Mediaboss Marketing

Any business owner will tell you LinkedIn can be an invaluable resource for a company, from recruiting talented employees, and connecting with clients and potential leads to networking with other professionals.

But Im often inundated with so many requests in a day from people who seem like scammers to people trying to sell me useless services and more. Its hard sometimes to cut through the noise to use LinkedIn to its full potential. Luckily Ive found a few tools to help weed out useless sales pitches, scammers or just people who won't help my network or business grow. Here are my favorites:

I use pitch.Me as a supplement to LinkedIn. pitch.Me is a career and social-networking site where users create a customized profile highlighting their professional and personal experience as well as skill sets and talents. Additionally, profiles can spotlight a users past or current employers, education and unique character traits. But the real magic of it lies in how you connect with other users.

You add a list of needs to your profile this can be open positions, services for your business, etc. People who find me and want to connect have to donate a certain amount of money to my charity of choice, and then theyre able to schedule a 15-minute in-app video or audio call.

I put a little note on my LinkedIn saying if youre wanting to set up a phone call or connect, go to my pitch.Me and schedule it there. It really helps weed out blanket requests and ensures that calls I have are only with people who take the time to get to know me and put some effort into the relationship.

A lot of people use LinkedIn ineffectively. Often there is no effort to build a relationship or to network its just heres what you can do to help me, will you do it? I reached out toLinked University founder Josh Turner, who explained, Would you go up to a person you just met at a networking event, and immediately start pitching them on your products and services, features and benefits? No way. And if you did, you wouldn't get far. It's the same on LinkedIn.

In Joshs Linked University, I learned how to better build a relationship with members of my network on LinkedIn and utilize its features to make it a resource and not just a place where I send out cold messages for sales and services.

If youre on LinkedIn for any period of time, youre bound to get a message for a free month of LinkedIn premium. I was always hesitant to pull the trigger on that but when it came time to fill a position at the internet marketing agency I founded, I decided to give it a try.

It took way less time to find candidates than going to Craigslist or working my local network to find talent. With the time left on my trial, I tried out some other features. A really cool feature I have used is statistics for top search terms, peoples visiting my page and their industries and locations. If I can see a lot of search traffic in visitors might be people who are looking for services my company offers, I can then work to tailor my intro and profile content to catch their eyes.

So there are some of my favorite tools for making sure my LinkedIn network works for me. What are yours?

Read more:
3 Tools to Build a LinkedIn Network That Actually Works - HuffPost

Nintendo is saying goodbye to its Miiverse social network.

The gaming giant said Tuesday that it would shut down Miiverse on Nov. 7, after debuting the social network alongside its Wii U video game console in 2012. Owners of the Nintendo 3DS mobile gaming console could also access the service.

Miiverse users could create cartoonish versions of themselves known as avatars that could chat and interact with others in a digital lobby. Part of the social networks appeal was that users could play certain Wii U video games or other online games with one another.

Nintendo closure of Miiverse comes as it heavily pushes its Nintendo Switch gaming console, which debuted earlier this year.

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The Switch is incompatible with Miiverse and instead relies on the Nintendo Switch Online to accommodate gamers who want to play against each other online. Currently, people can play Switch Online for free, but Nintendo plans to debut a paid version in 2018.

Before the Miiverse closes, Nintendo said it would let people could use their personal computers to download their messages to friends or other social postings for a limited time.

As gaming publication Nintendo Life notes, the Miiverse was a divisive social network, with many users appreciating the services playful interface. But others complained about its slowness in loading games and sometimes confusing navigation.

Still, Nintendos decision to close Miiverse caused some users to mourn. On a Nintendo technical support page, several Miiverse users expressed sadness about the planned closure, with one recalling how the service helped him connect with other people.

Miiverse is a place which has helped me to become more socially confident, and enable me to talk to others without having to actually physically talk to them, the person wrote. I've met so many wonderful people here, and I'm trying to get to grips with the fact that I may never see these people again when it ends.

Read more from the original source:
Nintendo Is Killing This Social Networking Service - Fortune

Every year, someone writes an article proclaiming that email marketing is dead -- and every year they are proven wrong.

Mobile data traffic is expected to increase sevenfold by 2021, according to Cisco's Visual Networking Index (VNI).

This smartphone usage expansion is due to improvements in network speeds and increasing availability of mobile applications, and the significant consumption of mobile video will all contribute to this growth.

So, how do marketers deliver the right messages to their customers to deliver the best ROI for their campaigns?

A recent report by technology adviser Analysys Mason shows that entertainment is the dominant activity on our smartphones -- accounting for 57 percent of our data usage and almost a third of overall time spent on the device. It analysed real-world usage from over 8,000 smartphones in Germany, India, UK, and US.

But if you are a marketer this might not be good news. It takes significant time and resources to create world-leading entertainment content to post across social channels. How do marketers connect with their audience and get a good return for their efforts?

A report from email marketing platform Emma shows that marketers are already overwhelmed and unable to meet expectations. Over 64 percent of marketers do not have the time or personnel to carry out the marketing activities that they would like to.

There are too many channels to focus on and not enough return for their efforts. It is easy to get side-tracked by flashier social channels, and marketers feel like they have to master every new thing that comes along

A look at customer data and response metrics will show which what channels are most successful for reaching the target audience so that marketers can focus their efforts there. And it is often email -- not social -- that is overlooked.

Now marketers are turning to email marketing to simplify their activities. Every year, someone writes an article proclaiming that email marketing is dead -- and every year they are proven wrong.

Although 'batch-and-blast email marketing' may be dead, timely email marketing campaigns could become key to successful digital marketing programs.

According to Emma, 47 percent of marketers said that email generates the most ROI for their organisation, and 58 percent of them are planning to increase their spending on email marketing in 2018.

With new channels seemingly popping up every day, marketers often feel like they have to be on all social channels all the time. But with the other half of our mobile data usage, we are very likely looking at -- and responding to -- a well-crafted email campaign.

Publishers say affiliates generate more revenue than other types of marketing

A recent survey points to a bright future for affiliate marketing and social engagement.

Why brands can't thrive without a good influencer marketing campaign

Brands are building deeper relationships with influencers using instant social platforms like Instagram and Snapchat.

New report shows top brands outperform their peers by maximising engagement

Revisit your online-only engagement strategy. Social influence leaders dominate the offline and online word-of-mouth consumer conversation, according to a new report.

Crimson Hexagon stores one trillion social media posts for customer analytics

If you posted one public social media post per second, it would take you 31,000 years to reach one trillion posts. That's the number of posts stored in Crimson Hexagon's data repository.

Link:
Social networking and video dominate smartphone use, but email generates the most ROI - ZDNet

China is going to be the second largest spender on social media ads in the next five years. But, according to Forrester, it will not overtake the US anytime soon.

According to the report Chinas Social Networks Have Room to Generate Higher Advertising Revenue, the analyst firm noted significant challenges.

First, Chinas per-capita income is still relatively small. According to the report, China's 2015 GDP per capita was US$6,498 or 13% of the US figures. Meanwhile, China's social ad spending per social user was only US$3.14, a mere 6% of the social ad spending seen in the US. It means that social media growth is not bringing in the ad spend that many hoped.

Another factor is the lower advertising revenue per user for mobile messaging. While WeChat dominates the mobile social networking market in China, the platform is lagging regarding monetizing users. The report noted that WeChat's per use social ad spending is US$3, which is far below China's online display ad spending per online user of US$18. Facebook and Twitter also fare better regarding monetizing users, according to Forrester, especially in matured markets like US, Japan, and South Korea.

Sina Weibo is not doing any better. The report noted that while Weibo is one of the largest social networks in China, it only generated US$567 million in revenue from its 313 million monthly active users in 2016. While Weibos revenues grew by 41%, it was largely from a small base.

Forrester noted that it is still early days. It pointed out that China's social networks are relatively young. Facebook went live in 2004, but WeChat only went online in 2011. It could be that WeChat may be more concerned about growing its base and consolidate its market position before looking to generate more ad revenues.

Also, Tencent, WeChats owner, has other revenue streams. Unlike Facebook and Twitter, they are not under immense pressure to build ad revenues. For example, a large proportion of the firms revenues came from value-added services.

Lastly, China social networks are beginning to monetize video ads. The report noted that it would provide a "meaningful" future boost. For example, Weibo video ads, launched in only Q2 2016, "accounted for 10% of Weibo's advertising revenue in the second half of 2016," it said.

Further reading:

Online ad spend in China impacts the region

Fake news costing advertisers reputation, ad dollars

US ad market shift from mobile-first to mobile-only

More here:
Report: China set to become second largest social ad spender in 5 years - Enterprise Innovation

Most of the research on phone addiction and deprivation is done on students. It's not just the "kids these days," though. At 45, I'm a recovering addict. It's been four months since I uninstalled social networking apps, three months since I last posted on Facebook, and two months since I turned off all notifications on my smartphone. Before I started the detox program, I checked my phone about five times an hour. That's about half as often as the average millennial but about three times as often as most people of my generation in the U.S. Now, I'm down to once an hour.

I think I got hooked because of my job. When I started out as a reporter in the late 1980s, you used your legs to get a story and teletype or dictation to file it from a remote location. It got progressively easier with email, the internet, search engines, social networks, and mobile communication. I could follow developments in several countries through a network of Facebook friends; in Ukraine, politicians became so addicted to Facebook that it became almost pointless to talk to them. In the U.S., much of the high-level political debate occurs on Twitter thanks in no small part to its tweeter in chief. I told myself that maintaining accounts on every social network was necessary for work, but that was absurd: most of these posts and videos were useless to me as a journalist.

I was submerged in the cozy haze of smartphone addiction, and it's hard to say how it differed from substance abuse. "Comfort kills, discomfort creates," wrote Jean Cocteau in his personal account of opium detoxication.

So, like someone trying to wean himself off a substance, I started experimenting with discomfort. That's when I lost the Facebook and Twitter apps, which were eating up most of my screen time. I figured that out from battery use statistics. At first, I felt such acute deprivation that I had to open Facebook and Twitter in a browser. That was less convenient, and my phone use dropped a little, but I wasn't able to completely swear off Facebook for a few more weeks. FOMO -- the fear of missing out -- ruined several mornings; I reverted to peeking for a couple of days, then forced myself to stop.

As Cocteau wrote, "I am not a detoxicated person proud of his effort. I am ashamed of having been chased out of this supernatural world after which health resembled a bad movie in which ministers inaugurate a statue." After having kicked opium, Cocteau still had alcohol and cocaine. I kept updating and reading Twitter, although I gradually cut down on arguing with people on it -- that had been time-consuming and sometimes emotionally draining. Now, I'm down to 30 minutes of Twitter a day: That's enough for work.

We touch our smartphones -- tap, click, swipe -- more than 2,500 times a day. That's probably 100 times more often than we touch our partner. The reason we do it is that the phone constantly demands attention by sending us notifications. It does so every time someone wants to connect with us, every time something changes in an app, every time an artificially intelligent entity decides we need information. Notifications have a barely veiled commercial purpose: Once we start playing with the phone, we're likely to open more apps, see more ads, buy more stuff.

It's relatively easy to retake control; I went into my phone's settings and banned every one of the 112 apps from sending notifications. Now, I only check my personal and corporate email accounts, as well as two messenger apps, when I want to, not when my device wants me to. That means my friends must wait longer than they used to for a response. They haven't noticed -- or at least they haven't commented on it. We overestimate the need for immediacy in communication; perhaps our kids don't because they live their addiction to a greater extent than we do, but an adult finds it easy to wait for a response.

Recovering addicts know it's impossible to be perfectly clean: Even if you don't use your favorite substance, you miss it. At the end of his opium essay, Cocteau wrote wistfully that perhaps "the young" might someday discover "a regime that would allow one to keep the benefits of the poppy" without getting addicted. That remains impossible for drugs but maybe not for smartphones.

After reasserting control over my digital life, I'm nearly ready to take further steps. My next goal is to be able to use it as an electronic book reader without ever switching from the Kindle app to the browser or the email and messenger apps. I expect a boost in reading speed, another way to battle my FOMO. A forced experiment during a two-week holiday in the south of France without high-speed internet produced hopeful results.

As I stood in a chapel Cocteau designed in the hills above Frejus, I felt healthier, able to breathe easier, almost capable of relearning how to lose myself in the company of my beloved wife and children, who are, of course, fighting their own battles with gadget addiction. Perhaps our lives can be a little more like their pre-iPhone versions. If Cocteau could kick his habit, so can we.

This column was originally published on Bloomberg and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

More:
How I'm Beating My Smartphone Addiction - Money Magazine