Marshal K has a very interesting post about “putting social network functionality on top of existing sites.” He describes a conversation with a startup that was trying to decide if they should build a social network and he advised them they didn’t need the “baggage.” Instead, just provide the kinds of tools that would enhance […]

Ideablob.com is near and dear to my heart. Here’s the best article we’ve seen written about us yet. Jennifer Laycock from Search Engine Guide really nails it. I don’t think I could have written a better piece myself. She actually “tested” the site by encouraging a nonprofit Mother’s Milk Bank to enter the monthly $10k […]

Alex Iskold, on AdaptiveBlue’s blog, has a really good post on PR tips for startups. It’s pretty long, but well worth the read. My favorite quote was in the section titled, “Community - The Best PR Strategy.” Here, he challenges the value of going after top bloggers to score ‘big hits.’
“By building community of passionate […]

Marshall Kirkpatrick, who I’m sure I’ll be linking to quite a bit, did a post a little while ago about how to simply explain the value of Blogging & RSS. I’m aspiring to find ways to explain social media tools and approaches as simply and as succinctly as possible. I like Marshall’s first effort, but […]

Using simple quotes, metaphors, anecdotes, images, etc. can really help when we try to articulate the basic distinctions between new media marketing and traditional marketing. Rod Amis on ‘Leverage Social Media‘ succinctly describes two very different ways marketers can perceive their ‘target’ groups:
“What is too often missed is the distinction between an “audience” (Old School […]

Paul Gillin, author of “The New Influencers,” has a newsletter with an article that he promises is the first in a series about how “to figure out who are the most important sources of influence in a given market.” This is a crucial question for the most basic social media marketing efforts. In his first […]

Simple but good article in the Dallas Morning News about the growth of advertising within niche social networks that “cater to specific interests, backgrounds, professions and age groups.”
Some good stats too:
“ Overall, ad spending on social networking sites is expected to grow 75 percent next year, to $2.1 […]

“Bottom line, there is no silver bullet or secret formula. To be successful in social media is much harder than ’starting to Blog.’ It’s about building a real relationship. That’s hard for Marketers to do and it’s not something that all consumers want.”
(From a comment in ‘The Top 3 Problems of Social Media’)

Vertical Response does email marketing and direct mail marketing, core tools for the small business owner. Janine Popick, founder & CEO has a good blog that provides very useful tips about how to integrate their tools with various social media channels. Worth checking out.

Here’s a controversial post that appeared on TechCrunch a little while ago. Written by Dan Ackerman Greenberg, cofounder of the Comotion Group, it’s titled, “The Secret Strategies Behind Many ‘Viral’ Videos.” Dan’s company uses some very clever tools to generate a guaranteed number of views. For every moralist decrying his methods, I guarantee there were […]