Guest Post: by Kevin Getch

Everyone’s buzzing about the new social media launch from Google dubbed “Google Buzz.” While millions of people are checking out the great new features it brings and new worlds of communication it has literally just opened up, all of us in the search engine optimization profession are asking, “How Will it Affect Local SEO?”

Let me first point out a few all but obvious strategic advantages Google Buzz has over its competition:

* Google is darn near synonymous with search, what I am saying is they control the gateway!

* Google Maps is by far the most used maps application on smart phones

* All Gmail accounts were automatically enrolled in Buzz

* Oh Yeah… and all new smart phone users that use Android automatically set up a Gmail account

I know you are thinking, they are devious geniuses… and I would have to agree!

With that said I don’t see Google Buzz taking over Facebook or Twitter in the near future in the social media realm but from a Local SEO perspective Google Buzz in the very near future will provide more Local SEO benefit than Facebook or Twitter will. I will clarify the prior statement in just a second, but first I want to share some of my experiences so far to help you get an idea on how Google Buzz may impact your company’s brand and online presence in the near future (yesterday).

I have been “buzzin” since they launched Google Buzz. First jumping into it from Gmail I was seemingly unimpressed. It wasn’t until I jumped on from my mobile phone through the updated Google Maps application that my brain started reeling! You can set a layer in your Google Maps application that allows you to see all of the other people who are “buzzin” in your local area. Though this does bring up many privacy issues (that we are not going to discuss right now, but you can choose not to share publicly), it is really cool!

When you search for businesses in Google Maps and you go to their mobile place page there is now a button that says “Buzz about this place”. You can Buzz about a business you like, you don’t like, etc. This is an area where Google is leagues a head of Facebook or Twitter as people who are using Google Maps to search for local businesses will be able to see what other people are saying about this business, much like a review.

So how is this all going to affect local SEO? Good Question!

First let’s discuss what is already in place and then let’s speculate about possible next steps by Google. Deal? OK, so we already established that Google Buzz is built into Google Maps Mobile edition, that people can buzz about businesses and that other people can see theses posts on their mobile Google Map, so it is pretty obvious that we want as much positive buzz as possible, right? Makes sense. Also, if someone posts negative buzz about your business, you may want to reply to their post to help bring them back in and salvage whatever went wrong, this also will tell other people that see this Buzz that you are concerned about your customers and that this is most likely an isolated incident. Yes, if you thought you were avoiding social media, your not anymore!

Now, let’s speculate what a few next steps for Google might be. I was writing an article on the future of search and what is interesting to me is that what I was speculating would come about in the next 3 years is partially here with the launch of Google Buzz and much more will follow in 2010. But, back to our speculation… It seems obvious to me that standard Google Place Pages will soon incorporate the “Buzz about this business” feature (Feel free to share your thoughts below if you agree or disagree). I believe they will also have a section on the Google Place Page which says something akin to “What’s the Buzz about this Business” and lists public Buzzes about the business (Again think of these as reviews). I would also think that Google would want to add a layer in their desktop Google Maps which allows Buzz users to add that same layer.

My last speculation! I promise!

I have been participating in one of Google’s lab studies with Social Media & search, but haven’t been super impressed by it and actually stopped participating a little while ago. The premise was that search results would incorporate information from your friends on social networks in the search results, so your friends posts from Twitter, Facebook, FriendFeed, etc. What is all but obvious to me now, is that they were running that lab test to determine how to best serve Google Buzz results along with “the other” social media platforms in search results most effectively. So, I believe in the very near future we will start seeing this lab released as a full blow feature or at least one that can be selected to show local social information on what you are searching.

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Kevin Getch is the President of Evolve 24/7, a Portland Web Design and SEO company which has a proven track record of providing small to medium size businesses with exceptional service and results. Learn more about how Google Buzz will affect SEO on our blog

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• Advertising, Opt-in Leads, Email Marketing service helps small businesses market their products more effectively. We provide everything you need, http://www.madviral.com Phone: 256-778-8350 (9am-5pm CST M-F) MadViral Enterprises, LLC 171 Early Rd. Hartselle, Al. 35640

Guest Post: by David Godot

Email marketing is still the most effective and widely used type of online advertising. Not only is it inexpensive to implement, it is also very well-received by consumers when done in a thoughtful way. What I mean by that is that you have to be able to think from the perspective of the people you are marketing to. You make them an offer that is appealing to them, and you deliver on that offer without becoming an annoyance. If you follow these seven simple steps, you will have no trouble taking advantage of this increasingly important marketing avenue.

1. Don’t skimp on market research

Email marketing is just like any other type of marketing. You have to know who you are marketing to and develop an understanding of what motivates them to take action. Then you will be able to design messages that appeal directly to the people most important to your success.

How can you offer a good value if you don’t know anything about your audience’s values? How could you ever counter their objectives if you didn’t know what makes them feel uneasy? Taking the time to analyze your market prior to launching your campaign will definitely pay off.

2. Plan your email campaign

Once you understand your market, you are ready to make decisions about what kind of email campaign you will mount. Take the time to do this in advance so that you can use the medium strategically and effectively based on what you already know about your audience. What sort of thing will they be happy to see in their inbox?

Many new email marketers imagine they’ll just toss out a newsletter every time they have a sale. And in some industries that will work. But you have to make sure you are providing a solid value to your recipient. In most cases, you’ll see better results if you use your newsletter as a venue to offer insider tips specific to your industry and your audience. By providing real value to your readers, you’ll not only retain them as readers but also earn their trust. And trust leads to better sales.

3. Build your mailing list with confidence

You’ve researched your target market and developed a plan to provide them with real value, so by this point you should feel very confident asking clients and contacts to subscribe to your newsletter. Every contact is an opportunity to promote your email list, both online and offline.

Your web site is a great place to start building up your mailing list. Begin by placing a large, attractive signup form in a prominent location on every page of your web site. Be sure to describe the benefits of joining, the frequency of your mailings, and an assurance that you won’t sell their email address. But remember, there is no reason to limit your promotion to the web. The people you interact with face to face are great candidates for your mailing list, whether they are customers standing at a cash register, clients sitting at a board table, or audience members at a speaking engagement.

Also, a word of caution: Don’t buy mailing lists.

When people think about starting an email marketing campaign, the next question tends to be “Where do I buy a list of email addresses.” This is entirely the wrong question, for a number of reasons. First of all, purchased email lists are not cheap. Second, you can kiss that money goodbye. The conversion rate that you’ll see on mailings to lists you didn’t build yourself are usually going to approach 0%.

If that isn’t bad enough, consider this: spam filtration is distributed. There are just a few main sources for the blacklists that prevent billions of spam messages from being delivered every day. That means that every person who marks one of your messages as spam makes it much less likely that all your other messages will be delivered. And that threatens the long-term viability of your email marketing efforts. So it behooves you to make sure that you never send a mailing to anyone who doesn’t specifically want to receive what you’re sending them.

4. Segment your mailing lists for laser-targeted campaigns

One of the biggest benefits of email marketing is the incredible degree of personalization that it makes possible. You can break your mailing lists apart by demographic, location, or even the types of actions they’ve taken in response to prior mailings.

It can be a little more work writing separate mailings for every little market segment, but the more work you put in the more benefit you’ll see. Plus, over time you’ll gain a better sense of which groups respond to which messages, and be able to combine and target them with an unmatched level of expertise. The more your messages approach the level of a one-to-one, personal appeal, the more effective they will tend to be.

5. Make it easy to unsubscribe from your list

Naturally, everyone would prefer that their subscribers continue to receive their email messages. But if they ever do decide they’ve had enough, it will be much better for you if they have an easy and highly visible unsubscribe link to click on.

Think about what you do when you can’t figure out how to unsubscribe from a mailing list. I know that, personally, if unsubscribing feels like a hassle I’ll just flag the message as spam. After doing that once or twice, Gmail never shows me messages from that mailing list again. As a list owner, this is something that you do not want to have happen to your messages, because every message that gets flagged as spam reduces the overall deliverability of your mailings.

6. For a great response, write great copy

The principles of great copywriting are all pretty much the same for email marketing as for every other medium. Your content should meet the expectations that you built up for your list. If your subscribers signed up just to hear about your sales and special offers, then just write great sales copy. But they are expecting to receive information about news in their industry, weave your promotional content into that framework.

7. Split-test your messages

Email marketing software gives you the ability to test multiple versions of a message against one another so that you can see which one performs the best. This is something you should take advantage with every mailing: test the effectiveness of different headlines, layouts, images, and calls to action. Over time you can accumulate some incredibly powerful knowledge about what your market does and does not respond to.

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David Godot works for ActiveCampaign, Inc., a leading developer of enterprise web software including Email Marketing and Survey Software solutions that have become industry standards for their power and ease of use.

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• Advertising, Opt-in Leads, Email Marketing service helps small businesses market their products more effectively. We provide everything you need, http://www.madviral.com Phone: 256-778-8350 (9am-5pm CST M-F) MadViral Enterprises, LLC 171 Early Rd. Hartselle, Al. 35640