9 Ways to have A Good Welcome Page On Facebook

There is a saying...You impress first and it lasts till the end ! Facebook is a platform of people coming from varied background, cultures and languages.. At times you may use this to your advantage but it cam get a bit tricky.To hold on to every visitor on your Facebook Page, you need to be captivating and at the same time be informative. There needs to be a fine balance and your landing page should just set the tone. Here's how you can have a great Welcome Page on Facebook to get you loyal first timers and keep the old fans interested as well!

1. Get a paid welcome page. Allows custom icons: I know you need to spend that extra bit but a paid service goes a long way to establish your identity. It adds so much of creativity to your content and image.
2. Include you tube and flicker links : Take your visitors to some visual platform where you have shared things for them to see and believe in your services and products.
3. Put the description about your company on top: People want to know who you are before anything else. So just write who you are and what you do. Doesn't need to be as lengthy as the info but should give the visitors an idea that this is an official account and they are at the right place!
4. Put a section as" Products" : Show them what you got! A nice way to introduce your product would be to include a small image of a product with a "see more" link. Should sound a bit tempting to them!
5. Include a Greeting : Say hello! If its Christmas decorate your page with snow. Make it relevant to the current time in-order to   make the visitors take notice.
6. Urge the visitors to like the page for staying connected: This is an old one but yes you still need to remind them to like the page. You can try a wall/screen to ensure they really need to like to enjoy a complete look of the page, But that's too harsh mate! 
7. Include New Product releases(upcoming or newly released): Make them come back frequently with your new product releases. Give them a sneak-peek of the things you have in store. They love stories! So give it to them.
8. Include some recent photos or videos: Other than including links of your company's YouTube and Flicker accounts, you may well leave some recent images and videos. Remember not to leave the video on play mode as it makes the loading pretty slow.
9. Include a nice Logo: This could be a dynamic image, but I recommend not to use huge ones.

You have a great idea? Share it with us...

Google+ Advantage For Businesses

Google+ Pages Logo

Last week you may have come across my blog mentioning the need for Google+ Pages for Businesses. And wow Google responded quickly by offering pages for businesses. Google+ Pages presents to us a host of marketing opportunities and makes the web a lot smaller ! Yes ! Smaller. The reason why I believe this is going to happen is because of the fundamental difference of a Google+ page with a Facebook Page.

In Mark Zuckerberg’s words, Google“is trying to build their own little version of Facebook". But we all know the added power of  Google Search for Google + Pages.It may prove an edge to Google over Facebook. Let us look at the potentials Google+ Pages holds for businesses.

  

1. Better Search Opportunities

Enhanced Search Opportunities

Google offers something extra, something that Facebook and Twitter can’t offer - the power of Web search.Call it cost efficiency, Google+ Pages fair far better compared to Facebook Ads. Generally the domain Facebook.com generates a lower CTR(Click Through Rate). In comparison, a Google + Page would be search friendly, as Google has over 60% of the Search Engine Market. This would mean a higher ranking of your page and website without spending much moolah ! It boils down to lesser effort to optimise your rankings on search engines. Create a page, maintain it and link it to your website. Let the Google algorithms do the dirty work. 



2. Better Analytics

Be Informed !

Google Analytics provides with metrics like time spent on page, referring sites top content, and geographic information. All this was horribly missing in the Facebook Pages Insights. Google with its detailed Analytics is a far better option for all the number crunchers. Its opens up information and visitor behaviour, giving the page owners the ability to adapt by the minutes!

3. Learn from Facebook's mistakes

Integrating Facebook’s positives and avoiding the mistakes offer invaluable lessons to Google. Better privacy settings, customisation and ,making content visible to the entire web (under user's discretion) could make Google Pages an instant hit. How did Google master these tricks so fast ? Of-course, learning from Facebook's mistake of making its users the "experimental Guinea Pig".



4. Direct Connect

Type + a on Google Search Query. It Prompts Google + Pages

I see it as a way how the Layman would go about in search engines in the future. Simply type + followed by the name of the brand/organisation in the search query box and hit the enter button. You will not be taken to the search results page. Instead directly to the Google+ Page of the brand/organisation. It would save us the time to go through hundreds of search results by taking us instantly to the Official Google+ Page. A special notification gives the option to the user to circle the Official Page. Companies can enjoy the Direct Connect feature once the have linked their website to their Google+ pages and vice-versa followed by a check by Google Algorithms to test the authenticity of the connection.


5. +1 Counts and being Circled as a Business

Add the +1 Button to your website

Business pages will have something unique compared to regular  profile pages — an overall Google +1 count that shows on their Google+ page. This may change the way you drive traffic to your website. Added to this, Google allows the users to add pages to their Circles. So Pages do not entirely lie in a separate category as on Facebook, but could well feature in Circles including friends and family.




6. The Power of Live Chat and Hangouts

Let Your Fans Experience it all. Live !

You must have noticed that whenever you use Facebook as a Page, you Facebook Chat is disabled. For sending a message across, you depend only on your status updates. What if you need to communicate instantly with a fan? On facebook, you would have to keep commenting on a particular post. However, Google+ Pages offer instant Chats. Moreover, Hangouts could be an excellent tool to promote an event such as a product launch or a conference.

More features are set to be rolled out in the coming days. One of these could be added personalisation to the tall blank spaces on both sides of a Google+ Page and enhanced tabs to control the different sections of a page. Stay tuned !

Social Media For Small Companies

Engage In Social Networks

There has been a paradigm shift in marketing ever since the arrival of the world wide web. So accustomed  were the marketeers with traditional forms of marketing that they somehow did not believe that "internet would help them sell". Things have changed. Iconic launches of the Windows and Apple Inc. have helped changed this notion for the years to come. In a survey conducted by a leading marketing magazine last winter, the internet soared with dollars from marketing revenues. What helped in the influx of these financial resources in an otherwise skeptical sector? Its technology! And social media has a great deal to do with it.

People Love Being Addressed Directly

One of the few things new or smaller organisations need  to do is to do away with  the traditional broadcasting culture. Gone are the days when when your loyal customers would flock for your products after reading about your new endevours in a newspaper or magazine, or see your add in a commercial. Its the age of social media. Things happen on the move.You need to connect with the masses instantly. At times even before your product is launched. Interact, publish and reward and do much more at the social media platform. When you address or make any communication to a customer over a social media forum, it is likely that the person will be satisfied and content. It would imply each customer is looked after well and they hear directly from you.

Let you employees engage on social media platforms responsibly. This would certainly help your brand name expand on the web. Let workers share pictures and events related to the organisation with friends. Remember, many customers are won over in the social media platform than the website. Social media enables individuals to address their issues directly to the organisation.

Activities You May Undertake

 Companies should not restrict their presence on social media platforms only to marketing. Other avenues do exist for companies. Recruitment and other PR related issues could also be addressed at social media platforms. It is important that you choose the right tool and the right platform for engaging in social media for your organisation. A lot of it is determined by the type of product/services you intend to promote and the type of people you want to connect to.

Here are some of the social media sites to get things started:

1 | Facebook
2 | Twitter
3 | LinkedIn
4 | MySpace
                                                                                     5 | Ning
                                                                                     6 | Google Plus+
                                                                                     7 | Meetup