There is a lot of marketing speak surrounding Facebook and Twitter.  But what about the other phenomenal social networking site, LinkedIn?

LinkedIn is really the only solvent site out of the bunch!  They grew up with a revenue model and it’s working really, really well for them.

There are a lot of different ways to use LinkedIn.  It isn’t as ’socially’ as Facebook (but it’s trying to be).  It’s way more sticky than Twitter.  In fact, LinkedIn is a nice mix of all the best features of each.

Biznik has a great article on tips to using LinkedIn to promote your business:

• Don’t be afraid to customize Your URL
• Use their badges and your profile url on blog comments and in other social networks
• Optimize all your labels – website, blog, personal site, portfolio…
• Use keywords to define yourself
• Sync blog posts and RSS feeds to your LinkedIn profile
• Use the email signature
• Add a profile picture!

The bottom line is visibility.  If you and your brand are visible, you will start to pick up support in no time.

What kind of successes have you found with LinkedIn?  Is there anyone who has successfully picked up a great client or a nice project?

JD

Last week, I was struck by two things – the lackluster performance of newspaper advertising and the fact that my mom loves Facebook.

The first leads into the second…

Newspaper circulation is declining.  That much we know.  The story is being told by all of the newspapers going out of business.  Billboards, no matter how many times they rotate a minute or how bright they seem to light up a March night, can’t hold a candle to the traffic and interest generated by a Twitter feed.

But yet people are dumping money into newspaper advertising?!

Let me put this a bit differently…  To buy a newspaper ad in our local newspaper – one ad – it’s $4,000.  Put that same money in banner ads or a text link ad campaign – You’re ad will be featured by 15-20 highly targeted sites with millions of page views for one whole month!

The kicker – you can track the results of your campaigns…

On to Facebook.  My mom loves it.  She keeps up with her friends, the kids of her friends and her college professors.  The Facebook demographic is changing.  College kids are on there, sure.  But so are their parents so they can keep up with their sons and daughters without always being on the phone.  Those parents are friends with other parents…  Get the picture?

So, let’s revisit the initial question.  Is your target market reading the newspaper?  Or are they on Facebook and Twitter and Youtube?

Do you want to spend $4000 for a one day ad that is limited to zip codes, or does it make sense to pursue banner advertising and Facebook ads?

The answer is simple.  And it’s not going to be found in black and white pages that fold over…

JD

I wanted to write a quick post thanking our sponsors for the month of March!  Without you, this site wouldn’t be possible :0)

And if you want more information about advertising here on MarketingHackz – fill out the advertising form and we’ll get back to you ASAP!

March Sponsors:

MediaTemple offers bulletproof servers.  We’ve smoked two so far with other companies and MediaTemple has stepped up to the plate for us…

Regus provides virtual offices for people who need the professional presence, but don’t need the actual office space!  These are great for web workers and bloggers who need a mailing address and a phone number.

Taste of Ink Studios provides some of the most cutting edge printed pieces and brand solutions on the web.  If you need branding work – these guys can cut it.

Solopress does great print and design work.  If you need traditional marketing type stuff, check out Solopress!

Additionally, I want to thank our featured sites!

• Fashion Colleges
• PPC Management
• Ross A Clevens
• loan modification leads
• Search Engine Optimization
• iContact
• email marketing
• Moishe Alexander
• Cash Advance

For more information on sponsoring MarketingHackz or any of the Hackz sites, fill out the advertising form and we’ll get a custom package ready for you! 

You’ll get the links or the banners, regular promotional tweets to our followers and our monthly sponsor report to our readers!

JD

For those of you who like numbers and surveys – White Paper Source has a real nice free PDF download about social media adoption.  The numbers in it are for the most part staggering… 

Here’s a brief look at what’s in it:

—-

“We set out to uncover the “who, what, where, when and why” of social media marketing with this report.  Nearly 900 of your peers provided the kind of insight that previously has not existed. In this report you’ll find:

• The top social media marketing questions marketers want answered
• How much time marketers are investing in social media
• The benefits of social media
• How time invested impacts results
• The top social media tools
• And much more!

If you’re pondering starting social media marketing, these findings will help push you over the edge.  If you’re already onboard, feel free to examine what the really experienced marketers are doing (and use this study to persuade others).”

—-

Let me know what you think!

JD

Over the weekend, we wrote about a 7 step plan that will help your video grow organically on the Internet.

Chris Brooks then pointed us to a couple tools which will help you critique and upload your video in a more timely fashion!

We decided that it would be a pretty cool idea to do a little feature on those two sites, while adding one in that we particularly like – Qik!

So here’s the rundown:

• Seesmic Seesmic is a video service that lets you record and upload video on the fly.  All you need is a webcam or some other sort of video capture device on your computer.Chris pointed out that it is a good idea to upload your video to the community and have them critique it before you put it out there for the world to see!
• QikQik enables you to share video right through your cell phone.  It can be a birthday party, a conference or someone acting like an idiot on the sidewalk.  I’ve seen conferences and events ‘livestream’d through this service and might be a good idea to work in to your next event…
• TubeMogul The idea behind TubeMogul is pretty simple – you upload your video once and then the service sends it out the the millions of online video sites including YouTube, Viddler and Vimeo.It’s a nice idea to get mass exposure for all of your video without spending hours and hours uploading the large files to each service!

If you want more info on video marketing, check out a how to at video marketing strategies!

Video marketing is huge, and growing each day.  How many times have you told your friends – ‘Hey, go to Youtube and search of [insert phrase here]!

My brother is king at this.  He gets these crazy videos and text messages everyone in his phone with the title of the video.

Alright, so we know video is important.  How can you make something you created go viral?

Here’s some tips from Web Ink Now:

1. Your video can be homemade – no need for professionals
2. It shouldn’t be any longer than 2 minutes
3. Have a bulletproof description – nice and detailed
4. Don’t sneak corporate-sponsored content in your video
5. Try a series of videos to build interest and increase loyalty
6. Make sure bloggers see the video! (KEY)
7. Experiment, experiment, experiment…

If you want more info on video marketing, check out this how-to at video marketing strategies!

Over the past few weeks, I have gotten into Firefox extensions and how they can be used to make content more viral.

We all know and love the Stumbleupon toolbar, but what about true networking and connecting on the Internet?  Is there something out there that lets me put a face to a name?

That’s when I came across Glue by Adaptive Blue.  It’s an add-on that lets you claim your own pieces of the Internet like blogs, Facebook pages, Twitter feeds, and things of that nature.  When a fellow glue ‘member’ runs across those pages, your image pops up with things that you like.  It’s also accompanied by other people that like the same things!

It’s kind of like Stumbleupon, but with a truly personal touch.

Here are some words from their add-on page:

Glue offers a new, smarter way for you to connect with friends around things you visit. When you navigate to popular sites like Amazon, Netflix, Last.fm, Wine.com or Citysearch the Glue Bar will automatically show you which of your friends visited the same thing around the web.

Now, an Internet marketer is probably thinking, ‘I don’t care about friends, I just want to make money!’

Well, in case you haven’t figured it out yet…  You are your own brand.  And the things you promote travel closely behind you on the Internet.