Category Archives: Internet Marketing

Get your website tablet optimized

This “Black Friday” tablets were everywhere. In many cases, they were selling for well less than a couple hundred of dollars.

My hunch is that in the coming months we’ll see a further explosion of tablet web visits.

That means you should have your website optimized for tablet visitors, but don’t be scared. It is actually quite simple. All you need to do is set up your website with separate stylesheets which are activated depending on the size of the visitors browser. Here’s a full article from css-tricks.com on how to pull that off technically.

As you begin working on tablet and mobile stylesheets I recommend copying and pasting from an existing stylesheet and revising it. More specifically:

  • Eliminate any and all flash, as Apple doesn’t support it
  • Keep as much content as you can in one or two columns
  • Eliminate any large images. To do this simply add to the bottom of a img class on the stylesheet {display: none;}
  • Make sure you are using html5 and css3 for color formatting and gradients. It’s a much faster load this way.
  • Reshape your main navigation buttons. Consider adding some rounded edges on buttons and corners. It gives the site have a more modern feel.
  • Don’t be afraid to cut stuff out.
  • Test and retest and make a note that as you design, you should be able to play with the window size of computer’s web browser to see new stylesheets take.

If you have further questions, check out a forum for web developers and please share any other good tips you have.

Random Personal Thoughts about Klout

Klout is a web service that measures the influence people and brands have in online social networks.  I have heard a lot of other marketers talk about it, but mostly because they have signed up for it. Not because they have used it for business.

Here are some random thoughts I have about Klout that go beyond “I can’t believe my score went down”:

  • As a “measure of influence” it is great at measuring reach.
  • As a “measure of social media marketing ROI” it is not as great. I typically try to measure ROI in three ways: attitudinally, behaviorally and financially. Financial ROI is the most important and also the most difficult to track. From what I can gather, Klout lacks in this department.
  • It fills a huge gap and supports marketers greatly in evaluating the reach or “klout” of the social media users they are targeting for product reviews or mentions. Klout Perks are awesome.
  • The gamification of Klout for users is awesome. Perhaps that is why it has grown so quickly.

Please feel free to share your thoughts as well. And for the record klout score is 36.

The Next Stage in Social Media Marketing

Long before my professional career started, websites were built and controlled by high school students and information technology departments.

A decade later, when those same high school students became college students, they started an internet revolution called social media. The movement led to many companies to rely on interns and recent graduates for navigation through this new communication phenomenon.

In both scenarios, marketers and communicators were somewhat limited in how well they managed the messaging. However in 2010, I think we have entered a phase where social media marketing is now better understood and better controlled by upper level management. Seriously, how many events can a marketer go to without sitting in on at least one social media presentation?

With that comes better planning of resources and content. This is contrary to the issues raised by Jason Fried of 37signals in an interview with Forbes.com. He argued that the biggest problem with social media marketing is that the social websites are just tools and that most companies have yet to decide who they are and what they stand for on social media.

In just a few years this will no longer be an issue. Much like marketing departments starting taking back control of their websites asking their IT department to turn them over the keys so they could optimize the site for search engines, they too will start asking questions about how to start a successful group on Linkedin.

The next stage in social media marketing ready to start flourishing will be more meaningful content publishing and consumer interaction led by senior marketing professionals, who are no longer too naive to ask tough questions of interns and recent graduates.