We are quickly moving into a new year, and now is the time when many social media analysts are making their predictions for 2012. We have a few thoughts and considerations to add to the mix.

Content Strategy

Many businesses have been beginning to see the value in this now and we see this trend continuing into 2012. As Facebook and Twitter become more crowded with comments, content strategists will become a more important part of the cycle. Businesses that take the time to review the content before passing it on will become a valuable resource for peer reviewed articles. Brands will become part of the media as they curate and stream relevant content to their followers.

Analytics Information

As social media budgets increase and more time is devoted to these spaces, demand for analyzing all that data will become more pronounced. The problem is we’re still relying on APIs that are flawed and even (as Twitter admits) purposely throttled. Manual tracking is still the most accurate. While many automation tools are promising, it is still very difficult to analyze the data and the trends well enough to structure spending decisions around it. We are hopeful to see progress toward a solution in 2012.

More Departments Involved

Instead of just one voice within a company, many businesses will take advantage of the many parts of their businesses in the social space. For example, expect to see more customer service departments using Twitter with accounts like @name_brandname monitoring the brand with keyword analysis and intervening when needed. These folks will report to a social media strategist overseeing a team of tweeters.  This will happen because customers will demand the scope to change thus changing the way businesses operate.

We all know that Facebook (although breached) was not pulled down completely this month by hackers and we see that users on this social network as well as Twitter are not going away anytime soon, so we are wondering, what are your predictions for next year?

If you are like many people out there you jumped on the blog bandwagon when it was the “hot thing” when instead of twitter and facebook you heard “visit our blog” at blah blah .com all the time.

Well it may be time to pull that old blog off the shelf , crack it open and start writing in it again.   If you don’t have a corporate blog its still not to late.. but I’d start one up now.

This article over on search engine land points to some indication of whats going to be important in the future.. and references to fresh content are all over this article. In fact is the update called simply FRESH? It seems like I heard that somewhere. Anyway head over to this site to read more.

Should you be concerned? Maybe.  According to the article this update will effect 35% of searches vs. 12% effected in the Panda update.

Can this be done? Shall we say that real-time can actually be scheduled? We say it can to a certain extent. If you are a small business that has a somewhat scheduled online presence, but are scratching your heads vying for a status update or tweet, then why not put your online marketing strategy to work? We’ve outlined a simple 3 step process to consider when mapping out your social media campaigns.

STEP 1: First look at your online efforts monthly. Which days during the month are you wanting to generate buzz about a new product? How can you incorporate a blog post on that product? How about a press release? Start filling in those dates accordingly.

STEP 2: Next, look at your strategy on a weekly level once the monthly topics are generated. Utilize your links, photos, white papers and other online media to endorse those topics on Monday through Friday.

Note: The Social Media Management Company, Vitrue released a study identifying the days and hours users are most active on Facebook. The results weren’t surprising. The three biggest usage spikes tend to occur on weekdays at 11:00 a.m., 3:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m. ET. The biggest spike occurs at 3:00 p.m. ET on weekdays. Weekday usage is pretty steady, however Wednesday at 3:00 pm ET is consistently the busiest period. Fans are less active on Sunday compared to all other days of the week. That being said, when planning your daily posts, don’t sweat the weekends! We now have proof to send up to your bosses that those days are not the days when conversations are happening.

STEP 3: Suddenly, you will have a viable outline for the entire month to post on Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and your other social networks. Fill in your scheduled posts with real-time information when it comes along.

Coming up with a successful social media campaign strategy can seem like a daunting task, but it doesn’t have to be an impossible one. TDM has unique strategies for online businesses to get ahead in the status update marathon. We understand that it’s simply not a race and creative, mapped-out efforts trump those that are disjointed.

Triangle Direct Media (TDM), a leader in search engine optimization tools and online marketing strategies, announces its participation in the Internet Retailer Conference and Exhibition (IRCE) 2011, taking place June 14-17, 2011 at the San Diego Convention Center in San Diego, California. TDM will be showcasing the company’s automated SEO technology, SEOTool at booth #225 of the world’s largest e-retailing show, in which every key industry is represented – retail, catalog, manufacturing and consumer service companies.

Stop by the booth (225)  ask for any of the 3 J’s :  Jason – Jason- or John.  Any of them ( or all of them at once )  will be happy to demo SEOtool for you or talk to you about any of Triangle Direct’s  Online Marketing Campaigns.

We are proud to announce that our company has been named the 247th “Fastest Growing Company” on the Inc 500 list! Thank you to all of our hardworking employees, loyal customers, and supportive family members. Without you, this would not have been possible. Stay tuned for more exciting announcements later in 2010 — we’re working on some major enhancements to our enterprise seo tools platform SEOtool and will continue to push the innovation envelope with forward-thinking Search Engine Optimization, link building, and content marketing solutions.

Special shout out and thank you to TDM’s original founders: Anthony, Keith, Derek and Jeff.

A couple of other recognizable accomplishments we can now share, as part of the Inc 500 List include:

• #1 Fastest Growing Advertising & Marketing Business in “The Carolinas” (NC & SC)
• #5 Fastest Growing Advertising & Marketing Business in the Southeast (10 states)
• #31 Fastest Growing Advertising & Marketing Business in the United States
• #8 Fastest Growing Company in North Carolina

Thanks

We love sharing new, relevant studies and trends with our blog readers. Below is a forward looking study where Top Rank Blog polled more than 200 Internet Marketing decision makers on which Internet Marketing Channels they planned to invest in for 2011. While we know most of our clients are currently focused on gearing up for this Christmas Season, we did want to share the future trends of web spend and where budgets are going. If you’re already planning or discussing budget allocation in 2011, please take note.  In total, more than 40 different Internet Marketing vehicles received responses but the overwhelming favorites were #1 Search Engine Optimization, #2 Social Network Participation & #3 Blogging.

While we are biased towards our own offerings, it is exciting to see that 3 of Top 5 channels that will receive the highest percentage of Internet Marketing Spend in 2011 are our 3 Primary Areas of Expertise!

• Search Engine Optimization (via SEO tool, SEO Consulting & link building campaigns)
• Blogging (via blog design, blog marketing & link building campaigns)
• Content Marketing (via educational/authority content & distribution services that generate quality backlinks)

Do you know where your business and its website(s) have the greatest areas for improvement?  Market share opportunity?  Competitive Advantages? Feel free to include your thoughts and comment on this post.  You can go here for the full study & additional commentary.  If you’d like to discuss your 2011 Internet Marketing Initiatives and where your budgets are best spent, we’d love to talk to you!  Don’t be shy, contact us.

The group over at PPCblog.com has put together a nice, visual representation of “How Google Works”.  If you’ve ever wondered just how complex search engines are, enjoy the below overview.  SEO is not for the faint at heart — Google confirms that there are more than 200 factors in their algorithm and in 2009, the engineers at Google made more than 400 adjustments to their algorithms; more than 1 change per day!  Thank goodness for advanced SEO tools and expert engineers who live, eat & breath search engines on behalf of their clients.

Link building has been a major force in the SEO industry for the past 5+ years.  Google led the way with its PageRank algorithms and other major players have followed — by recognizing links as “votes of confidence & trust”.  Unfortunately, all votes (or links) are not counted equally.  The brain trust at SEOMoz, has just released one of the more insightful articles on links we’ve read in quite a while, specifically addressing 10 Major Factors that Influence the “Valuation of Links” by Search Engines.

If your business is constantly trying to get its website ranked above the fold in Google, Yahoo & Bing — then you know the importance of link building.  Below is a recap of the Top 10 Factors discussed in the SEOMoz article.  As you read this list, think about your own link building practices and determine if your company is heading in the right direction.  The types of link building services we provide to online retailers, fortunately, meet the majority of these criteria and our clients’ ranking results speak for themselves — that’s why we’re such a fan of supporting this list!

• Links Higher Up in HTML Code Cast More Powerful Votes
• External Links are More Influential than Internal Links
• Links from Unique Domains Matters More than Links from Previously Linking Sites
• Links from Sites Closer to a Trusted Seed Set Pass More Value
• Links from Inside Unique Content Pass More Value than Those from Footers, Sidebar, Navigation
• Keywords in HTML Text Pass More Value than those in Alt Attributes of Linked Images
• Links from More Important, Popular, Trusted Sites Pass More Value (even from less important pages)
• Links Contained Within NoScript Tags Pass Lower (and Possibly No) Value
• A Burst of New Links May Enable a Document to Overcome Stronger Competition Temporarily (or in Perpetuity)
• Pages that Link to Webspam May Devalue the Other Links they Host

There are obviously many other factors that influence the Link Graph and Value of Backlinks in a competitive landscape — but take the above list to heart when auditing the successes or failures of your past link building efforts and look towards the future with a closer eye to detail.  After all, SEO is all about the execution and standing apart from your closest competitors.

The North American search marketing industry is projected to grow by 14% in 2010 and reach $16.6 Billion, according to a newly release report called “The SEMPO State of Search Report 2010″, published by Econsultancy  The full report costs $299, but for a sneak preview, visit here. We’ve posted before about SEO stats, but this newest report just adds more fuel to the SEO budget argument.

Other key highlights important to the search marketing space, in particular SEO include:

• In 2010, companies expect to spend 43% more on SEO than they spent in 2009 — the big question is where is this extra spend going?  To be competitive, it should go towards strong link building and ongoing SEO site analysis
• Social media marketing budgets are still small in comparison to SEO & PPC spend — so spend wisely and don’t get sucked into the social media craze!
• 90% of respondents actively engage in search engine optimization — which has remained steady since 2007.  See bullet point #1 — it’s about to get much more competitive!  Are you ready and are you investing the in the right SEO opportunities?
  • 31% of companies are spending $25,000 – $150,000+ per year on SEO
  • 17% of companies are spending $150,000 to $3,000,000+ per year on SEO
• The Top 3 objectives companies have for SEO are (based on #1 priorities & in order of importance) — nothing new here, but consider that generating leads & selling products/services is a function of ranking well for mid-tail and long-tail keywords; not exclusively the top 3 keywords in your industry.  Smart marketers rule the day.
  • #1 – Generate Leads (34%)
  • #2 – Drive traffic to website (32%)
  • #3 – Sell products, services, or content directly online (26%)
• 67% of Companies have at least two (2) people responsible for search marketing — this is very interesting to say the least. If your company doesn’t want to carry the overhead of another employee OR needs to increase productivity per employee, you really need to do yourself a favor and check our our SEO technology (SEOtool) — it’s proving to be an invaluable “employee” for objective SEO analysis and ongoing QA on a site-wide basis for in-house marketers.

Without question, the SEO industry continues to experience fast growth as more and more advertisers pull marketing budgets from print advertising and other traditional vehicles which just can’t compete from both a scale, visibility, monetization and measurability perspective.  SEO is hear to stay — granted the landscape will keep shifting —- but companies who spend wisely and in the right SEO strategies WILL be successful.  Contact us to learn more about how dominant our clients have become in their own natural search competitive landscapes and in what ways we can accelerate your business objectives.

We’re proud to announce that our proprietary technology, SEO tool, has been selected as a DEMO Showcase finalist for the Internet Summit event.

Here’s the official release:

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/triangle-direct-medias-seotool-selected-to-present-at-internet-summit-2009-demo-showcase-68850962.html.

If your company has a focus on improving its search engine optimization, then you should speak with us about SEOtool and the unmatched intelligence and SEO metrics it can uncover for your website(s).  We’re biased, but we strongly believe there is not a single web-based platform that can deliver the amount of insight and depth that SEOtool provides to both in-house SEO teams, agencies and web development firms.

Learn more about SEOtool:

http://www.seotool.com

http://www.triangledirectmedia.com/seo-tool.htm