Social Media Roundup: Feb 24, 2015

Local Search Marketing Tips for Franchisees

Search marketing poses particular challenges for franchise businesses, who need to find ways to differentiate themselves from other franchisees online, as well as from the national brand, which can swamp their listings in local search rankings. Creative use of search engine marketing makes all the difference, but the best approach involves collaboration and coordination between all local franchise owners, and good support from the national brand. Rachel Lindteigen, senior director, SEO for PM Digital, writes on Search Engine Land, "Several years ago, I worked in the marketing department of a children's franchise organization, and we ran into several challenges. All of our franchise owners were essentially targeting the keyword , and they all had URLs on the same domain." She continues, "With some planning, we successfully launched both SEM and SEO campaigns for the franchise owners. It took some time and a bit of collaboration (which can be a challenge within a franchise system at times)." To find out how she did it, read more here.

A Teenager's Take on Social Media Channel Use Among His Peers

Facebook, for a growing number of young people, is "dead to us," writes a 19-year-old male college student in an insightful blog post, saying he and his peers view it as a sort of weird family party they're compelled to attend and can't leave easily. Also, they feel trapped into using it because it's come to look strange if you have a presence there (58% of U.S. adults have Facebook accounts). But they do acknowledge that it's useful for connecting with casual acquaintances, and they appreciate the utility of Facebook Groups and Messenger. Instagram is the most-used site, according to the writer, although he seems to prefer Snapchat. Teens consider the content on Instagram to be higher in quality, and hipper than what they'll find on Facebook, since it hasn't been flooded by old fogeys (yet). This teen (like many people) doesn't see the point of Twitter. The usefulness of Twitter to any niche community is extremely hard to predict; it all depends on whether the community is taking advantage of it. Finally, he values Snapchat for its informality, intimacy, and sense of authenticity, and he doesn't worry about the widespread rumors that contrary to stated policy, Snapchat retains users' photos. He also has interesting things to say about Tumblr, Medium, LinkedIn, and other platforms, too. If you're looking for insights about reaching this group on social media, you may find some clues here.

Google News Now Trusted More than the Media Sources It Aggregates!

An international study of 27,000 people shows that more trust online search engines as a source of news than traditional media (especially Millennials) - even though Google creates no content, but only aggregates stories from other news sources. (Yahoo, on the other hand, has differentiated itself by being a content creator as well as an aggregator.) Traditional journalists and owners of traditional media can take some comfort in the fact that they're still ahead of social media in terms of reader trust, but their advantage is likely to prove short-lived.

If We Could See Our Customers (and Ourselves) as Facebook Sees Them...

Researchers from Cambridge University in the U.K. and Stanford University in California have shown that insights based on nothing more than publicly available Facebook information allow stronger predictions about individual preferences and personality traits than those made by friends and colleagues. In some cases, Facebook appears to know people better than they know themselves. The author of this blog, Andrew Hutchinson, a consultant in Australia, writing on Social Media Today, says that in addition to non-commercial uses (early detection of health problems, psychological distress, etc.), "This study highlights the amazing range of insights available to us in social media data. Privacy concerns aside, the benefits of such analyses are far-reaching... there are also significant benefits in connecting brands to people who're most likely to be interested in their offerings, in linking people to products and services relevant to them, at the precise time that they need them." Says Hutchinson, "he opportunity is there to build a more collaborative commercial system that's more responsive, more efficient, and functions at a more optimal level for both business and consumer."

Daniel Lieberman is the founder of Daniel Lieberman Digital ("I speak Geek - You don't need to"). Based in Shelburne Falls, Mass., he helps companies, organizations, and individuals learn to use the Internet to communicate, market, and brand themselves using the most up-to-date tools and techniques. Contact him at 413-489-1818 or daniel@daniellieberman.org.