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What Exactly is a Ning?

I have been testing out a Ning for a client to check its viability for his particular use and so I set one up for myself to see just how easy or hard it was to do. The first question that I got from people who looked at my Ning was what exactly is a Ning?

A Ning Is:

  1. A private label branded social networking site built around one particular brand or topic.
  2. It allows people to interact with your content or topic in a social manner and create a personal page on your topic within your Ning to share with others; drawing others into conversation.
  3. It allows you to create forums or groups within your network to engage others and allows them to create groups to share or comment on your content.
  4. It creates a rich experience for users and allows full interaction in a new manner.

What a Ning is Not:

  1. It is not a blog, although one of its components is a blog or blog RSS feed. It is more than a blog, it is a true social network.
  2. It is not Facebook or LinkedIn, it is a private label network and so its success is based on your promotion of the content and use of your Ning through selling its use to others who are interested in your topic.
  3. It is not a website. It is more restrained than a website in that you have compartmentalized content and not full freedom of use as you would with a website. But the expense to create some of these applications within a single website would be cost prohibitive.

A Ning is exciting, it is fun, it is interactive, but it really relies on member interaction. If you have a Ning and no members, you have nothing. If you are going to consider doing your own Ning, check out mine first at http://webauthority.ning.com/ This fairly simple Ning took around 6 hours to create and is a work in progress. It uses one of the Ning templates and includes many of the free modules customized for my use. You can create custom advertising sections with images on your own Ning.

Feel free to join my Ning if only just to check it out and run it through its paces and see what a Ning is. I won’t pester you at all to interact or with spam mailings. This way you can see if a Ning is for you.

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Social Media: People Are Hungry, No, Starving to Connect

I am shocked really, today I worked on my Facebook and LinkedIn profiles and sent out some invitations and requested for LinkedIn recommendations. Within minutes I had a slew of question responses, tons of new friends, and six recommendations. The response has staggered me. I have toyed with social media networking, it has seemed like a time pit to me without any selling value, but I have to say I am strongly rethinking my viewpoint.

Here’s what I have found so far:

  1. People who are acquaintances, colleagues, and clients really want to know you better.
  2. People want to share what they know through LinkedIn questions and answers.
  3. People want to share resources that they have found to help someone they know.
  4. People are not afraid to give you a recommendation, if you ask for it.

Interesting, as I thought people would just be too busy to do any of these things and that Facebook and LinkedIn were only for people who had a lot of time on their hands. Not so, clearly.

My big question has always been, and has been shared by other professionals, is that the time you invest in social media, specifically social networking, may not translate into sales. But based on what I have seen this may be a concern that I may need to reconsider. Most of my business comes from referrals of other satisfied customers. With these new networking tools, I may be able to tap into the second degree of separation to my colleagues and clients to garner additional clients and access to news and emerging technology through my own connections. This would provide more value to me personally and warrant the time investment not only with increased sales and contacts, but access to new emerging trends and technologies.

As I got responses from others in from my LinkedIn question on how others are effectively using social media, I am finding that use of the question and answer tool is very important and video continues to pop up as a very important aspect as well.

You can click in and join my three social media networks from the badges on my right side bar right now and I’ll accept you. This way you can be part of the conversation as I do additional research on how to effectively use social media and social networking for your business. I’ll be sharing my findings with my networks and offering ideas and suggestions.

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The Color of Your Money Does Not Determine Your Organic Placement

This is a truth that you should remember especially when you get contacted by search engine optimization firms from a cold call. You cannot buy organic placement on Google!

Google placement is not for sale! This is not the first time that I have heard this story, a client calls and says for $xxxx a month this firm guarantees top placement on Google and Yahoo because they have a special partnership with the search engines. Just these statements alone should put up a red flag for you and you should not buy into the scam. That is what it is, a scam to separate you from your money.

Google has over 150 different factors that determine organic search placement and the color of your money is not one of them! Google does not partner with SEO firms to provide organic placement. Actually that is one of the best things about Google. A small firm can actually compete with a large firm for great organic placement through great content, regular updates, and slow link building strategies. The playing field is leveled by considering what really matters to readers – targeted and great content.

Now, notice that I have not said the same about Yahoo. This democratic mentality does not apply to Yahoo. You may possibly be able to buy your way on Yahoo. We know that Yahoo preferentially will show websites in organic placement results that have bought into their local non-PPC programs sold through advertising agencies, but Yahoo is closed mouthed to even us, professional webmasters, on the real details here and how to participate. So you may be able to buy your placement on Yahoo, but be very careful over what you buy in to.

The bottom line is, if a firm says we can guarantee top organic placement on Google, you should question the program as they CANNOT guarantee this, Google is not for sale!

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PPC Strategy 101

If you need extra push for your business, then you should seriously be looking at Google AdWords first. Yahoo is a good second choice to consider, but for most people, you really don’t need to consider MSN at this time.

MSN has lost so much traction in the world of pay per click, that I have to say I just don’t think that investing in the set up and management of a program there warrants the expense. There is a very narrow market there and the return on investment is simply not happening.

It used to be that for the majority of accounts you would receive nearly half of your AdWords conversions on Yahoo and then again about another half of what you got on Yahoo on MSN, but now the figures are even more dismal. Here is just one very pointed example for one high tech client:

Google AdWords: 4725 clicks, 209,254 impressions 2.26% CTR

Yahoo: 1536 clicks 87,136 impressions 1.76% CTR

MSN: 69 clicks 1,970 impressions 3.50%CTR

This program is just showing on search and search partners, no clicks are coming from content. Clearly MSN simply does not have the technical search traffic for industrial and high tech customers that Google and Yahoo do.

If you are selling entertainment products, beauty products MSN may still be a solution for your needs but if your PPC program is for technical and business don’t waste your time with MSN at this point.