.

And it costs nothing because you are doing it for each other.

But what if you're new to the platform? If you have social clout on other platforms, you might do a cross promotion in which you promote them on your established platform and they promote you on your new platform.

And the best thing about this technique is it works on any social media platform, including Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and so forth.

There you have it - 5 genuine social media hacks that can make a real difference in your marketing.

Pick your favorite and start using today.
By Nick James  |  Source

How To Sell Digital Products On Bonanza

Digital product authors and licensed resellers have sold their products on eBay for many years. Sadly, for the past couple of years eBay has made this increasingly more difficult. This is due to their restrictions on the sale of digitally downloaded products. As a result many digital product sellers have been forced to find an alternative.

Bonanza fit the bill perfectly!

If you're not familiar with Bonanza, it's an online auction site very much like eBay. Bill Harding founded Bonanza in 2007. Today there are over 20 million items for sale on Bonanza. These item listings are available to nearly every country in the world. Among these items are, naturally, digitally downloaded products.

Digital products are not only fully supported on Bonanza, the digital delivery to your customer is also handled. When your product is purchased and payment completed, the buyer is able to download the product immediately.

The ability to easily list digital products, has made Bonanza one of the top venues for selling downloadable software, eBooks, plugins and more.

Listing your digital downloads is easy

1. Register a sellers account on Bonanza.
2. Once your account is active, login and go to your seller's dashboard.
3. Set up your Seller's Booth, following the provided instructions/suggestions.
4. Select items, then add or edit items. This will open your listings page.
5. Select add an item. This will take you to the listing creation page.
6. Complete the Give Your Item A Title Field.
7. Next you will upload your product images.
8. In the item category field, select Digital Goods, then type of item from the list of options.
9. Enter the number of items available in the Quantity Available field.
10. Complete the Detailed Item Description field.
11. In the Shipping Selection field you'll upload your digital file. (.zip file)
12. Set a price for your item.
13. Click the, Add This Item To Your Booth button.
14. You'll receive confirmation that your listing is now live.

That's all there is to it. When your item sells, payment will be added to your PayPal account, the buyer will be able to download the item immediately. All of this is handled automatically, with no additional action required from you.

Another great feature of Bonanza is the Rewards Program. You earn reward tokens for just about every action you perform on Bonanza. Logging in and listing items are just a couple ways you earn tokens. These tokens can be used for fee discounts, listing promotion and more.

There are many other great venues for selling digital products online. However, if you sell digital products, Bonanza definitely ranks among the best. Even if you currently sell on other sites, don't overlook Bonanza!

I have been in the Internet Marketing field for over 18 years. In that time I have had my share of losses, which I consider a "right of passage", so to speak. It has always been my belief that without failures, there can be no success. The important thing is to learn from those failures and keep going. "Any online marketer that says they have never had failures, is simply not telling the truth."

Currently I am the co-founder of Super Resell Rights, information and resources for new marketers.
By Robert Sellers  |  Source

12 Points of Comparison - eBay and Amazon

Think of any situation, and there are likely pros and cons. The same is true when deciding whether to expand your sales to Amazon. The fact is, neither eBay nor Amazon can claim to be the best across the board nowadays.

Many eBay sellers have wondered if it's really worth selling on Amazon. Some feel there are too many rules and it wouldn't be worth the effort. Some have asked for a point by point comparison between the two sites. Here are a dozen points of comparison that may help sellers make a decision.

1. Fees

2. Format (Auction vs. Fixed-price)

3. Community

4. Stability

5. Feedback

6. Branding

7. Photos

8. Taxes

9. Average Sale Price

10. Payment Methods

11. Return Policy

12. Shipping

1. Fees

Most sellers agree that fees between the two sites are almost a wash. Especially when you consider that you pay for every item to be listed on eBay whether it sells or not. When you consider unsold items, time spent relisting items, and time spent dealing with unpaid items, my opinion is Amazon comes out ahead.

Amazon collects the payment for the seller, and deposits the funds into your checking account. There are no fees for this, while PayPal fees are substantial. If eBay moves to a PayPal only model in the U.S., they can increase fees for collecting payment at will.

Advantage: Tie

2. Format (Auction vs. Fixed-price)

eBay popularized the auction format listing. Amazon failed at auctions and only offers fixed-price listings. Which is best?

For collectibles, auctions are the best way to get market value. eBay is better if you are running an antique store online and want the best prices, and shoppers looking for unique items.

But most businesses, do not deal in collectibles, they sell "practicals," commodity items that people want to buy and get on with their day. Buyers can readily find these items, and buy online for convenience. It's easy to set a fixed-price for these items.

While Amazon is the fixed-price king, eBay is moving in that direction by downplaying auctions and encouraging fixed-price listings. The advantage is in the buyers. The Amazon buyer is more affluent, and pays a higher average price for products.

Advantage: Auctions: eBay

Advantage: Fixed-price: Amazon

3. Community

eBay sellers are very involved with eBay buyers. The transactions can be extremely interactive. Amazon buyers and sellers rarely interact. The Amazon buyer tends to expect high customer service and they don't expect to have to ask if an item has shipped.

Because of the higher interaction with customers, eBay sellers have to spend more time per transaction. Amazon transactions take less time.

Advantage: Amazon

4. Stability

Online retailers rely on the stability of their chosen platforms to operate smoothly. Changes cost time. Sellers have developed systems that allow them to list, sell, and deliver items. When rules change, or things don't work, the systems break down and profit is lost.

Amazon has had very few major changes in the past few years. Even though there are some restrictions, they generally stay the same, and are enforced consistently. When changes have been made, they tend to stick and sellers can adjust.

eBay has had major changes over the past year, including Feedback, fees, digitally delivered items, search results, Detailed Seller Ratings, eBay's affiliate program, and more are to be expected. Sellers have been greatly affected in real and perceived ways. Some changes have been rolled out, only to be reversed causing even more consternation among sellers.

Advantage: Amazon

5. Feedback

Both eBay and Amazon have a feedback system allowing buyers and sellers to record their impression of a transaction. Both sites allow buyers to leave negative comments for sellers. Both sites allow sellers to leave only positive comments for buyers.

The eBay culture has given much more weight to feedback than their Amazon counterpart. Amazon buyers can see the seller's feedback score, but tend to overlook it more readily than eBay buyers. Amazon's A-z Guarantee may have a bearing on this by making the buyer feel more protected when purchasing an item.

Amazon does not "disadvantage" sellers, as eBay does, by moving them down in the results when shoppers perform a search. eBay does this by considering the seller's feedback score and making them less visible to shoppers, rather than letting buyers make the choice themselves.

Advantage (especially for sellers): Amazon

6. Branding

Amazon restricts sellers from reaching out to buyers and marketing to them. Traditionally, this has been an advantage to eBay since eBay allowed sellers to link to a site off eBay from the seller's About Me page.

Recent changes at eBay have virtually eliminated the ability to use eBay as a lead generating tool for off-eBay business. eBay has all but forbidden any outside links from any eBay pages including custom store pages. The only place a link may appear is on your eBay About Me page. This has effectively neutralized eBay as a "branding tool."

Advantage: Tie

7. Photos

eBay sellers have always struggled with photos. How to take good photos, how to get the photos to show up on eBay, how many photos. Each item, no matter if it's exactly the same as another, gets its own photo on eBay.

Amazon is different. An individual product gets one photo, and one description page, and all sellers use the same page.

Generally, the first photo posted on a given product, is the photo everyone will use. Some sellers don't like the idea of other sellers using their photo. But if "one photo fits all" for a particular product, it's pretty likely that product is a commodity product. Not many photos are needed.

As an Amazon seller, I absolutely love the fact that I can list 20 items without shooting a single photo. It saves a ton of time.

Amazon buyers will buy an item without a photo. They know that the image they see is generally just representative anyway.

Advantage: Amazon

8. Taxes

Marketplace sellers are responsible for the sales tax on any items sold on Amazon.com, and if necessary, they generally add this cost into the price of their items. This is a pain for Amazon sellers who are running a business.

eBay provides a mechanism in the Sell-Your-Item form to collect the taxes in addition to the sale price. This way the taxes don't eat into the seller's profits.

It seems Amazon could add a tool like this to their process quite easily for their Marketplace sellers and I wouldn't be surprised to see it in the future. But until that happens, I'd say...

Advantage: eBay

9. Average Sale Price

Amazon buyers have been shown to be more affluent, and more willing to spend more on similar items. eBay buyers tend to look for bargains, and are willing to wait through a seven-day auction to save a buck.

As a seller, I'll pick the buyer that is willing to spend more. I have actually used eBay to source products at rock-bottom prices, then sold for good profit on Amazon. Amazon buyers often don't even look on eBay, and they ultimately pay more.

Advantage: Amazon

10. Payment Methods

Amazon sellers must use Amazon Payments to accept payment. That's it. Amazon collects the payment, and deposits it into your bank account twice per month (more often if you choose). They collect and deposit the funds with no fees added. eBay sellers can accept PayPal, money orders, cashier's checks, or cash (in person).

eBay seems poised to require PayPal payments on all transactions. If that happens, it will significantly affect many sellers. If you sell an item for $500, you may now accept non-PayPal payments and keep most of your money. If PayPal is required, you will fork over 2.9% + $.35 ($14.85) in PayPal fees.

Amazon sellers do not have to send invoices, payment reminders, or track unpaid items. If Amazon cannot collect the payment, you don't have a sale, and your item is still listed on their site. eBay's system is simply more work, more time, and ultimately costs more to manage as a seller.

Advantage: Amazon

11. Return Policy

Some eBay sellers fear Amazon because of their obligatory return policy, called the A-z Guarantee. This guarantee allows the buyer to receive a full refund if the item is "materially different" from that described, for up to 90 days. Amazon will usually side with the buyer. Sounds pretty tough.

The eBay seller is free to fight it out with buyers with a dispute resolution. This could ultimately result in negative feedback for the seller. They are not required to offer a refund. If eBay forces sellers to use PayPal for payments though, your funds could be held or you may even receive a charge-back against your account. It's basically the same difference, but the eBay / PayPal route is a lot messier and time consuming. If you have a buyer that is determined to get a refund, they'll generally figure a way to get it.

Simply based on the time consuming mess the dispute resolution process is, I'm saying...

Advantage: Amazon

12. Shipping

eBay sellers have long looked at shipping charges as a small revenue stream. They bump up shipping prices and skim a little for themselves to cover shipping supplies, labels, and pixie dust. (Okay, I added the pixie dust.) The fact is, many sellers have turned this legitimate charge into a way to avoid eBay fees.

eBay has now begun penalizing sellers who charge above average shipping amounts by lowering their visibility in the default search results. They are even giving breaks to sellers who offer free shipping, in effect hurting those sellers who cannot afford it.

Amazon gives sellers a "shipping credit", based on an item's category. This does not always cover the full shipping amount, but usually does. The amount is fixed by Amazon. You cannot ask for more from the customer, and even if the shipping credit does not cover your shipping costs, you must ship the item. Since the shipping credit is fixed, it can be figured in when setting your price.

Which is better? I like to have control over my shipping. But if a seller is careful, it's pretty easy to figure in the shipping credit on Amazon and not lose money. Even if there is a loss, it's minimal.

I have found items I wanted on eBay, only to leave because of the outrageous shipping charges. ($1.99 item + $10.99 shipping for a cell phone cover.) I go straight to Amazon, because I know shipping is standard and I won't feel ripped off. How many other buyers do the same? I'll take those buyers...

Advantage: Amazon

Summary

There is no question eBay is best for some items, while Amazon is best for others. But the overlap is incredibly large. The vast majority of items that sell on Amazon will also sell on eBay, and visa versa.

The important thing to remember is the shoppers are different. While you and I may shop on several sites, many Amazon shoppers are very loyal to Amazon and won't even visit eBay. Some eBayers feel it would be a sin to shop on Amazon. By selling on both sites, you are potentially getting millions of additional eyeballs on your products.

If you are avoiding Amazon because you think there are too many rules - take a look at eBay's User Agreement. eBay is moving closer to Amazon's model, in many ways. Like it or not, this is the wave of the future. Will you be ahead of the game, or will you be playing catchup?
By Steve Lindhorst  |  Source

Time Management - Why it is a Problem?

Some of the reasons people use time management can be counterproductive to achieving sustainable change that delivers consistent results.

Part of the problem is that the phrase can be misleading. Here's why:

Time doesn't need managing. It's YOU that needs managing!

The problem is that you are diverting attention from resolving underlying problems permanently that would create lasting solutions that would then no longer require managing.

The problem with time management strategies is that they are often used inappropriately - and that is what concerns me. What we are often doing is using time management to manage ineffective behaviour patterns and bad habits instead of using them for improving productiveness and effectiveness. An important distinction.

So instead, I chose to focus on, what I call, self management.

Focussing on self management is about finding lasting changes to ineffective behaviour patterns and bad habits. Whereas time management often is about managing these problems. Self management deals with real change that delivers tangible results. Hence my preference for focusing on self management, not time management. You are going to dramatically increase your effectiveness if your remove problem areas totally rather than putting things in place to manage them.

Now, don't get me wrong, I am not suggesting you throw out the current methods you use to get things done or that time management tools don't have a place. What I am suggesting is this......

Focusing on self management is more likely to give real solutions, lasting change and effective habits that naturally produce results.

A good starting point is to look at the mindset you go into when something comes up that you feel falls into a "time management" issue.

If every time a bad habit or behavior pattern surfaces your immediate mindset is to put a time management technique or tool in place to manage it, you are going to be forever in managing issues mode, not creating lasting solutions mode.

The key is to create a mindset that looks inside yourself to the source and solution first and techniques to manage issues second.

A good rule to follow with this sort of thing is to remember to always look inside before you look outside!

The key to real change always starts on the inside, with you and your mindset.
By Ali Davies  |  Source

5 Mistakes I Made on Amazon when I First Started Selling (that cost me $...

Good advice on selling on Amazing.

Make Money Online With FREE Wix Websites (Easy $100/Day Method)

A great tutorial on building a Free Wix website.

Blogging For Dummies - Book Review

Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com 

4.0 out of 5 stars 

A good overview with first steps. 27 Nov. 2016

By Mark Morrison - Published on Amazon.com

Format: Kindle Edition Verified Purchase

Not many reviews so I'll jump in. I purchased this book today in the Kindle format. Spent a long rainy day with it. I am new to the idea of blogging and probably exactly the kind of dummy it is aimed at. I found the book to be very informative and I believe it gave me a good overview of a number of topics related to blogging. There were several chapters devoted to actually setting up a blog which I went through briefly without actually doing them as I am not ready to decided on a particular set-up so I can't talk about their practical helpfulness, but I think they did help me decide which way I will go in my first attempt. For a beginner there was I believe a good deal of thought provoking material that moved me from thinking about setting up a blog, mainly for my wife, to specific ideas about how to handle things earlier in the day I didn't even know existed. So, as far from an expert in the area, but a probably fair example of a "dummy" the book was helpful. I would recommend it to anyone looking for an overview, with then some practical instruction on how to get going.