Phyllis Zimbler Miller's Blog: Phyllis Zimbler Miller Author, page 71

Is Social Media a Black Hole for You?

Does social media seem like a black hole that, if you enter, you may never emerge from the other side?

I understand if you feel this way. I spend a great deal of time trying to keep up with major new opportunities and changes in social media, which also can feel like being trapped in an endless black hole.

Let's think about this feeling. What are the obstacles to starting on social media?

• Are you concerned that you will feel stupid when you start?
• Are you concerned that you won't do it...

Social Media Results Require Consistent and Continual Efforts

Click here to view the embedded video.

I asked client Chuck Hendershot of Exit Realty Group NJ if he would make a testimonial video for Miller Mosaic Power Marketing after we built his website/blog and got him started doing video blog posts. He's become so expert at video posts that I wanted him to demonstrate his expertise.

Little did I know how truly surprised I would be by what he says on the video. I had no idea how many people he had talked to before he connected with me.

And he also...

What Does It Take to Learn Social Media Marketing?

If you are starting out to use social media marketing for your brand, book, cause or business, you may be asking yourself:

How much time does it take to learn social media marketing?

The simple answer is:

How much do you want to know and how effectively do you want to implement that knowledge?

I received an email from someone who had downloaded four ebooks about Facebook, Twitter and social media. Although this person had not yet read the ebooks, the person was sure that, once the ebooks were ...

Why Should You Take Social Media Seriously for Your Business?

Businesses large and small, online, offline, national, and local need to take social media seriously or be left behind by their competitors who do take seriously this form of promotion/marketing/connecting with potential customers/clientele.

It's human nature to prefer to interact with real people rather than with faceless businesses. How many times have you had a customer service problem and asked whom you can talk to that can help you with the problem? If the business has a known contact ...

The Time Frame of Sharing Tweets on Twitter

As I have written before, Twitter deceptively appears simple when it is anything but simple.  There are written rules – and many unwritten rules – that it is wise to follow in order to reap the most benefits from Twitter.

Thus when I was a little startled by something a client new to Twitter asked, I realized that this would be a good blog post topic.

The client asked why not tweet with links to the client's older television show appearances?

I replied that there's a time frame element of...

Wearing Blinders So You Can Focus on Internet Marketing

Let's face it, the amount of information on how to market on the Internet and the amount of information on cool new Internet features can be overwhelming.

For example, last week Facebook introduced social plugins. (Here's one such social plugin – the "like" box.) Just trying out these new plugins takes time.

And what about checking out Mashable.com's compilation of lists on Twitter? (See http://mashable.com/twitterlists/ ) You can easily become overwhelmed checking out all the lists.

What's...

Facebook: Greatest Thing Since Sliced Bread or About to Take Over the World?

After listening to a free call with Facebook expert Robert Grant sponsored by Lewis Howes and Sean Malarkey, I now "get" why so many people are either excited or upset by Facebook's new features.

For marketers and researchers the new features are incredibly powerful; for people worried about privacy issues there are, indeed, new issues over which to worry.

It's too early for me to come down on either side of the issue.  But I would like to share three sites that I learned about from...

Twitterlink Comments test

testing Twitterlink Comments

Use Your Website to Provide Backup Info for Physical Products

Do you use your website to sell physical products that are then shipped along with instructions for using those products? If so, consider putting those same instructions on your website.

There are several reasons why this is a good idea:

Instructions get lost

Changes are made to instructions

A video demonstrating the instructions can be included with the print instructions

This subject came up when I was giving feedback to a client about the print instructions for assembling the product he had ...

Marketing Websites: Patience Is No Longer a Virtue

In the old days (maybe a year ago) saying "patience is a virtue" or maybe "patience is its own reward" may have been an okay attitude to have when your company/business website slowly loaded. After all, why shouldn't your prospective clients/customers wait (only a few seconds after all) to see what marvelous information you have on your site?

Those days of prospective clients/customers waiting patiently for even a few seconds are gone — replaced by "if it's not immediate I'm out of here...