Siri Search, makes use of Yelp’s business ratings, thus this makes instantly makes Yelp a strong local competitor to Google Places.

The understated thing for small businesses, is to make sure that you nurture your Yelp business profile page. You need to claim your listing, and encourage happy customers to leave their happy thoughts on your profile link.

Yelp is now very relevant to your small business rankings. Google Places has been the big dog in local optimization or as I call it, Local Awesomeization…. And your places ranking and profile completion has become very important for your local marketing.

Now, Siri, which is a virtual assistant will be able to find you anything you want… and it is using the Yelp Reviews to rank therecommendations.

Apple just entered Local Search in a big way. This is the key take away from this event, not that the iPhone 5 isn’t here, but that the iPhone 4S with Siri is going to revolutionize how Apple iPhone users find local information.

HUUUUUUUGE.

Siri used over 35 APIs to find what its users were requesting, including one to translate speech to text. In April, 2010, Apple bought Siri before it could expand to Android. Over a year later, the app has been built into the next generation iPhone software. The fact that Siri uses Yelp, instantly gives them importance, and even more importance, when the Siri service launches on some of the other iOS versions.

Nuture your Yelp account now.  Claim it, and begin getting good reviews.  Local search is a science, and you have to get that information out there.

Now, what you may want to do, is to connect with and nurture relationships with people on Yelp… the people who leave reviews for your business.  Look at this message that I recently got via Yelp.

Yelp has re-entered the local search fray, folks.  Pay attention.

First of all, what is SEO?

Wikipedia defines it as:

“Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the visibility of a website or a web page in search engines via the “natural” or un-paid (“organic” or “algorithmic”) search results.”

Search Engine Optimization is Obviously Part of Marketing.

Search Engine Marketing is certainly a tactic to get more customers to your website. Most website goals are to bring buyers to the company website, and to get them to convert. You want them buying the products or services you are selling. This is marketing. SEO should go in marketing, right?

Well, not so fast.

Search Engine Optimization is Obviously Part of I.T.

When you search engine optimize or as I call it, “Awesomeize” your website, it is a technical act.

Much of the work up front will be changes to website copy, backend work on page titles and meta tags, and other technical work that requires the knowledge and assistance of your IT team. You go through best practices to identify the correct keywords, structure, tags, and content of the site. When you are dealing with the structure and programming of the site, this needs to be done by web engineers, who understand the language of ‘teh interwebs.’

It’s a two-way street. For this reason, SEO bridges marketing and the I.T. dept. And for your in-house SEO to be effective, you need to have buy-in from each dept. But really, SEO is a marketing tool, not just another I.T. project.

SEO is Marketing Tool, not really an I.T. project.

It’s easy to define and allocate a project based on the expertise needed to do the work. This happens all too often with SEO. Because a large part of the practical work seems to fall to the IT department, especially if you’re working with an outside SEO firm and implementing SEO work in-house, it’s easy to also delegate the bulk of the SEO decision-making power to the IT team as well. However, SEO is a marketing tool and requires intricate knowledge and consideration of marketing and branding strategy.

I.T. may work on a large portion of the SEO project, but I.T. involvement, as well as most major SEO decisions should be managed by your marketing team. A lot of companies have their SEO department be strictly I.T. and many companies have their SEO departments in the Marketing department. I’ve heard bitches and whines from both sides of the fence. But, it all boils down to this question, “Is the work getting done, effectively?”

There are two main types of SEO, on-page and off-page, there are different functions that fit under each dept.

On-Page SEO is more Technical, the changes done to the site. It is the changes you make to your website that will help your web pages to be indexed correctly by the search engines. By doing this, you are laying the foundation for future success in your search engine rankings. Here is a great On-Page SEO Checklist that may come in handy for you, when you are “Awesomeizing” your website.

Offpage SEO is a combination of all the things that can help you to rank your website well in the search engines.

• Factors which are not located ON your Web site pages
• There are many functions involved in Offpage SEO that if you do correctly, can help you to get your site ranked well in Search Engines.

Here is a great Off-Page SEO Checklist that will certainly be enlightening after you’ve completed your on page SEO recommendations.

So Where Does SEO Fit?

It can be a tough business decision to definitively decide where you place your SEO team. Again, part of your On-Page SEO is done by the I.T. Dept, but it doesn’t mean that I.T. should be driving the SEO bus.

In fact, Marketing should be driving the SEO Bus, but many of the passengers on that bus will be from the I.T. Dept. It truly does bridge both worlds, so the people in charge of your company’s SEO should be able to fluently speak the language of marketing along with the language of the I.T. dept. You can’t have one without the other, if you want to fully Awesomeize your web presence. Together, I.T. and Marketing can help make your website shine in the eyes of Google… and that’s really what you want, right?

Does your branding kick ass?

If your branding doesn’t kick ass, then guess what… people may not connect with your company. If you don’t “speak” to your targeted demographic, then your company is going to have a hard time maximizing it’s potential, until this issue is solved. Maybe your brand needs a refresh? Go to a crowdsourcer site like 99Designs or Crowdspring

Does your product kick ass?

Now, your product doesn’t have to be 100% at launch, but you still want it to kick ass. Hear me out. When Apple launched the first Macintosh computer in 1984, it was 100% what they wanted. They were able to fix issues and make it better. But it worked. Launch quick and see if it has wings before you put 100s or 1000s of hours into a product that may have legs. You don’t know if the legs are gonna crawl or run, until you test. But, the main idea has to kick ass. It can eventually get to 100%, but it has to kick ass, and it has to grab people by the balls. If your product doesn’t kick ass… then it’s a fail.

Does your marketing kick ass?

What decade is your marketing stuck in? Are you still paying for dumb marketing? It’s 2011. You should be spending at least 25% of your marketing budget on interactive. And if you get a few key salaried people to do it for you, perhaps it is more. But you have to really think about Inbound Marketing, instead of Outbound Marketing. Are you trying to contact them with radio ads, or TV ads… or yellow pages? Maybe a die-cut piece of shit brochure or direct mail piece that sucks and wastes money and doesn’t kick ass. Read this: The State of Inbound Marketing 2011 PDF from Hubspot. Learn to kick ass.

Do your sales kick ass?

If not, you are missing some of these other principles of ass kicking. And your sales team needs these in their tool set. Now, if you kick ass at all of these other things… and if you have hired competent sales people and given them training on your products… and they are excited about it… then they will be more kick ass. So, do some testing, figure out where your weakest links are… and try to turn those into a strength, by hiring the right candidate for the culture that you are hiring for.

Does your SEO kick ass?

How are you doing your marketing? Do you know the most popular keyword or phrase that people type into Google to find your type of business? Have you claimed your Google Places / Maps listing for your business? Is your business information connected accurately with the main local search ecosystem? Have your researched your industry and competitor keywords? Do you know about your competitors backlinks? How many do they have? How many do YOU have? Have you checked your Mozrank? How is your page rank or domain authority scores looking? Have you ran a website grader report on your site?

Does your social media kick ass?

Do you own all of your usernames for your business? If not, you need to. Go to KnowEm and type in your business name and have them mass register all of your social channels. Take care of that. Do you monitor your online reputation? Do you hear who is talking to you on Twitter or Facebook? Do you interact with them? Do you engage them? Also, do you track your interactions with key influencers? Here is a pretty handy tool out there to help you manage social, Sprout Social and here is one that helps you manage your tweets, BufferApp. It finds the optimal times for you to send out your message, so you get more retweets. It kicks ass.

Does your culture kick ass?

Do your employees want to stick around and kick ass? Or do they go home as soon as 5pm goes off… are they gone? Do people hate coming to your work? Do they complain a lot? Is your boss becoming a curmudgeon? If so, that doesn’t kick ass. You want to have a place where people love coming to work, where they are happy and proud to work. A place with a big ideas. A place that focuses on adding value and finding ways to make things mo’ betta.

Does your team kick ass?

If you hire great people, and continue to hire more brilliant people, you will eventually win. Can they execute on the strategies? Do you need to hire smarter engineers? Do you need to hire more entrepreneurial minded people? The really, really good talent is hard to pay for, at times. So, figure it out. Quit bitching and start doing. If you have to, get some motivated interns in, if you can’t afford to pay top dollar. Do your best to assemble a team that has such passion for technology, knowledge and a love for continual education. Shit changes quick in tech. Do you have a team hungry enough to learn how to maximize the tools to make the products kick more ass?

Does your CEO kick ass?

Do you have a solid leader at the helm of your company? This is important. You need to have someone with vision and insight. They need to love the company and have passion for the ideas. I think what happens to a lot of companies that have too many investors, you have to worry about how much profit you are going to make, and then the consumers end up getting fucked over because of corporate greed. Is your CEO a greedy bastard? Do they make $18 million dollar bonuses and golden parachutes? That doesn’t kick ass. Not for the people, who are the cogs that make the engine work. A good CEO has the best interest of the company, but also has the best interest for the consumers and clients. Make things better. Don’t suck. Kick ass. Your CEO has to kick ass. When you CEO stops kicking ass, it may be time to freshen up the resume.

Do your finances kick ass?

It’s my belief that if you can build something that kicks ass, that has decent sales, that has fully optimized SEO and a great presence on social media it can kick ass. Does your company have kick ass culture and does your CEO kick ass… well, if your product kicks ass… and the other stuff kicks ass, finding an investor will be easy as shit.

There are many ways that your business can kick ass or suck ass, and you have to a plan of action in play to make sure that you stay at the top of your game. If things aren’t where they need to be, now is the time to move the rudder towards kickassness. If you wait to long to make these changes, then one of your competitors may kick your ass!

As U2 never actually said, “In the name of kicking ass… ♪♫ one more, in the name of kicking ass.”

This appears to be a relatively new phenomenon. There are several sites out there that gauge our social influence. They take our actions on the top social media sites, sees who interacts with us the most, sees which content we are sharing, see who is sharing our content and comes up with a composite score based on your actions, social influence and general online awesomeness.

They each take into consideration things such as:

• How influential are the people who @ message you?
• How influential are the people who retweet you?
• How influential are the people who follow you?
• How influential are the people who list you?
• How influential are the people who follow the lists you are on?

Each site does tend to measure the social influence a bit differently.

Klout Ranks Social Influencers

Klout was one of the first companies to begin ranking social influence.

According to their definition, Klout is defined as:

The Klout Score is the measurement of your overall online influence. The scores range from 1 to 100 with higher scores representing a wider and stronger sphere of influence. Klout uses over 35 variables on Facebook and Twitter to measure True Reach, Amplification Probability, and Network Score.

True Reach is the size of your engaged audience and is based on those of your followers and friends who actively listen and react to your messages. Amplification Score is the likelihood that your messages will generate actions (retweets, @messages, likes and comments) and is on a scale of 1 to 100. Network score indicates how influential your engaged audience is and is also on a scale from 1 to 100. The Klout score is highly correlated to clicks, comments and retweets.

Empire Avenue is a Social Influence Stock Market

Empire Avenue is the Social Stock Market, where you can Grow your Social Capital online. Here’s how it works, you get to discover valuable, interesting, cool, fun people online and then based scores or share price, invest virtual currency in their profiles by buying shares in our Social Stock Market. It’s an interesting concept. The simple act of buying shares in someone you think is worth your currency, you will create new connections and as people invest in you, grow your own social influence within the game.

Empire Avenue is what you make of it. Empire Avenue can be used as a complement to your social networking, as a way to meet and make great new connections, find individuals who are engaged in each of their networks and as a way to connect online. If you’re new to social media, Empire Avenue can even be a great training tool – a fun way to discover the power of social networks, find out how strong your social media efforts are and how to make your online presence even more effective by growing your social influence.

Triberr Creates Groups of Social Influencers

Basically, its a syndication network. You can build a group of influential people, who like what you like. And everyone agrees to share everyone elses content in their Twitter following.

To join, you must be invited. Which doesn’t look to hard. Seems lots of people are eager to “build their tribe” (especially given that then you will broadcast their content to your following – everyday). Who knew that people would be so eager to promote themselves?

From Triberr.com:

Every time you publish a new post, Triberr sends it to everyone in your tribe and they tweet it to their followers. You do the same for everyone in your tribe. All this is automated of course.

Creating a tight tribe with like-minded people has an interesting impact on the other social influence ranking systems such as Klout and EmpireAvenue. You can literally see the effect on your rankings. I posted a blog post earlier in the week, and my Klout went up 2 points in 4 days. The traffic to the blog post was much higher than normal.

Social Influence is very real.

People gauge your worthiness as a marketer or thought leader by the information that you share, and by who you are connected to, and who shares your information. Some people even put their social influence scores on their resume!

Razorfish also put together a Social Influence Marketing Report, that is worth checking out. There are becoming more and more companies that measure social influence by all of your social accounts, and some that just measure certain networks. Like TwitterGrader.com just measures your twitter account. And PeerIndex does some of the same things that Klout does. So, the space is gaining attention.

Have fun out there, and make sure to invest in my social influence capital on EmpireAvenue (e)TEEDUBYA. But, when my social influence scores start to drop, don’t be afraid to “Sell, Mortimer!! SELLLLLLL!!”

Brian Solis has a great writeup on this topic of social influence. How do you increase social influence? Don’t think about the score

Via FormStack

They say that “in honor of 2010 being The Year of The Bieber on Twitter, we’re giving away one pair of Justin Bieber’s Solo Justbeats headphones and limited edition iBeats earbuds.” with a link for you to   Win a Pair of Justin Bieber’s Solo Justbeats Headphones or iBeats Earbuds [CONTEST]

From all of the comments I’ve read – most think that the folks over at Mashable are off their rocker. Literally.

Most boo & hiss that they can’t believe Mashable would offer such a contest that is so obviously out of line with their target demographic.

Some plead a strong case for Facebook to add a “dislike” button.

Others threaten to abandon Mashable for good over this contest.

I’m starting to side with the folks who, though silent, are firm in the belief that even bad comments are still comments and good PR. If you leave a comment, you are still giving them time on your social stage. So go ahead and bitch about the Bieber contest. You are only bringing it more attention.

The people who have commented on this page have now put this post in front of all of their friends (and tweenagers). Yep, you guessed it. Sometimes the best way to get attention is to piss a few people off. Bravo Mashable.

Look at me . . . I’m writing about the damn thing. Case closed.

–

Got Bieber Fever? . . . neither do I.

Want to leave your two cents worth? Head on over  the Mashable Facebook page and tell’em @dhatfield sent you.

Following is a brief overview of each of the 11 consumer trends which trendwatching.com predicts will have a global impact on marketers in 2011.

1.Random acts of kindness: Consumers’ cravings for realness, for the human touch, ensure that everything from brands randomly picking up the tab to sending a surprise gift will be one of the most effective ways to connect with (potential) customers in 2011, especially beleaguered consumers in North America, Europe and Japan.

trendwatching.com advises that the rapid spread of social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook among consumers gives brands previously unavailable insight into their moods, wants and locations, and also provides a new direct channel to deliver acts of kindness.

2.Urbanization: Urbanization remains one of the absolute mega trends for the coming decade, with about the global population currently living in urban areas. Urban consumers tend to be more daring, more liberal, more tolerant, more experienced, more prone to trying out new products and services. In emerging markets, these effects tend to be even more pronounced, with new arrivals finding themselves distanced from traditional social and familial structures, while constantly exposed to a wider range of alternatives.

3.Pricing Pandemonium: Mobile devices and social networks allow consumers to constantly receive targeted offers and discounts, even at the point of sale from a rival brand, as well as join interest groups. Brands should target consumers with offers and features such as instant mobile coupons and discounts, online group discounts, flash sales, and dynamic pricing based on real-time supply and demand.

4.Made for China/Emerging Economies: In 2011, expect an increasing number of ‘Western’ brands to launch new products or even new brands dedicated to consumers in emerging markets. Growth in consumer spending in emerging markets far outpaces consumer spending in developed markets, and Western brands are favored more than local brands in emerging markets. Western brands including Levi-Strauss, Apple and BMW have already capitalized on this trend.

5.Online Status Symbols: In 2011, trendwatching.com recommends that brands supply customers with any kind of symbol, virtual or ‘real world,’ that helps them display to peers their online contributions, interestingness, creations or popularity. This includes personalized social networking memorabilia as well as location-based games and contests which award virtual or real-world prizes.

6.Wellthy: Growing numbers of consumers will expect health products and services in 2011 to prevent misery if not improve their quality of life, rather than merely treating illnesses and ailments. Products such as mobile health monitoring devices, as well as online health apps and health-dedicated social networks, will serve the multichannel wellness needs of consumers.

7.‘Twin-sumers’ and ‘Social-lites:’ Both of these types of online consumers identified by trendwatching.com are critical to spreading positive word-of-mouth recommendations. Twin-sumers are consumers with similar consumer patterns, likes and dislikes, and who are hence valuable sources for recommendations on what to buy and experience, while social-lites are consumers who consistently broadcast information to a wide range of associates online.

8.Emerging Generosity:This trend is about brands and wealthy individuals from emerging markets (especially China) who will increasingly be expected to give, donate, care and sympathize, as opposed to just sell and take. And not just in their home countries, but on a global scale. It’s a profound cultural change and a consumer demand that their counterparts in mature markets have had a few years to getting used to.

9.Planned Spontaneity: With lifestyles having become fragmented, with dense urban environments offering consumers any number of instantly available options, and with cell /smartphones having created a generation who have little experience of making (or sticking to) rigid plans, 2011 will see what trendwatching.com calls full-on “planned spontaneity.”

Brands can expect to see consumers in 2011 rushing to sign up to services (the planned part) that allow for endless and almost effortless mass mingling with friends, family, colleagues or strangers (the spontaneity part). A developing segment of this trend is consumers signing up for mobile services that passively and constantly broadcast their location.

10.Eco-Superior: When it comes to ‘green consumption’, brands should expect a rise in “eco-superior” products; products that are not only eco-friendly, but superior to polluting incumbents in every possible way. Trendwatching.com says brands should think of a combination of eco-friendly yet superior functionality, superior design, and/or superior savings.

11:Owner-less: Fractional ownership and lifestyle leasing business models have re-emerged, with services such as car-sharing and public bike programs enjoying success around the globe. For many consumers, access is better than ownership.

Emerging Economies Provide Consumer Innovations
Emerging economies are an increasingly important source of consumer innovations, according to earlier findings from trendwatching.com. The company cites a number of statistics to support its premise that emerging economies are becoming a major source of consumer innovations that will have a global impact. For example, these economies have accounted for nearly 70% of world growth during the last five years, accounted for 34% of global GDP in 2010 and will account for 39% in 2015, and will account for two-thirds of world trade in 2050.

In addition, trendwatching.com says emerging economies contain a growing middle class of 2 billion people who spend $6.9 trillion USD annually. That figure is expected to rise to $20 trillion by 2050.

This is completely true and changing the world as we know it.  The folks over at Cognitive Media created this visual art transcription drawing.  Here is what they had to say:

“Here’s our latest effort in the video Scribing arena. I say arena, but there seems to be very few of us doing this sort of thing. This is for the RSAnimate series we are doing. We are getting a great response from it and we are fortunate to have great sponsors at the RSA. We thank them and the great speakers we get to listen to and translate. If it wasn’t for the rich content they provide, we wouldn’t be able to do what we do.  Anyway, Dan Pink gave great talk at the RSA in London about what motivates us and here’s how we translated what he said. We are just about to start work on another two ‘animations’ and they should be up very shortly.”

As a part of the community of Android users that are constantly innovating beyond what Google issues as the stock operating system, I can see this concept coming to fruition all the timer.  With new innovations becoming a reality on a daily basis, simply because of developers that work to give back to the community of their knowledge freely, compliments being their only compensation.

Back in November we had a post about this.  I am re-posting as I really enjoyed the video.

(Thanks for the tip Rick)

Are you ready for some liiiiiiveblogging!  It may be a rainy Monday but all is right with the world here at SMX East.  The next few days will be jam-packed with conference coverage and antics so I hope you’re stocked up on vitamins and coffee.   To kick things off we have a killer local panel to tell us about the local/mobile/social crossover happening in search.  Presenting together are Gillian Heltai and Greg Stewart.

Local search is increasingly driving local behavior.   Greg says his company wanted to study the ROBO effect – Research Online, Buy Offline.  They wanted to know how consumers went into the marketplace and used local search in their research for products. They partnered with comScore to help make that happen. He’s going to talk about the findings of the study they performed together.   This going to be FILLED with data, so let’s jump right in.

Study Objective: To understand the use and value of IYP, Print YP, online and mobile search in the consumer shopping process for local information.

They conducted the survey via two methods:

Consumer Survey

• Email invitation to participation in the survey.
• Online survey structured to take approx 15 minutes to complete.
• ~4,000 completed responses collected and grouped into three major site categories.

Observed Online Behavior

• Online behavior was based on a sample of one million consumers who agreed to have their online searches monitored anonymously.

Definition of Local Search: Local business information includes details such as the business name, phone number, address, hours of operation, specials, promotions, products carried, payment types accepted, etc.

Continue Reading:
The Search Crossover by Lisa Barone

Well, this just isnt the case.  According to Marketing Sherpa’s Social Media Marketing Benchmark Survey, almost every niche surveyed is increasing budgets.

I know a lot of small business people. That’s why I blog about their experiences and their issues because these people are often viewed as the backbone of any true economic recovery that might take place.  If we are to recover from this recession, it is going to be by small business and the innovations that they create.  While big business still use the “bad economy” as an excuse to cut jobs at record pace the little guy is trying to make it happen. Heck, as a result of the continued layoffs from the big boys more small businesses are being born every day. As a result, social media adoption by SMB’s has increased as well.

A study reported by the Center for Media Research which was done by Network Solutions and the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business tells us

….social media adoption by small businesses has doubled from 12% to 24% in the last year. Small businesses are increasingly investing in applications including blogs, Facebook and LinkedIn profiles.

It’s crucial for the small business to get more involved with social media. Unlike paid search marketing, social media allows for some true creativity and because of its relatively low cost (notice I didn’t say free) the small business has less of a chance of getting burned. I can’t tell you how many times I speak to SMB’s who bemoan how much money they have spent on paid search and have seen no return. Social media opportunities are a breath of fresh air to these people. Plus, it isn’t all that hard to create viable strategies that work for small business owners. But, they have to keep in mind, it’s not just the TOOLS… you have a to have an actionable strategy to make social media worth your time. Randomly sending out tweets, will not likely yield you any additional revenue or new customers. Your strategy has to be tight.

The chart below tells the story

This kind of activity is something that will reinvigorate a struggling SMB and can even lead to cost savings as they learn what is really working with their advertising.

Dr. Alan Glazier, CEO and Founder of an eye and vision care center, said “… I was forced to consider alternative options to keep my business visible… with a very small investment in social media marketing, I was able to generate new business opportunities… (and) most importantly, my marketing budget has been reduced by more than 80%… “

So you need to be creative. It can work out great for your business… or it can go NOT so great.

Small and Mid size businesses struggle more with some of the downsides of the social media “effect” because they may not have enough people to help out with the social media load… Also, some companies are scared of social media “time suck” that could happen without effective strategies in place.

50% of small business social media users say it takes more time than expected. While social media adoption has doubled in the last year, there are still some roadblocks to small businesses fully exploiting its potential. Another 17% feel that social media gives people a chance to criticize their business on the Internet. Related to this, only 6% feel that social media use has hurt the image of the business more than helped it.

While it is never the silver bullet or the “automatic win” that many SMB social media snake oil salesmen, er… social media experts proclaim it to be there is a lot of opportunity for the SMB to be promoting their business and finding more business than ever before. While most times, it is NOT free, you can do a lot with a minimal budget. You just have to get continual education on the space and keep learning effective strategies for marketing your business online.

If you want to check out what has worked for some other businesses with social media, make sure to check out Peter Kim’s Social Media Wiki of all kinds of corporate social media case studies.

The odds are not stacked against the SMB in social media as they can be with other marketing options but the old adage “you gotta be in it, to win it” is more real than ever.

Tell us a good example of SMB social media or encounter you had with a SMB that did something to impress you. Some really creative ideas never get the notoriety they need because they never told anyone. Let’s share!

Let me start by saying that my reasons are mine and mine alone. I don’t pretend to know why others are involved; that isn’t a huge concern of mine. And while I am sure there is a certain level of vanity in it all, that level is very, very low.

For me, it’s all about business; and  while I understand that isn’t some altruistic warm and fuzzy reason (I’m not trying to save the world here) it is my reason.

My company started as a web and brand development business eleven years ago and with the onset of social media we have moved more towards the direction of marketing and PR through social media. Plain and simple, this project allows me to show my clients that I can use my reach to help their company to succeed.

And then, when the bills are paid, I can use that reach for some great causes (here is the warm and fuzzy), like the event that we just did with the Wisconsin Humane Society.

One last thing,  I don’t look at this as a competition, but as a project as Fast Company has so aptly named it. We are all in this together,  and to that end I’m listing the people I know who are involved with the project and would love for you to support them by clicking their links and please feel free to comment with people you know and include their links. Let’s see what we can do when we support each other.

Charles Gartland  – http://fcinf.com/v/abnw

George Kasica – http://fcinf.com/v/b7bq

Eric Sforza – http://fcinf.com/v/awud

Jon Kurozawa – http://bit.ly/aoupAQ

Chad Schomber – http://fcinf.com/v/c5pd

Sarah White – http://fcinf.com/v/ahjx

A. Ryan Thompson – http://fcinf.com/v/djjk

Nate St. Pierre – http://fcinf.com/v/bxch

Susi Schuele – http://fcinf.com/v/dokl

Rebecca Bradley – http://fcinf.com/v/doc3

Mia Kurozawa – http://fcinf.com/v/csvg

Charles Gartland – http://fcinf.com/v/abnw

TweetUp Girls – http://fcinf.com/v/br74

Jeanette Pham – http://fcinf.com/v/b24p

And me – Michelle D’Attilio – http://fcinf.com/v/dxub

Download this FREE Old Bottle Crowns Icon Set by @jancavan

“ Quit counting fans, followers and blog subscribers like bottle caps. Think, instead, about what you’re hoping to achieve with and through the community that actually cares about what you’re doing.” – Amber Naslund, Social Media Today

I came across this quote today and it really struck home . . . it’s about the QUALITY of relationships you have, not another notch on your Social Media belt.

Read this great post by Debbie Weil;

Social Networking Is Not Just a Numbers Game

Another relevent post by ChristineGallagher;

Three Ways to Build Relationships Beyond Social Media

What are you doing in your social communities that to show people you are not a collector?

This is obviously an oversimplified statement of what we do, but I’m hearing a very interesting (read: disturbing) statement  being made that reminds me of a time 10 years ago, when we where doing mostly website proposals. So let me ask you web developers how many times you heard the statement “I don’t need to pay for a website, I have a 14 son/nephew/neighbor (by the way, it was always a boy) that can build it for my company.”  What kind of ridiculous thought is this for a business owner. Your are going to hire a teenager to design and build one of your most powerful marketing and promotion pieces?

Most people wouldn’t consider doing that now that websites have proven to be such a powerful tool. But guess what I am hearing about social media?????

So what you are saying is that you want a teenager to be the voice of your company to your clients or potential clients? Of course a teenager can set up a Facebook page and might even be able to skin your Twitter & blog (skin means to customize the look and feel to match your company rather than using a template) but will they do it in a professional way that will show your company in a serious light?

I understand that social media is a new and strange creature to a lot of business owners, but think of it as you did websites 10 years ago? There are more uses for it than what is immediately visible and you can learn to manage it just as you have learned to manage your email.

Social media is a powerful business tool and if you hire then right people to get you rolling you will see an investment on your return. However, if you hire the teenager next door you are going to find yourself a step behind your competitors and in a couple of years you’ll find yourself looking to hire someone to “fix” your social media plan, just as you hired someone to “fix” your old website.