What do I do now for the development of my business or career?

This was the question I asked of the I Ching as I threw the three coins seeking an answer.

Development (Gradual Progress) 53. Chien was the answer:

THE IMAGE

On the mountain, a tree:
The image of DEVELOPMENT.
Thus the superior man abides in dignity and virtue,
In order to improve the mores.

Yahoo Pulse
Yahoo! takes steps to enhance its presence in the Social Media arena. In 2010 Yahoo launched Yahoo Pulse including Facebook integration. Yahoo Pulse will aggregate updates from social networks such as Facebook. Yahoo Pulse has mail integrations similar to Google Buzz but unlike Google Buzz Yahoo Pulse has a complete mail privacy menu. Thank you Yahoo! This is a welcome feature considering how Google and Facebook have not dealt well with the privacy issues.

Google AdWords Mandates Reporting and Transparency for Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Managers

Starting in February Google Pay-Per-Click (PPC) management companies will be required to fully disclose the amount spent on AdWords. Search-Optimization.com will not need to change as we have had this policy since the days of GoTo PPC.

For the advertiser who hires a PPC management company they will now know how much was paid as PPC management fees and how much went into the Google AdWords PPC program. If you are an advertiser you should start receiving this break-out of hard costs. If the agency does not furnish this it is time to shop for a new company that does. I suggest advertisers ask for an accounting of 2010 costs.

Social Sign-Ins

Social sign-ins is the next big thing for the Internet. Social sign-ins allows your visitors to sign in using their social media credentials, such as Facebook, this has a number of advantages. First it allows the visitor to use an already existing profile connected to all of its rich content. Social sing-ins give the web site owner access to information that already would not be available if the user did a quick registration.

Social Media Ad Spend $3 Billion in the United States

Social Media Marketing Ad spending on social networks in the US will pass $3.08 billion mark by the end of 2011, according to eMarketer. Spending in 2011 will be more than 50%, about $2 billion, higher than advertising on social networking sites in 2010. eMarketer further expects that Social Media Marketing ad spending on social networks would rise by another 27.7% to reach $4 billion in 2012.
A dramatic increase in ad spending on social networks is now 10.8% of the total ad spend online in the United States. Worldwide Social Media Marketing ad spend will increase to 71.6%, $5.97 billion in 2011.

Linkedin Share Button

LinkedIn has a share button! Now your readers can share your news with those that you are LinkedIn with. If you select group button you can really make an impact.

Liz Reaves Walker of LinkedIn makes the following comment on the release:

“We know there are a lot of options for sharing content today, whether it’s on Twitter or Facebook. And, now with our new LinkedIn’s share button, we’d like to offer readers an effective way to share relevant professional content – news, thought pieces, white papers, or presentations on slideshare – with their business network on LinkedIn.”

Google Places

Google Hotpot

Google launched a recommendation tool called Hotpot that lets people share with their friends information about shops, restaurants, bars, theaters and other places in their life.

“We’re making local search results for places on Google more personal, relevant and trustworthy,” product manager Lior Ron said in a blog post. “When you rate places you like, we’ll tell you about other related places you’ll love.”

Protect Your Brand Name in the Social Media

In a competitive online world, social media platforms offer online businesses a definitive edge. These are not only one of the most frequented sites on the Internet; these are also highly trusted sources of information and influence user behavior like no other.

Social media Marketing

Social media Marketing is the art of bridging the communication gap with your consumers. Writing compelling content and using different tools can speed up your process of getting more fans following on the social media networking sites but, is this marketing technique helping you in gaining the desired credibility level in the market?

If your audience feels that whatever you said is not credible, it won’t really matter how well you said it, your motive will not be fulfilled. Most of the small businesses find it difficult to get a credible position in the market. A small fan base to support the brand via word of mouth or no brand recognition will make the small business owner feel that the efforts made are simply a waste. Don’t sell; Educate!