Online Marketing Budgets: Skip Social Media?

I know that I'm doing a lot of badmouthing social media today, but a lot of this stuff should be thought about at least by those that use it a lot for their businesses. Knowing the downsides of things is usually the best way to decide if the upsides are worth the hassle right?

Is social media the right choice for an online business? Most people believe it is great, but where is all the money coming from? Probably e-mail marketing, which has been around for over a decade. Someone that bought your weight loss drinks probably wouldn't be upset if you sent them an e-mail about your weight loss bars. Some of the cross-marketing of e-mails for people that don't immediately mark them as spam has always been very effective marketing.

Social media may get all the ink, but it is not getting most of the dollars – at least not from small businesses, says a new report.

The majority of small companies will plow most of their marketing funds into traditional websites and e-mail, says a report by online survey firm Zoomerang and GrowBiz media. The report surveyed 751 small firms, nearly all (89 percent) of which had fewer than 25 employees. more

Is Too Much Social Media a Bad Thing For Business?

Business owners love all the social networks. It's free advertising in the simplest form. You can connect many social networking accounts like Twitter, Facebook, Myspace, etc. and update them all to keep your customers informed about what is going on, sales, and anything else. Is it possible there is too much, or it can hurt you? Of course, but is there any reason NOT to use them?

For some business owners all these social networks are more time than they are worth. We actually have to spend time updating this stuff, and thinking abut what we are going to be posting on it don't we after all? What if none of these things really drive you business? What if they waste too much time? Maybe you should think about pulling back and focusing on what does. After all, are you going to sell a metal building on Twitter?

For two days this past summer, online men's clothing retailer Blank Label's social media presence went dark -- 48 hours without a new Twitter post or fresh Facebook posting. This was no technical hiccup, but rather a deliberate experimental maneuver by company cofounder Danny Wong and his partners to adjust the custom shirt design venture's social media strategy on the fly. Because from a revenue standpoint, they could no longer justify spending as much time and money on generating and updating content for networks such as Facebook and Twitter. more

Do You Overthing Social Network Marketing? Some Easy Tips

Today I'm going to post a couple things on social networking. You know, sites like Facebook, Twitter, etc. that we all love because they are free and we can reach millions of people for not much effort. Usually.

Sometimes we over think these mediums and spend too much time on them. These things aren't brain surgery to use, and many think way too long and hard about what they use them for, and how they go about it rather than spending time on something more important like the side effects of diet pills.

In the rush to gain subject matter credibility in the eyes of anyone who's paying attention, PR firms, advertising agencies, marketing organizations, application service providers, and consultants and consultancies in nearly every business vertical are all publishing reports, studies, white papers and more about social media-related marketing. But in nearly every case, they're either repeating what someone else has already said or, worse yet, they're wasting everyone's time by pointing out the obvious. more