As was recently explained in this post from Anum Hussain, at hubspot.com, the recent changes to Facebook, meaning the new Timeline rollout, requires a dynamic response from social media marketers.
” The most recent posts that appear on a Facebook feed are now a direct result of the latest content being published,” writes Hussain. “And of course, this all led us to where we are now with the somewhat controversial new change, Facebook Timeline. Now that the complete rollout of Timeline to all Facebook users is nearly complete, the change means one crucial thing for Facebook marketers: The life of a status update is diminishing. Fast.”
Already, some surprising statistical analyses of the changes to the Facebook feed are showing up online, statistics which are making social media marketers very nervous about their strategies for marketing with the social media leader. As Hussain explains this change, marketing on Facebook may soon become an hour-by-hour endeavor.
“According to URL shortening service bitly, the mean half life (the time it takes a link to receive half the clicks it will ever receive after it’s reached its peak) of a link on Facebook is 3.2 hours.”
Such radical and fundamental changes to the way online marketers will be forced to modify their strategies if they wish to continue marketing through the world’s most popular social media site, has many marketers nervous. Just how often will they be forced to post, and where will they find the time to increase the number of posts to Facebook? Also, where will they find the content?
As always, time is the answer. Social media marketers will now need to devote more time to creating quality content, and to posting it to Facebook. Since Facebook is now seeking more content more often, online marketers will need to respond. However, as Hussain explains, quality will still matter when posting to Facebook.
Finally, he suggests the possibility of automating your social media marketing to save yourself the time and effort which the changes to Facebook have now made necessary.
Facebook Launches “Timeline”
Uh oh, here we go again. What is Facebook doing to our profiles now? Well, according to Mashable.com, they’re making them better: more versatile, more interesting, and more informative.
We think…
With a big “Thank you” to author Christine Erickson, we highly recommend her article on Facebook Timeline: The Complete Guide, in which she explains how to exploit the advantages of this new Facebook feature, and how to implement it to create a more compelling profile.
Are there issues involved with this change? Sure there are, or will be. Will Facebook address them? Of course they will. Will some resist the changes to their favorite social site? Yep. But we will all adapt, as we have in the past and as we always do, we will continue to use Facebook to be social and interact in ways we can hardly now imagine.
Facebook Profile Changes
As usual, Mashable.com is on top of the changes to social media that matter. Today’s post on the newest profile change from Facebook, Timeline, is either enlightening or frightening, depending on your perspective and whether or not you trust the social networking giant.
“Timeline is a radical redesign of Facebook‘s user profile pages…Instead of merely listing your interests and personal info, the Timeline shows a detailed overview of your life on Facebook, with the ability to check out what you’ve been out to at a particular point in time,” writes Stan Schroeder, who goes on to say that some fear the new changes, while others love the expanded personal profile.
All we can say is, we love anything that enhances the Facebook experience and keeps Facebook users on our profile longer. If it helps to get our message across, we’re definitely for it.
One of the most important elements of effective email marketing is the subject line. Just like a headline in a blog post, a subject line is key to get your foot in the door and have the recipient open your email.
Do you know what it takes to craft a subject line that compels your receipt to click each and every email you send? It’s not that complicated and with the right formula, you will have it down to a science.
Let’s take a look at three elements of an effective email subject line and how it will help you get more opens to your email marketing:
- Keep it short and sweet – No one wants to read a long subject line and worse, it will probably get your email deleted. Keep it short and to the point with a reason for the recipient to open the email. Five to eight words is best, but no more than 40 characters.
- Write it last – Don’t worry about your subject line until you complete drafting up your email. This gives you room to put together a great email and this ties into writing a compelling subject line. Also, it’s easier to edit a subject line than it is to edit an entire email message.
- Avoid spammy symbols – We all know about spam and hate it, right? Well, don’t be a spammer by adding spammy symbols to your subject line. These symbols include !@&!? If you’re tempted to add these symbols, just don’t do it. This increases the chance that your email will get a trip to the spam folder and not in your recipient’s email inbox.
Email marketing is an important part of your marketing mix and the first thing someone will see if your subject line. If it doesn’t compel them to open the email, you can bet they will delete it. Don’t fail to reach your customers; use these three elements to craft a powerful email subject line that gets your email opened and noticed.
If you’re looking for more help with your email marketing and list building efforts, consider a look at my email marketing Ebook. Right now, it’s only $9.99 and it covers everything you need to get you down the right path for successful email marketing.
Branding is important to ensure you project the right message to your clients and your prospects. If you fail to do this, it could result in a negative impact in your business.
Providing the right message across all of your online profiles, websites and blogs is critical to effectively projecting a professional image. In just a matter of seconds, you could lose a client – simply from inconsistent online branding.
How do you ensure you have consistent online branding online? It takes a solid strategy and a commitment to staying on the same path with each of your online presences.
Here are a few ways to keep a consistent online brand that will keep clients coming in…over and over again:
Blog
Now, anyone can create a blog, but for a business blog, there are different requirements. To ensure you have a consistent online brand, keep your blog design, copy and overall experience the same as your other online profiles.
Ways to include this are using a WordPress theme with colors and design elements uniform across any of your blogs, websites and online profiles.
Facebook Page
Now, you may think that your Facebook page isn’t a place to keep a consistent design or look, but you would be wrong. Again, look to keep the same experience on your fan page as you do for your blog and other online areas.
Some of the things you can do include:
- Use apps that integrate your blog or email opt-in list into your fan page
- Use a custom welcome page designed with the same colors, elements as your other online profiles.
- Post content from your blog and other online outposts to your fan page.
Twitter
If you didn’t know, you can add a custom background to your Twitter profile. This is a key place to keep your branding consistent. Again, use the same colors, elements and bring out the same experience from your blog and other online outposts.
By the way, you can also do this with your YouTube background for that consistent brand.
Logo
Your logo isn’t just for letterhead or business cards anymore; it’s also a key element to your online branding. Everywhere you have your company name, you need to include your logo. A few places to remember this include:
- Your website
- Your blog
- Your emails to your list
- Your social media profiles
- Your special reports
As you can tell, your online brand is a critical part of your business. Just because you have a blog and a Facebook page, don’t think you can do whatever you want on each platform. Don’t send out the wrong message to your clients and prospects – keep everything consistent for optimal branding.

Image Source: cliconomics
When you publish a blog post, you want to get as many visitors to it as you, right? Well, we know how to push people to our blog from social media and other platforms, but did you know there’s a way to tell sites about your post right away?
Yep, it’s built into WordPress and it’s easy to setup. Some use plugins to handle this function, but we all know that too many plugins can actually bog down your blog’s performance.
So, what’s this option?
Go to your WordPress blog dashboard, scroll to your settings menu on the left side and click on Writing. Under the section called Update Services, there’s an area to enter a list of sites to notify about your new blog post. Simply add the sites and they will get a notification when you publish a post.
To get you started, here’s a list of sites to add to this area:
- http://api.moreover.com/RPC2
- http://bblog.com/ping.php
- http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2
- http://ping.weblogalot.com/rpc.php
- http://ping.feedburner.com
- http://ping.syndic8.com/xmlrpc.php
- http://ping.bloggers.jp/rpc/
- http://rpc.pingomatic.com/
- http://rpc.weblogs.com/RPC2
- http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping
- http://topicexchange.com/RPC2
- http://www.blogpeople.net/servlet/weblogUpdates
- http://xping.pubsub.com/ping
After you enter the sites, just click the save changes button and you’re all done!