Biznology

Image by Vali… via Flickr

This is an unusual day for me. Normally Frank Reed mans this spot each Friday, but he needed a day off, so I am filling in. And it makes me realize how much I depend on Frank and on my other blog contributors to keep this thing running every day. We post almost every business day, except when I am on vacation (like next week–see you on May 2), and it could become a real grind if I needed to do it all myself. It can feel overwhelming, like you are all by yourself in the vast expanse of work with no one else to help. But I don’t need to do it alone. And that’s what I want to talk to you about today. Marketing is very hard, so the more help you can get, the better. Read the remainder of this entry »

Image via CrunchBase

I was asked this question in an interview the other day. It’s framed more provocatively than you or I might think about it, but interviews are like that. The answer was easy, because of the extreme nature of the question. Of course Facebook won’t kill Google. But I don’t say that because I somehow think Larry P has the jump on Mark Z.–instead, I say it because nothing kills anything… Read the remainder of this entry »

I’m starting to hear more an more people despair of being able to determine return on investment for social media. For some uses of social media, such as public relations, they might be right, because there are precious few companies that can calculate ROI even for offline PR. But if you use social media for marketing, you can use direct marketing principles to prove your rate of return. Everyone’s talking about social media, but how do you know it is worth your precious marketing dollars, or even worth your time? In this free 30-minute Biznology Webinar, I explain how virtually any business can use direct marketing principles to track their customer leads and sales from social media, whether those sales occur online or offline. So, if you have given up on tracking the impact of your investment in social media, give a listen to this Webinar on how to track social media return on investment. Read the remainder of this entry »

Image by Joi via Flickr

Do you sleep soundly each night? I know some of us do, but I know a lot of people who are worried. You might imagine that if you had all the billions that Sergey and Larry have over at Google, that you’d have nothing bothering you at all, but I bet they don’t feel that way. I suspect that Sergey and Larry are laden with problems and concerns, because they are playing a different game than you or me. To find out what they are so worried about, check out my latest post on Search Engine Guide, “What’s keeping Google up at night?”

Image via CrunchBase

Google announced its Q1 earnings late last week and posted a profit of $2.3 billion. That’s billion. With a “B”. Pretty good, huh? For GOOG, anyways. But what about for you? If you’re like most businesses, you probably rely on Google to help you build your brand online. You’re a key contributor to those billions per quarter flowing to Google’s bottom line. But, the real question is, whose brand is Google interested in building? Read the remainder of this entry »