Why You Should Use and SEO Company

In Meredith Kim’s post Building Effective Web Landing Pages she explains why a landing page is effective and discusses strategies to ensure that it reaches its intended audience.  While Scott (2015, pg. 406) summarizes that “the best search engine marketing comes from paying attention to and understanding our buyers, not manipulating or tricking them,” I do not believe that utilizing SEO companies and their suggestions is ineffective or manipulative.

Scott (2015, pg. 296) defines search engine optimization as the “art and science of ensuring that words and phrases on your site, blog, and other online content are found by the search engines and that, once found, your site is given highest ranking possible in the natural search.”  The point of an SEO company is to make sure that a company is properly utilizing these words and phrases to capitalize revenue.

Take Meredith Kim’s example of the professional builder, small business owner.  In this example, the consumer “stumbled upon” their blog.  What made them stumble upon their blog?  What did they search that led them to the blog?  Was it on page 1 or page 101 of Google?  Had she been researching for weeks prior to finding the blog and ultimately finding the landing page?  Would she have reached the blog sooner if the business owner was utilizing an SEO company?  While a small business owner can optimize their landing page the best they know how and by using Google recommendations, they are most likely missing key phrases or things that will catch the consumer’s attention and they may not have time to regularly update and refresh the site. 

This is one of the top three reasons for utilizing an SEO company; saving time and money, experience and understanding, and optimum results (Edge, 2016).  The professional SEO company can dedicate the time to ensuring the small business owner’s landing page is up-to-date and content is relevant and continuously refreshed.  This gives the business owner time to focus on their business and ultimately, they benefit from the SEO company’s expertise gaining more exposure and revenue for the company. 

Think of all the ways the above-mentioned business owner could optimize their site.  What if the business owner missed one, what if they forgot about it or got busy and didn’t update it for months?  How would he know what key words and phrases were performing well and which ones were not?  They wouldn’t see the same return doing it on their own rather than if they had hired a professional company.  The below is a screen shot of all of the ways a consumer could look for hotels in Lake George, NY, what the most popular key phrases are (along with statistics), and recommendations for what phrases to change to be more reachable to consumers.  This is incredibly helpful!

This doesn’t make the company “manipulative” it makes them strategic and effective business owners.  However, to Scott’s point, there are going to be SEO companies out there that take advantage and in fact are manipulative and the business owner should avoid working with these companies.  This is why Lachance (2016) recommends asking the following 10 questions when selecting an SEO provider;

1. May I have a list of current and past clients?

2. How will you improve my search engine rankings?

3. Do you adhere to search engines' webmaster guidelines?

4. Can you guarantee my website will achieve a number-one ranking on Google, Bing and Yahoo?

5. Are you experienced at improving local search results?

6. Will you share with me all changes you make to my site?

7. How do you measure the success of your SEO campaigns?

8. How will we communicate and how often?

9. What are your fees and payment terms?

10. What happens when we part ways?

Sources

Edge, Amelia.  (2016, Apr. 4).  Top 3 Benefits of Hiring a Reputable SEO Company.  The Chicago Tribune.  Retrieved: http://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/oak-park/community/chi-ugc-article-top-3-benefits-of-hiring-a-reputable-seo-comp-2016-04-14-story.html

Scott, David.  (2015).  The New Rules of Marketing & PR.  John Whiley & Sons, Inc.: Hoboken, NJ.

Lachance-Schandrow, Kim.  (2016).  10 Questions to Ask When Hiring an SEO Consultant.  Entrepreneur.  Retrieved: https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/227229

Todd, Caitlyn.  (2017, Feb. 28).   Courtyard Lake George Quarterly Key Word Refresh: Q4.  W-Promote.  

Social Media and your Future

Social media has revolutionized the way society communicates and the advancements of technology and social networking sites have blurred the lines between personal and professional.  There are now even social sites built for professional connections (i.e. LinkedIn). 

With the increase use in social networking, employers are using these platforms to search out employees on social media platforms to ensure successful hiring practices.  O’Shea (2010) explains that using social media is a “powerful means of candidate identification, selection, and retention.”  Employers are utilizing the social media platforms to find out more detailed and accurate information about an applicant.  A full 69% of employers admit that they reject applicants after reviewing their social media sites (Rep’N Up, 2015).  Rejection could be from any of the following;

1. The applicant lied about their background or qualifications
2. The applicant posted negative information about a current or previous employer
3. The applicant posted about or showed images of themselves using drugs or abusing alcohol
4. The applicant posted inappropriate photos or comments (Rep’N Up, 2015).

Individuals don’t recognize that while these platforms are meant for personal relationships and friendships, that what is posted online greatly affects professional relationships and opportunities as well.  Some inappropriate employee behaviors on social media have even gone viral and led to individuals not being hired or being recognized as poor employees.  Imagine looking up this employee online to find how poorly she discussed her previous employer?  That is a definite “No-No.”

While some people don’t understand that social media can be seen by all and shouldn’t be used to publish all personal activities, some set all their privacy settings to ensure that they are not found or viewed by those that are not personal connections.  Despite how private your profile may be, employers can find you simply by using your phone number (Bateman, 2015).  If not, there are some legal questions and ethical concerns as to how employers find your information and to ensure that they are not implementing bias or discriminating against candidates (Hill, 2012).  The new trend of investigating employees on social media has launched a world of legal issues (O’Shea, 2010).  O’Shea (2010) continues to explain that employers can hack or use unauthorized login credentials whether creating faulty personas or utilizing other active profiles to find the information. 

Because of the tightly bound relationship between personal, professional, and online social media platforms, employers need to protect themselves and ensure that their reputation is not ruined.  Think of the above example where an employee quit online and broke a whole bunch of HR rules.  The company was “called out” online and its “dirty laundry aired.”  Because of behaviors and examples like this, organizations must implement social media policies to protect themselves;

1. Employers may prohibit employee “rants.”
2. Employers may restrict employees’ commercial use of company marks.  
3.  Savings clauses are recommended, but may not win the day.
4. Confidentiality clauses should be narrowly tailored.
5. Generic or overly- broad “courtesy clauses” should be avoided. 
6. Restrictions on outside and/or unauthorized interviews may violate the Act.
7. Opinions are largely protected.
8. Social media policies implemented in response to union activities (or attempts to unionize) are particularly scrutinized.
9. Employers remain entitled to enforce important workplace policies, even in the context of social media (Jaffee-Halpern, 2012). 

Questions for Discussion:

• What social media platforms if any, do you recommend having as a job applicant?
• What privacy settings do you recommend a job applicant uses when seeking new employment?
• What is your perception of company’s viewing candidate’s social media profiles prior to hiring?  Is it ethical?

References

Banks, Rob.  (2014, Feb. 18).  Girl Quits Her Job on Dry Erase Board + Boss Answers in Hysterical Response [PICTURES].  WRYK.  Retrieved: http://wyrk.com/girl-quits-her-job-on-dry-erase-board-boss-answers-in-hysterical-response-pictures/

Bateman, David.  (2015, Aug. 10).  Employers can Find your Facebook Profile Even if it’s Set to Private.  The Star. https://www.thestar.com/news/privacy-blog/2015/08/employers-can-find-your-facebook-profile-even-if-it-s-set-to-private.html

Hill, Kashmir.  (2012, Mar. 5).  Facebook Can Tell You If a Person Is Worth Hiring.  Forbes.  Retrieved: http://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/03/05/facebook-can-tell-you-if-a-person-is-worth-hiring/#3c2652976236

Jaffee-Halpern, Sheryl.  (2012, Dec. 3).  When is Your Company’s Social Media Policy an Unfair Labor Practice? Recent NLRB Decisions Offer Long-Awaited Guidance for Employers.   The National Law Review.  Retrieved: http://www.natlawreview.com/article/when-your-company-s-social-media-policy-unfair-labor-practice-recent-nlrb-decisions-

O’Shea, Kellie.  (2010, Oct. 30).  Use of Social Media in Employment: Should I Fire? Should I Hire?  Cornell HR Review.  Retrieved: http://www.cornellhrreview.org/use-of-social-media-in-employment-should-i-fire-should-i-hire/

Rep’N Up.  (2015, Sept. 9).  Employers Can Find Your Facebook Profile Even If It Is Set to Private.  Rep’N Up.  Retrieved: http://www.repnup.com/blog/2015/09/09/employers-can-find-your-facebook-profile-set-to-private/

 

Is Bigger Really Better?

In her blog, Think Like the Consumer: Stepping in Someone Else’s Shoes, Ste-Aria explains how it is imperative to use social media to effectively target your audience and to make sure the messages sent are ones that the consumers want to see.  It is important to “find your target audience, listen to them, find out what they are looking for, and provide your product or service to meet their needs” (Kerpen, 2015, pg. 27).

However, before doing so, one must have a single focused goal and a plan to capture their audience’s attention, engage them by telling stories, and create a viral campaign that helps in spreading the message and supporting the established goal (Aker, 2010).  Through measurable goals and targeted efforts, companies will see more positive results in their social media campaigns.  Just because a company may be reaching more people, it does not mean that they are reaching them effectively or reaching the right people at all so is bigger reach really better reach?

There are plenty of sites online providing tips and tricks on how to get more “likes” on your page and many businesses may follow this advice.  However, the people you are reaching may “like” or see your page but will never buy from you or use your product?  How efficient is that?  In 2015, there was nearly 1.59 billion Facebook users, 400 million users on Instagram, and 320 million on Twitter (Adweek, 2016).  Should it be the goal of every company to capture all of these users?  This seems quite un-achievable.  If every company were targeted everyone, there would be no success – they would be a small fish, in a big bowl.  On the flip side, if companies established social media campaign goals that targeted the specific audiences they wanted to reach, they would stand a fighting chance and be the big fish, in a little bowl!

The Courtyard Lake George for example, would love to see millions of followers on social media and reach individuals in California or Russia or Japan but this wouldn’t gain the hotel any business as these areas and these people are not its target audience.  We want to see as many followers from New England, Pennsylvania, and Canada as possible as this would mean that we were reaching more of the right people.  The same thing applies if the Courtyard’s Facebook page was only sharing historical data or political posts at 12:00 noon – our audience doesn’t want to see that.  They want to see gorgeous views of the lake, discount deals, and travel opportunities for things going on in the area when they are relaxing or thinking of a getaway. 

Implementing targeting strategies such as paid advertising with Facebook will assist a company in targeting their consumers by gender, age, location, interests, and workplace (Kerpen, 2015, pg. 28-29).  However, these efforts need to be strategic and surround the goal of the social media campaign rather than blanket boosts and ineffective posts to reach mass audiences.  As Ste-Aria mentioned, “if it’s something I wouldn’t like or pay attention too, it’s likely my audience won’t either.”

References:

Adweek.  (2016, Apr 4).  Here’s How Many People Are on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Other Big Social Networks.  Adweek.  Retrieved: http://www.adweek.com/digital/heres-how-many-people-are-on-facebook-instagram-twitter-other-big-social-networks/

Aker, Jennifer.  (2010).  The Dragonfly Effect: Social Media Strategies that Innovate.  Monster.  Retrieved: http://hiring.monster.com/hr/hr-best-practices/recruiting-hiring-advice/attracting-job-candidates/social-media-strategies.aspx

Kerpen, David.  (2015).  Likeable Social Media, 2^nd Edition.  McGraw-Hill.

Customer Service and Social Personalities
Consumers spend nearly twenty percent of all their time online utilizing social media platforms, fourteen percent of which is spent on Facebook (Adler, 2016). With the rapid growth in popularity of social media platforms, more and more people are using social sites and posting both negative and positive feedback of their lives as well as products and services that they use. Because of this, it is imperative that a company participates on social media platforms to engage with, take care of, and most importantly, LISTEN to their consumers.

As Helmrich (2014) explains, “an engaging social media strategy that's equipped to handle customer service issues” is imperative to a business. However, at the same time, it is also vital to differentiate themselves from other company’s and stay relevant within consumer’s minds when using social media platforms. Businesses need to listen to their customer’s and develop their own unique “social personality” by giving their brand human traits when conversing with the public (Kerpen, 2015, pg. 92). The brand’s personality should also be in line with their mission statement and resonate positively with consumers above all else.

Seamless is one company that has found its brand personality and is using it successfully to handle

customer’s questions and concerns. Seamless’ brand voice is “a bit snarky and very witty” and it is “a relatable brand that’s way more than just online food delivery” (Kerpin, 2015, pg. 94). Their social media has been described as “fun, amusing, and foodie-friendly, and shares everything from mouth-watering food photography to hilarious food puns and memes” (Helmrich, 2014). Seamless listened to their consumers and understood their target markets in such a way that they found a quirky, unique brand voice that suits their brand’s personality and makes sense to consumers.


While this social personality works for Seamless, it is imperative that each company listen to its audience and understand what they want to hear and how they want to hear it to find its true social personality. For example; Wendy’s social media was recently under attack because it attempted to follow Seamless’ brand voice when Wendy’s audiences did not respond to this type of “fun” behavior. Their attempt at witty customer service resulted in them being under fire for using a meme that has been associated as a symbol of hate (Fox News, 2017).

This is just an example of how a company should listen before speaking as well as the “words and the way in which you respond, even to positive comments, are integral to the way in which they will be received” (Kerpin, 2015, pg. 14 & pg. 94).


References

Adler, Emily. (2016, Jul 7). Social media engagement: the surprising facts about how much time people spend on the major social networks. Business Insider. Retrieved: http://www.businessinsider.com/social-media-engagement-statistics-2013-12

Fox News. (2017, Jan 4). Wendy’s tweets, then deletes ‘hate symbol’ meme. Fox News. Retrieved: http://www.foxnews.com/food-drink/2017/01/04/wendys-tweets-then-deletes-hate-symbol-meme.html

Helmrich, Brittney. (2014, Dec 15). 10 companies that totally rock customer service on social media. Business News Daily. Retrieved: http://www.businessnewsdaily.com/7578-social-media-customer-service.html

Karpen, Dave. (2015). Likeable Social Media, 2nd Edition. McGraw-Hill.