Social Media

7 Video Sharing Sites To Promote Your Business Videos

by cyrus on Nov 27

For years experts have been talking about how video is the future. Video marketing on the web is not the future anymore. It’s the present, and if you are not taking advantage of viral videos to drive more customers to your business, you are seriously missing the boat. Video marketing can not only get your business exposure on YouTube and other top video sites, it can also get you some extra hits from search engines. So if you are not taking time to develop a real video strategy for your business, you should re-think your strategy. With that in mind, if you are ready to start making your own promotional videos, here are 7 places that you can submit them to:

YouTube: YouTube doesn’t need any introduction. Your videos will most likely get the most hits on YouTube, and the search engines will bring even more traffic to your videos if you optimize your videos.

Viddler: Viddler is made for those who are looking to create branded videos. The pro plans can be pricey, but the service is well worth the investment if you are into vlogging. The prices are not that bad if you are getting real results with you videos. Great for web shows too.

Vimeo: Vimeo is one of the best alternatives to YouTube. In fact, many professionals use Vimeo to share their videos with the world. It may not get as much traffic as YouTube, but I found it easier to work with. Many businesses are using Vimeo as a way to give demo of their products or communicate with their customers.

DailyMotion: yet another underrated video sharing website. There are a lot of European videos on the site, but that doesn’t mean you can’t use this service to get more impressions for your videos. You can also partner up with DailyMotion and get rolling with MotionMakers program. In that case, you can expect your videos to be promoted by DailyMotion.

MetaCafe: MetaCafe was one of the first videos sites that started compensating video producers. Video makers who had their content go popular on MetaCafe were somewhat compensated for their work. MetaCafe is community driven, so make sure your videos are high quality and useful or the community will let you have it.

Veoh: Veoh has been around for years. It’s a platform for business professionals and all other types of publishers to get their work in front of Veoh’s community. Once you upload your video, you are going to have the opportunity to use the tools available to promote your videos.

TubeMogul: one of the best ways to keep track of your videos and their performance across popular video sharing websites. All you have to do is make a killer video, upload it to TubeMogul, and let the service upload your videos to top video sharing sites. It definitely saves time.

What”s your favorite video sharing site for business?

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How To Use Linkedin To Drive Leads To Your Online Business

by cyrus on Aug 27

Linkedin is one of the top social networking sites on the Internet these days. It has been around for a while now, but it still doesn’t get the respect that it deserves. Many businesses focus too much on Facebook and Twitter and don’t pay enough attention to Linkedin and similar services. In reality, Linkedin is an amazing network to be a part of if you want to build business relationships, gather leads, and network with experts in your industry. Being involved on Linkedin is more than just creating a profile and telling others what you do for a living. Creating a killer profile should be on the top of your agenda but it shouldn’t be your only contribution to the Linkedin community. Depending on your business model, there are plenty of ways to reach out to your prospects on Linkedin and build long lasting relationships.

If you are looking for ideas on how to use Linkedin to build leads for your business, here are some tactics that you can try:

Your Linkedin Profile: your profile is your first impression on folks who find you on the web or through LinkedIn. Make sure you have information on your skills and recent projects. Add your relevant experience to your work history and don’t forget to mention your education. Don’t forget to use the right keywords so people can find you through search engines and Linkedin search. Make sure you provide an accurate description of what your talents are and how you can help others.
Past colleagues: don’t wait for others to find you on LinkedIn. Take action and add your former colleagues to your network. You never know when you are going to need their help and vice versa. Don’t let your past relationships to go to waste.
Linkedin Groups: Linkedin groups are a great way to connect with others and build your network. Just don’t join them. Participate in them. Join sub-groups and volunteer for activities in those groups.
Relationship Management: don’t forget that Linkedin is about networking with others. In order to do that, you need to be connected with them. Being an open networker can help you a long way towards achieving your professional goals. You should also get your Twitter and Facebook friends to join you on Linkedin.
Contact Management: thanks to LinkedIn, you have a decent contact management system that you should definitely use to manage your professional networks. Don’t hesitate to add new connections from the groups that you are a part of or people who have answered your questions on Linkedin.
Your blog/websites: you should take time to add your blogs and websites to your Linkedin account. Don’t forget to change “My Website” text link to something more descriptive.
Share Info: whether it’s sharing articles, answering to polls, helping others with their questions, or sharing your travel information through Linkedin applications, you have got plenty of choices to be involved on Linkedin.
Add Company: don’t forget to add your company or business to Linkedin. Don’t just rely on your personal profile to push your business.
Recommendations: don’t be shy to ask for recommendations on LinkedIn. It’s much easier to get folks to recommend you on LinkedIn. Your clients and past colleagues can provide your business with much needed boost to score more clients in the future.
Turn on Applications: you should have done this by now, but if you haven’t, make sure to check out the applications available on Linkedin and add the appropriate ones to your page.

Linkedin is a wonderful community to be a part of, and the noise is much lower on Linkedin than Twitter or Facebook. If you have taken time to get more involved on Twitter and Facebook, there is no reason you should take the time to do the same on Linkedin. You’d be surprised once you see your results.

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Automate Your Social Bookmarking With Social Maximizer

by cyrus on Jun 5

Whether you own a business or just have a blog that you are treating as a hubby, you are going to have to drive traffic to your business if you want to survive. You can always try paying for traffic and get lots of traffic with pay per click marketing, but that is going to depend on your budget. It’s so easy to spend a fortune and blow through your budget without making real profits. Pay per marketing is effective but you have to be very good at it, and even then you’ll have to combine multiple tactics (SEO, offline, …) to manage your cost per acqusition and increase your margins.

One of the best ways to drive traffic to a website is by using social networking and bookmarking sites to get the word around it. Think about it. If your site is submitted and dugg on Digg.com, you are going to get a whole lot of free traffic that you wouldn’t get otherwise. And if you have real good content or services that you can offer to your visitors, there is no reason your site won’t get some love from Digg or other social networking community members. Let’s not forget the SEO ramifications of submitting your pages to social bookmarking sites either. Not only you get back-links that could help you climb the search engine rankings, you may even get ranked for highly competitive keywords through your pages on social bookmarking sites.

Taking advantage of social bookmarking sites is a no brainer, but there are hundreds of them around and submitting each page to these sites can be a hassle. Most of these sites require you to create an account and verify them before you can use their service. You’ll also have to manage your passwords, secret questions, and so on. It’s just too much hassle for a business owner to go through. And you can use your time on other more important chores. Thanks to social bookmarking automation services such as Social Maximizer, you won’t have to do it all by yourself.

Social Maximizer is a cool social media automation service that lets you submit your pages to hundreds of social bookmarking services without having to lift a finger. You will have to set a title and description for each entry, but you won’t have to create accounts and submit stories by hand. What I love about Social Maximizer is the fact that unlike other social bookmarking automation services, you get to choose what goes live. That way you can not only avoid spamming these networks but also get more value out of your each entry.

Services such as Social Maximizer are life savers for your business. They let you concentrate on more core business activities and still drive you lots of free traffic to bring down your costs per customer. Best of all, they don’t spam these social bookmarking sites, which means you won’t get banned. Best of all, they don’t cost much (18 cents per submission in Social Maximizer’s case). If you own an online business and are looking for more traffic, Social Maximizer is a no brainer.

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65 Ideas on How to Build a Business on Twitter

by cyrus on May 21

Twitter is one of the fastest growing Web 2.0 properties around. Everyday, thousands of people join Twitter and millions of tweets are posted. When you have a fast growing community, you have the potential to make a lot of money. As long as you are there at the right time with the right product, there is no reason you can’t build a business on Twitter. Twitter API is a great way to start building a service for Twitter, but that’s not the only way you can make money on Twitter. With that in mind, here are a few ways to build your business on Twitter: