Do you follow businesses on Twitter? Or are you a business on Twitter? Either way, you follow your favorite businesses to get real-time notifications about the latest hapennings and special offers or you promote your own business to connect with supporters and share news. We have talked about the positive role Twitter plays in search engines’ algorthims, which determine what websites are the most relevant – meaning, in large part, which sites are most liked by fellow internet users (people searching and shopping on the internet).

MG Siegler of TechCrunch talked to Twitter’s Adam Bain about newly promoted tweets:

“It turns out that on Twitter, users are already interacting with ads on a level that most would be surprised by,” Bain says. He notes that while traditional online display ads only get a click-through rate of something like 0.05 percent, some Promoted Tweets are seeing engagement in the double-digit percentages. “Engagement matters,” Bain says.

“Users want to be updated when brands have updates or exclusive content. The one problem we’ve heard from users is that when there is exclusive content or deals, there’s a chance they might miss them,” he says. “If the brand tweets at 9 AM, and the person comes in at 9:15 AM, they’ll miss them.”

“Resonance is also really important to us. This is about the realtime opportunity. And that expires fairly quickly,” Bain goes on, saying that in the ideal scenario, the things brands tweet will be “good, not loud”.

Bain says that the realtime aspect of the product is also vital to how Twitter places them. Because hot topics that people are Tweeting about can happen at any time, Twitter needs to be able to talk to a brand and quickly place an appropriate Tweet. “It’s realtime marketing at scale,” he says. “That’s the whole value proposition of the platform.”

We know positive reviews help local businesses by acting as recommendations or referrals for internet users considering purchasing a product or service. The more positive reviews a business gets, the easier it becomes for search engines to notice that business and consider it a relevant search result for users (consumers). Click on this link to read up on how reviews effect your marketing strategy. The post also discusses the impact fake reviews made by a competitor in the moving industry had on a number of moving companies. Read up on that story here.

Search engines like accurate, thorough content and they like fresh content. Beyond meta data, the more indicators that point to your business (outside links, reviews, “likes”, tweets, regularly updated content) the more important and valid search engines consider you to be and therefore the more likely you will have a strong internet presence in organic search. So vehicles like your website, blog and social media where you can endlessly update your site and/or profiles as often as possible are a great way to reach potential customers vis a vis search engine results and customers directly if they keep up with your sites on their own.

All that being said, you can see how Twitter plays an important role in “talking” to the search engines. It’s a place where new content appears in real time. The more, the merrier! Check out this blog post that walks you through the steps of a basic Twitter strategy for your business. Recently, an app called Breath Bird for Twitter was released for people who cannot use their fingers and who have problems speaking. I haven’t used it but I think the concept is great and there should probably be more apps created for handicapped people. Learn more about the app here.

Again, Google has impressed me with one of their Google Places demo videos! Here’s the last one that tickled me pink.

This one, which simply explains how to give your favorite places (restaurants, bars, painters, contractors, photographers, lawyers, chiropractors, etc.) a best ever medal in your rating. It’s the simplicity and the cheerful music that makes it so awesome! This music is reminiscent of the Conan movie score.

Regarding the idea of the gold medal itself … we like that, too! It’s a nice way to show appreciation for your favorite spots and to help give them the recognition they deserve. It’ll help those businesses rank higher in search and it’ll make it easier for your friends to discover your “best-evers”.

And Google’s +1 recently became accesible without having to be signed into your Google account – which makes another form of rating that much easier!

LOCQL. It’s similar to Quora or other Q+A user-generated sites. Right now, it looks like the site could benefit from some more legitmate users but the intent for a location-based Q+A social network is positive.

Questions based around given cities can help users find local eateries, bars, attractions and other things to do while traveling or even if you just want a fresh perspective on your own town.

If you’re thinking the site would be a good platform for marketing your small business, take precautions – like any link-building or blog commenting strategy, it’s best to have a real interest in the subject matter you’re looking at. You should offer a real solution for people’s needs. You’ll want to provide helpful tips and insight rather than just throwing your name into the mix without being respectful of the platform and its users, meaning that you want to build trust and establish credibility as a community member rather than as a name dropper or free advertiser.

Here’s a link to another post that explains how it works. Here’s a link to LOCQL itself.

Today I came across a Mashable post discussing brand identity in the digital world. Ron Rogowski talks about how brands used to use their actual product to differentiate themselves in the marketplace. But now, the tech landscape is so crowded with similar products that it’s much more of a challenge to compete.

The mobile takeover has provided unique opportunities to market your brand and, frankly, if you don’t get on the bus, you could very easily get left in the dust. We’ve discussed check-ins and location-based apps where businesses offer coupons when you make a purchase or track your spending so you can accrue points for discounts and special offers later. These are some of the most common uses where businesses focus their marketing efforts into the mobile market.  The post on Mashable suggests using the same tools, but using them differently in order to stand out. Rogowski says the experience is the differentiator.

Check out his post for some ideas on where to begin.

Stay true to what it is that you do by incorporating promotions that will be useful to your demographic, rather than doing something like hosting a giveaway of a popular item that has nothing to do with your brand or attracting a network interested in YOUR product or services.

Experiment with different outlets to find what works for you and what draws the highest level of interest and, more importantly, response from consumers.

There are reports that Twitter is releasing their own photo sharing service. No, Twitpic is not Twitter. Some are wondering why Twitter would continue to alienate third parties like Twitpic and YFrog that support them … or why not just acquire Twitpic?

Bottom line = Twitter is looking to make money.

Mathew Ingram, in a post on GiGaom pointed out:

Twitter may have inadvertently chosen the perfect time to launch such a service, judging by some of the backlash Twitpic has been enduring recently. Twitpic has been widely criticized for changes to its terms of service that give it the right to license user photos to an entertainment news service, without sharing any of that revenue with the original owner. A number of users have said they plan to boycott Twitpic as a result, which gives Twitter a large window of opportunity. That and easy integration with Twitter’s various software clients should give it a pretty big runway.

We all know how popular photo-sharing has become, so there’s no need to get into why that’s a good thing surrounding Twitter. Beyond implementing a tool to further engage your users, naturally – there’s ad revenue that could make this an even better thing for Twitter.

Google held their annual I/O Developer Conference last week in San Francisco. I previously mentioned in another post that they paired up with Foursquare to test NFC technology. They also unveiled the Chromebook — the Samsung Series 5 Chromebook. Chrome OS is set to be delivered to the masses this summer when the first Chromebooks become available.

The Chromebook is Google’s second attempt at a notebook, which will undoubtedly be compared and contrasted to the Macbook and lest we fail to mention – Microsoft. MG Siegler says in his post on TechCrunch

Make no mistake, Chromebooks are a direct attack on Microsoft. Thanks to Chrome, Google Search, Gmail, etc, Google has all the data they need to know that people spend the vast majority of their time on computers these days in the web browser. So why not just cut out the middle man? Microsoft.

The cost of the Chromebook will be $429 or $499 depending on if you get WiFi-only or WiFi/3G.

Google says that “Chromebooks are built and optimized for the web … So you get a faster, simpler and more secure experience”.

Some of the Chromebook features:

For a long time now, I’ve been discussing the ways businesses can advertise efficiently on the internet–namely SEO. As a marketer, I can’t help but notice how the mobile channel is exponentially growing, and how slowly the business world is adapting to this. My goal in this post is to help you understand the value of mobile marketing, and how you might capitalize on its growth.

Recently, I saw two Google Account Managers (Anjali Vaidya and Bon Mercado) make a presentation about this topic. Though both were clearly selling Adwords, they presented some very compelling data:

• Mobile search queries grew by 400% from January 2010 to January 2011 (faster than desktop search growth)
• Mobile search volume stays constant hour-to-hour, day-to-day, unlike desktop searches
• 1 in 3 mobile searches are locally-focused
• After looking up a local business on their smartphone, 61% of searchers called the business and 59% went to their website
• Tablet users spend 50% more than PC desktop users
• In the next 18 months, 15-30% of website traffic will come from mobile users

Most businesses are bad at SEO. They are even worse at landing page optimization/conversion. With this in mind, it is not surprising that mobile landing pages are generally glitchy, frustrating and poorly designed (where they exist at all). Fortunately, for Outrank’s local business clients, ranking on the front page means your mobile customers are only a touch of the finger away from calling you.

Another area of mobile advertising that cannot be ignored is the app market. Businesses are investing heavily in games and utility applications that keep the attention of mobile users for long periods of valuable time. Some companies and individuals are banking solely from selling standalone apps that profit from an up-front downloading fee or from advertising. An interesting presentation from The Nielsen Company’s Jonathan Carson, CEO, Telecom, made last month at the AppNation conference highlighted some good data profiling app downloaders:

• 36% of U.S. mobile consumers now have smartphones
• App downloaders with Apple iOS and Android OS smartphones have more applications on their mobile phones than those with other kinds of smartphones, with an average of 48 apps on iPhones and 35 apps on Android phones. (By comparison, app downloaders with Blackberry RIM smartphones only had an average of 15 apps on their phones.)
• They also use their apps more often: 68 percent of app downloaders with iPhones and 60 percent of those with Android phones reported using their mobile apps multiple times a day compared to 45 percent of app downloaders with Blackberry/RIM phones.

The 2011 results from the 15th Annual Webby Awards were revealed this week. There are four major entry types: Websites, Interactive Advertising, Online Film & Video and Mobile & Apps. Each category wins two honors – The Webby Award and The People’s Voice Award.

The Webby Awards is the leading international award honoring excellence on the Internet. Established in 1996 during the Web’s infancy, the Webbys are presented by The International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, which includes an Executive 750-member body of leading Web experts, business figures, luminaries, visionaries and creative celebrities, and Associate Members who are former Webby Award Winners and Nominees and other Internet professionals.

The Academy of Digital Art and Sciences is made up of luminaries like

musicians Beck and David Bowie, Internet inventor Vint Cerf, political columnist Arianna Huffington, Real Networks CEO Rob Glaser, “The Simpsons” creator Matt Groening, R/GA Founder and Chairman Robert Greenberg, Virgin Atlantic Chairman and Founder Richard Branson, and The Weinstein Company Co-Founder Harvey Weinstein.

Interesting that Google barely made an appearance, even as far as simply being nominated. Google and YouTube: YouTube Play did win the People’s Voice Award in the Art category, though. It’s no suprise that they didn’t win anything in the Social category – they’ve had a difficult time syncing things up (Hotpot, Places, Reviews) to make for a seamless user experience. Here are some categories they would surely like to win next time around: 

• Best Use of GPS or Location Technology (Foursquare won both The Webby & People’s Voice Award)
• Guides/Ratings/Reviews (Yelp won  both awards as well)

Definitely a favorite of mine as well as around the office: Pandora won the Music category from both the Webby Academy and the People’s Voice.

I thought it would be interesting to look at what categories Google has won in the past compared to what they haven’t won in more recent years. You can visit the Webby Awards website to browse through each year, starting with 1997. It’s amazing to be able to see the changes in technology and trends — and how competition plays such a major role in progress.

2001 Best Practices: The Webby & People’s Voice Awards

2002 Best Practices: The People’s Voice Award

2003 News: The Webby Award, Webby Technical Achievement: The People’s Voice

2004 Best Practices: The Webby & People’s Voice Awards, Services: The Webby & People’s Voice Awards

2005 Best Navigation/Structure: People’s Voice, Best Practices: The Webby & People’s Voice Awards

2006 Best Practices: The People’s Voice

In 2007 they were nominated for Best Visual Design Function (gapminder.org: The Gapminder World 2006) and in 2010 they were nominated in the Music category for Google Creative Lab: YouTube Symphony Orchestra.

The Interactive Advertising Bureau, made up of companies who control over 80% of online advertising, has released The IAB Internet Advertising Revenue Report for 2010. PwC, the world’s second-largest professional services firm, prepared the report.

The report, which is available here, puts Internet advertising revenue for 2010 at $26 Billion, a new record. Randall Rothenberg, President and CEO of IAB, had this to say in a recent press release:

“As the latest IAB Internet Advertising Revenue Report amply demonstrates, brand advertisers and marketers have adopted the power of digital media as a central element of their campaigns…Consumers have shifted more of their time to digital media – watching television shows and movies online – and advertisers now accept this multifaceted medium as a key component for reaching their targets.”

Any business owners reading this post should pay attention closely to what I’m about to say. A whopping 46% of internet advertising revenue in 2010 came from search advertising. That’s almost $12 Billion dollars. Much (if not most) of the revenue attributed to the “search” channel comes from paid search advertisements, or PPC. With that in mind, take into account that 85% of searchers don’t click on PPC ads. Most of us, myself included, stick to the regular (organic) results that appear when we’re using search engines. Furthermore, optimizing your site to rank prominently in organic search (the art of SEO) is much less costly than buying PPC ads.

So, for pennies on the dollar, your business can use SEO to reach way more customers than your counterparts who are using PPC. If paid search advertisers are making good money as it is, just imagine how much you could grow your business using SEO. As time progresses, the market will only become more competitive, so you might want to consider making a small investment while the iron is hot. As your competitors catch on after you, their sites will be at a disadvantage–older, more established sites that have been SEO optimized (like yours) will tend to rank better.