There are many reasons people use Internet marketing or search engine optimization. One of them includes the improvement of their online reputation.

The term "online reputation management", or ORM, is defined, as the practice of consistent research and analysis of one’s personal or professional, business or industry reputation as represented by the content across all types of online media. It is also sometimes referred to as online reputation monitoring.

Those in marketing know and understand the value of branding and image. Combine this with the influence of consumer's decisions based on the Internet and one can see what businesses are using the Internet to market themselves. For instance research has shown that brands with the highest 'social media activity', including reviews, have seen an increase in revenue by as much as 18%. And today, over 51% of consumers are using the Internet before making a purchase in a shop to educate themselves on a company or product.

Consumers love to gather information. Therefore it is important that when they search for your company or brand name, they find it in the search engines. This is where SEO is tied into reputation management. Search engines do not automatically give credence to one company over another due to assets or value. It's all about who understands how to get online visibility.

So let's say you are Company A and want to improve the name of your company and become more visible on the Internet. What strategy would you take to assist you with your online reputation management? To start you would want to combine a series of marketing, public relations and search engine marketing efforts. Having your website and company name highly visible and in important keyword positions is good for publicity. If you are a company that is highly visible but for all the wrong reasons, such as bad press, it is important to replace this with good press. A good SEO company will help you push out negative reviews in search engines and replace them with positive ones.

What are some strategies an SEO company will take to help your company in addition to monitoring results? First they will help you set up a blog and then provide you with articles with important keywords. The articles can be about anything related to your company or product, the idea is to have them point back to your company website and push its value up on search engines.

Second, you will want to create a social media profile. Using social media is one of the most powerful and yet easy ways to help improve your online reputation. The top four social media sites have high authority in search engines that therefore affects your rankings. What are the big four media sites you should be participating in? They include:

• Facebook
• Twitter
• Linked-In
• MySpace


Once these simple steps have been put into place, the second step is to begin monitoring and participating. Creating an account with social media groups isn't enough; there are rules of engagement. You have to participate in a way that adds credibility to your profile. Participating isn't just about talking about your company and how wonderful it is, but truly engaging others in conversation, making meaningful exchanges and contributions. Doing this requires time and effort that is ongoing.

Last, you will need to monitor your results. You can set up Google and Yahoo alerts which will catch mentions of your company and product name online and let you know who is talking about you and where. You can track everything from the name of your company to key employee names.

You can also monitor, if you are not already, your website statistics. You will want to determine whether your website(s) are showing up with more frequency based on keywords and your namebrand or product names on the search engines. You can monitor everything from your corporate site to product or affiliate sites.

Online reputation management doesn't have to be difficult and yet it is quite effective. With a little work and a little monitoring, you can help your company's reputation move in the direction you choose along with improving its visibility.

Pamela Ravenwood is a copywriter for ArteWorks SEO. She is an award winning writer, journalist, SEO specialist and strategic planning consultant. To learn more about this search engine optimization company, visit www.arteworks.biz.

If you have been in sales or marketing for a while you probably have heard of the term "Relationship Based Marketing".

This type of marketing differs from other forms of marketing in that it recognizes the long term value to the firm of keeping customers, as opposed to direct or "Intrusion" marketing, which focuses upon acquisition of new clients by targeting majority demographics based upon prospective client lists.

Relationship marketing also relies upon acquiring the knowledge of what the consumer needs solely through existing customers in a mutual exchange. Relationship marketing is also dependent upon viral marketing for the acquisition of new customers. But as we have seen in very successful campaigns, viral marketing can have extensive effects.

What is viral marketing? Viral marketing refers to marketing techniques that use pre-existing social networks to produce increases in brand awareness or to achieve other marketing objectives (such as product sales) through self-replicating viral processes, analogous to the spread of pathological and computer viruses. It can be word-of-mouth delivered or enhanced by the network effects of the Internet.

So how are people using the Internet to utilize viral marketing - in many ways.

Web 2.0 and Social Media



According to Wikipedia, which is a perfect example of Web 2.0, the term Web 2.0 is defined as "commonly associated with web applications that facilitate interactive information sharing, interoperability, user-centered design, and collaboration on the World Wide Web. Examples of Web 2.0 include web-based communities, hosted services, web applications, social-networking sites, video-sharing sites, wikis, blogs, mashups, and folksonomies."


Web 2.0 gives more tools to those who utilize relationship-based marketing to promote their product or service. With Web 2.0 you are not only reaching a large base of people but you are also giving more marketing power to your website through the spider web of connections behind each of these types of media. If you are promoting yourself through Wikipedia, you are getting a two-fold force of marketing, one, directly to your potential client and two, promoting your website's viability due to Wikipedia's highly spidered site.


Blogging



Blogging has probably been around longer than the other types of relationship based marketing techniques. What better way to promote yourself and your product then to sit down with a one-on-one conversation with potential clients? With your blog you can share your interests or passions with others who will then share that information and thus you have viral marketing.


If the idea of creating a blog scares you, this too has been made easier. Not only is there software out there making it easier and easier to blog but there are also people who you can hire to write blogs for you.



Comment on Existing Blogs



Once you write your blog, it does your blog well to have people comment on it. This has to do with the way search engines work as well as plain ole viral marketing. To bring in more people to read your blog and comment, become a frequent visitor to sites that are related to your professional expertise and you may find yourself becoming the go-to person for those in need of that expertise.



Facebook and Other Social media


It is quite possible you have heard or even used Facebook by now. And if you haven't used Twitter, certainly you have heard the term. These along with MySpace, and LinkedIn are common forms of social media. Sites like Facebook and MySpace have a broad focus while LinkedIn is more business focused. Sites like Facebook, provide the opportunity to add a customized page you can use to promote a business.


Relationship based marketing takes time and patience but is possibly one of the most viable and reliable forms of getting your name and company out to the public with the greatest long term value.

Pamela Ravenwood is a copywriter for ArteWorks SEO. She is an award winning writer, journalist, SEO specialist and strategic planning consultant. To learn more about this search engine optimization company, visit www.arteworks.biz.

Viral marketing, either you have heard of the term or you haven't. If you haven't, it is most likely that you'll question the term viral, as it seems dangerous. But for those who understand how it works, viral is good.

The formal definition of viral marketing is to promote information or products that other customers are compelled to give to other friends, colleagues and family. Viral marketing is also a way to promote a service or product exponentially, that is, a handful of people tell another handful of friends and the information spreads, kind of like a virus.

The beauty of viral marketing is that at times, you may not even see how it is spreading, it could be living in secrecy and then show itself suddenly in huge numbers. The 'virus', can piggybacks on other hosts and uses its resources to multiply itself. Add to that the right environment, and it will grow exponentially.

So how what are some elements of viral marketing and using it in a strategic way? According to professionals, an effective viral marketing strategy includes:

1. Giving away products or services - The term free still holds power, even after all of its use. Most viral marketing strategies give away some type of product or service.

2. Transferring Your Virus To Others - For viruses to transfer, they require human contact. And, they have to be easy to transmit. When looking at your marketing plan and strategy for your viral marketing, choose a medium that carries your marketing message easily and is easy to transfer. For example, Twitter has become a popular medium and platform for quickly transferring information. With Twitter, over 3 million messages are posted everyday.

Other ways Twitter has become useful in marketing is that it provides a venue for you to post news or updates about your company or products. You can post promotions, sales, or specials. With Twitter you can also give your brand a voice and a personality.

Another way to transfer information is through a news release announcing what you are giving away, or if you are hosting a contest, or even providing a free service. If your news release is carried by just 5% of the media you send it to, you could have not only have your URL in front of tens of thousands of readers quite inexpensively, you are transferring information at exponential speed.

3. Utilizing common motivations - Humans have a variety of things that motivate them. Marketing is about plugging into those motivations and working with them. Some of the basic motivators include the need to be popular, loved and understood. Discovering something that is free, cool or makes one feel unique, drives people to grab on to it, tell others and share 'inside information'.

4. Take advantage of others' resources - Blogs, forums, social networks, podcasts, RSS feeds, text messaging - they’re all capable of instantaneously distributing information across any and all borders and time-zones. They also allow you to reach people in a more targeted and personal way than ever before. Creating a timely and non-disruptive communication with your niche audience is the key to a successful email campaign. With the Internet, today’s shift in social media is bringing forth a whole new breed of brand influencers. Your job is to convince them on your brand’s attributes. The viral nature of the Internet can help you give your messages better reach than any traditional media ever could.

5. Encourage Word-of-Mouth Recommendations - Word-of-mouth (on the Web it's "word-of-mouse") is considered the very best advertising, because it is unsolicited. Here are some ways to encourage friends to share with friends, and use their network to promote your site.

Install a Recommend-It.com referral system. Recommend-It won't save a dismal site, but it will help your visitors promote your site to their network of friends.

Make it easy to e-mail or fax your webpage to a friend. Encourage readers to e-mail your webpage to a friend. This is similar to recommending your site, but allows your visitor to send specific content as well. This is easier to accomplish without a database-driven site.

Encourage people to forward your newsletter to friends. Do this at the end of a newsletter, and you may jog some readers to do it immediately. It's easy to do.


Viral marketing doesn't have to be complicated nor expensive. It often requires some great forethought and planning, along with follow through and patience. The results may not be immediate but the effect great.





Pamela Ravenwood is a copywriter for ArteWorks SEO. She is an award winning writer, journalist, SEO specialist and strategic planning consultant. To learn more about this search engine optimization company, visit www.arteworks.biz.

Did everyone see that update on your Facebook “Home” the other day? 100 million active users on Facebook, and no, this is not an Austin Powers reference. This social networking platform has consumed a population that is one-third the size of the United States. The more amazing part of this new fact is the “active users” part. This number does not include those fly by night posers that just sign up for an account and never return to that beautiful blue bar again. Now, what if we took a little liberty and substituted the word “users” with the word “viewers.” Suddenly we all see the dollar signs.



Think about the demographic that Facebook has captured. Traditional advertising has been fighting for this culture group for years. Want middle to upper class, 18-24 year olds? They’re on Facebook, and it makes sense when in fact the Facebook creator and world’s youngest billionaire, Mark Zuckerberg, is only 24 years old. You might say that he speaks their language.

So what does this have to do with us, Internet marketers? This is obviously a major platform for exposure to one of the most impressionable and profitable demographics online. Time magazine even discovered that Facebook is more popular than porn with college students. How is that even possible?

So how do you get the stage for this audience?

Facebook advertisment is certainly one way to approach it. These have proven to be some of the most successful ad campaigns in the history of social networking (which I suppose is not that long). Every user has a “Home” page that gives them news and updates about their various friends, updates on Facebook changes, as well as short little ads. The most successful of these ads are the ones that make announcements about new products or offer some kind of update for users. You will also find image and text ads on the right side of profile pages, specifically targeted for certain demographics. In fact, in the Facebook ad creation form, you can actually designate the age group you would like to reach, where they are from, and specific keywords that might be found in their profiles. This is truly amazing ad control.

Also, most online marketers have long realized the importance of viral participation in major social networking communities. This is an excellent way to get your brand in front of target markets without beating them over the head with advertisement language. Company Facebook profiles and groups can accumulate quite a following, especially if there is useful or interesting information being posted, videos being uploaded, or other incentives for users. Most Internet marketers have barely tapped the surface of creating a Facebook presence but have already realized results. Facebook can produce citations/references, brand awareness, community interaction, and yes, even links.

If your company is not involved on Facebook, I hope these numbers give you a kick in the pants to get started. Take it step by step. There is no need to be afraid. Start by signing up and creating a profile, NOW!


About the Author: Peter Hamilton is the Project Manager in charge of the Seattle office of ArteWorks SEO. His interest and experience in search engine marketing is largely focused on the social media optimization and multi-media facets of exposure. To learn more about search engine optimization, visit www.arteworks.biz.

In the old days, unless someone sent a letter to the editor or started an all out advertisement war, most big companies had little difficulty keeping a tight hold on their reputations. Unfortunately for some, the information age has turned the world of reputation management upside down. Anyone with a computer and a dial-up connection (or just an iPhone in their pocket), can post whatever slanderous thoughts they have or take out their frustrations on anyone in a very public way, and because search engines appreciate the authenticity of blogs and other user generated content, these comments, rants, and raves often find their way into extremely visible positions. Agreed, some companies probably deserve it, but the really sad thing is that many great businesses hurt by one person’s statements, suddenly lose an incredible amount of online credibility.

Social media websites have amplified the situation incredibly. These user-generated meccas are permeating search indexes and grabbing ranking results in virtually every possible market. Decide you don’t like the company you work for? Just give them a thumbs down in Stumbleupon and leave a nasty comment. It is so easy for a single voice to be heard that companies are walking on pens and needles, afraid of their social networking savvy employees or customers. Don’t get me wrong, I believe in a freedom of speech, but some of these negative claims have no foundation in truth, and in some circumstances, the company is just an innocent bystander.
Luckily, it is still possible to control online reputations using a very similar principle as in the old days.

Own the space.

By taking over the entire space for particular search terms, companies don’t have to worry about those one off bloggers or that one disgruntled customer (who was being unreasonable anyway). Consider a search for the phrase “hillary clinton.” I am quite certain that this senator as a large amount of slanderous material written about her online, but somehow a Google search does not reveal any of that material for at least the first two pages. Now does this mean there are not hundreds of blogs devoted to running her name through the mud? of course not. Because Hillary has a large amount of valuable and heavily linked online material associated with her name, she owns the search ranking space for her name.

Yes, this is an extreme example, but any company can take control of their name space by producing great content, building the strength of that content in the search engines, and using that content to build the strength of other websites in that space, are things that reputable SEO firms should have no problem accomplishing. Sometimes negative comments can stay in the rankings for years, and there is no reason why any organization or individual has to stand by helplessly as their reputation suffers. Online reputation management is a great way to protect your brand.

About the Author: Peter Hamilton is the Project Manager in charge of the Seattle office of ArteWorks SEO. His interest and experience in Internet marketing is largely focused on the social media optimization and multi-media facets of exposure. To learn more about reputation management and this search engine optimization firm, visit www.arteworks.biz.

The use of video for Internet marketing strategies is predicted to become to a $3 billion dollar industry by the year 2010 by eMarketer Report. What an incredible figure, considering it has only really exploded in the last few years. Why are investors, businesses, and marketing/advertisement firms so excited about video? The answer lies in the numbers. The mass of viewers is so great, that anyone seeking to promote products or brands would be silly not to consider such a huge portion of the population. According to a market trends expert named Brian Haven, 53% of all adults using a broadband connection state that they watch videos online. Considering the current viewing audience and realizing the potential of online videos, it would be would silly not to invest in such a cost effective, wide reaching medium.

An enormous number of videos are produced and posted to the Internet every day by amateurs and professionals alike. From funny happenings to how to videos, there is an amazing surge of content, and it is inspired by the fact that anyone can be heard. Literally, anyone who makes a video and posts it on Youtube, Google Video, metacafe, or something similar, has the opportunity to be viewed by thousands, if not millions of viewers. It is a fantastic opportunity and an excellent way for businesses to make themselves known. This is without even considering the impact video can have on search engine rankings.

Like any content, video can also be utilized as a form of “link bait,” meaning it is valuable material that other websites, blogs, or forums might want to link to. If the video is posted to a video sharing website and optimized correctly, those links in turn bring recognition to the keywords and links associated with that video, which should all be pointing back to the creator. This practice is extremely new, and the results vary somewhat due to the current limitations in search engine indexing, but it may prove to be the most effective strategy. For now, the sure fire way to make sure videos bait to a particular website is by posting directly on that website. While also gaining viewers by submitting to Youtube and others, the object of posting directly to a website is to drive traffic directly to that site. This can be done in a variety of ways, such as a strategic social bookmarking campaign.

There is a video revolution on the move, and those who join will certainly surpass the competition. Not only can videos produce brand or product recognition, they can increase a website’s authority in the search engines and bring in great, relevant traffic. So why not start kicking around a few ideas?

About the Author: Peter Hamilton is the Project Manager in charge of the Seattle office of ArteWorks SEO. He has a Bachelor's degree in radio, television and film and extensive experience in social media marketing. Mr. Hamilton also heads up the ArteWorks SEO educational video series on topics related to Internet marketing and search engine optimization. If you would like to view the free educational SEO video series, please visit www.arteworks.biz.

Have a few minutes? Want to spend some time checking out fascinating websites that relate to your specific interests? Maybe you want to see what is out there on astronomy, the environment, or even the entertainment industry. StumbleUpon is an amazing one-click stop to meet your curiosity needs. With over 4 million users already, StumbleUpon makes it easy for people to surf the web in a care free, channel flipping sort of style, stumbling on the most interesting material the web has to offer.

How does it work? After downloading the toolbar and setting up your personal category preferences on StumbleUpon, you are ready to go. With a single click on the Stumble Button, you are launched to one of many extremely high-quality web pages recommended by thousands of similar users. This creates an extremely valuable content source by sending StumbleUpon users directly to sites that match their personal interests. Not only that, but these sites have also been approved by like-minded individuals.

Many people might say that this is just one more of many social media sites that doesn’t really do anything. On the contrary, it has become one of the most enjoyable searching tools I have. I spend at least a few minutes every day “stumbling,” just seeing what is out their in my world. Everyone should give it a try. Once you have learned to truly enjoy this unique Internet community, you will also quickly realize its value for Internet marketing and search engine optimization.

As the number of “Stumblers” increases and ratings become even more relevant, StumbleUpon will increasingly impact search engine results as well as wide spread viral marketing. If your company provides content that is considered valuable by the relevant web community, features on social media sites like StumbleUpon will certainly increase exposure by introducing your brand as well as baiting valuable links. Social Media is the wave of the marketing future, and familiarizing yourself with StumbleUpon is just one way to capitalize on the ever-changing information age.

About the Author: Peter Hamilton is the Project Manager in charge of the Seattle office of ArteWorks SEO. He has a Bachelor's degree in radio, television and film and extensive experience in social media optimization. Mr. Hamilton also heads up the ArteWorks SEO educational video series on topics related to Internet marketing and search engine optimization. If you would like to view the free educational SEO video series, please visit www.arteworks.biz.

I wanted to take the time to write on a subject that has every company pondering. And if it is not, it should be. Social media has taken the world by storm with its viral, growing network of people, groups, and companies. Your employees, or marketing representatives, have the ability to impact your company image and increase your web presence simply by becoming active members of social media sites like MySpace, LinkedIn, and Facebook. However, many employers are very hesitant to allow this kind of work to be done on company time. It seems more like fun than work, and more importantly, can it actually be productive enough to pay for?

The answer is yes! Of course, every business is at a different stage, and the amount of time employees should spend on social media sites will vary depending on the type of business. For example, social media involvement might be more important for a business that only operates online than for a local brick and mortar, services oriented business, but I would submit that every business planning for a broader future, online or not, should invest some time and money into social media. Social media sites have become hubs of professional networking, information sharing, and personalization of the web. MySpace allows users to basically create their own website, sharing pictures, videos, stories, blogs, and more to the rest of the world. Others then view this content or contact the member and are able to comment, vote, and pass on content as they desire. LinkedIn offers a professional profile for employees where they can network with other professionals, give recommendations, post resumes, and more. Because these sites are already well indexed within the search engines and often have their own, more than adequate search engines, the right kind of regular posting can really create awareness of your business. In addition to that, clients or associates can get to know some of your staff or learn more about the inner workings of your business, thus becoming more familiar and comfortable with your people and operations.

According to a study by Pollara Strategic Insights, 46% of a 444 business sampling, believe that social media is now more important than TV, radio, Newspapgers, and Magazines, and 85% agree that it is a very important element. However, in the same study, 66% of those business owners or managers did not think employees should be compensated to interact with social media networks. What these people do not realize is that time spent on social media can actually be productive company interaction between employees, to management, or even to clients as well. All of these messages, shared stories, and more, can actually serve as useful content and buzz surrounding a business. This can drive traffic, increase rankings, improve branding, or simply serve to familiarize your employees with each other. The bottom line is that all social media sites and search engines reward those who participate in the online community. Creating profiles, adding posts, commenting, and content rating on a regular basis are great ways for your employees to improve your social media presence.

I would highly recommend talking this over with some of your staff and creating a strategy for getting your business involved with social media. Perhaps each employee has a required amount of time they spend online, or maybe they are just required to post or comment on certain facets of your business. Whatever protocol you devise, continue to modify and investigate your efforts to come up with the right amount and quality of social interaction on the web, producing the best results for your business.

About the Author: Peter Hamilton is the Project Manager in charge of the Seattle office of ArteWorks SEO. He has a Bachelor's degree in radio, television and film and extensive experience in social media optimization. Mr. Hamilton also heads up the ArteWorks SEO educational video series on topics related to Internet marketing and search engine optimization. If you would like to view the free educational SEO video series, please visit www.arteworks.biz.