Persuasive Picks For Week Of 6/17/13

hashtag1The popularity of the hashtag (#) has just received another boost with the recent news that Facebook will now be rolling them out to users. While most of us are familiar with hastags and their rise to fame on Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest, their background and meaning remains shrouded in internet lore. Who created the hashtag? Why is it called a pound sign, number sign, and a host of other names? And when we use them, are they actually helpful? EContent‘s Jose Castillo explains The Humble History of the Hashtag #And #Why #It #Matters.

Social media can level the playing field between industry leaders and upstarts, between multinational corporation executives and small-business owners, making peers of all participants. So what makes the difference between a following of 500 and a following of 500,000? Brian Patrick Eha, Assistant Editor at Entrepreneur.com, provides 5 Social Media Rules Every Entrepreneur Should Know culled from darlings of the current social media landscape. Use these tips to increase your influence and make a direct impact on your business strategy.

types-of-social-media-followers-peekTake a look at how many fans your company has on its social platforms. Now, look at how many of those fans are active and how they interact with your brand. There are all types of fans to consider; the casual liker, the deal seeker, and of course the ranters. So what other types of social media fans exist? MarketingProfs‘ Verónica Maria Jarski posts an infographic that provides profiles and suggestions for reaching various fan types in Seven Types of Social Media Fans and How to Engage With Them [INFOGRAPHIC].

Relatively recently, YouTube made a change to their ranking algorithm to favor watch time, which means the longer you can keep viewers tuned in to your videos, the higher they will rank in search. This doesn’t mean, however that you should make lots of long-form videos of 15 minutes or more. Watch time simply means the length of time your videos keep a viewer on the site. In ReelSEO‘s latest “Creator’s Tip #96″ How to Increase YouTube Watch Time by Linking to Playlists, host Tim Schmoyer offers this subtle method to get viewers watching more videos per session.

A Week of (Soggy) Marketing & Social Media Learning in Boston - Join us online or at IMS at 1 today!

If you’re in or around the Boston area this week, you already know that it’s a big week for new marketing, social media and business professionals. A flurry of events are taking place as IMS 2010 and FutureM are in full swing. If you can’t join live, be sure to watch the numerous sessions on livestream via The Pulse Network, catch the chatter on Twitter (hashtags: #futureM and #IMS10) or the many blog posts being written by attendees.

Today, you can catch PerkettPR’s Claire Russell presenting “The Power of Reel” at 1 p.m. EST at IMS. She’ll be partnering with Bettina Hein, Founder & CEO of Pixability, to showcase how easy and powerful video is - and how it can help you to not only tell your story but create stronger relationships and impact in your social marketing efforts. Case studies will include work and campaigns from businesses such as Old Spice, Livestrong, St. Louis Children’s Hospital and more.

Not in Boston at IMS today? Then considering joining me at 1 p.m., along with the American Marketing Association, Conduit (a PerkettPR client), John Jantsch, Author of Duct Tape Marketing and Sally Falkow, as we present “5 Must Dos for Social Media Holiday Marketing.” Focused mainly on how SMBs can use social media to successfully - and easily - expand their holiday marketing efforts. Not convinced social marketing is for you? Check out these facts from the press release:

  • More than 50% of the 500 million Facebook users log on to Facebook every day.  In total, they spend over 700 billion minutes per month on the service.
  • People are watching 2 billion videos a day on YouTube; every minute, 24 hours of video is uploaded to the service.
  • Users spend 22.7% of their time online on social networking sites.

I hope we’ll see you either at IMS, FutureM or on the webinar today. Looking forward to sharing insights, learning from others and continuing to merge our online and offline relationships.

Happy marketing!