The Great Land Grab

Seems like over night social media has exploded into a new and vast marketing medium. New jobs are being created to keep up. Interactive marketers are charged with communicating with customers and creating an open discussion about their products and companies.

With over 500 million users Facebook has become one of the largest social media platforms. Every company, organization and entrepreneur is creating their own page or group to help promote their own interests. There seems to be a big land grab going on with every organization trying to get their own fans. With so many companies vying for our attention the gold rush has come and companies should try to get as many fans as possible before people become overwhelmed and stop becoming a fan of every page that asks them to. Now is the time to get as many fans as possible.

Stop stalling and jump in the game. Now is the time to hire a real professional to communicate with your customers. Now is the time to pick your platform and to start getting your members to join you.

It isn't to late, go West and find your Gold!

Online Marketing...and Off

I passed a street performer while walking home for dinner this evening. Most people strumming an acoustic guitar on a bench don't have percussive elements, but this guy had a high-hat at one foot and a kick drum at the other. And he was a pretty good singer...a veritable one-man band. Unlike most other street musicians I've seen, he actually drew quite a crowd.

After he was done playing a few songs and much applause from the onlookers, I approached him and asked him if he had a CD for sale. He replied that he didn't, as he was traveling and had sold all of them. He asked where he might buy some CD-Rs so he could burn some more from his laptop, and I pointed him to a few places nearby.

He then mentioned that he had a MySpace page. He ripped off a scrap of paper and wrote down the URL using a thick magic marker, in fairly sloppy handwriting. Later, I managed to locate the page after a few attempts to determine the correct letters in his name.

If this guitar player wants people to find him, he should consider investing in cards that have his MySpace URL on them. Bundle them with the CD. Always be prepared, whenever you're going to start playing for people, to tell them who you are and where to find you.

Just because you have an online presence doesn't mean that the people you want to find your page are going to go out of their way to find it. You have to make yourself so easy to find that people don't even have to think twice about it.