Business Archives - AndreaVascellari.com

4 Steps to Reach your Target Audience

What are some of the first steps a business owner should take when creating his or her digital strategy? I shared 4 tips to better reach your target audience during an interview with Andrea Genovese of Wind Business Factor. The video is in Italian, but the original transcript has been translated into English below by my team at itive.net. Enjoy!
Andrea

The Experience of a Business Owner

When a business owner is going to use the web for the first time he or she should keep a few important things in mind. First and foremost, a business owner should no longer think of the web or “digital world” as something disconnected from the real one.

Today, the web is constantly evolving. And a consumer and a business owner can do business exactly as they would if they were downtown “IRL” (in real life).

First, the most important thing to understand is where you are as a business and where you would like to go. Therefore, at this initial starting point there is a need to create a digital strategy that will allow you to reach your goals.

Second, you should analyze the tactics that will be utilized to achieve your objectives and reach the finish line. After that, you could reach out for support from somebody who has experience in this arena. It could be a web agency like us at itive.net, it could be an external consultant, an online communicator who in a certain sense could help you move through these “first steps” of the digital world.

Before you start to do any of this, though, be silent and use these, one of the most important organs we have, your ears. You have to listen carefully in order to learn about what is happening in your niche market. You have to be attentive listeners and figure out the dynamics that are in your market, as well as to identify the needs of your consumers. Once you understand the current situation within your market, you should contribute to the conversation and become an active member who interacts with the digital communication dynamics that are already taking place in your field.

In summary, the 4 tips for creating digital strategy are:

Listen to what is happening within your niche market
Analyze the market dynamics
Evaluate the needs of your consumers
Contribute to the conversation and to the digital dynamics

If you’re interested in creating your digital strategy with us, feel free to contact us or go ahead and click here to fill out a “get started” form and we’ll help you get there!

Engaging Consumers – Social Media Boot Camp for Entrepreneurs

Engaging Consumers – Social Media Boot Camp for Entrepreneurs

View more presentations from Andrea Vascellari.

This week I had the pleasure of being invited by Eric Schwartzman to present as a guest speaker at his Social Media Boot Camp for Entrepreneurs in Rome (Italy) during Social Media Week. I talked about how you can engage consumers (current and potential) in new ways using social media.

In my presentation I shared:

Two case studies + Take aways (Teymur Madjderey aka Icedsoul, and Exclusive Sicily)
Some Interesting books
Special tips for entrepreneurs on strategic use of Twitter, Facebook and Slideshare

Of course, a special thanks to Eric and a digital hug to all the interesting entrepreneurs that I met at the venue!

Andrea

Eric Schwartzman & Andrea Vascellari – Photo Credit: Leah D’Emilio

Communications Report for January 13th 2011 – AndreaVascellari.com

Do you want to get these report-updates in real time? Subscribe to the live-report RSS feed! This feed includes only report related items. It’s not a substitute but a complement to my main RSS feed which still remains the official one that brings you all my blog posts.

Participation in Real-Time Social Media Increased 20% in 2010 – Blog writing declined by 4%, and forum participation decreased by 11%. Participation in real-time social networks and microblogs, however, both grew by 20%.
Momentfeed is Google Analytics for the Real World – With the proliferation of location based services, it would seem that there is a real opportunity to better understand how people go about their daily lives.
YouTube Reports 200m Mobile Daily Mobile Views, 2.0 App for Android – 75% of respondents say that mobile is their primary way of accessing YouTube.
HOW TO: Create a World-Class Online Community for Your Business – 9 steps businesses must take in order to make their online communities world-class.
Are We Too Obsessed With Facebook? [INFOGRAPHIC] – Some highlights about Facebook usage, 2010 trends, adoption numbers and a great deal more.
5 Predictions for Small Business in 2011 – Here are my five predictions about how small businesses will continue to adapt to changing technologies as we move into the new year.
Email, Social Media to See More Marketing Dollars in 2011 – Email and social media are the top tactics marketers worldwide expect to increase budgets on in 2011.
10 Online Tools for Better Attention & Focus – A handful of the best apps for fighting back against the constant distractions of our digital lives.
44% of Online Sharing Occurs Through Facebook [INFOGRAPHIC] – Impressively, 44% of shares occurred through Facebook in 2010, up 33% from last year. That number does not include shares done via Facebook’s “Like” button, which means the actual, universal percentage of shares through Facebook is likely higher.
5 ingredients of smart online commerce – Seth’s Blog – Few things they do that make them successful online.
Exploring the Twitterverse – With Twitter at the center of the stellar system, apps orbit at different rotations based on their design and functionality.
6 Predictions for Digital Advertising in 2011 – Whether they choose to go big or small, the social web equips advertisers with significantly more consumer data points than ever before to improve the targeting and relevance of online advertising.
5 Predictions for Small Business in 2011 – Predictions about how small businesses will continue to adapt to changing technologies as we move into the new year.

Communications Report for December 20th 2010 – AndreaVascellari.com

Do you want to get these report-updates in real time? Subscribe to the live-report RSS feed! This feed includes only report related items. It’s not a substitute but a complement to my main RSS feed which still remains the official one that brings you all my blog posts.

Search Engine Optimization – Hmmm…’juicy’ links by Chris.
More Than Half of Mobile Ads are on Smartphones, Says inMobi – Smartphone impressions are now the majority (56%) of mobile ads in the United States. inMobi says that it has increased its ad impressions by 600 million monthly (+25%) in the past 90 days, thanks to a huge (57%) increase in smartphone inventory.
Facebook Brings Facial Recognition to Photo Tagging – Facebook Photos, one of the social network’s most popular features, is getting a big and potentially controversial upgrade with a new feature that automatically suggests who users should tag in photos based on facial recognition technology.
Pepsi Refresh Project Netted 61 Million Votes – Consumers cast 61 million votes— compared to about 89 million for the 2010 U.S. general election — on refresheverything.com to make a case for their various causes, the company said. Pepsi has pledged to give away $20 million via the program. To date, the program has given about $14.6 million to fund 352 ideas. The site also got 1.6 million comments.
Young and Mobile: A Global View of Cellphones and Youth | Nielsen Wire – 16 percent of young people reported that their parents selected their mobile phone. Price was the most common consideration among youth in selecting a mobile phone, though that is true among other age groups, too. Youth aged 15 to 24 in all countries surveyed put price as the first purchase driver, with the exception of Russian youth, 21 percent of whom placed design/style first.
Social Media Success: 5 Lessons from In-House Corporate Teams – Here we are highlighting five companies that have enjoyed long term success with their own social media teams and taking a look at some of the measurable returns they have seen as the results of their programs.
Slides: Social Business Forecast: 2011 The Year of Integration (LeWeb Keynote) – Research reveals corporations to focus on integration, staffing, advertising, and measurement in 2011.
Americans Now Spend As Much Time Using Internet as TV [STATS] – The average American now spends roughly 13 hours per week using the Internet and watching TV offline.
How Much Is a Tweet Worth? $500, Says Toyota – The car manufacturer is rewarding those who purchase a new Toyota by January 3 with a $500 debit card for tweeting about it.
The Anatomy of a Perfect Landing Page – Nice & clear.

Communications Report for December 20th 2010 – AndreaVascellari.com

Do you want to get these report-updates in real time? Subscribe to the live-report RSS feed! This feed includes only report related items. It’s not a substitute but a complement to my main RSS feed which still remains the official one that brings you all my blog posts.

Search Engine Optimization – Hmmm…’juicy’ links by Chris.
More Than Half of Mobile Ads are on Smartphones, Says inMobi – Smartphone impressions are now the majority (56%) of mobile ads in the United States. inMobi says that it has increased its ad impressions by 600 million monthly (+25%) in the past 90 days, thanks to a huge (57%) increase in smartphone inventory.
Facebook Brings Facial Recognition to Photo Tagging – Facebook Photos, one of the social network’s most popular features, is getting a big and potentially controversial upgrade with a new feature that automatically suggests who users should tag in photos based on facial recognition technology.
Pepsi Refresh Project Netted 61 Million Votes – Consumers cast 61 million votes— compared to about 89 million for the 2010 U.S. general election — on refresheverything.com to make a case for their various causes, the company said. Pepsi has pledged to give away $20 million via the program. To date, the program has given about $14.6 million to fund 352 ideas. The site also got 1.6 million comments.
Young and Mobile: A Global View of Cellphones and Youth | Nielsen Wire – 16 percent of young people reported that their parents selected their mobile phone. Price was the most common consideration among youth in selecting a mobile phone, though that is true among other age groups, too. Youth aged 15 to 24 in all countries surveyed put price as the first purchase driver, with the exception of Russian youth, 21 percent of whom placed design/style first.
Social Media Success: 5 Lessons from In-House Corporate Teams – Here we are highlighting five companies that have enjoyed long term success with their own social media teams and taking a look at some of the measurable returns they have seen as the results of their programs.
Slides: Social Business Forecast: 2011 The Year of Integration (LeWeb Keynote) – Research reveals corporations to focus on integration, staffing, advertising, and measurement in 2011.
Americans Now Spend As Much Time Using Internet as TV [STATS] – The average American now spends roughly 13 hours per week using the Internet and watching TV offline.
How Much Is a Tweet Worth? $500, Says Toyota – The car manufacturer is rewarding those who purchase a new Toyota by January 3 with a $500 debit card for tweeting about it.
The Anatomy of a Perfect Landing Page – Nice & clear.

Communications Report for December 6th 2010 – AndreaVascellari.com

Do you want to get these report-updates in real time? Subscribe to the live-report RSS feed! This feed includes only report related items. It’s not a substitute but a complement to my main RSS feed which still remains the official one that brings you all my blog posts.

Online Advertising Sucks – How often do you hear about a traditional mass media company shifting to a “digital first” strategy? Those companies may want to take a look at this…
How the Fortune 500 Use Social Media to Grow Sales and Revenue – The truth is, there are only five different ways the Fortune 500 use social media. Seriously — just five. And once you know what they are, you can figure out which ones would be most useful for your business.
College Students Admit To “Shocking” Text Messaging Habits in Class – According to data released from Nielsen this fall, that age group sends around 1,630 texts per month – roughly three texts per hour.
Research Examines What Motivates People to Comment Online – The study examined user activity specifically to try to gauge the influence of “emotional content” on users’ behavior. Using sentiment analysis, the researchers looked at content, separating “objective” and “subjective”, and then examined users’ responses
How 10 Year Olds Explain Cloud Computing – They explain cloud computing in a simple, clear way. They don’t see limits to the cloud. They see it as infinite, accessible anywhere, any time.
Intelligently silence Gmail conversations with “Smart Mute” – If you enable “Smart Mute” from the Labs tab in Gmail Settings, muted conversations will only appear in your inbox if a new message in the conversation is addressed to you and no one else, or a new email in the conversation adds you to the “To” or “Cc” line. Once you enable Smart Mute, mute behavior will change across all versions of Gmail: web, mobile, Android, etc.
Study: Two-Thirds of Marketers Integrate Social Media and Email Marketing – Just because social media may be a new addition to your marketing mix doesn’t mean email marketing should be eliminated. In fact, social media can help to enhance your email marketing efforts.
The State of Small Business Online Marketing Budgets [REPORT] – According to the survey, 54% of respondents indicated that their businesses currently have websites. Regarding website features, the vast majority (80%) of websites include general business information, while customer service (45%), lead generation (35%) and e-commerce (30%) features trail in at a distant second, third and fourth places. A mere 13% of businesses reported having a blog.
YouTube top search term in Japan for third year running – #trends A survey by Yahoo! Japan of the most used search terms in 2010 has shown that YouTube is still the most popular search term in Japan for the third year running.
How To: Build a private collaboration site on WordPress.com in 5 minutes – #productive & #smart
Introducing the PostRank Facebook Analytics App – This new Facebook analytics application, which will help publishers solve not one, but two problems at once…
Popularity does not equal influence on Twitter: Seeking influence – only one in 318 messages containing an internet address is “retweeted” the researchers found.
Social Media Case Study: Cold Stone Creamery – The payoff goes well beyond greater customer engagement; Cold Stone’s promotions add to the bottom line by moving people from their computers to physical stores.

Communications Report for December 6th 2010 – AndreaVascellari.com

Do you want to get these report-updates in real time? Subscribe to the live-report RSS feed! This feed includes only report related items. It’s not a substitute but a complement to my main RSS feed which still remains the official one that brings you all my blog posts.

Online Advertising Sucks – How often do you hear about a traditional mass media company shifting to a “digital first” strategy? Those companies may want to take a look at this…
How the Fortune 500 Use Social Media to Grow Sales and Revenue – The truth is, there are only five different ways the Fortune 500 use social media. Seriously — just five. And once you know what they are, you can figure out which ones would be most useful for your business.
College Students Admit To “Shocking” Text Messaging Habits in Class – According to data released from Nielsen this fall, that age group sends around 1,630 texts per month – roughly three texts per hour.
Research Examines What Motivates People to Comment Online – The study examined user activity specifically to try to gauge the influence of “emotional content” on users’ behavior. Using sentiment analysis, the researchers looked at content, separating “objective” and “subjective”, and then examined users’ responses
How 10 Year Olds Explain Cloud Computing – They explain cloud computing in a simple, clear way. They don’t see limits to the cloud. They see it as infinite, accessible anywhere, any time.
Intelligently silence Gmail conversations with “Smart Mute” – If you enable “Smart Mute” from the Labs tab in Gmail Settings, muted conversations will only appear in your inbox if a new message in the conversation is addressed to you and no one else, or a new email in the conversation adds you to the “To” or “Cc” line. Once you enable Smart Mute, mute behavior will change across all versions of Gmail: web, mobile, Android, etc.
Study: Two-Thirds of Marketers Integrate Social Media and Email Marketing – Just because social media may be a new addition to your marketing mix doesn’t mean email marketing should be eliminated. In fact, social media can help to enhance your email marketing efforts.
The State of Small Business Online Marketing Budgets [REPORT] – According to the survey, 54% of respondents indicated that their businesses currently have websites. Regarding website features, the vast majority (80%) of websites include general business information, while customer service (45%), lead generation (35%) and e-commerce (30%) features trail in at a distant second, third and fourth places. A mere 13% of businesses reported having a blog.
YouTube top search term in Japan for third year running – #trends A survey by Yahoo! Japan of the most used search terms in 2010 has shown that YouTube is still the most popular search term in Japan for the third year running.
How To: Build a private collaboration site on WordPress.com in 5 minutes – #productive & #smart
Introducing the PostRank Facebook Analytics App – This new Facebook analytics application, which will help publishers solve not one, but two problems at once…
Popularity does not equal influence on Twitter: Seeking influence – only one in 318 messages containing an internet address is “retweeted” the researchers found.
Social Media Case Study: Cold Stone Creamery – The payoff goes well beyond greater customer engagement; Cold Stone’s promotions add to the bottom line by moving people from their computers to physical stores.

Online Video Secrets – Get Seen

Episode: VMC #331 – Online Video Secrets – Get Seen

Subscribe to the show on YouTube!

Show Notes & Credits: Powered by itive.net, Steve Garfield, Get Seen (book)

The key for success in this digital era

I believe that the key for success in this digital era lies at the intersection of technology, business and people. It’s something so simple, right?

Well, you might be surprised to know that for many this is still a difficult concept to understand and achieve.

Just think about it.

Think about how many talented teams of engineers (people) have great ideas and develop new excellent products (technology) but don’t know what an actually business plan (business) looks like. On the other hand, think about great marketing campaigns that sell lousy products or when products are targeted to the wrong audience. Every time you see a project failing there’s always something missing from one of these 3 core spheres: technology, business and people.

A vital concept that many people probably don’t pay enough attention to because of its almost too extreme simplicity.

At the world blogging forum (check video below) I explored some of the trends that we are seeing in the 3 spheres linking back to what we are doing in Finland.

Please keep in mind: The audience was ‘general’ and not representative of any specific niche so this was not a technical talk, a keynote presentation or a workshop targeted to advanced strategies and tactics to leverage each aspect of these 3 spheres. I simply introduced the audience to this concept and left the topic open for discussion during the panel with the other panelists. If you are interested in more specific presentations with advanced content you might be interested in having a look at m my speaking archive.

I once again thank Ritchie (@datadirt) for inviting me and for the flawless organization of the event. And now, enjoy the video!

Andrea

Andrea Vascellari -The key for success in this digital era from World Blogging Forum Vienna 2010 on Vimeo.

The key for success in this digital era

I believe that the key for success in this digital era lies at the intersection of technology, business and people. It’s something so simple, right?

Well, you might be surprised to know that for many this is still a difficult concept to understand and achieve.

Just think about it.

A vital concept that many people probably don’t pay enough attention to because of its almost too extreme simplicity.

At the world blogging forum (check video below) I explored some of the trends that we are seeing in the 3 spheres linking back to what we are doing in Finland.

I once again thank Ritchie (@datadirt) for inviting me and for the flawless organization of the event. And now, enjoy the video!

Andrea

Andrea Vascellari -The key for success in this digital era from World Blogging Forum Vienna 2010 on Vimeo.