Search Engine Optimization Strategies that Middle East Companies can Use to Maximize Website Popularity

admin    SEO Flash     Companies, East, Engine, Maximize, Middle, Optimization, Popularity, Search, strategies, Website

Search Engine Optimization Strategies that Middle East Companies can Use to Maximize Website Popularity

SEO LEBANON and Search Engine Optimization Strategies that Middle East Companies can Use to Maximize Website Popularity All companies right now know the importance of having a company website. But more to that is their awareness on the importance of Search Engine Optimization to be really visible in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs).

Middle East companies are not solely putting up company websites for the sake of owning one. Most are aware that they can use it to reach out to other companies or other possible clients from overseas.

They know that if they popularize their sites in Google website optimize the growth of their business. Building links is one of the best ways to ensure the popularity of a website. And right now, there are different ways of linking your site to other sites. One way of doing this is by exchanging links that we call “back links” or the process by which you give the link of your site to others in exchange of you linking their site on your page.

It’s a win-win situation especially if you have links outside the country or even outside of the Middle East. But, there are still other ways that you can do besides exchanging links. One of these ways is called reciprocal linking.

This happens by putting a link logo or link word to your site with the assurance that your site will be on their site as well. But involving your site to reciprocal linking could gain you a lot of headache especially on your attempt to do SEO.

The second way of building link is through indirect exchanging of links or the indirect reciprocal linking. This happens by linking a certain site on your page and making that site put your other site on theirs.

But what you do not know is that search engines can detect such way especially if you do it more than once with the same site group.

Another is through paid links. It can surely increase your online marketing in Iran or other Middle East countries for that matter. But there are also different kinds of disadvantages on this type of SEO. First, the money that you need to shell out and second, search engines such as Google are taking actions on those sites that manipulate PageRank. So you have to be sure you are doing it legally.

Articles can also be a way to optimize your site. Any Lebanon SEO company knows its importance. Most Internet users see this as online marketing with the use of articles (such as through EzineArticles.) But this kind of SEO will take most of your time, missing out a lot of sites where you can promote your own website.

People also patronize news blurbs. Sites that support this kind of SEO allow you to place a couple of paragraphs with your link in it. The links are promoted through short but interesting stories and it works as a promotion-through-suggestion kind of thing. Others do the reprinting of press release. At a sweep, it will look like an article but with a much more specific format than that of an article. Press release remains to be one of the most effective write ups to popularize your company or service. It is the publication companies that find your stories interesting and beneficial to transmit that does this type of promotion for you. The disadvantage is its stiffness which is often perceived as a boring one. Although it has been treated as such, still, it can be easy to do. Webware, games and other tools are also used for SEO such as the use of flash games and other web promotion that will ask for an exchange of link. However, such process requires technical support which can cost you much in the process. Using images and videos can also do the trick.

These types of advertisements attract people and you get good links through them. However, you need to protect it by putting codes that will not allow right clicks or copying of your images. You can also personalize it by putting water marks.

Unfortunately, doing so will make the image a little less attractive. You can also use personalized web templates wherein you can put your link at the end of the template. This way of optimizing a site has long been used however, some users of free themes now remove the link embedded in them. These 10 ways of establishing links to popularize your website is very effective. However, doing these linking strategies require extensive know how to ensure that the efforts you put in doing so can give you the results you are expecting.

So if you are not certain, you can have a Lebanon SEO company do the link building requirements of your company website. That way, you are assured of quality links at an affordable rate. You also get to save your own time doing it and learning how to do it well. Sounds fair enough! At least now you know the basics that you should ask the Lebanon SEO company to do for you.

Related SEO Flash Articles

Web Design Companies – Redefine Business Web Design

admin    SEO Flash     Business, Companies, Design, Redefine

Web Design Companies – Redefine Business Web Design

There are many professional, affordable and experienced website design company situated in Miami. These companies offer web services to businesses nationwide. You can choose any of the Miami web design firms which specialize in flash web design, ecommerce website design and HTML website designs for making a website search engine friendly. Enjoy the best services from Miami web firm professionals who possess talents and skills for any kind of web-related jobs. You can choose to get works done to fulfill your objectives and give you graphic design objectives to make a website truly functional and useful.

Many websites assist companies by offering multilingual flash services at affordable rates. These service providers offer relevant services to advertising agencies to financial services firms, manufacturing companies and to educational institutions as well.

Graphic design companies redefine business web design:
With the growing demand in graphic designing, many private companies have ventured into web designing sector. These companies are transforming digital as well as traditional media for giving the best online presence to all kinds of organizations from entry-level firms to mediocre companies to establish corporations. Miami-based companies are offering a variety of services such as website designed Marketing, Web Sales, Web Conferencing Events, Web Training, Web Entertainment.

Designing is not only representation of ideas but it boosts a company’s web identity by supporting its appeal and giving it a better appearance. These designing companies believe that every business should need a positive impact on the Internet. Find an organization where your graphic needs can be protected and expressed properly.

Related SEO Flash Articles

Don’t Hurt Your Rankings: Common Mistakes Made by Companies

admin    SEO Flash     Common, Companies, Don’t, Hurt, Made, Mistakes, Rankings

Don’t Hurt Your Rankings: Common Mistakes Made by Companies

Search engine optimization and even pay per click campaigns will surely be around for quite a while. Perhaps this is because they still remain two of the best strategies to obtain the most ideal search engine position for your website. However, because the results may take some time, there are a number of companies that unknowingly or deliberately “sabotage” their own SEO and PPC campaign. In the end, they have to suffer the consequences of their actions, which may be a decrease in their ranking and traffic or, worse, getting banned from search engines.

Where You Can Go Wrong

There are two types of mistakes a company may make in relation to SEO or PPC. First, there are a number of business website owners who actually don’t have much idea about the technique that their demands are contrary to the best practices of SEO. On the other hand, there are also others who pretend they already know SEO and perform some tricks and changes that will only damage what they’ve started.

So watch out for the following errors:

1. You make some updates on your site. You may ask yourself, “What’s the harm of doing this? Wouldn’t it be a very clever thing to do, knowing that you’re saving your SEO company some time and energy?” You may have a point, but your actions may compromise whatever plans the SEO company may have for your site. Worse, your actions may spell a destructive process for you. Here are some possible scenarios:

You decided that you want to add another content in your website, perhaps some news or press release about your newest product or service. Hence, because you thought that it doesn’t hurt if you’ll do this by yourself, you went on with your plan without consulting your SEO company. Unknown to you, however, you already have altered the tricks and codes that may have been used by the SEO firm so you can rank highly. You may have modified the right keyword density for your site. The bottom line is you could lower down your search engine ranking.

There could also be a time when you wanted to create a new link for your site. However, you’ve forgotten to make proper redirection for the URL. Thus, what you have is a broken link, which makes it very difficult for search engine spiders to crawl and index the pages of your website.

In the end, SEO companies would take the blame for the client’s wrongdoings. To avoid getting misjudged, though, they would often monitor the performance of the site of their client, take note of the changes, and contact the webmaster right away. This is to prevent any bad consequences or to make the necessary repairs before the website suffers tremendous loss.

2. You want some change, but you don’t want to make any modifications. This can be one of the most difficult aspects for SEO companies. There are a lot who want to make sure that they can rank highly in search engines and send traffic into their webpages. However, they don’t want to make any type of modification for them to achieve these objectives.

Here are examples:

Keywords and keyword density are two important elements in a website. You want to drive targeted customers into your website. These are people that would likely buy your product or avail of your service. However, you don’t want to make any changes in your articles and content. You don’t like to identify the most effective keywords, and you don’t maintain the most ideal keyword density.

There are also a number of website owners who still believe that Flash and other forms of animation can drive traffic into their website. This could be true; however, what make these Flash sites searchable in search engines are their contents. You cannot simply depend on your animation. As a matter of fact, they make it very difficult for search engine spiders to index your Flash page. After all, they can only read text files. Moreover, they make the site very difficult to download. Flash files are known to be really heavy.

Ethical SEO companies are usually very blunt about the right way to do things. And they wouldn’t mind letting go of a client who will not likely listen to what the firm has to say about their website.

3. You apply your own techniques. Unless you’re a certified SEO guru, you should avoid performing your own SEO tricks. First of all, it becomes an extremely difficult job for an SEO company to make the necessary repairs. Second, by the time they try to change what has been done, your website may already be suffering from a loss of ranking.

If you don’t like to get yourself hurt, allow the professionals to do their job and take care of these aspects.

Related SEO Flash Articles

What the SEO Companies Serve You?

admin    SEO Flash     Companies, Serve

What the SEO Companies Serve You?

In the era of Internet there are lots of websites are born everyday and will be. Will those all the websites are going to seen by world? NO!! But it can be by such plans and those tactics are provided by the SEO companies and by SEO experts. When anyone go on the internet what they will do if he is not sure of for what he comes at the doorstep of internet? He/She just open the popular search engines and give some key words to the search engine and the engine presents you the lots of links and form that link you have to choose your required website.

SEO Companies offer services of SEO and web optimization. As a complete SEO solutions company offer moral web optimization services. Whether you are a small business or a large, SEO services can help you achieve an online presence. One of the main concerns that most people forget about is maintenance. When your website starts to rank in search engine, which drastically affect your website’s performance and Search engine ranking.

Many beginners and new comers in the field of Internet businesses are not aware of the significant need of SEO service, it is therefore they face hurdle and feel down when they observe their websites dropping down instead of coming ahead in vision. This obviously directs the need of Search Engine Optimization. So we are here to prove the better results by serving the friendly and professional SEO service just for your website. Many people lack the knowledge, and they want to acquire the correct knowledge regarding SEO. At our website you will get all your queries answered. Our purpose is to serve you the righteous path along with all possibilities to give you profuse desired results as you wanted and guidance to improve your website respective of the Internet environment.

Now, the job opportunities are much more than any other jobs. The word is internet marketing for the website promotion. E.g. Mr. A wants to find a job then he goes to the internet and writes one word “jobs” in the search engine. Engine gives hundreds of sites which has job listing. You have to making a website before you want SEO service. The website contains website design, website development, website marketing and the last website maintenance.

The design of your website handled by website designer team and that team contains PHP programming, ASP programming for the coding perspective. The other members are multimedia designing and flash designing. Those give an appearance to your website.

What the SEO Company like to give you,

· Rank tall on Search Engines (Google, Yahoo, MSN, etc.) and get highest benefit

· Maximize your Return of Investment – ROI

· Confine a focused and targeted customers efficiently

Find More SEO Flash Articles

Seo Companies and Who to Choose

admin    SEO Video     Choose, Companies

Seo Companies and Who to Choose

“Without Seo4whitehats , my site would not be this successful”. My articles are a domination on the web. I have helped hundreds of people make it to the top page for the desired keywords time and time again”

“Seo 4 whitehats has taught me about researching for keywords and some methods of marketing that should be branded. I learned how to wheel link my articles and generate  more serps and more traffic for my blogs. Dont be like the others who post common articles that have no sense of originality”

“Seo 4 White hats is the first SEO company that laid it all out infront of me.The taught me the basic stratagy of SEO and proveded me with the reasearch methods to know what route to take to get my site to the first page in as little as a month. SEO 4 White Hats always has  up-to-date information and it is completely free”

<!–INFOLINKS_OFF–> <!–/lens_intro–> <!–INFOLINKS_ON–>

Many of our clients not only get better ranking and more traffic, They learn our techniques and what the current SEO tips and stratagies  to get to the top of all search engines. They leave with a wider knowledge base of how the internet works and even some web design skills. Many seo companies are snakes, which is why we promise results. The first seo company I hired as a business management major in college. The company was based out of nashville and provided weak links and did no on site page SEO and charged me 4 x what I should have been charged.they charged me 8 times what I charge currently and I provide 10 times the results.They provided no articles, no press releases and no videos. To promote your web site you must do all these and more.  So trust when I say, I have been in your shoes and I know how hard running a business is, the last thing you want to be bothered with is honestly from you SEO provider.

Our SEO company consist of 5 dedicatied, educated and ground breaking researchers who do not stop untill we are making giant leaps with your site towards the first page. They also do Kansas City web design, and are taking our clients to the next level. .

“Seo 4 Whitehats is truly amazing. I cannot thank the Lord enough for letting me come across thier web page, they have saved me thousands and made me even more.”

Related SEO Video Articles

Stay Away from Ineffective SEO Companies

admin    SEO Flash     Away, Companies, from, Ineffective, Stay

Stay Away from Ineffective SEO Companies

Welcome to the age of online marketing and advertisement thus the constant demand for a search engine marketing company that is capable of providing an array of services that range from search engine optimization (SEO) to pay per click ads management.

Many people think having all the components necessary to build an outstanding website is enough to make them reign on the whole wide web. Little do they know that despite having all the special features of a website like flash template designs, pull down navigation keys and many others that you can think of, the popularity of their website would still have to depend on responsible PPC and search engine Internet marketing.

Keyword research is the backbone of SEO. Knowing how to identify the common keywords which Internet users type when searching for a particular service or product relevant to your business is imperative, as this will gather for your website a generous amount of back links and make it popular in major search engines such as Google, Yahoo! and MSN, among others in such a short period of time.

Entrepreneurs who wish to run an online business, however, are unsure of which search engine company to entrust their website because not everybody in the SEO industry is equipped with the fundamentals that will put a website in the Top 10 position.

SEO specialists are always on the lookout for new tools that will help improve the status and rankings of websites. What has worked last month may not work today so they patiently research and compare SEO tools made available to them. Your ability to spot the company that is equipped with the latest and most effective tools is an advantage on your part.

To find out which company offers the best online marketing service, it pays to make time for inquiries. Inspect each company’s offered packages and don’t be instantly lured by those that offer the cheapest ones. Oftentimes, cheap is not always good neither is a company that offers an unreasonably priced service. Always go for quality. You’ll know the capacity of a company if you look up its previous works. Ask for a list of its previous clients and compare their standing on the web with those clients from other SEO firms. The company that has a bigger number of popular websites on search engines is undoubtedly an expert in the field of online marketing and you shouldn’t pass the chance to experience working with it. Be wise and prudent.

Find More SEO Flash Articles

Miami SEO vs Miami PPC – why Miami SEO companies offer the best results

admin    SEO Video     Best, Companies, Miami, Offer, Results

Miami SEO vs Miami PPC – why Miami SEO companies offer the best results

Justifying a substantial investment for internet marketing services can be risky and difficult. By not considering multiple consultants or firms during the selection process, your company becomes vulnerable. Qualifying your Miami seo company is one thing; picking the right Miami seo company for the job is a whole other ball game.  Before making a costly mistake, you owe it to your company to explore why Miami SEO firms provide premium results and dedicated customer service better than full service Miami marketing agencies.

The search industry has changed significantly in the last few years (let alone months!).  A variety of shifts in the way search results are displayed has affected how SEO companies handle their client accounts. The inclusion of local search results,  video, and “authority” information sources in SERPs (search engine results pages) requires professional SEO’s to stay on their game when it comes to developing strategies and solutions for dynamic clients.  What does this mean for you during the SEO company hiring process? Quite simply, it means the SEO you hire should be able to think on their feet, provide analytical feedback, and work with you to develop a solution which is right for your needs.

Miami SEO companies are a completely unique breed of search marketing professionals. Their skill sets range from novice (often blackhats masquerading as white hat professional) all the way up to industry pioneers (true veterans of the search marketing industry). Understanding what defines a well developed SEO skill set comes down to research, diligence, and analytical acuity. Bottom line: skilled Miami SEO companies demonstrate a consistent set of skills.

1. The ability to explore, analyze, and engage a new search market.

One of the most effective techniques to get a solid read on the competitive landscape of a search market is to launch an experimental PPC campaign. Although PPC can be a very complex endeavor, getting a basic trial PPC campaign off the ground is a relatively easy process.  It doesn’t require tremendous search marketing knowledge to launch a basic campaign.  Google built the adwords system for “the average joe” to manage with limited understanding of search engine algorithms, keyword research, or competitive analysis.  If you’re a small business in Miami considering getting started with PPC, there are certainly plenty of opportunities online to learn the ropes yourself rather than paying a full scale Miami PPC consultant to manage the entire campaign for you.  Now don’t get me wrong, PPC can be a particularly complicated entity, and in many cases, YOU DO need to hire a professional.  But don’t be intimidated by the basics of PPC.  In actuality, a preliminary round of PPC is a great way to kick off an SEO campaign. Hence why the ability to explore, analyze, and engage a new search market is so important.

A skilled SEO (search engine optimizer) should have a profound understanding of why SERPs display results in a particular arrangement. This is often accomplished by using browser based tools (in the form of plugins) to analyze SERPs on the fly – allowing a savvy SEO to quickly get the pulse of a prospective search market.  Within a few hours of investigation, a qualified SEO should be able to explain how competitive a prospective search market is, how long it might take to rank competitively for the primary phrases associated with the search market, and how growth over time will be quantified metrically.

It’s impossible to have full mastery of every search market on the web today…but it is possible to jump in, analyze quickly, and paint an accurate picture of the competitive landscape.

2. The ability to make SEO and PPC work together to save you money.

As I mentioned earlier, SEO and PPC are essentially coexisting elements within a comprehensive search marketing campaign.  PPC is a tremendously effective way to evaluate the effectiveness ( and conversion factor) of search terms before optimizing your site accordingly. For less than 0, a skilled SEO should be able to validate which terms from a keyword research report will actively convert visitors.  PPC provides an outstanding opportunity to see which terms perform in terms of traffic generation, sales conversion, and visitor loyalty.

The bottom line: why not take the guess work out of keyword research and save your company (or yourself) money in the long run? Find out what people respond to immediately…rather than several months down the line.

3. The flexibility to leverage local search optimization techniques (SEO and PPC wise) while maximizing the effects of prominent rankings in organic search.

In the Miami SEO search market, SEO companies compete for dominance in the local search results (i.e. google business listings) as well as the organic search results.  This requires discipline, profound competitive analysis, meticulous ethical search engine optimization, and the diligence to keep trying new techniques to earn prominent rankings for competitive search terms. Learning to dominate a search market comes down to an SEO’s ability to leverage local search and organic search simultaneously.  This is one of the hardest skills to develop and often requires significant trial and error.

Before hiring a Miami SEO to generate more traffic to your company’s site, be sure to explore their local search optimization techniques. Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft business listings are rapidly replacing phonebooks as contact references, which means it’s critical your SEO is able to help you establish a strong presence in major directories (like business.com, google business center, and the yahoo directory) as well as local business listings. If an SEO consultant, specialist, or company doesn’t present the ability to leverage SEO and PPC, both in a regional and local search market, it’s time to keep looking.

The real reason Miami SEO companies offer the best results over premium miami marketing agencies.

At then end of the day, a brand’s success in the digital world comes down to establishing a connection with your customers. Developing your web presence into a place for your clients/customers to take part in an experience centered around your remarkable brand requires offering something different, compelling, addictive, and valuable. It’s critical your company brands itself as a part of the market you want to join, and becomes a part of that market.

Miami SEO companies are typically able to offer profoundly dynamic creative services in addition to progressive web marketing strategies.  For whatever reason, creative entrepreneurial, and resourceful marketing professionals are attracted to Miami…which is all the more reason there are so many choices. Be sure to remember that Miami SEO companies offer premium results because they are forced to generate those results for themselves! In most cases, the Miami SEO company you hire should be able to demonstrate results they’ve earned for their clients…and for their own firms.

You might be surprised just how many “SEO consultants” outsource their entire operations overseas…or to other Miami search engine optimization companies. Be sure to understand what your prospective agency has to offer before making a costly mistake!

World Class Companies in India are Offering Expert Flash Web Development Services

admin    Flash Video     Class, Companies, development, Expert, Flash, India, Offering, Services, World

World Class Companies in India are Offering Expert Flash Web Development Services

India has always been a favorite destination for various Information Technology (IT) and Information Technology Enabled Services (ITES) products and solutions. Many world class Flash Web development companies in India are offering their expert services and solutions to help grow numerous businesses worldwide.

These Flash Web development companies in India are offering the best web development services. These companies have experienced Flash scripting experts. Your web site will become more interactive than before with numerous features. These companies are offering Flash graphics designing services in a variety of software platforms, such as Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, CorelDraw, PageMaker, Freehand, Punch Software AS4000, and many more. If your need is any kind of multimedia programming, these companies will provide you the best solution in technologies, such as Director, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, Macromedia Authorware, Macromedia Flash, Macromedia Flex, and Sound Forge.

If your web site is not appealing to its target audience, you can get your web site redesigned with the implementation of various animation and special effects. The professionals working for various Flash web site development companies in India also offer specialized services fitting to Open Source and Microsoft platforms.

Flash scripting can add new life to your web site enhancing its look and feel. With the implementation of various Flash intros, Flash video-enabled web pages, banners and advertisements, animated Flash logo, your web site can attract more number of quality traffic.

In the world of internet, for any business to flourish, you need to promote it on the Internet. A good looking web site with all the required information well organized in proper order has the potential to represent your company and its various products and services in the most effective manner.

While Flash scripting can improve the overall presentation of the content, the same also renders interactive options before a user.

Find More Flash Video Articles

SEO Guide for Newbie’s Companies?

admin    SEO Flash     Companies, Guide, Newbie’s

SEO Guide for Newbie’s Companies?

Critical to helping people connect with the web businesses they are searching for. There are companies out there that claim to get your page rankings so high that you’ll gladly pay high prices to make it happen. Not every website can or wants to go that route however.The best way is to try to get free organic website traffic, meaning when someone searches for a term or phrase in the search engine, those pages that come up are “organic” type listings or go on www.seo-prediction.com. Being on page one is highly desirable as few people search beyond the first one or two pages listed. This is different than the paid ads you see on the right hand side of the page, other wise known as “pay per click” ads. Trying to get listed at a high page rank is known as search engine optimization or SEO and boils down to:1. Content, content, content. You need real content on your web, this is content that has real meaning to real people, not just stuffing a bunch of keywords that make no sense. Search engines use programs called web crawlers or web spiders that list web sites. The one thing those web crawlers looks for is content. They figure out if a site has content by tracing keyword phrases. This is why search engine optimization usually starts by picking keywords and writing content around them; many web site marketing experts advocate writing a high density of the same keywords, but doing too much of this can actually work against you.2. Link backs provide validation. The more links leading back to your site, particularly links that are in contextually appropriate content, the higher your page ranking will be. Ways to get these link backs range from link exchanges with other companies in related marketing niches, to having articles about the topic or niche you’re selling to with links back to your site, to social networking sites and Squidoo Lenses.3. Updated and fresh content. This is important both for your human visitors as well as the web spiders. When both see there’s new content added at least 3 times a week, they will be more likely to come back more often or you can visit www.huge-niche-keywords.com, It takes an average of seven visits before someone will purchase a product or post on a forum, so it’s important to give both reason to return to your site.4. Web structures that make sense. Your web site should have clearly structured navigational links, your landing page or front page should have links to everything else on the site.5. Text rules everything in web content. Search engine spiders ignore Javascript, they ignore graphics, and until very recently, they couldn’t read text in Flash animations. If the search engine spiders can’t read it, it doesn’t get used to help your page rankings.The real secret to long term success with web site optimization is to make sure your site is usable and interesting, both to the search engine spiders and to your human visitors. Keep adding fresh content that makes them both want to come back for more, and your site will continue to grow in popularity with both.

Related SEO Flash Articles

How Social Media Is Changing The Way B2B Companies Communicate

admin    Adobe TV     Changing, Communicate, Companies, Media, Social

Nowadays, the question seems to be not who is on Twitter, but rather, who is not on Twitter. The world seems to be aflutter with the Twitter phenomenon. Even Bill Gates is tweeting.

The proliferation of Twitter and other Web 2.0 technologies such as Facebook, YouTube and blogs have drastically changed the way society socialises and communicates. And businesses are taking note.

Some of the world’s largest corporations are themselves changing the way they communicate and collaborate with their customers, stakeholders and employees. Conventional marketing such as advertisements and sending out mass e-mail are no longer enough. These days, companies are more inclined to engage directly with customers via online discussion forums or through blogs.  Marketing personnel are also equally at home typing out pitches using less than 140 characters on Twitter as they are writing out lengthy advertising copies.

Jumping on the social media bandwagon

According to an August 2009 survey by Mzinga and Babson Executive Education, 86% of companies from various industries said social media now forms part of their businesses. 61% have integrated social applications within their websites or other sites, while 40% have set up standalone online communities. 39% chose to embed third-party widgets into their sites.

Marketing was cited as the top reason for adopting social media tools (57%), followed by internal collaboration (39%).

In another survey done by McKinsey in 2009, 53% of business respondents said they plan to increase their investment in social media tools and technologies in the next three years.

Why the interest in social media amongst companies? It is considered a word-of-mouth marketing phenomenon that commands a higher level of consumer engagement, and in some cases, better return on investment (ROI), than conventional advertisements.

Power of social media

If there are any doubts as to the power of social media as a marketing tool, look no further than Dell. The computer maker made headlines last year when it reported that it had generated USD6.5 million in revenue from sales alerts on its DellOutlet (http://twitter.com/delloutlet) Twitter account. Granted, that is a tiny percentage compared to Dell’s total revenue of USD60 billion in 2008. However, considering that it cost the company next to nothing to set up the Twitter account, the ROI is pretty significant.

Another good example of the power of social media is Intuit’s use of online discussion forums. The financial and accounting software company’s “Live Community” forum allows customers to ask other customers questions, including those that the company isn’t allowed to answer because of regulatory restrictions. Through word-of-mouth and consumer feedback, Intuit has seen sales increase by more than 30% each year.

Technologically-savvy

Dell and Intuit are two examples of technology companies that are socially savvy in an industry that is by far the most comfortable when it comes to embracing Web 2.0

Tech companies already utilise podcasts, webcasts and video to market their products and service offerings, while online discussion forums and the blogosphere are used to solicit free feedback and suggestions for their products.

They have also started to engage bloggers to create awareness of new products by inviting them to do trial runs and pre-launch product reviews. This can work both ways though. A bad review may hurt a brand, but an endorsement from an established blogger can be powerful marketing.

Financial institutions – still on the sidelines

On the other hand, financial institutions in general, are still contented to be wallflowers in the realm of social media. They don’t engage much at all. This is not surprising as strict industry regulations and compliance issues prevent many banks from embracing the ‘open transparency’ that social media requires.

The only platform most of them seem to be in is LinkedIn. Although some banks have a Facebook page, most of the accounts seem to be opened by fans, rather than the lenders themselves.

Still, there are signs that some financial institutions are beginning to experiment with social media. Banks like Citibank and HSBC have discussion forums on their websites to get feedbacks from customers. While Standard Chartered Bank in Hong Kong has its own Standard Chartered TV (http://www.youtube.com/user/scbtv09) on YouTube.

Management consultancies – some are greater converts than others

Management consultants probably have the most to gain from engaging in social media, especially in promoting their thought leaders. Many partners from these firms already have their articles posted on the company’s website. These thought leadership pieces could potentially reach out to a wider base if they also have their own blogs or twitter accounts, or if they are linked to bookmarking and news sharing sites like Delicious, Digg and Reddit.

Deloitte Consulting and McKinsey are two of the best examples of management consultancies that are fully exploiting social media to promote their thought leaders. They use platforms such as Delicious and Digg to draw more people to their websites. By starting a discussion forum on their articles, they are able to provide links back to their corporate website showcasing more of their services. This, in turn, generates more traffic hits and eyeballs, and potentially, new clients.

Unfortunately, aside from Deloitte, McKinsey and Accenture, most management consultancies have yet to jump on the social media bandwagon.

LinkedIn

The only social media channel that all companies across the three industries seem to be on is LinkedIn. This is to be expected. Unlike other social networking sites, the approximate 50 million registered users on LinkedIn are professionals looking to connect with like-minded peers, or to create their own business connections.

The site’s large treasure trove of professional contacts has become a popular “go-to” place for human resources personnel. Because it also has different groups for any number of organisations or special interest groups, companies also find LinkedIn especially useful when looking for candidates with a specific set of skills.

Bookmark it and share and share alike

While blogs, Twitter and Facebook are the more popular social media channels being utilised by businesses, B2B companies should also look into exploring bookmarking services like Delicious and news sharing sites such as Digg and Reddit to generate greater awareness.

Adobe Systems maintains a list of interesting company related news and conversations on Delicious. For instance, the software company used Delicious to store and share a link that gives a tutorial on how to apply the Bokeh, or hazy effect, in web design. By bookmarking this link, Adobe ensures it gets more eyeballs, and potential customers, than it would have had had it only featured the link on its website. It also uses Delicious to advertise its eSeminars.

Meanwhile, Intel’s blog network allows readers to ‘digg’ or recommend the blogs that they have read on Digg. For example, a blog written by an employee on the power of Intel’s 3D streaming technology was recommended by almost one thousand registered Digg users and generated over 100 comments. As a result of this employee’s blog entry, the company was able to review independent feedback, gauge the popularity of the subject and generate some buzz through a third-party site.

So, what’s next?

While some companies, such as Intuit, Intel, Accenture and Deloitte, are taking full advantage of, and reaping the benefits, from Web 2.0 technologies, most business-to-business companies are not very socially engaged.

It would not be long before social technologies become a norm within the B2B space. After all, it aligns with what B2B marketing is all about – and that is to build ongoing relationships with one’s stakeholder communities.

So go ahead and:

Like it or not, social media is here to stay. It is no longer a one-to-many business environment, but rather a many-to-many world. B2B companies can no longer afford to stay on the sidelines if they want to get ahead of the competition.  So, is your company socially engaged?