After building up a following of about 19 million active users, Twitter has finally revealed their plans for capitalizing on that massive audience. Company co-founder, Biz Stone, announced in his blog post this morning about Twitter’s new “simple” ad service – “Promoted Tweets” – to boost their company revenue.

Promoted Tweets are ads that will be shown on the top of the search pages that Twitter members use to find other members. There is nothing original in Twitter’s model. Facebook and Yahoo! are already gaining significant revenues from advertisements targeted at their audiences.

It should come as no surprise that Twitter has had no problem in attracting major advertisers to their site. The first wave of advertisers includes Bravo, Red Bull, Starbucks and Sony Pictures. You can expect many more big names to be added to this list shortly.

Of course, Twitter’s fan base has enjoyed the site so much because- in part- the site wasn’t crammed with advertisements. Twitter users must be asking themselves, “Will these promoted tweets be at all helpful for online businesses? And “Are these advertisers going to be haunting me every time I ‘tweet’?”

Here is an excerpt from AOL Daily Finance explaining the issue:

Many companies already use “tweets” on Twitter to promote their products and services, so the new program is a logical extension of that. But the new Promoted Tweets may annoy Twitter users. It is one thing for a company to use the standard “tweet” system to talk about their goods and services. It is quite another for ad messages to appear out of this system and on the top of Twitter search pages.

Twitter will face the same problem that Facebook did when it first launched its advertising program. Users will wonder if they are being targeted by advertisers who track their behavior on the site. This, in turn, may cause members to attack the ad messages and Twitter management.

But Twitter had to find a way to make money. The company is four years old and has not yet put together a plan to make itself profitable. This has raised questions about the firm’s valuation, which some estimate could be as high as $1 billion.

We understand that Twitter needed to start making money for their business, but will this make Twitter users rebel? Was this a good business plan to go with?

Think about it, though. Even in an extreme case where 50% of Twitter users were to jump ship – that still leaves a staggering of 9.5 million, an audience that advertisers would be thrilled to reach!

Do you use Twitter? How do you feel about it? We’d love to hear your views!

To read the full AOL Daily Finance Article, Click Here.

What is Email Marketing?

If you have an email address, you’ve seen plenty of examples of email marketing. A clothing store might tell you about some new styles, a car dealership might let you know about a special financing deal, a local restaurant might let you know about new menu items.

Email marketing is a form of direct marketing which allows anyone to send messages directly to a pre-determined list of users. These messages can be anything from simple, plain text to rich, graphic-laden pages (similar to normal websites). Email marketing messages are delivered right to the recipient’s inbox, just like normal email.

Email marketing differs from other online marketing in that it is inexpensive, easy to send, highly measureable, and goes straight to a target’s inbox. It’s another tool in your online marketing toolbox.

Now, let’s take a look at what makes email marketing so useful.

The Advantages of Email Marketing

1. Low Cost

Email-based marketing costs can be as low as $0.005 per email. This compares favorably to other online marketing methods like pay-per-click or cost-per-impression advertising. Compared to the expense of traditional mail marketing, the savings are even greater (think about all the printing and postage costs!).

2. Measurable Results

Using innovative tracking systems, email marketing allows you to know exactly how many people receive your message, how many open it, and how many actually click on the links and calls to action contained within your message. Armed with this knowledge, you can make adjustments and improvements to subsequent emails.

3. Precision Targeting

Send emails exactly where you want them to go. You can easily create segmented lists and direct different messages to designated customer groups. You can collect email addresses from a number of sources, including your existing customer database. Adding a “mailing list” box to your website is a great way to build a list of users who are interesting in to hearing from you.

4. Interactive

Email newsletters don’t limit you to simple, static content. You can include video, music, polls and more. These tools provide multiple ways to engage your customers.

5. Strong Calls to Action

Clicking on a link or button is very easy, which means that recipients have to take very little effort to follow through on a call to action. Compare this with traditional newsletters where recipients have to dial a phone number or type a website address into their computer.

6. Highly Personalized

Use your database to easily greet recipients by name. Make them feel that they aren’t receiving a generic mass email.

7. Time and Venue Shifting

Recipients can read your message on their own time and on the device of their choosing, whether that means in a traditional email inbox or on an iPhone. This freedom increases open rates and engagement rates.

8. Opt-In & Unsubscribe Options

Because email lists are easy to opt-in and opt-out of, you don’t have to worry about customers receiving unsolicited and unwanted advertising.

9. Instant Response

Most recipients will read your message within minutes or hours. You can know the success of your campaign the same day you send it instead of weeks down the line.

10. Simple

No need to coordinate design, printing, and mailing as is necessary with physical mail-shots. And unlike other forms of online marketing, you don’t have vague targets and results. Email marketing is straightforward: send a message to a targeted list of recipients. Write the message and press send.

11. Easy To Get Started

Getting started with your mailing list is simple. You probably even have a huge database of email addresses already. Think about all the email addresses you have in your current email system, Rolodex, Blackberry, or other device. And surely you have at least a handful of company news, special offers, or other piece of information you want to share with your contacts.

Blue Fountain Media successfully employs Email Marketing campaigns for a wide variety of clients. To find out how we can help you get your own program started, request a quote or call 212-260-1978.

At the SMX East Ad Agencies discussion, a few of the panelists have discussed the problems they run into when they scale up SEO, particularly as part of a large company or a complex marketing plan.

Blue Fountain Media has approached the same problem—we work with large, Fortune 500 companies; we work alongside PR companies and ad agencies; and we often work with websites that use legacy software, and companies that face strict regulatory issues. Here’s what we’ve learned about integrating search engine optimization into larger campaigns.

1. Find out what the broader goals are: if the PR company is rebranding a client as a premium provider, it’s a good idea for us to avoid targeting keywords that start with “cheap”. At the same time, it’s good to find out how their marketing materials describe the company. If they describe themselves as “The only company in the X industry that offers unconditional full refunds,” you can guess that customers who don’t remember the name may remember the pitch—and target keywords accordingly.
2. Learn who to communicate with: there’s nothing worse than realizing that a week-long email thread could have been resolved with a five-minute phone call to the right person. At Blue Fountain Media, we go to the source: if we’re doing something that involves media outreach, we’ll talk to the PR people first; if we need to edit a client’s website, we’ll work with the IT team to do it as efficiently as possible.
3. Get ready to share credit—in both directions: The PR team got them into the top industry trade magazine. The SEO team made sure that mention came with a link. Obviously, the PR team scored a major hit—but the SEO team helped get even more value out of it.

   We’ve gotten the best results when we measure what actions we’ve taken, and what results those actions usually get. When a PR company, an SEO firm, and an internal IT team work together, they can compound the results—if something goes wrong, keeping close track of the actions taken lets you pinpoint what didn’t work.

4. Share insight: SEO and social media marketing simply can’t be matched when it comes to finding data. It’s impossible to get so much high-quality information—on what customers are looking for, what convinces them to buy, what prices and discounts they respond to.

   But we’re happy to share. If an SEO campaign reveals that customers love “25% off your first two purchases!” and don’t care for “half off your second purchase!” that’s information that can be used in TV ads, in-store displays, and other forms of traditional marketing.

   At the same time, PR agencies can give us good people to contact, and general advertising agencies often come up with great creative ideas that we can incorporate into search and social interaction.

At Blue Fountain Media, we don’t operate in a vacuum. And we don’t want to! We’re web design and search engine marketing experts, and we’re happy to work alongside experts in other fields. The most common result is that we all provide a better service to the client.

(source: Jason Nicholls)

Many companies are at a point where their brand identity in an on-line environment is static in an era of chaos. Things that used to work now don’t. Traditional branding has always been built on out-branding the competition in an ever-increasing advertising clutter-filled environment, media fragmentation, and the seemingly limitless choices that are offered in just about every product category.

Why do some companies “get it” and some are being left behind in the dust? Why are Nike, JetBlue, and Zappos the poster-children for companies that “get it”, and how are they achieving their social media success? Why is transparency so important? Will these things have a positive ROI and how do you measure it?

We have to remember that social media is just one piece of the puzzle and a component of branding. The following are things you have to remember when trying to build a strong brand interactively:

Listen:

I’ve mentioned numerous times that as a brand you have to actively listen. Create ego-centric searches on as many social media platforms as you can—Twitter, Facebook, Google Blogsearch, Friendfeed, Technorati. Read blogs and people’s comments—understand what people are saying, and always ask yourself why. Why are people saying what they say?

Care:

Ultimately one of the core aspects as a company or brand is that you care about your customers and your own product or service. I know this sounds fundamental, but many companies’ online presence suggest that they just don’t give a damn about either—and they didn’t have to in the past. Customers were forced to rely on brands that gave them bad customer service and they had no say in it. The power of broadcasting bad customer service wasn’t transparent.

Online Real Estate & Interaction:

Wherever there is conversation you have to connect with it—connecting with people is integral, not only as a brand but as a society. Build your brand on:

• Twitter (Word of Mouth on steroids)

• Facebook and/or Myspace (soon becoming obsolete unless you’re a musician)

• Flickr (for photos)

• Youtube (for video)

• StumbleUpon/Digg (for discovering websites and voting on them)

• LinkedIn to connect with your employees and business related individuals

There are other social networks out there like Plaxo, Friendfeed, Bebo, etc., but those depend on your needs versus wants and on the audience or consumer you want to target.

Signing up for these services is just the first step, actively listening and participating is the second step. Participating on a timely manner and correcting situations is the next.

Content:

Content is key! Create new content regularly. Think about it as your interactive voice—you want to have something to say, but don’t be annoying and obnoxious (no one really likes jerks). Create content on you website or blog regularly—at least twice a week (create one if you don’t have one—it also helps your website’s SEO). Create engaging content—company and industry news—and make it personal (people like human emotions, we’re hardwired that way). And if you promise something follow through with it. Many have promised the world to their customers (*AHEM—Cuil*) and don’t follow through 100% of the time. You lose credibility as a brand and trust is hard to get back once you lose it.

Conversation & Community:

Now that you are listening to the conversation, you should participate to stay actively pertinent. Comment on blogs and converse with “Tweeters”—all in a reasonable time-frame (the sooner the better). If you discover bad news or negativity of your brand, try not to be too defensive—be honest, professional, and deal with the situation as best as you can (and always try to go above and beyond what’s expected) .

Also make sure that you are easily “accessible” by the community, since you are so connected. When a customer needs some customer service, don’t shun them! Connect with them!

Also be human—I know this sounds stupid, but people forget (intentionally or unintentionally). These social media platforms are tools to connect—Twitter is a powerful tool to connect, sometimes faster than email and phone communication. Quick response is optimal, but any response is better than no response.

Passion:

Last but not least, have some passion! Passion is one of the most important factors, if not the most important factor as a brand. I’ve briefly touched on this earlier with caring for your customer and product. Sure you have to have a quality product, conversation, avenues, listening skills, but if you’re doing all those things without passion, you may as well not do them at all. Because it will show.

Last night, the BFM marketing team (@alhankeser, @ishquez, @zacksinkler, and I) attended Mashable’s NextUp event. Here’s a great summary of the NextUp speakers.

Just in case you were there for the presentations and not the audience, here are some of the folks you could have met at Mashable’s NextUp NYC last night:

Lauren Litwinka: The charismatic online face of Hudson Horizons. Loves Bubble Tweet. Follow her: @beebow.

Lea Marino: Created Incognito’s social presence. Follow her: @LvM.

Jeff Stolarcyk: Jack of all (online) trades at Solid Cactus Web. Follow him: @TheOtherJeff.

The secretive founder of the street art and personal finance collective EnjoyBanking.com & you may have seen their street art all around Manhattan. Follow them: @enjoybanking.

The team at Zemoga (DJ Edgerton, their CEO, achieved the networker’s dream of meeting lots of people, and the networker’s nightmare of running out of business cards by the end of the night). Follow him: @wiltonbound.

Tyler Pennock of Ruder Finn, who knows more than anyone about introducing big brands to niche social media sites, and getting them to play nicely together. Follow him at @typennock.

Jamie Propp at Sanga A, who is cooking up ways to mix high fashion and new media.

Kiki Vassoler at Pitch Media, who is turning her considerable PR talents to the social media world. Check her LinkedIn.

Thomas Cohn, an attorney with Venable, who is helping clients navigate tricky FCC regulations applied to new contexts. Take a look at his LinkedIn.

Forrest Pan, a consultant with an interest in social media. His LinkedIn.

Alex Mann of AM Analytics who, having worked for the best investment bank, the newspaper of record, and two of his own ventures before finishing school, is now building a company that plans to revolutionize social media metrics. He’s on Twitter, too, as @alexjmann.

Megan Nesta with the IDT Group, who is looking into social media as a new way to market some high-end products that wouldn’t traditionally be sold that way. Find her on Twitter: @mjnesta.

Kennedy Moore of Ask a New Yorker, who is helping eight million people have a civil conversation & one of the most audacious business plans in history.

Alex Payne at MWW Group, who actually managed to listen to several of the presentations, and even took good notes. Follow him: @alexmpayne.

And many many more people whose business cards seem to have vanished. Drop us an email or leave a comment if we missed you.

Oh, right, and some blogger was there. MoneyMax? TopDollar? CashMore? I forget.

Now that we are officially in a recession (and have been for over a year), it is time to start spending money wisely. The oversized marketing budgets of the past are set to be replaced by smarter investments like search engine optimization of websites coupled with social media marketing.

Here a few reasons why it makes sense to invest in your website right now:

Learn from the past and prepare for the future: Research shows that companies that spend money on marketing during a recession tend to benefit over companies who cut back on their marketing budgets. Not only is it a good idea to continue your online marketing budgets, but cutting back could cost you more in the long run. Place yourself in a good position to be found online now so that once people start shopping more eagerly down the road, you’ll be right there waiting. If you wait until the economy is back in shape to start an SEO campaign, you’ll be behind the game.

Check out the competition: The big “R” is forcing your competition to take a look at their spending habits and, according to eMarketer, traditional marketing budgets are shrinking and online marketing budgets are increasing. If your competition is investing in their online marketing strategies and you know in the past companies that continue to invest in marketing benefit, then it’s clear you shouldn’t be cutting your marketing budget, but increasing it.

Traditional marketing budgets are being spent online because you can measure the results more effectively! There are a number of tools and metrics to tell you just where your traffic, leads and conversions are coming from. Once you know, you can reorganize you online spending to make it more effective. Traditional advertising doesn’t even come close to giving you the direct feedback and measured results that you get online.

Follow the leaders: Warren Buffet and Rupert Murdoch are still investing and so should you. In fact, entrepreneurship is up almost 12% above the height of the mid-90′s dotcom boom.

The economy is cyclical and downturns are typically short-lived so don’t waste any time. Now is the time to be smart, learn from the past and start investing more in your online marketing. While others are cutting back, you will ready to go when we start to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Consumers everywhere seek out the best deals at this time of year, and properly optimized e-commerce vendors were at a particular advantage thanks to the ease of shopping around on the internet using search engines, which gives these businesses instant access to the users who are already looking to buy their products.

Invent words. There are many domain names out there that are one-word, nonsensical utterances that do not mean anything, but are catchy and easy to remember. One example is Deezer.com, the website formally known as Blogmusik.net. To stand out from the hundreds of “music” and “blog” combinations, they went with the new catch-word, Deezer. This solution is not suitable for everyone (imagine www.lawyuz.com being used for a law firm), especially not for small businesses that do not have multi-million marketing budgets to spread their nonsensical name throughout the Web (i.e. Google).

Use keywords. Whenever possible, add in a keyword or two to give your domain name that extra little boost. Of course that can lead to some very spammy looking domain names such as mortgage-homebuyer-badcredit.net. SEOMoz has a rudimentary algorithm for analyzing a domain name and determining whether it is spammy or not. We passed the test with a score of 0.385 (1 being extremely spammy and 0 being, well, tough to get close to unless using a .gov or .edu domain extension). Remember: do not sacrifice quality for a few keywords. It is more important to have a domain name that is creative and unique.

Keep it short. Whatever you do, make sure that when you say what your domain name is over the phone, that someone will remember it. You should not have to email someone a link for them to visit your website. It should be easy enough to remember that a client can type it in themselves into the browser address line.

Use your company name. Okay, so this is the traditional way of going about picking your domain name when you are not an online company and already have name for you business. It also has its risks, though. First of all, be sure that your domain name doesn’t do something like this: www.atcibusinessschool.com. Second, the length of your company name may be too long. Consider shortening it. For example, consider using www.tahitibar.com instead of an entire company name such as “Tahiti Late Night Dancing Bar”.

Spending money on the Internet offers a number of advantages that have attracted the auto industry. Results are measurable, audiences can be easily and precisely targeted, and the price paid is for results – not Nielsen Ratings.