SEO Factors Archives - Page 4 of 21 by Mark Murnahan

NASCAR Start and Park Sponsorship is Marketing Absurdity

If you are a NASCAR fan, the term “start and park” is something you have probably heard a time or two. It has become a point of contention between many fans, teams, and NASCAR itself, but I am not here to judge. I am here to point out the challenges of marketing a NASCAR team, and particularly one that is frequently criticized for this practice.

I had a dinner meeting with the owner of a NASCAR race team last night. He is in the hunt for sponsorships, so it was right up my alley. I was very excited about the meeting, because beyond being a lifetime gearhead, I am also a highly trained driver, I have owned a race team, and I have sponsored multiple race teams. I could help him to get those sponsorships, and this is the kind of work I would take on for free. Well, except that I still have a family of five to support, and that it is hard to work for free when others wave their money in my face.

The meeting reminded me, once again, how very misinformed a lot of people are about marketing, social media, SEO, public relations, reputation management, and other online communications. You know, the kinds of communication that remove roadblocks and make something popular. It also reminded me why I once wrote an article titled “When I Go to Hell, They Will Have Me Selling SEO“. It really made it clear to me that, although I rank number one in search engines for “sell seo”, being good at online marketing and having the patience to explain it to people are two entirely different skill sets.

I have basically come to the conclusion that people will either “get it”, or they won’t. They either see the value in building a brand and giving people reasons to love their brand, or they don’t. They may even say that they want to understand this whole Internet thing beyond Twitter being for telling people what you had for lunch and Facebook being a place to swap stories with high school friends. The reality is that beyond all the education I try to give them, what they really need is confidence in their own business. So, let’s look at this NASCAR dilemma for a moment.

What makes NASCAR racing possible? I mean, in a single word, what is the thing that makes it happen? Is it the gasoline, the cars, the drivers, the adrenaline, the passion for the sport of auto racing? Sure, NASCAR needs those things, but what ultimately gets those cars around the race tracks?

A lot of people would say that it comes down to the money, and that is true, but that is still not the word I’m looking for. Sponsorship money is important. Without a sponsor to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars per race, per car, many teams change careers to become professional parking teams instead of racing teams.

How Big is NASCAR Big?

To understand the importance of marketing in NASCAR, I think you have to look at how much money is involved. If you want to be competitive in NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, don’t plan on starting a team unless you’ve got twenty million to invest (yes, $20,000,000). The car may just be a measly hundred thousand, but if you want it to go fast, you can expect to spend three to four million per season for your engine lease program. You will need about fifteen sets of four tires per week, and of course, some skilled people to put those tires on a car. You will need to guarantee your driver at least a few hundred thousand (actually a million and up is more like it) plus 30 percent of your take. You will need your driver and crew to have NASCAR licenses, so you will drop anywhere from fifty thousand to a quarter million, depending on how big your staff is. Each of those crew will probably need to eat, so you will need to pay them. If you want good ones, you will need to pay them very well, so plan on about $5,000,000 in personnel cost. You will need to buy a lot of race fuel, a garage, some trucks, and be ready to pay $100,000 fine from NASCAR and have your car taken away if your fender is one sixteenth of an inch too high. You get the idea, right? It is expensive.

That sponsorship money is big … really big! Teams are paid anywhere from a hundred thousand dollars, on up to $850,000 for a single race. So, what are those sponsors getting out of the deal? That is the big multi-million dollar question. Just consider how silly it sounds to drop a half million dollars for a few stickers on a car. Well, that actually would be really silly, but it is not just about those stickers. It takes a whole lot more than that if it is to make good business sense for the sponsors. After all, just imagine how many targeted ad impressions a half million dollars will buy using Google or Facebook ads, or hiring a guy like me to handle their online marketing.

Most business people who can afford a seven to eight digit multi-race contract can also do the math and realize that their brand will not get their money’s worth from those people watching from the stands. They will not get their money’s worth if they end up on television for a few laps. They get their money’s worth when the team takes on the responsibility of marketing that brand far beyond the race track. That means it is the sponsored team’s job to do what it takes to improve the sponsor’s return on investment in every possible way.

Teams that do a good job for their sponsors will go to great lengths to put the sponsors’ names in front of the public. Many teams will spend easily over $175,000 per year to tour the USA with a show car. You’ve seen them at car dealerships, grocery stores, state fairs, and other events. It costs a lot of money to haul those cars around and pay a staff to shake hands and answer questions. They will also do more than just keep their fingers crossed and rub a lamp while hoping to be interviewed by the media. They make it happen!

The amazing thing I found is that very few of them take the Internet seriously, or they are otherwise doing a poor job of it. They don’t realize the powerful connections available for media exposure, or the ways the Internet works into, or even supersedes the value of a flash-in-the-pan moment on television. At least that is the way it appears to me, and I’ve done a little checking on this.

The Tone of NASCAR on the Internet

You can find an amazing amount of chatter on the Internet about NASCAR, if you’re looking. It should not be surprising that a lot of it is centered around arguments. Arguments about NASCAR rule changes, who did what, who is the best driver, who caused that big crash, and other rather heated discussions.

You will generally find a lot fewer stories of the good things teams are doing. Bad news travels faster than good news. Without a fair dose of good news, it is really easy for a team to either disappear, or become disliked.

One of the things many NASCAR fans really dislike are the “start and park” race teams. What is a “start and park” team, you may ask? Those are the teams that go out to the race track each week for qualifying, but once they qualify to be in the big race, they run a minimal number of laps and then make an excuse to drop out of the race early.

Why would they do that “start and park” thing? It is really easy … they get paid for it … a lot! If the car qualifies for enough races, runs the minimal laps, and finishes the season with enough points to be in last place, they still get millions of dollars in purse money. The problem is that a whole lot of people hate this kind of “racing”, because there is very little competition in it. It is for the money, and not for the sport.

The driver will radio in to the crew chief to say the car is not working right. They may say it has a strange engine noise, or a vibration. Although the drivers usually want to strangle somebody for this, they will need a good excuse. Although the NASCAR organization tries to sweep this start and park phenomenon under the rug, they don’t like it. They say it is not a problem within their organization, but they also seem far more likely to discover reasons to fine teams like this an extra $25,000 from the crew chief and $25,000 from the owner for something silly like “unapproved door braces” (true story).

When a NASCAR Sprint Cup Series team gets tagged as a “start and park” team, it is really hard to change the fans perception of them. That makes it ever harder to receive a decent sponsor. After all, who wants to put their company name and a bunch of dollars on a non-racing team that fans disrespect? Although a lot of teams would never admit that this is a cause to reorganize their company and actually change their team name, it definitely happens.

This brings me back to that word I was looking for earlier, about what makes NASCAR all possible. That word is “fans”! Without fans, it is a whole lot harder to get sponsors, and harder to compete in full races. A problem that I found is that some people will get this backward and think they will get more fans after they find a good sponsor and have a chance to be competitive. The problem becomes a discussion of what came first, the chicken or the egg.

There is a really huge difference in the profit margins of teams that compete, and teams that park after twenty laps. In between the profitable comfort zone of parking the car early to avoid wear and tear, crashes, tires, fuel, and etcetera, and actually becoming a competitive race team, there is a big gap. The gap has risks involved. You can lose a whole lot of profit by staying in the race until the checkered flag is waved. If you make it across that gap, there are many, many, many millions of dollars up for grabs.

How Would You Seek a NASCAR Sponsorship?

If a team really wanted my corporate sponsorship, they will already be doing the things that build a fan base. Even if they don’t have the highest number of fans just yet, they had better show me that they are worthy and capable of building a loyal fan base. Don’t tell me that the team will be popular after I sponsor them … they need to be popular and do popular things to give me a reason. After all, it is their job to bring fans to my company, and not my company’s job to bring them fans.

If a team holds a lot of promise of building brand recognition for my corporate sponsorship dollars, we will work in synergy. That means we will both build their fan base by working together with a common strategy. If they are just trying to sell me on how good they could be, while their reputation is being castrated online, I am out the door!

Not so unlike becoming a rock and roll music legend, it would be ridiculous to ask for a recording contract based on musical talent alone. If you want the contract, you had better have some marketing talent and a fan base. Otherwise, it brings up the vitally important question: “If you are so talented, why don’t you have fans waiting in line to buy your music?”

NASCAR Thinking Summarized

Something struck me as both silly and sad when I parted ways with that NASCAR team owner last night. He said, “Well, Mark, you think about all of this and let me know how you can help us.”

Building and implementing a strategy to entice millions of dollars from sponsors is not a one-race fix, and it won’t come easy. I don’t need to think about it … I already wanted to help him. I suppose he wanted more specifics, but all I can offer for free is a taste. The strategy buffet requires an investment.

What I perhaps didn’t quite make clear enough is that “thinking about how I can help them” is approximately 80 percent of what I am paid to do. My job is not to lift heavy objects, or even to type on this keyboard. My job is to think about how I will help them, and make it happen. My job is to do the research, model the audience, define a creative strategy, and then see that plan through to perfection.

I could think about it a whole lot for free, but until he has enough faith in that race team to engage my services and put my thinking to good use, I am unable to help. I think the better parting question would be “How can I stop wasting the racing season and start getting sponsorships.”

If you are one of those race team owners or management wondering “How can I attract more sponsors for my NASCAR team?” I’ll give you a really simple tip. Pick up the phone and call me at *REDACTED DUE TO AGING WEBSITE*.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Lighthouse Candles: A Flicker from Search Engine Obscurity

I know, you may be thinking to yourself, “Lighthouse Candles, Mark, really?” Yes, it is true that I am generally likely to write about something more exciting and manly, and include things like guns, race cars, and motorcycles. That is mostly because I draw things right out of my real life, and my life is manly. Don’t make me prove it!

Not this time, my friend. Today, I am taking “SEO and Social Media Marketing Blog” to a whole new level of lace pink pantie-waist and foo-foo good smelling stuff. Just go with it, because if I have my way, Lighthouse Candles will be researching gunpowder and locker room scented candles by day’s end.

I realize that a lot of small companies are struggling with their marketing. It is very confusing to a lot of people. A common statement I hear is “We just can’t afford marketing.” The trouble with that statement is how stressful and difficult it is to keep paying all of those other expenses without marketing. Marketing is what sells products and services. It becomes a chicken and egg question of which comes first. Without marketing, there is not enough money to afford marketing. Something has to give, because unless a business does afford marketing, they can’t afford marketing. Without marketing, a company is better described as a costly passion than a business.

Lighthouse Candles SEO Marketing Example

Like so many other companies, Lighthouse Candles in Salt Lick, Kentucky has a strong case for marketing their business online. They produce a consumer product, and in order to earn profits, they must sell that product. In very familiar fashion, their market potential is huge, while their market reach is comparatively minuscule. In fact, I was challenged to find them at all.

Lighthouse Candles is representative of many small companies in some respects. So, I am using them as an example to pose some questions about business, and why some companies thrive, and others fail.

If the product is as good as they say, then why is their reach so small? Is it because people don’t like them? Sure, that happens with some companies, but it is more likely that the company is better at what they do than they are at marketing what they do. These people make and sell candles. They have done it for over a decade and a half, so let’s assume they have become pretty good at it. It is their specialty, and they are smart enough people to concentrate on that specialty. They make candles … but they are not a marketing company.

It is easy to wonder why they don’t take more care to market their company better, but I think it is really foreign and scary to many companies. I frequently find the cause of under-marketing to be fear of the unknown, apathy, finances, or a combination of these. It is seldom because they want to keep their revenue and profit low.

It is a big challenge to help companies like Lighthouse Candles to stop being afraid, start caring more about their business, and to grow their finances. When that challenge is overcome, it brings consistency to a company, and levels the ups and downs in business, and that takes knowledge!

Reducing Lighthouse Candles Challenges With Basic Education

It is hard to make good decisions based on bad information, or information that is hard to understand. When it comes to marketing, especially online, there is a lot of confusing information. I think it brings a lot of people to see marketing as risky, rather than to understand it as an investment. So let’s clear that confusion a bit and make some sense of this.

Many companies treat their marketing budget like risk capital, instead of a required operating cost. Marketing should not come from a slush fund, and it is not a luxury item. It is an essential component of business, and it is what makes companies more profitable.

I have to admit that there are levels of understanding of the Internet, and of marketing, that I tend to forget. I have been in my industry for many years, and it is a constant challenge to explain things in ways that both novice and experts will benefit from. If you will give me your time, I will try to deliver on both counts.

A friend told me, only yesterday, that some of my topics are “way over his head”. I really didn’t understand it, at first. I guess I often just assume that people in business know that being more visible, with the right message, to the right people, will increase sales, profits, and make a company more successful. Good marketing accomplishes those things, and the Internet is an extremely good tool.

I am sorry for the instances when I get too deep with my geekish chatter about SEO, customer modeling, propensity marketing, data analytics, and anything else that makes your eyelids heavy. The thing is, I really want to make this easy. I seriously, with every cell in my marketing brain, intend for people to benefit from the tips and advice I write about here on my blog.

Today, I want to break this down and make it easier than ever, while providing a good reminder for the experts. The SEO acronym stands for search engine optimization. There is a lot that goes into those three little letters, but let’s keep this simple.

Being listed at the top of the page when somebody searches the Internet is one big piece of that success. Being listed for something obscure is not good enough. Knowing what the people interested in buying your products or services are inclined to search for is another big part of the job. Then, after they search the Internet, find you, and click over to your website, you must give them something interesting, useful, and trustworthy enough to become your customer. Even when all of that is done, good SEO marketing includes giving them reasons to come back, and to tell their friends about their great experience.

OK, but this is about Lighthouse Candles, right? Yes, that is correct. Lighthouse Candles is a company I will use for my example. The example is intended to get you thinking about their missed potential, and how you would run things if it was your company.

Useful Observations About Lighthouse Candles

I have not spoken with Lighthouse Candles, so I am working with what I know of them from the Internet. I have the same information that any customer or potential business partner finding them online would have, if they looked for it. The first challenge was just finding them. It was seriously not easy, and their website was buried deeply from view.

Note that this is not picking on Lighthouse Candles. It is absolutely not one of my “Suture Express” jobs where I take over 50 percent of the top ten Google search results for their company name. It is more similar to the examples I have made with fearful Smart Slate retailers, apathetic online cigar stores, and lazy car dealers who fell asleep at the wheel and missed huge opportunities.

This is just observation, and it is an example that I find extremely common with companies that buy a website and are left wondering what to do with it. It is what often happens when a company realizes they need a website, but decide that the cheapest website price will be the best option for them. Then, their misinformed question of “How much does seo cost?” leads them to realize that marketing is much less about cost, and is better addressed by how much it pays them. It is called return on investment (or ROI for short), and it is based in mathematics and science, not unicorns and fuzzy bunnies.

How I came across Lighthouse Candles in the first place was when I saw a visitor to my blog that seemed to really pay attention and read what I have to teach about online marketing. Of course, every visit to any website is logged. Since I know what to do with my user data, I will often go through and take a look at people who are looking at me. I learn a lot from their actions, such as how they arrived here, what they do while they are here, how long they are on each page, and much more. I filter through and find users who visit certain pages, with a special interest toward anybody verging on an hour in a given week, and viewing 20 pages. These are the kind of website visitors I just want to reach out and hug. These are the kind of website visitors you should be reaching out to hug, too!

Fortunately, I discover a whole lot of users like this, which feels great, because it means I am doing my job well. Certain visitor actions will catch my attention when I don’t get a call or email. Here was a visitor who caught my eye.

Whenever I see this level of activity, and when specific pages are viewed for given amounts of time, there are a couple of likely conclusions as follows:

a.) Somebody is really trying to learn and implement suggestions I make.
b.) They are finding out what I know about SEO and social media marketing before they contact me to do the job.
c.) They have a rogue SEO next door who has hacked into their wireless network and is reading my blog.

There are just not a lot of other reasonable possibilities. I don’t know which is the case here just yet, but those are each distinct possibilities. So, let’s split a, b, and c into some likely conclusions.

First, I want to applaud Lighthouse Candles for being more proactive in their business and trying to improve their online market. I think it is a grand idea for them to try and reach out to capture a larger market share. There is a reason Yankee Candle has hundreds of thousands of website visitors per month. They sell candles, and although race cars and motorcycles are popular, people apparently really like candles.

So, we must ask the real questions about why Lighthouse Candles is not making a more aggressive play at that Yankee Candle market. Some companies will say they just don’t want to grow, out of principle. We can rule that out, because Lighthouse Candles is researching how to grow. They wouldn’t be on my blog otherwise. We could assume their budget is insufficient, but budgets must begin somewhere. That “somewhere” is what determines how well a company reaches its market growth objectives. That can mean reaching several different market potentials such as the market of investors, the market of retailers and distributors, and the market for potential acquisitions. There is a lot more possibility than just setting a goal of keeping the lights on.

The first reliable market to reach, in order to attract those other potential markets, is the consumer market. After all, who wants those candles in their stores, distribution networks, or investment portfolio, if the consumer doesn’t want them?

I know that it is a scary thing to believe in your own company, and to see things from a clearer view of potential. I have built successful businesses for over 20 years. It will age you faster than nearly anything else. However, success would not be so alluring if everybody could do it. That would cause the whole complex of “survival of the fittest” to come crashing down! Let’s not make it that scary. Instead, I will try to offer my possible answers and solutions to the a, b, and c speculations listed above.

Speculation is guesswork based on limited evidence. When that evidence is enhanced by experience, its feasibility increases. So this is based on calculated guesses, rather than just randomness. Breaking this into simple terms, in my estimation, the answers to those earlier possibilities are as follows:

Speculation About “a” (trying to learn and implement): This often happens when the company either does not have enough funds, or belief in their market potential to hire a professional. You can give them all the facts, case studies, and trustworthy reputation, but their confidence will not waiver. Their hopes to gather enough knowledge from reading blogs and do it themselves is what gives them confidence, because if they fail, it was probably just “fate” anyway.

Possible Solution to “a” In this instance, I would suggest an investor, or a bank loan, or pulling their teeth and selling their gold dental fillings. Just like any field, an experienced and accomplished professional will do a better job 100 percent of the time. No, not 90 percent … don’t even go there.

Example: Suture Express tried to cut their expenses and do things the cheap way. Search Google for them and look at the top ten search results to see how well that went.

Speculation About “b” (seeking the right option): This shows a diligent business person who understands that one of the greatest assets a company can have is the right people to do the jobs they are trained for. Many famously successful businesses have credited their success to discovering the right people, and knowing when to delegate what is not within their area of expertise.

Possible Solution to “b” Try driving a car like in this video. If you crash, it should help to emphasize the importance of training and the difference between a professional and somebody “testing the water”. If that doesn’t work, a frontal lobotomy may be in order, but I am not qualified to give medical advice.

Example: I don’t try to make candles, and I don’t do my kids’ dentistry either. I know when to hire outside professionals, and I am far more successful for it!

Speculation About “c” (rogue SEO): I suppose “c” is a good example of just how badly they need somebody on their side who understands the Internet from every angle.

Possible Solution to “c” Buy a better firewall, use better encryption, and change all passwords to something a little more challenging than “candles123”. Then, spend some more time at that computer to find out how easy it really is to hack a network.

Example: This is what a password looks like … o*D#kV$j2X&c7X

Some Painful Truth About Lighthouse Candles

In the case of Lighthouse Candles, there is such a huge opportunity, but why aren’t they doing things right? Why is their first marketing statement on their website a disclaimer. Yes, seriously, the first word after their company name is “DISCLAIMER”. Is it likely that a professional marketing consultant suggested that, or is it the work of a candle maker? Would Yankee Candle do that?

Why did they hire an inexperienced website developer who does not have good design or programming skill? They hired him for an ecommerce site, no less! I mean, surely he is a nice fella, but my guess is even stronger that he is cheap … very cheap! Not surprisingly, the one outside link to the Lighthouse Candles website I found was an accidental link placed on the privacy page of another company that their web developer built. If you are HTML literate, you will love this:

Why does Open Site Explorer only show three total links to the website? Yes, the total domain-level link count is three! Heck, even my little one man blog about boring marketing stuff shows 115,452 total subdomain-level links. Can you imagine what some great smelling candles could achieve with some effort?

Lighthouse Candles Subdomain-Level Links According to Open Site Explorer

aWebGuy.com Subdomain-Level Links According to Open Site Explorer

In the real world, marketing, and all of those tedious related tasks like feasibility studies, customer modeling, strategy, planning, budgeting, psychographic analysis, making good connections, and all of those other eyelid droppers really do matter. They are what make up the biggest differences between Yankee and Lighthouse.

If you like candles, maybe you’ll like this song, too. Candles by Hey Monday. It is something to listen to while you add your comments.

Photo Credits:
Candle by oneilkwangwanh via Flickr
Candle Smoke by The Ewan via Flickr

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

How to Add Facebook Comments to a Blog and Improve Search Ranking

Facebook for Blog Comments

Perhaps by now you have seen a few blogs using Facebook comments. If you have not seen it yet, you can witness it in action here on “SEO and Social Media Marketing Blog”. Go ahead and look, if you must … but we will get to that part anyway.

When I recently added Facebook comments I was so excited about the increased commenting and Facebook sharing that I knew others would want to know more about it, too.

I want to tell you about some really useful features of this free service, including SEO (search engine optimization) benefits, enhanced user-experience, increased social interaction, and more. Then, I will give you step-by-step instructions on how to add Facebook comments to your blog (or any website).

So, let’s get started. Before I give you the step-by-step “How To”, I want to explain some huge benefits. After all, it really doesn’t make sense to do this if you don’t know why, or how it can benefit your website.

Maybe I should have split this into two articles, but if you are just here for the installation, jump to the installation now. It could get a little geeky around here for some people, but haven’t you ever really wanted to know what makes geeks tick? Read on my “non-geek” friends. I have some love here for you, too!

Facebook Comments Search Engine Ranking Benefit

It is not a secret that Google and Bing use information from social media for ranking websites. Since December of last year, it has been speculated that one of the strongest individual signals Google uses is the number of Facebook shares. That is, the number of times somebody actually shares your website on Facebook. It is really hard to qualify this, and there is a lot of contention in the matter.

Regardless of any potential direct SEO value, when you use Facebook comments, it greatly increases the probability of people sharing your blog on Facebook. Of course, they don’t have to share it on their Facebook wall when they comment, but the option is selected by default. The way I see it is that unless I am ashamed of something I am reading, I will usually share my comments on Facebook, along with the originating article. Other people seem to react the same way, and since the option is so simple and right there in front of them, is it easy to see why it will increase the probability of a blog article receiving more Facebook shares. Facebook shares can lead to blog posts, Twitter conversations, and a whole list of other possibilities. So, in the end, the SEO benefits can come in many forms.

Although Google cannot see much of the information shared on Facebook, there is still a lot of reason to suspect that the crawler can find at least some of it. In case you are doubtful of the value of Facebook sharing to SEO, here are some influential third party references on the matter:

“Facebook + Twitter’s Influence on Google’s Search Rankings” SEOmoz
“What Social Signals Do Google & Bing Really Count?” Search Engine Land
“Correlation Data for SEO and Social Media Analysis” SEOmoz

Below is a video from the third article in the list. If you don’t have time for it, just know that Facebook sharing can potentially benefit your search engine rankings, and that Facebook comments are a huge step toward a more interactive user experience … another big step toward good SEO.

Let’s not forget that in addition to the benefit of Google and Bing using Facebook sharing in their rankings, it also opens the floodgates to more people seeing your website. That means more people to potentially share it along to their friends. Oh, it all gets so exponential and mathematical … I think I may need another cigarette!

Facebook Comments Enhance User Experience

User experience sounds so cliché and empty to me, but you understand the notion. Making your website easy and familiar is imperative to its success. The end-user is why we all work so hard to make our websites feel easy and familiar, like sweatpants and a pair of flip flops. It has to be comfortable, or people will stop coming back … or coming at all.

On the other hand, if you focus the website on benefiting the end-user, before you know it, that hard work all starts to make a lot of sense. People start blasting it out to all their friends about how they almost peed their shoes when they found the one website on earth that actually smelled like bacon, and rubbed them like a teenager in the back seat of a Camaro.

Add More Nasty Camaro with Facebook!

If you want to call it “User Experience”, go ahead … I am thinking about the party in the yellow Camaro with steamy windows! Then, before I fall asleep, I will paw through the fridge in search of that bacon I smelled. That is how I see “user experience”, and you can flop on my virtual couch any time. It’s comfy, isn’t it?

Here is how Facebook comments improve the user experience: Let’s face it, everybody who ever wrote a blog wants to see comments … even if only to point out a typosnaphical error. They want to know that they didn’t do all that work for nothing. If you are reading this, you probably have a blog, so you know what I mean. The challenge is in making comments an easy and natural response for the people who read your work.

Of course, you could look at it this way: Maybe everybody except you is a lazy, no-good, deadbeat blog lurker who soaks up your hard work, and laughs in your face when they click away to their next victim.

-or-

You could consider that there are a lot of busy people, and even a lot of them who really don’t know much about blogs, or the benefits of participating. They don’t all know the value of getting to know all of those other readers with the same interests. This makes it your job, the blogger, to fix the challenges. You need to make it easy, and natural to leave a comment, and Facebook comments do just that!

Shoe-peeing, Camaro-sweating, bacon-scented, unicorn-kissing, all-you-can-haul-out-the-door-for-a-dollar brilliant content is not always enough. You have to make it so easy that getting up to deal with a bad case of diarrhea can wait just a few more seconds while they shower you with their lovin’ words.

Facebook Comments Increase Social Interaction

With well over half a billion people using Facebook, it is a lot more recognized than your blog. People know how to use it. Facebook is a comfy, cozy, snugly, familiar place for many people. Those Facebookey people are not so shy to communicate on Facebook. They do it all the time. That is what Facebook is there for, and that is also why it is on my blog (and probably on your blog soon).

Facebook comments meet the challenges of familiarity and ease of use like a hungry blogger meets a greasy bacon sandwich. If people aren’t talking to you, and each other, with Facebook comments on your blog, you can believe it … they really just don’t like you, or other people … At All.

Some interesting things to note is that when somebody comments and elects to share it (along with the article) on Facebook, it will appear simultaneously on the blog, and on Facebook. Replies to that person will then be visible to them on their Facebook Wall, as well as a link back to the article.

For those who have their employer set up properly and visible publicly on Facebook, another neat feature is that their title and company Facebook Page link will appear. That can create additional possibilities for business networking. Of course, the user’s Facebook security settings still apply.

How to Add Facebook Comments to a Blog

The list of nice features goes on, but we can chat about that in the comments. That way you can see how neat it really is from a user perspective. Let’s get to the part about how you can add these nifty Facebook comments to your blog. I am going to explain it based on WordPress, but it is similar for other websites.

I looked for a a plugin for this, but I didn’t find one, so I may write a Facebook Comments WordPress Plugin (actually just a relatively simple installation script) if I get the time. The closest plugins I found were to import comments from Facebook notes, but that is not the same thing at all. This is how to actually include and synchronize Facebook comments, likes, and shares on a website.

This is really not very hard, but Facebook’s documentation is so lengthy that it could get confusing if you don’t know what you are looking for. So, I am going to include the links you will need to visit on Facebook, and what to do when you get there.

If you need help, that just makes a good case for why blogs have comments in the first place.

Step One: Create a Facebook Application – This does not mean going to school for web programming, and creating an app is much easier than it sounds. All you have to do is click here, then click on “Set Up New App”, enter an App Name (like the name of your blog), agree to Facebook’s terms, and then fill in a few more easy blanks.

Once you have the app set up, hold onto that info for a bit. You will need the application ID number in the next step.

Relax, you can do this … really. If you get confused, just add your questions in the comments below, and somebody will help you … probably me. If you start feeling a bout of rage coming on, just put down the weapon and ring me up. I will do it for you for a song. Well, actually a song along with some of your money, but not all of it.

Step Two: Load the JavaScript SDK – If that “creating an application” thing sounded hard, this one sounds like having to share a sleeping bag with your mother-in-law. It is actually quite simple. I don’t know why they make it all sound so difficult.

In this step, all you are doing is adding the basic information the application will need for your website, in the format Facebook needs it. It looks daunting to some people, but if you just look at the example, and find where it says “YOUR APP ID” replace it (the letters only) with the ID number you received when you created your app.

You can either go and copy the code on the Facebook Developers JavaScript SDK page, or just use the snippet below. I suggest using the version where it says “Loading the SDK Asynchronously”. You only need the one snippet of code, and this is the one I use here on my blog. Just be sure to put your new app ID where it says “YOUR APP ID” in this code.

Here is the code you will need:

<div id=”fb-root”></div> <script> window.fbAsyncInit = function() { FB.init({appId: ‘YOUR APP ID, status: true, cookie: true, xfbml: true}); }; (function() { var e = document.createElement(‘script’); e.async = true; e.src = document.location.protocol + ‘//connect.facebook.net/en_US/all.js’; document.getElementById(‘fb-root’).appendChild(e); }()); </script>

Step Three: Copy and Paste the JavaScript SDK – If my mother is reading this, she is probably going to the kitchen junk drawer for glue. That copy and paste thing drives her guano-crazy. I will handle it for my mom when she gets hot on her blogging career, but for you, this will be a snap! Take that snippet of code from above (edited with your new app id) and open your WordPress Theme Editor. It is right there in that place where you add new blog posts. More specifically at http://YOUR-DOMAIN/wp-admin/theme-editor.php (unless you have some freaky-deaky version of WordPress). This is where you can see a list of your theme files sitting there ready to beat up like a row of red headed boys in pink high-water pants.

Pay Attention and Stop Beating Up the WordPress Redheads

The precise placement of this code is not a huge issue. You see … this really is easy! I added mine into the “Header (header.php)” file in my theme. It could have a slightly different name, but you have something like that, where it has all of that header-ish kind of stuff. Within that file, you’ll see words like “head”, “body”, “meta”, and a lot of others. I added my “JavaScript SDK” snippet immediately below the “body” tag. You can see where it is in my source code if you like, but just don’t go giving me any “Grandma Guilt” if you don’t like the html comments in my source code. Just search the code for the word “body”. It’s there … you can find it … I have faith in you.

Paste it your code somewhere right around there (or exactly there), but keep that same page open. You still need to shove some more stuff in there.

Step Four: Add Facebook’s “xmlns:fb” Namespace Attribute to Your HTML Tag – That sounds worse than it is, but we want this to be easy. So, while you have that header file opened, look for this: xmlns=”http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml” and add xmlns:fb=”http://www.facebook.com/2008/fbml” right behind it … well, with a space, of course.

So it should turn out to look like the example below. Just copy it and replace the old one.

Step Five: Add the Open Graph Protocol – I swear these Facebook guys smoke some crazy stuff to make this sound so darn complex. This is just a series of meta tags … little bits of information about your website and the specific pages, so Facebook knows what it needs to know.

Here is the code you need, with very minimal editing if you are using WordPress. All you need to do is edit the parts in CAPITAL LETTERS. You can pretty it up with line breaks and stuff if you like. It really makes no difference in function.

Step Six: Add the Comments Code – Ahh, this is the easy stuff. You are almost done. You need to paste the code below on your website where you want the comments to appear. In your WordPress theme editor, just click to edit “Single Post (single.php)” or the equivalent in your theme. It may be named differently, but don’t let that eat you up. I added it immediately above my existing comments. Just search the file for the word “comments” and you will probably find it really quick.

The only editing you will need to do here is to adjust the width (520 in my example) to the width you want it to appear on your blog, and also the “num_posts” for how many comments you want showing before the “show more comments” link appears to users.

That should do it. Save everything and start enjoying more comments and Facebook shares.

What About WordPress or Disqus Comments?

To me, WordPress’ built-in comments, Disqus comments, Intense Debate, and etcetera are not replaced by Facebook comments, but rather enhanced.

Disqus is Here to Stay

You cannot import your existing blog comments into Facebook (at least for now), and I still enjoy all of the features of Disqus. So I think it makes good sense to keep an existing comments system in place.

I am keeping Disqus right here where people can embed videos, upload photos, and all the other great networking benefits, but I am also pretty excited about the new addition.

Which one will you choose to use to add your take on the matter? If you don’t leave me a comment, I may just think you are a snob, so please redeem yourself! Oh, and give that share button a whirl, unless you are ashamed of me. 😉

More Useful Facebook Articles:
(You didn’t expect me to stop here, did you?)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Social Media Marketing Pricing Like Cab Rides by the Pothole

I find that a lot of people are curious about breaking down marketing services like social media and search engine optimization to an hourly rate. I know this, because a lot of people search the Internet for pricing information and find me.

Silly me, I don’t have a standard rate sheet, but I will tell you why. I don’t know how much it will cost to perform SEO or social media marketing until I know what a company wants and needs from the services.

I understand the concern of marketing cost. After all, the reason for a company to spend money on marketing is to achieve a higher profit. This means the cost of marketing will be a factor. However, it is too common that the only set of numbers a client will clearly understand is the outgoing money, while they ignore the more important numbers such as accurate projections, goals, and increased profit.

The cost of marketing is not the same for any two projects, because the associated tasks are as different as the company itself. More importantly, marketing is something which spans the life of a company, and not just a set of tasks that are finished in a set number of hours. If you shop for marketing by seeking to buy a set of tasks, then you are essentially dictating a job, rather than letting the professional do the work they are trained to perform.

Reasons Marketing Cost Varies, and Menu Pricing Fails

Menu style pricing works great for some marketers, but it can create a huge disaster for the client. I don’t have time to list all the reasons the cost of marketing can vary widely, and you don’t have the time to read that list. I’ll give you a few points to consider.

Some companies will have well-formed projections of their market potential, and some will have already done the research to know how many people they must reach to achieve their goals. Some will have a targeted marketing strategy already prepared, and most will need help improving it. Some will have already performed A/B testing to determine their optimal conversion rate. Some will have creative ideas for their marketing, and even have talented people to help implement it.

Some companies have all of these things in place, but this is often not the case. Instead, I find that they come to me asking me to do whatever it is I do, without really even knowing what needs to be done. Then, without understanding the tasks, or reasons for them, they want a shortcut answer to “How much does it cost?“

The question of how much it will cost, without a clear idea of what is needed, or what will actually improve your return on investment is an easy way to waste money and time doing the wrong things. It is like shopping for a dentist by seeking the cheapest price for a filling while what you really need is a root canal. Worse yet, it is like telling the dentist how to perform the filling, and asking for a discount because you used less Novocaine. With that kind of thinking, should there really be any wonder why most marketing fails?

Dictating Social Media Tasks is Like Telling Your Cab Driver to Swerve for Giraffes

Would You Buy a Cab Ride Priced by the Pothole?

It makes me wonder how many companies pay their building lease by the hour. What if they booked flights by the mile? Would you pay extra to fly around a storm? Would you tell the pilot which way to fly, or would you rely on the professional?

Some things just don’t sensibly calculate in the terms we think they should, or wish they would. It is not always because somebody is trying to hide an obscene profit. Many times, it is because the cost would be outrageously high to account for each item granularly. Imagine trying to account for a cab ride that includes a charge for every time the cab hits a pothole and gets a little closer to needing a new set of tires or shocks. Should stopping for traffic signals cost more to account for the brake wear, or should we burn more gas and take the longer route to avoid them?

The challenge for a lot of people to realize is that the cost of any product or service will be built into the price. The cab driver will need to receive more money for his job than what it cost him, so he sets his pricing and maintains his car to optimize his earnings. If you asked him to itemize each thing, you would have to pay him for that extra time he is doing accounting instead of driving his cab. If your driver lets you blindfold him and direct him how to drive, you are both foolish.

My point here is to express how easy it is to make mistakes when shopping for and comparing services in an unfamiliar industry. In the industry of online marketing, if you pay for somebody to account for every hour, you will likely pay a lot more for the extra accounting.

Then again, I guess I shouldn’t complain if somebody wants to pay me for the hours I lie in bed at night staring at the ceiling as I ponder how I can make them more successful tomorrow than yesterday.

Related Articles:

Photo Credits:
Costa Rican Pot Hole! by Arturo Sotillo via Flickr
Cone & Pot hole by oknidius via Flickr

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Hourly Rate for Setting Up Social Media Profiles?!

My blog is often inspired by things that happen in my real life. It is easier to tell something from experience than to make things up. Sometimes those things which happen in real life make me want to scream! I am going to share a good example.

I received a call from a friend yesterday. My friend was seeking some advice about social media, so I was delighted to provide my assistance. The question created one of those moments when I want to scream, pull my hair out, and choke people. My friend wanted to know how to set an hourly price to set up social media profiles for companies.

The question was important to her, because an advertising agency she works with had come to her asking for an hourly rate to help set up client’s accounts on Facebook, Twitter, and etcetera. She was caught off guard by their request, and so she asked me for an opinion of what it is worth.

My friend is a relatively popular blogger, and avid user of social media, but she is not really in the business of social media marketing. Strangely enough, they thought she could help. Since she does not want to turn away business, I feel for her dilemma. In this case, I suggested that providing a service that creates a zero net gain, or even a loss to the client is a good reason to either further educate the client, if they are open to learning, or to walk away from the offer.

I suggested that an hourly rate for setting up social media profiles, as with any other marketing or public relations service, should have a basis in the value to the client. In this case, the value would be minuscule, if not negative, and I explained some reasons this is the case. Of course, it began with the logic that any company who needs somebody just to set up their profiles is not likely to use those profiles for any significant benefit.

Creating social media profiles has extremely low value without a strategy, and without the manpower and mindpower to use them well. If they had that manpower, and more importantly, the mindpower, they wouldn’t need my friend at all. It all got me to thinking that it is like a dog chasing a train. What will the dog do if he catches it? The dog doesn’t know, and so the dog will not get much benefit from the chase.

I want to tell you a couple reasons this is a formula for failure.

Social Media Profiles Do Not Provide Value!

I understand that this may not make perfect sense to everybody, but I am going to try to make this easy. Sure, there are a lot of people who do not know how to get their name on Facebook, or how to create a Twitter username. My mother would not have a Facebook account if I had not set it up for her. My mother is not running a business and trying to promote her name, either.

Think for a moment … If my mother was in business, would it make sense to have somebody set up her account just so she could say “I’m on Facebook and Twitter”? What good is that? Is it so that people who already know who she is could magically flood her with new business? Why would they do that? Let me tell you the truth about this … They won’t!

The value of social media comes when you actually give people a reason to chose your company over the squillion other options out there in the marketplace. If you don’t have a clear reason for people to choose you over a competitor, or to recommend you to their friends because your company is awesome, what is the point? Is it the visibility that is so enticing? I want to assure you that there are millions of visible people who are failing in business. Having a social media profile is not going to make you more successful, and is very unlikely, in itself, to make you more visible.

A lot of people obviously do not yet understand that social media profiles are not going to spew crude oil or reveal a hidden gold mine. Perhaps everybody around you says “You have to be on Facebook” or “There are people making tons of money on Twitter.” The thing they don’t tell you, and probably do not realize, is that social media is not like a Hollywood “Field of Dreams” method for easy success.

This mentality is something I really try hard to understand, and I even try to be compassionate and patient about. The challenge is that when I explain it to people with solid proof, but they still have to learn things the hard way, I end up feeling bad for not having the strength to help them. That is crazy, right? I should not feel guilty for other people’s unwillingness to believe the truth, but I still do.

What About the SEO Value of Social Media Profiles

A lot of people seem to be convinced that there will be a big SEO (search engine optimization) benefit by having a lot of social media profiles. Social media can have an amazing impact on search engine rankings, but it is not why some people think, or hope, or would ask you to believe. The benefit comes when social media is used well, and more of the right people learn about your offerings and share it across their networks and link to your website from other places, such as their blogs and websites.

I understand how the false notion can seem almost logical, because each of those social media profiles will have a link to their website, and more links are a good thing.

There really is a lot of SEO value in social media, but it takes more than just setting up unused profiles. Otherwise we would all be in a race to have the most social media accounts. Some people are, but not the wise ones … not the informed ones. If you ever actually thought that the SEO comes from unused and unknown profiles, think again! Of course, most of the people seeking to pay for such a service would never take the time to read and learn about this, but for your amusement, I offer you some articles on the matter as follows:

100 Social Media Profiles or 1,000 … How Much Do You Want to Waste?

There is a constant pipeline filled with desperate companies hoping and begging for a quick and easy fix to increasing their business’ profit. However, with each company that sets up their social media profiles and endures the failure of short-sighted thinking, comes dozens of their friends and colleagues who will learn from their failure. This means that the pipeline will eventually slow down, and people will have to start thinking before they earn.

When Marketers Sell Negative Value, They Destroy Their Own Market

There is a rule in marketing that a lot of people try to overlook, but it is to their eventual regret. Regardless of the client’s request, it is the duty of a marketing professional to be sure that the client receives more value from the relationship than its cost. This goes for advertising agencies, independent marketing consultants, and in-house marketing departments.

The rule works like this: If the client / company receives less value, in the way of increased business, than the cost of the marketing efforts, it is not sustainable! Trying to work around this rule is like rubbing a lamp and hoping that a money genie will somehow magically come and make up for the screwups.

I realize that the conventional thinking is to give the client what they ask for, and to take their money. I see that as a huge mistake, and proof of a marketer who does not adhere to the same standards they expect of their clients. Good marketing consultants help clients to maintain their marketability and to avoid taking hazardous shortcuts. If the consultant just takes the money and gives a client what they ask for without questioning it, they are not doing their job.

As long as people are set on believing the myths of social media rather than the truth, they may as well say a toast to their own failure.

My Answer to This Question

My answer, if somebody asked me how much it would cost to set up their social media profiles would be something like this:

It will cost a bare minimum of $5,000 per month, and quite easily over $25,000. It will come with a whole lot of market research, strategy, implementation, and a well-forecasted return on investment. That means it will pay you a lot more than you pay me, but that is only if I believe in your company enough to hang my reputation on it. That does not happen with companies who are resigned to believing that simply “being on social media” will increase their profit. Thank you, but no thank you.

If you run your business by placing cost above value, you are making a big mistake. Instead of pouting about how much a successful marketing campaign will cost, it is better to focus on how much it pays. Then the more important factor is how to get your hands on the money it will take to achieve the results you are after.

Related Articles:
Yes, I put these here for you to read. I think they can help to emphasize why simply setting up social media profiles without a good strategy is a waste of time and money. You already have an idea whether you can afford me or not, so don’t worry … I am not selling you anything, and my prices will not go down just because you read more of my blog. Enjoy!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download