Yellow Door Media

Six Pixels of Separation: Everyone is Connected.

Connect Your Business to Everyone

By Mitch Joel

In one of the hit movies of the summer, Julie & Julia, a frustrated office worker, Julie Powell, decides to start a blog describing her attempt to cook 524 of Julia Child's recipes in 365 days. On one level, the film is about the act of sharing good food and good company as a route toward happiness and self-discovery. On a much more profound level, though, it is about Julie Powell putting her life online, giving the entire world access to her enterprise, and transforming her circumstances in the process. Human beings have been cooking since prehistoric days, but Julie & Julia couldn't have been made before the first blog was launched 12 years ago.

Great things happened to Powell based on the experiment expressed in her blog, including widespread media attention, a bestselling book and a movie deal. Her success would not surprise Mitch Joel, whose new book, Six Pixels of Separation, provides a detailed examination of the vital importance of online marketing for entrepreneurs. As Joel writes, "building

relationships and turning those relationships into an online community is more powerful and more important than ever before."

Joel should know. As president of Twist Image, a digital marketing company based in Montreal and Toronto, he has emerged as a guru of online connectivity. His thesis is simple: No matter what you are trying to achieve, you have an unprecedented opportunity to speak to the entire world and, by extension, to market your product, through the Internet. To support this thesis, he meticulously walks the reader through the many channels available to build an online community through social marketing, from Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter to blogs, podcasts and YouTube video postings. Moreover, he coaches the reader on how to build a personal profile and a community, providing tips on crafting content and tone better to engage an audience.

Throughout Six Pixels of Separation, Joel, whose column of the same title appears every other Thursday in The Gazette's Business section, applies his lessons to a wide spectrum of entrepreneurs, and gives numerous examples of individuals who have boosted their business fortunes and outpaced their competitors by creating a clever online presence. One such example is Tom Dickinson, the founder of a company called Blendtec, which sells blenders. When Dickinson started posting popular videos on YouTube under the title Will it Blend?, in which he tries to blend everything from a golf club to a Rubik's Cube, his profile and, by extension his business, benefited.

Joel's challenge to all entrepreneurs, whatever their business, is to be creative and find a hook to attract online attention, and then engage in an entertaining dialogue with the newfound community. To illustrate his point, he provides an example of a fictional pen and stationery company, and effectively walks the reader through each of the many options available to create a compelling online presence, which in turn will, ideally, attract a broader market.

Although Joel is speaking primarily to business entrepreneurs, it could be argued that his message is equally applicable to virtually any endeavour. Barack Obama, for example, is mentioned late in Six Pixels of Separation, but he single-handedly stretched the limits of online social marketing farther than anyone previously had in driving his political and fundraising agendas and becoming the first person to win a presidential election with the help of an innovative digital strategy. And although the ASPCA is discussed briefly, Joel could have dedicated several chapters to the ways in which major charitable organizations like World

Vision and Greenpeace have grown tremendously, both in their fundraising and in advancing their missions, by building online communities through effective social marketing. The challenge for all readers, whatever their field, is to interpret how to apply Joel's message to their own work.

Joel's key message is that the Internet is, first and foremost, a powerful marketing tool, and should be approached strategically, with a well thought-out commercial agenda.

There was a time when social marketing tools like blogs, Facebook, and YouTube were thought to be the domain, principally, of people with too much spare time on their hands - a place where members of the lunatic fringe could post a daily political rant or where teenage skateboarders could post videos of a gnarly Frontside 180 Powerslide.

The breakthrough of Six Pixels of Separation is in providing a wake-up call: The Internet has advanced, and those who fail to merge their Great Idea onto the superhighway as quickly as possible are going to be left behind.

Harold Heft can be found in the virtual world on Facebook, LinkedIn

and other social marketing tools.

© The Gazette (Montreal) 2009

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BT Business has announced plans to make search engine marketing affordable for SMEs with the launch of its SearchSmart service.

 BT claims this new provision will help small businesses to digitally market themselves better.
The Telco has teamed up with independent search agency Latitude to deliver the service
According to figures from IMG in 2008 an estimated £78bn is expected to come from online sales this year.

 With those statistics in mind, BT says companies need to make sure they don't miss out on these online customers.

 BT SearchSmart promises small businesses marketing experts who will provide a website audit and will help increase their online traffic, according to the Telco giant.

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Blogs are used to help people connect in order to share knowledge and feelings about issues in life. One of the keys of writing good blogs is speaking in a way that more people will understand. Don't use a lot of acronyms or local slang that few will actually comprehend. Try to keep sentences short and concise and grammatically simple. Keep your blog updated as much as possible so visitors will want to return often to see what's new in ‘your world'. Try to stay focused on one main topic or issue and comment on other blogs with similar content. Ask questions or make comments which visitors can reply to. Most importantly, make your blog ‘good reading'.

Start with a free blog hosting service which allows immediate blogging. No knowledge of scripts, hosting, or programming is needed allowing you to concentrate on your content instead of the internal maintenance of the blog. By starting with a free service, you are not out any start up costs or left with a bill should your blog not be successful. Once you are ready to upgrade to your own domain, you simply post an entry to your blog announcing your move. Since blogs are organized in chronological order, your last entry can be used to redirect your followers to your new ‘location' at the new URL address. Only upgrade when you absolutely need to.

Choose a niche to blog about. This can be a targeted product, service or topic, anything you can write enthusiastically about. Keep your topic precisely focused by using keyword research services.

Keep your blog updated daily in order to keep your blog more interesting to readers and more appealing to search engines. In order for your blog to be successful you must keep traffic and retain visitor interest.

You must have traffic in order to profit from blogging. This can be accomplished in several ways. Always use your blog URL address in the signature of your email, forum discussions, message boards, and other communication media. Submit your URL to search engines, blog directories, and blog ping services. If you use your blog for posting articles, you should submit those that are valuable and lengthy to article syndicators like GoArticles or Ezine Articles. Make sure to put your blog URL in the ‘About the Author' area to create link popularity and backlinks for your blog. When your article is picked up from syndication and used on another website, the ‘About the Author' area is included along with the link you included and is then crawled and indexed by the search engines. In this way search engines are bound to find your site and credit you as an authority on the topic which increases your ranking.

By using a simple free page counter service, you can track the traffic your blog receives. By using a service which gives you advanced traffic analysis such as keyword tracking, referral, and search engine information, you will be able to tweak your blog for greater performance.

Once you know how others are finding your blog, you can figure out which keywords are being used. If one or more keywords are constantly leading to your blog, then use these keywords in entry titles and posts as often as possible to make your blog even more powerful. Use multiple blogging services to attract more visitors and increase the chance that one of your blogs will be in the search engine results for your focused keywords. By simply using copy/paste, you can post your entries to several different accounts such as Blogger, LiveJournal, or your own personal favorite.

Try to keep your daily entries short and concise but detailed and informative and topic oriented. Should you find an entry can not be covered this way, save it for an article which can be published for syndication.

Graphics can sometimes be used to bring your blog to life but don't allow them to detract from the more important aspect of the blog content. Choose graphics carefully and make sure they fit your entry topic. Try to use original graphics, photos, and art, and add a caption or comment to each.

Keep your blog entries as personal as possible using personal experiences ad endeavors. Share product reviews with your visitors instead of using your blog as a pitch page.

Give your readers something to look forward to each time they visit your blog by using themes or advance notice of product, service or topic reviews you will be discussing. Also try to find exclusive information to share with your readers that they can only find at your blog and they in return will tell others about your site. Once your traffic increases, start using advertising to turn your traffic into profit. Contextual and graphic advertising can be used.

Now that you have a successful blog, you can upgrade to a domain of your own. You'll need a web host and blogging software. Once you're ready for traffic, announce your move on all your previous blog accounts, give your new URL name and address. Ask your visitors to bookmark this link for future reference.

By following these techniques your blogging experience should be much more rewarding. But remember, there is no guarantee of overnight success. Time, dedication, and persistence will be rewarded with the royalties of happy blogging.

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Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Digg: A business may hear these and other networking sites' names over and over yet they don't think these sites are important to their company's good name. WiWorks, Inc. (http://www.wiworks.com), a well-regarded Salt Lake City web design and marketing company, sees things differently and is taking steps to focus on using social media marketing to help its own clients.

 Social Networking sites are all about developing relationships, and what better way to reach your key demographic than to market on sites where they spend a lot of time? Each networking site has a different goal, and the professionals at WiWorks Inc focus on using various techniques that will effectively fit into that network's goal. On Facebook, for example, a business can place an ad on the side of a page or it can create its own dedicated business page or invite users to events. It's all about creating relationships and generating positive buzz.

 Besides creating positives on networking sites, WiWorks also recognizes the harm that negative word of mouth on these sites can create. As a consequence, they help their clients neutralize negatives that may appear on blogs and message boards before they have a chance to do any real and lasting damage.

 WiWorks is committed to providing the very best in Utah web design to its clients and by emphasizing social network marketing techniques, it continues to help websites maximize their number of daily visitors and increase their bottom lines.

 About WiWorks, Inc:

 Wiworks, Inc. (http://www.wiworks.com) provides design, development, and full-scale internet marketing to companies nationwide, with a special focus on SEO and best practices. For more information, please visit their website or contact them directly.

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2009-09-19 19:11:34 - Business Oceans SEO Marketing Firm - Internet Marketing SEO Firm – SEO Consulting Firm provides top SEO marketing services

to business clients in the USA, if you are looking for best SEO Marketing Consulting.

Search Engine Optimization is the next Yellow Pages boom.
SEO consulting is one of the best ways to promote your online business website on the Internet using more effective marketing dollars.
Visit: www.denver-internet-marketing-seo.com/seo

SEO promotion is what direct mail used be except it's allows your online company to "target" customers with online marketing budgets. Internet search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing are

where over 80% of Internet users and online customers seek and search for products and services. That's a strong online demographic to market to.

As a matter of fact, the search engine optimization/marketing organization, SEMPO released figures of $13.5 billion dollars being spent on search engine marketing last year. An SEO consulting firm can simplify advertising online for you.

When you hire an online marketing firm to increase your ranking in search engines, it pays to have a team who understands the secrets of online advertising whether it's "Organic" SEO- search engine optimization or PPC- pay per click advertising. Both of these seo techniques will help you take customers from your competitors.

Your website is the store of your business online. Internet ranking on top pages of popular search engines with your online 'store' will increase profits. Just like having your brick-and-mortar store on a popular street where more people walk by, you'll need effective SEO Optimization marketing to get your website's keywords SEO engineered to start ranking higher in Search Engine Rankings such as Google, Yahoo or Bing.

The most popular search engines are those three. 80-90% of searches on the Internet start there first for a product or service search. The fact is that the higher a website ranks in the SERPs- Search Engine Ranking Pages, the higher return on investment (ROI) a company will receive when doing seo marketing online.

When you are looking for internet marketing services, look for an SEO consulting firm with experience and a proven track record of SEO ranking success.

Remember that when you search for keywords “internet marketing services”, or something like it, some companies who rank at the top of the search engines will have a huge staff and lots of overhead to achieve those rankings. You may not need that super-high level of cost to achive the same popular search engine rankings for your industry keywords.

You can get affordable SEO consultants with a smaller company who uses the same seo techniques for your less competitive keywords and save you money. Industry keywords have different levels of Internet traffic competitiveness.

This translates into cost savings for you if your keywords are not highly competitive, but only moderately so. That's when it can be a good value for SEO marketing/optimization. You can pay less targeting those keywords for the business marketing of your website online and new inbound web-traffic leads will pay for that marketing.

The key to an seo marketing increase in your website’s visibility online is in the code and text on the page. Then, link building with good seo
links pointing back to your site will get your site ranking on the top pages of search engines.

Popular search engines have billions of visitors a year searching for everything from pizza to cell phones, pantyhose to guns. Your website can attract some of that web traffic when all the seo is done right.

SEO Marketing Company – Business Oceans SEO Consulting Firm
( Visit: www.businessoceans.com/internet-marketing-firm )
provides affordable and effective SEO consulting services and they are a Better Business Bureau accredited company
( www.bbb.org/denver/business-reviews/internet-consultants/busines .. ).

Search Engine Marketing is the new Yellow Pages with the ability to generate leads instantly online. It has proven to be a major boost for businesses which are looking for cost effective and affordable ways to do seo marketing to promote their business services/products.

Higher search engine rankings on various popular search engines means more leads, more conversions, more revenues and more profits. SEO optimization/marketing is the modern day phonebook online marketing and advertising

. Website's lead traffic improves when visibility online is improved. Getting your company on a search engine such as Google, Yahoo, Bing and others is very important if you want to beat your competitors.

SEO Consulting Company – Business Oceans SEO provides SEO marketing to clients nationwide. Contact us for effective and efficient SEO consulting.

Press Information: SEO Consulting Firm- Business Oceans - Website Marketing Firm Specialists Denver USA Contact Person: Brian SEO Marketing Consultant Phone: 3035215119 email: email Web: www.businessoceans.com/internet-marketing-consultants

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New Delhi, India (September 10, 2009) – The popularity of eCommerce and desire of businesses to be visible on the Internet to attract online customers has resulted in a boom in Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Online Marketing services. Keeping this trend in mind, NetEdge Computing Solutions Pvt. Ltd., a global IT Product and Services Company, has started to offer Online Marketing services to help its clients increase their website visibility on the Internet and improve their Return on Investment in Internet properties.
The core Online Marketing services offered by NetEdge include Search Engine Optimization, Pay Per Click Advertising Management and Search Engine Marketing.
“Based on its experience in Search Engine Optimization, NetEdge has developed its own methodology SIROI incorporating best practices for online marketing which assures maximum returns on investment for NetEdge customers”, said Dr Manoj Saxena, CEO, NetEdge Computing Solutions Pvt. Ltd.
NetEdge’s organic Search Engine Optimization focuses on how to build a search engine friendly and persuasive website that converts visitors into buyers and also achieves top search engine rankings.
NetEdge takes a disciplined approach to optimizing the client’s websites following its unique STAD process. The process is divided into 4 phases, each of which is carried out by an expert SEO team in that area to ensure a desired ranking for the website.
NetEdge offers Online Marketing services under three different models which are comprehensive, customizable and flexible to meet any requirements that a customer may have. The three models are Effort Based, Dedicated Resource and Guaranteed Performance. These packages range from a Starter Package at US$ 150 dollars per month to an Advanced Package with guaranteed performance at US$ 2,000 per month.
NetEdge has a professional team consisting of Google Adwords Certified Professionals to offer these services. Google Adword Certification demonstrates a high level understanding of Google Adwords. The certification also focuses on optimization techniques in Adwords, which can mean a difference between a successful campaign and a failed one.
About NetEdge
NetEdge Computing Solutions Pvt. Ltd. is a leading IT Products and Services company which started operations in India in 1992. Recognized as the 39th fastest growing IT Company in India by Deloitte, NetEdge specializes in Real Estate, Retail and HR Domain Specific solutions. The company has concentrated its activities primarily in these domains and has built an immaculate databank in every facet of these fields. The company was founded with a clear focus of providing high quality IT services and solutions to it’s customers across the globe and therefore the development and operation processes are ISO 9001 certified. NetEdge is headquartered in New Delhi, India, with offices in the U.K, Thailand and U.S.A.
For more information contact:
Mokshi John
Manager, Corporate Communications and Branding
NetEdge Computing Solutions Pvt. Ltd.
Tel no: (0120) 473 0500
E-mail: mokshi@netedgecomputing.com

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Effective online security can help firms improve their ecommerce business, it has been revealed.

In news which underlines the importance of pay per click services employing visible safety features, a survey of 163 million internet users by IT services provider McAfee found that sales conversions were 11 per cent higher for digital window shoppers who were shown a security cue - indicating that those involved in online marketing services might benefit from using them.

Senior research analyst at the group Shane Keats commented: “Online retailers who ignore the role security plays in converting digital window shoppers to customers are missing out on billions of dollars they can't afford to lose in this economy.”

He added that improved security measures can complement traditional sales measures, such as reducing shipping costs or offering coupons.

Earlier this week, managing director of User Vision Chris Rourke wrote on the Econsultancy blog that retailers with an online presence must make the purchase process as simple as possible for their customers.

News brought to you by ClickThrough - experts in SEO, Pay Per Click Services, Multilingual Search Marketing and Website Conversion Enhancement services.

Bookmark this post:

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Invests in Fastest Growing Area of Marketing and Communications

 NEW YORK, Sept. 16 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ - MDC Partners announced today its
investment in Attention Partners LLC (www.attentionusa.com), a leading social
media and marketing communications agency based in New York.
Attention is differentiated by its data-driven approach to earning media. Its
services encompass measurement, consulting, engagement, and community
development. Managing more than 100 social communities for some of the most
recognized brands in beauty and fashion, media and entertainment, technology,
luxury and consumer, the agency excels at integrating social media across all
aspects of its clients' businesses.
"The brand building pendulum continues to shift from persuasion, typically
driven by traditional media, to influence from trusted sources," said Miles
Nadal, Chairman and CEO, MDC Partners. "Social media is a powerful vehicle for
consumers to emotionally engage their favorite brands. We must stimulate more
intimate interactions through peer-driven word-of-mouth, and the creation of
trusted communities, to drive customer advocacy. We are privileged to partner
with Attention."
Curtis Hougland, CEO of Attention, who created one of the first 'new media'
practices in 1993, founded the agency in 2006. He and the management team will
continue as partners to lead its growth and expansion.
"MDC is the ideal partner for us," said Mr. Hougland. "They give us the
resources to grow our clients' businesses with the autonomy to run the
business and preserve our entrepreneurial culture and DNA. MDC's dedication to
invest in the most talented people is critical to a business built on
authenticity, one-to-one communication, and word-of-mouth."
Mr. Nadal continued, "Attention has some of the most prolific thought leaders
in the area of social media, one of the fastest growing areas of the marketing
and communications industry. Several of our agencies have been working with
Attention for over a year with great success, and we look forward to
leveraging their expertise across the entire MDC Partner Network."
Forrester Research estimates social media marketing will grow at an annual
rate of 34 percent - faster than any other form of online marketing and double
the average growth rate of 17 percent for all online mediums - over the next
five years.
Both Miles (@milesnadal) and Curtis (@curtis_hougland) will be available on
Twitter today to answer any questions, and they will extend the press release
through posts on http://blog.attentionusa.com.

 Tags: MDC, Attention, social media, social marketing, social PR, Miles Nadal,
Curtis Hougland
Links: http://www.twitter.com/milesnadal, http://www.attentionusa.com,
http://www.twitter.com, http://blog.attentionusa.com, http://www.mdccorp.com,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MDC_Partners.

 About Attention

 Based in New York, Attention Partners LLC is a social media marketing and
communications agency. Attention is differentiated by its data-driven approach
to social media. Attention uses data to communicate authentically and
measurably through user-generated media such as blogs, social networks,
forums, and rich media sharing communities on behalf of its clients. Its
services encompass planning and consulting, engagement, measurement, and
building, managing, and growing social communities. Having founded one of the
first new media practices in 1993, Attention boasts 16 years of experience in
understanding changes in consumer behavior in response to user-generated
media. For more information, go to http://blog.attentionusa.com.

 About MDC Partners Inc.

 MDC Partners is a progressive Marketing and Communications Network,
championing the most innovative entrepreneurial talent. MDC Partners provides
strategic solutions and services to multinational clients in North America,
Europe and Latin America. Our philosophy emphasizes the utilization of
Strategy and Creativity to drive growth and measurable impact. "MDC Partners
is The Place Where Great Talent Lives." The company's Class A shares are
publicly traded on the NASDAQ under the symbol "MDCA" and on the Toronto Stock
Exchange under the symbol "MDZ.A".

 SOURCE MDC Partners Inc.

 Katie Kempner, VP, Director of Corporate Communications, (305) 646-7366,
kkempner@mdc-partners.com

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