The Social Pro - The Latest News & Info About Social Media for Business

June 21, 2017 / Laura Donovan / Digital Media

Increase Fixed Ops Profits with Social Media Marketing

Is your dealership taking advantage of the new world of marketing and advertising?

If you are still relying on snail-mail postcards and newspaper ads, you are excluding a large audience of potential customers, including your previous buyers. This exclusion can hurt your bottom-line.

Since typical dealerships make most of their profits from parts and service and only dedicate just 3% of their online content to fixed ops it’s time to change your strategy.

Your Customers are Social

77% of online American adults are using Social Media. From Millennials to the Boomers, Social Media is now a daily part of their lives.

June 19, 2017 / Laura Donovan / Social Media

5 Reasons You Don’t Need to Market with Social Media

Just because over 70% of online adults use Social Media, and 91% of Millennials (the next big consumer group) use Social Media does not mean it is worth your time or money. Right?

Traditional marketing still matters. Just because it’s 2017, does not mean you can’t still market like it’s 1999.

Here are 5 reasons you absolutely, positively do not need to use Social Media to market or advertise your business.

1. Print newspapers will probably make a comeback any day now, maybe.

For nearly a decade now, newspaper circulation has been in a steady decline. In 2010, circulation had a sharp decline, but has been rising very slowly since. Well, until 2016 when it had its sharpest decline since 2010.

June 15, 2017 / Laura Donovan / Facebook

Comment with a GIF on Facebook

When responding with a Like isn’t enough, and choosing from Love, Ha-Ha, Sad, Angry, or Wow still won’t do, Facebook has the answer.

You can now comment with a GIF!

GIF, or Graphics Interchange Format, is “”an image file format commonly used for images on the web and sprites in software programs. Unlike the JPEG image format, GIFs uses lossless compression that does not degrade the quality of the image.”

The original GIF, or GIF 87a, was developed by Steve Wihite while working at CompuServe in 1987. Since its birth, the GIF is now widely used on the internet.

June 14, 2017 / Laura Donovan / Twitter

Twitter Offers Tips to Make Father’s Day Really Tweet

Twitter really wants your business to make Father’s Day great.

Father’s Day is Sunday, June 18 (in the United States), it is a great time for businesses to make the most of this “holiday” to find shoppers looking for great gifts for dear old dad.

Hoping to help businesses capitalize on the momentum Facebook had with Mother’s Day (Mother’s Day 2017 “drove more posts in a single day than any other topic on Facebook in the last year.”)

Twitter has provided some tips and tricks related to Hashtags and Keywords, so you can make the most of your Social Campaign and make Father’s Day great for your business, as well as Dads across the country.

June 5, 2017 / Laura Donovan / Digital Marketing

Targeting Your Audience: From the Boomers to Gen Y (& Everything In Between!)

BABY BOOMERS

Baby Boomer is a term referring to a person who was born between 1946 and 1964. The Baby Boomer generation makes up a substantial portion of the North American population, representing nearly 20% of the American public.¹

Most businesses dismiss the Boomers on Social Media. Thinking someone in their 60s isn’t sitting on Facebook or scrolling through pins.

91% of Baby Boomers have some sort of Social Media account.² Boomers are also known as the “silver surfers,”³ because they will seek out new platforms to use and navigate them to reach out to others. They favor Facebook and are quite vocal about what they want and how they want it. Boomers spend 27 hours a week on the internet (2 hours more than 16 to 34-year-olds.)⁴Boomers are more likely to act based on something they see on Social Media.
36% of Boomers 65 years and older use Facebook.⁵
75% of Boomers use Facebook daily.⁵
58% are more likely to visit a company’s website after seeing them on Facebook.²
Boomers are most likely to complete a questionnaire or poll.²
95% of Boomers prefer email over messenger²(so send those email newsletters to these folks.)

Takeaway…

Use interactive content.
Share content that is relevant and offers information they can use.
Encourage newsletter sign-ups (and send an email newsletter.)
Ask for their opinions, they are very opinionated and not afraid to share their views.

GENERATION X

Generation X, or Gen X, is the demographic cohort following the baby boomers. There are no precise dates for when this cohort starts or ends; demographers and researchers typically use starting birth years ranging from the early-to-mid 1960s and ending birth years ranging from the late 1970s to early 1980s.⁶

June 5, 2017 / Laura Donovan / Google

Google Wages War Against Annoying Ads

The highest priority for most website owners is SEO (search engine optimization). This simply means the opportunity for their web pages to be found by their target audience, by appearing on Page 1 of search engine results pages. However, being found is only the first step. Most business websites rely on online advertising to sell their products and services. Their goal is to provide compelling and useful information that convinces viewers to either purchase immediately or learn more.

In their pursuit of compelling ads, many end up publishing annoying or intrusive ads that annoy, rather than engage people.

May 31, 2017 / Laura Donovan / Instagram

A Few Reasons Your Business Should be Using Instagram [VIDEO]

Only 1 in 4 small businesses are using Instagram. In fact, of the 3 out of 4 not using Instagram, a third don’t use any Social Media at all.

Instagram has over 700 million monthly users, and currently has 300 million users per day. Whether you like it or not, Instagram is here to stay and if you run a business or manage a marketing department you need to reconsider devoting some time to this network for the future success of the business.

Marketing on Instagram is different and produces different results, but instead of focusing on driving organic traffic to your website or paying for advertising, spending some time and budget on running a daily marketing campaign on the site can benefit your business.

May 30, 2017 / Laura Donovan / Facebook

How Facebook and Smart Phones Changed the Internet

In the late 1990’s and early 2000’s, desktop computers were the norm. Being “online” meant having an email account and, perhaps, a website. Most websites were nothing more than online brochures.

In 2007 the Internet was turned on its head with the release of the iPhone that could access the Internet. The opening of Facebook to official business pages gave businesses a new Internet on-ramp. Today, 80% of Internet users have a cell phone and over 1.5 billion people are on Facebook.

The early 2000’s also saw an exponential increase in the number of websites. This made it necessary for search engines to decide which web pages best answered a user’s request. Sophisticated and complicated rules were developed to make those decisions. These algorithms continue to evolve as technology advances, making it increasingly challenging to “chase” top rank for web pages.

May 25, 2017 / Laura Donovan / Social Media Marketing

6 More Reasons You Can’t Ignore Social Media Marketing

Social Media is one of the top online activities.Social Media updates and searches direct more traffic to websites than Google search and over 70% of adults using the internet use a Social Network.

If you are still not on board with budgeting for Social Media Marketing and Advertising or you still think it is a silly trend that is a waste of time, here are 6 reasons you need to readjust your thinking.

1. Social Media Reaches More People

What other marketing medium can reach hundreds of people in a few hours, tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of people each month? No other resource has the potential to reach this many people with the ability to target the exact audience that fits your business. Additionally, consistent activity on the top Social Sites can reach far more people than direct mail, print ads or even commercials these days.

May 17, 2017 / Laura Donovan / Social Media Marketing

A Few Reasons Why Social Media Matters [VIDEO INFOGRAPHIC]

If you own a business, run a marketing department, or rely on the public to generate sales you need to understand that Social Media marketing and advertising can no longer be ignored.

Social Media is no longer a “technology” that we use, it is a cultural shift.

Using Social Media to reach your consumers is no longer an option. Traditional marketing and advertising through print ads, mailers, billboards, phone books, community business groups, networking and word-of-mouth may work for you, but your business is likely losing out on an entire group of consumers.

The Social Pro Posts