Google Drops Third-Party Reviews And Citations

In an effort to promote their own user reviews, yesterday Google made a major change to the Google Places listings, their local business directory. Prior to the change, viewers would see reviews that Google pulled in from third-party sites such as DemandForce.com, InsiderPages.com, CitySearch and many others.  Search Engine Land did a great job of […]

Online Video Advertising Up By 52% In 2011

Courtesy eMarketer.com US Online Ad Spend Poised to Grow 20% in 2011 JUNE 8, 2011 Video remains fastest-growing format while search gains most new dollars Online ad spending is returning to pre-recession growth levels, with steady increases projected through 2015 as marketers continue to invest more in digital channels. eMarketer expects US online advertising spending […]

Are You A Native…of The Digital Age? Marketing To Natives

The Millennials are ahead of the curve by almost any digital metric: online video viewing, mobile internet usage, mobile commerce, and location-based services like Foursquare. Also known as Generation Y and echo-boomers, the internet is a vital part of this groups media habits. Small business owners who continue to market to consumers using “old-school” marketing […]

Social Search Gaining Ground Quickly

Local search marketing represents major commerce to search engines, hence all the attention and infrastructure invested in making Google Places a much better user experience when searching for local businesses. Well, social search is quickly gaining ground and can have a major impact on local search depending on user settings. For example,  if a user […]

Are Pay Per Click Ads Being Ignored?

I’ve been telling clients and colleagues alike since 2009 that pay per click advertising is becoming less and less effective. Using sophisticated eye-tracking equipment and “heat maps” (which can tell us where people are looking when they land on any web page), several studies now prove that users spend more time looking at the organic […]

A New Facebook Privacy Setting

A new Facebook privacy setting called “Instant Personalization” has been rolled out. In other words, Facebook will be sharing your personal information with external websites under the auspices of an enhanced user experience. What’s worse is this new setting is rolled out as “Enabled” automatically. If that works for you, then no need to change […]

Mobile Marketing For Small Businesses

Is mobile marketing right for your small business? With millions of mobile phones in use around the world, the potential to communicate with current and future clients is limitless. Small business owners can use both SMS (short text messaging) and MMS (multi-media text messaging), which can add video and audio files to messages sent to […]

A Social Media Strategy Is Not Optional

The December 10, 2010 issue of ENTREPRENEUR Magazine featured an article “Tearing Down The Walls” where they really make it crystal clear that social media is not only here to stay, if you don’t have a social media strategy, you’re placing your business at risk in a major way. Read what Charlene Li had to […]

Google ‘Boost’ Local Advertising To Boost Local Business

Google has just launched Boost, a location-based ad product for local businesses. Built on Google Places, Boost beta is available in San Francisco, Houston and Chicago right now and will roll out to more cities soon. Boost ads show up when users search for local businesses; they appear in the “sponsored links” section of Google’s […]

How To Boost Local Business Fast Using The Internet

“How can I boost local business fast using the internet?” That’s one of the most common questions a local business owner will ask me. The short answer…Increase Your Online Visibility! There are so many marketing strategies to increase the visibility of your business on the internet and surprisingly, you can get results pretty quick.While many […]