All Things Social #Florida #Amplify

by Steve Cabeza / Amplification, Inc. 

There has been a recent explosion of businesses establishing “person” pages as their business page on Facebook. Per the Almighty Facebook TOS (Terms Of Service), this is not a good idea. Personally, I see the allure, as you can proactively add friends more easily with a “person” page than with a business fan page, which forces you to grow your fan base naturally and organically.

With that in mind, put down your guard and peer into Cabeza’s crystal ball for a view into the future.

You’re going about your daily routine, when ding! You receive a notice from Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook. Anxious to know what the Zuck has to say, you waste no time reading the memo, which reads, “Dear Friends: Your non-human ‘people’ pages are set to archive and go buh-bye in 24 hours. Too bad, so sad. Toodles!”

Don’t think it could happen? You’ve not been keeping up. Seriously, do everything you can to convert, churn, change, transition, and evolve your non-human people pages over to a fan page. And don’t do it tomorrow. Start the process now!

“Personal pages are for people, and people do business with people they know, like, and trust,” says Sharon Gadbois, #1 Bully of Social Media Bullies. “How are people supposed to get to know you as a person if you're busy shoving ‘buy my products’ in your friends’ faces all day long?”

Obviously, your Facebook friends won’t know you at all if you’re shoving unwanted ads down their throats and they may hide you from their Facebook news feed. Facebook made pages specifically for businesses. People who actually like your page can get your business updates whenever they want, plus it's SEO (search-engine optimization) driven.

Afraid of losing folks when you go from a personal page to a fan page? Facebook makes it easy for you to download your information and keep a backup copy before you make the transition from the personal page to fan page.

“Facebook fan pages are an extension of your website that offer a free and interactive form of communication with your customers,” says Marnie Goldberg, Social Medium with Amplification, Inc. 

Running ads in a newspaper or elsewhere? Gadbois recommends asking yourself the following questions:

• How much does it cost?

• What is the expected and real return on investment?

• Am I getting any leads?

• Are those leads enough to fuel my business and to pay the cost of expenses every month?

“If you don’t like the answers to these questions, social media is a great solution,” Goldberg says. “Because despite what you may think, social media isn’t a fad. It’s an effective channel through which you open the lines of communication to reach your intended audience in a cost-effective way that is relatively low maintenance. Stripped to its essence, social media is a conversation, a way to stay in touch with the very people who pay your light bill and mortgage. So why not spend a few hours a day doing it the right way?”

Timely Media

I read a great article recently (The Science of Social Timing) that broke down the best times for interacting on social media. Good stuff to keep in mind if you’re doing your best to get your marketing message to break through in the most effective manner.

• Best time to tweet: 5 p.m. ET

• Ideal tweet frequency: 1 to 4 per hour

• Best days to tweet: midweek and weekends

• Best day to share on Facebook: Saturday

• Best time to share on Facebook: noon ET

Wish you had someone on your team who could keep up with your social media presence? Amplification, Inc. would love to discuss how we can take care of this for you. And we can deliver an established audience, which we have painstakingly built over the past few years, of almost 40,000 people!

foursquare X 10 Million

Congrats are in order for foursquare surpassing the 10,000,000-users mark! If you don’t have a foursquare account (or haven’t heard of foursquare) but would love to have more consumer traffic through your door, please read my recent article on location-based marketing (using Facebook Places and foursquare "check-ins") and then call Amplification, Inc. We can help you with strategies and tactics that translate to immediate, new business within 60 days or less!

New Amplifications

We recently started assisting Courtney Refkin to drive traffic and interest to her blog, Kiki's Corner. Using a little of our social media magic, we were able to…well, Courtney says it best.

“Marnie and Steve boosted web traffic to my blog by over 200% in less than 30 days! It was amazing!” says Courtney.

Told you she said it best.

Davie Style

We love being members of the Davie-Cooper City Chamber of Commerce. Sophisticated yet sincere, close but transported, capitalistic yet altruistic, business-oriented yet neighbor-centric, the chamber is a great group of business pros. We are helping the chamber with two upcoming events, one centered on restaurants and dining, the other a golf outing. In the process, we’ll be asking for help, raffle prizes, and sponsors, and we’re prepared to incentivize participants and donors with access to our social media network, currently pushing 40,000 people. Interested? Let’s talk.

The Thrive Network recently joined the Amplification, Inc. family. Fran Asaro, founder and CEO of the successful Fort Lauderdale-based Thrive Any Way coaching network, recently relocated to Asheville, North Carolina. But don’t let her location fool you. She can help you no matter where in the world you find yourself. Fran works with businesses and individuals across the US, helping them create balance in their personal and professional lives. As a proponent of natural/alternative wellness, balance, and harmony, Fran’s network of Thrive programs include Thrive Any Way, Thrive Raw, and Thrive Any Weight. To schedule an appointment for a free consultation, call Thrive Any Way at 954-370-8001 or send email to Fran@thriveanyway.com. Visit Fran online at www.thriveanyway.com.

Equally exciting is the addition of Gulf Coast Tankless Water Heaters to the Amplification, Inc. roster. Do yourself a favor and toss your old hot water tank for a Gulf Coast Tankless Water Heater, and you’ll save water, money, space, and the planet, while having an unlimited supply of hot water in your home. Join their fan page on Facebook or follow along on Twitter (twitter.com/GCTanklessWater).

The List Goes On!

More interesting people, causes, and businesses being Amplified include:

• Endlessly Organic

• South Florida Hotspotz

• Fitwize 4 Kids Fitness Center

• The Grizzly—Mixed Martial Arts Fighter

• Calvin Johnson Home Inspection

Need help blogging, tweeting, linking, YouTubing (it’s a word—trust us!), and Facebooking but don’t know where to start? Marnie Goldberg, Social Medium at Amplification, Inc. wants to answer your questions. Email her! Need help wording your message just right? Email Daniel Brantley, our resident copywriter and editor and the only person who thinks Mark Zuckerberg would say “toodles,” at daniel@danielkbrantley.com or hunt him down at his website (www.danielkbrantley.com) or Twitter (www.twitter.com/danielkbrantley).

Leveraging your touchpoints #Amplify #Florida #Touchpoints

Oftentimes when working with large and well-established client-institutions I encounter a glaring, embarrassing, obsequious lack of touchpoint awareness and opportunity maximization.


A touchpoint is a place wherein the customer literally "touches" your institution via your delegate, usually at the lowest common denominator. Like a bank teller, waitress, customer service rep, and others. 


[ Seeing the Sign in Boca Raton! ] 


This shortcoming or hole in the works usually occurs when an organization grows very quickly (like after a merger or acquisition) or is overly large and ends up in a posture wherein they have many channels for customer interaction and revenue influx, and then this creates an environment wherein that institution doesn't take advantage of their full potential for marketing delivery, image infusion, or messaging capacity. The ignorance of this capacity/delivery gap leads to a descending coefficient of drag wherein the law of diminishing returns kicks in and reminds us of it's existence and the outlay of resources has a correspondent-diminishing effect.


I am a student of history and in addition to that, a recent friend has taught me to be more attentive to the naturally occurring patterns in things. That having been said, I suggest you visit Stratfor, a commercial, strategic forecasting organization that will teach you to think more deeply and strategically and 3-dimensionally, and to think like an intelligence analyst.


[ Social Media Marketing in Miami ] 


My father, God rest his soul, was a contract C.I.A. special operations asset. In that context, he used to repeat something that I now repeat to others as rote; "Stephen, there is no such thing as coincidence." Wow, how that resonates through the years!


The take-away here is you need to always have a "real-time" feel for what is happening at the bottom-line of your outreach and/or delivery network. Assuming it will work perfectly, status quo, forever is being blissfully ignorant. If you are a bank, you need to know, intimately, what the dynamics of interaction are that take place where the money switches hands at the teller level. This touchpoint needs to be monitored and tweaked just like any other business-maximizing tool.


[ Women + Care ]


If you are a casino, same thing, but at the dealer and cashier level. If you are a fast-food joint, know what is going on where the burgers get flipped and passed across the counter. Leveraging the opportunities afforded where "the rubber meets the road" will afford you tremendous opportunities to communicate more efficiently, and cost-effectively without distraction, competition, repetition or clutter.


Example: Let's say you are a restaurant or hospital that has valet parking. Use, leverage, and monetize that "touchpoint" to disseminate your messaging and manage your identity and proactively craft your customer service perception. If you outsource valet service, you sure better make sure that they are on the same page with your culture and your messaging agenda. Make sure that valet-contractor meets your customer service guidelines, and if not, manage them up or show them the door.


Use that "touchpoint" as an opportunity to further disseminate and distribute your messaging and as a furtherance of your communication agenda. Engage them in your success!


[ How Does Twitter Help My Business ] 


I have probably visited and called on more hospitals across our great and grand country than many can imagine. In the course of counseling these institutions and as a precursor to our meeting, I would usually have to check in at an information desk. Those information desks are usually manned by volunteers. The reason being that volunteers are "free" labor. The vast majority of these volunteers are ill suited (as well as ill-tempered) to serve in the most helpful, friendly, or knowledgeable customer-service capacity.


My suggestion is to continue to leverage that free labor, but use it in a more tactical application.


And if you are spending money on marketing or advertising, and you aren't prepared for the touchpoint-capture of the fruits of that marketing, you may as well throw the money out the window. I have an ongoing client consult with a large healthcare interest (which will remain confidential due to contractual obligation) that happens to be doing a good amount of mass media advertising to promote a specific service line. This institution is not leveraging the business influx at the touchpoint of these marketing efforts and was not taking advantage of the potential cross-selling opportunity here. That was until Amplification, Inc. came along.


"Every touchpoint brings the brand to life." Thanks to Cohn Marketing for that line.


Written by Steve Cabeza, Idea Man / Marketing Ninja at Amplification, Inc. Click here to see part of an interview with Becon-TV wherein Steve speaks social media.