Next month sees one of HeadRed’s clients, Picture Frames Express, launching a new monthly photo competition via Facebook and Twitter with the opportunity to win a made to measure picture frame. People simply follow or like the company on the different social media sites and submit their photos to the company’s Facebook and Twitter profiles. Not only do social media competitions give people the chance to win a great prize, it also gets people engaging with and talking about your brand and this is one of the benefits with regards to search engine optimisation (SEO).

Taking the Picture Frames Express photo competition as an example, the details about the competition will spread naturally throughout the Internet as people tweet, like, post and blog about the competition. People will want to inform other budding photographers about a chance to show off their photographic skills so it will spread via word of mouth across the web. This is a great way to build up natural links from a range of sources which should have a positive effect on your search engine rankings.

A large range of different companies utilise social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube for clever online marketing campaigns. Kit Kat have been using Facebook to get people to vote for their favourite Kit Kat flavour out of four limited editions, with the winning one being crowded the ‘Chunky Champion’ and staying in shops. This is a great campaign to get people involved with the brand and talking about it so that their favourite flavour stays in shops. Personally I’m voting white chocolate. A completely different example is the ‘Shoot my Truck’ campaign to promote the PlayStation 3 video game Twisted Metal. Users were invited to visit a YouTube video where they had the chance to fire live bullets from a machine gun at a real life version of one of the characters vehicles from the game. This interactive element led to people discussing both the campaign and the game which leads to great exposure.

Not all campaigns are successful though, with Microsoft receiving a lot of negative feedback after directly attacking Google’s Gmail service in a video originally posted on YouTube and then reposted on Facebook. The Gmail Man viral video mocked how the Google email service used keyword search methods to display targeted adverts to its users but the campaign led to more people criticising Microsoft’s own email service and for being juvenile than agreeing  with the content of the video.

Social media is becoming more intertwined with SEO so it’s important to utilise it in the correct way to garner the best results for your business. You could target a local area with an SEO Coventry campaign or a larger audience with a more nationwide focussed campaign but either way, you want to ensure people are talking about your products, services and business in a positive manner because with the social web, everyone has a voice.

This week I have been exploring new social media site Pinterest and getting to grips with what it offers over other social sites. Whereas Facebook revolves around creating a personal profile and connecting with friends and Twitter is a microblogging service for text based posts, Pinterest is a visual ‘pin board’ that you add your favourite sites to. You can create multiple boards covering different interests and when you pin a webpage, you choose an image which will then appear on your board. Other users can browse your boards and re-pin your items to their own which is a great way for people to share sites relating to an area that they are interested in and discover new things.

A good example of how Pinterest can be a useful tool is for when planning a wedding. The planning and preparation can be a time consuming and stressful time as you browse the Internet looking for inspiration for everything from venues, flowers, dresses and wedding cakes. Using Pinterest, you can create a wedding pin board and as you are browsing sites and come across something you like, you ‘pin it’. You could create boards for each different area of your wedding planning and then friends and family can see your ideas and help with comments and opinions. The visual nature of the site makes browsing for ideas a very easy process. Have a look at my wedding Pinterest board to see the site in action.

So is this going to be the ‘next big thing’ and will the ‘pin it’ button be a common sight sitting alongside the Facebook ‘Like’ and Twitter ‘Tweet’ buttons on all sites? Well if the stats from America are anything to go by the answer will be yes. Last month the site had 11.7 million unique visitors per month in the US and interest in Pinterest is growing in the UK too with many news and blogging sites discussing the benefits, flaws and potential of the pin board site. There has been one high profile user already making use of pins and pin boards with Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg setting up his own set of boards covering topics such as movies, what building inspires you, overwhelmingly spectacular and for my mouth. You have to wonder though whether he is using the site for personal reasons or having a look at what a competing social media site is offering, ready to plan something similar for Facebook.

The simplicity of creating an online collage away from ‘status updates’ and ‘checking-in’ is a very simple yet enjoyable time-consuming activity. Whether it’s a pin board of your favourite bands, the best cooking recipes for beef based dishes or your portfolio of digital work from across the web, the potential of Pinterest is clear to see.

HeadRed’s social media and SEO Coventry team will be keeping an eye on Pinterest to see what, if any, benefits ‘pinning’ will have with regards to search engine optimisation over the coming weeks. So if you like it, why not try sticking a pin in it?

If you’re on Twitter or Google+ then why not follow the HeadRed accounts and get in touch, stay up to date with the latest blog posts and hear about the latest sites we’ve launched. Come and be social and follow the HeadRed Twitter account and add the HeadRed Google+ to your circles.

Social media is very important with regards to search engine optimisation for our SEO Coventry clients so get in touch to find out how HeadRed can help you and your business.

The other week, Snickers employed a number of celebrities including Rio Ferdinand, Katie ‘Jordan’ Price, Amir Kahn and Cher Lloyd to take part in its latest advertising campaign on Twitter, but the stunt may have backfired and landed the company in trouble. The “You’re not you when you’re hungry” campaign from Snickers involved the stars tweeting out of character messages followed by a picture of themselves enjoying a Snickers bar. Here are some examples of tweets that our definitely out of character:

@misskatieprice
‘Great news about China’s latest GDP figures!!’
‘Large scale quantitative easing in 2012 could distort liquidity of govt. bond market. £justsayin.’

@rioferdy5
‘Can’t wait 2 get home from training and finish that cardigan,’
‘Cardy finished. Now 4 the matching mittens!!!’

A follow up tweet, “You’re not you when you’re hungry @snickersUk #hungry #spon”, was then sent but investigations are underway to see whether the campaign broke advertising rules because the initial tweets didn’t make it clear that it was actually an advertising campaign and whether the ‘#spon’ in the final tweet was enough to make it clear that it was. Under the 2008 consumer protection regulations, celebrities cannot seem to be promoting products without it being perfectly clear that it is an advert. The Office of Fair Trading can actually seek a court order which could possibly lead to a criminal prosecution and an unlimited fine.

There have been many examples of large companies getting social media marketing wrong, another of which being McDonalds ‘#McStories’ campaign, so if you’re in the Midlands it’s important to have a social media and SEO Coventry agency guiding your online activity in the right direction.

This week the news of Facebook’s plans to float on the stock market has been all over the news with the social site looking to raise $5billion from its initial public offering (IPO). The point of an IPO is that Facebook needs money. Now for a company that has $3.9billion, that might seem like a strange think to say but when you put it into comparison with the $45billion that Google has, you start to understand why Facebook would want more money; to improve and compete with the other Internet giant by improving its mobile sites, making acquisitions and introducing new features. With the release of a letter from Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg that details previously unreleased information, some interesting facts have been revealed as Facebook looks to sell shares in the company.

For anyone who has an interest in the story of Facebook, or has seen the hit film “The Social Network”, you will know how Mark Zuckerberg is the brains behind Facebook and even after going public, Mark will retain charge of the empire that he has created. Shares in the company are split into two types, shares ‘A’ and ‘B’, with the ‘B’ shares actually being worth 10 votes per share compared to the single vote of shares ‘A’. Mark owns 28% of the company’s shares and obviously they are ‘B’ shares so that actually equates to Mark having a 56.9% say in how the company is ran. Not only that but in the case of Zuckerberg’s death, he has the right to name an heir to the company to make sure Facebook continues to be ran by someone that shares his vision.

It wasn’t only details of Mark’s control over Facebook that was detailed this week. The profitability of Facebook has been revealed as $1billion of pure profit with 2009 being the year when everything started going right in terms of finance. Income almost tripled from $272m to $777m and costs only doubled which of course means plenty of pure profit. So what happened in 2009 that made this happen? Well that was the year that Mark introduced the ‘Like’ button to the world. One thing the aspect of ‘liking’ has done has been to enable the site to target advertising, which of course is something Facebook depends on for revenue. The other aspect of revenue for the site is through in-app purchases and one company got a special mention in the IPO report. Znyga are the company behind popular social games such as Farmville, Mafia Wars and Poker and make up 12% of Facebook’s revenue and so are a very important company for them to continue working with.

One aspect of all of this that has been focused on by the media is how a lot of people are due to become very rich or become even richer. Many people already have shares in Facebook such as co-founder Dustin Moskovitz, Silicon Valley investor Peter Thiel and even U2 singer Bono. One great story is that of graffiti artist David Choe who was commissioned in 2005 to decorate the social sites new offices. He was offered a few thousand dollars or shares in the company and decided to take the shares, which could now net him somewhere in the region of $200million. Even the enemies of Facebook, the Winklevoss twins, are going to capitalise on this with their shares from their lawsuit against Facebook being potentially worth $300million. Employees that have been with the company for a number of years are also looking to benefit from any shareholdings they have with a number of them looking to become millionaires.

The story of Facebook is an interesting tail and there are many interesting stories to read and if you haven’t seen “The Social Network” movie then we’d suggest doing so. With Facebook going public, there will sure to be more to come as Zuckerberg and his social network look to shape the future of the Internet.

To discuss how social networking sites could help your business improve its web visibility, contact the SEO Coventry company HeadRed.

Facebook has announced a program to help businesses in the UK by giving away over £4million worth of advertising to help smaller businesses get started and grow their business online using Facebook. The program is offering up to £80 of ad credits to companies across Europe and since the social networking site generates £2.2billion in the UK alone, this could be a great opportunity for smaller businesses to gain exposure on the site.

Having a presence on Facebook is a great way to interact with customers and as they ‘Like’ your products and services, your business will appear in their feeds and be seen by all their friends and can lead to great exposure.

Have a look at a social media or SEO Coventry campaign with HeadRed to help improve your search engine rankings and lead to greater visibility, more enquiries and more business.