As the search engines cracked down on paid links that are considered "unnatural," webmasters came to believe that paid links are bad. The truth is, they aren’t all bad. You just need to know where to draw the line.[read more]

It seems that Target may have finally found its way into the next frontier of digital retail. Within the last week, Target has launched Cartwheel, a responsive website which will eventually become an application that allows users to earn and redeem in-store savings via Facebook and their smartphones.[read more]

It’s so easy to get overwhelmed by numbers. It almost feels like the new binary; we used to speak to computers in 1s and 0s, and now we have thousands of numbers with which to communicate our social media successes or failures. So how do you know which measures to pay attention to, and which ones are more vanity stats?[read more]

Twitter users who regularly retweet your tweets could be fans or influencers. If they're influencers in your industry, consider reaching out and looking for ways to not only thank them, but reciprocate their gesture. An easy and obvious way is to regularly retweet some of their tweets as well. This is not only good business, it's being a good social citizen.[read more]

For most small B2C establishments, particularly brick-and-mortar retail and dining, social media presents a challenge in terms of authenticity, timeliness and scale. Casey at the pizza place is able to capture pure moments as they happen and deliver them to his online audience, such as a toddler enjoying a slice while wearing a Superman cape.[read more]

As more sites have now added share buttons and integrated social media it has become easier to share content socially than ever before. In February 2010, people preferred to share content via email but now sharing content via email has decreased from 93.3% in 2010 to 53.3% in February 2013.[read more]

Consumers, aided by social, mobile and internet technologies, are expecting more from the brands with whom they choose to do business. They are beginning to define a brand mostly, if not solely, by its online presence. To offer value and increase website conversion, make sure you fix these any or all of these five elements if they are broken.[read more]

Linkedin can be used to search for and find almost every professional business person in the Western World. But Linkedin hides those people who are not closely connected to you and uses this fact as way to get you to upgrade to paid-for accounts. But there is a way around this.[read more]

Now, when looking at a product pin, pinners will see pricing and availability, and where to buy that product. Pinterest is calling these "rich pins" and has already worked with a number of retailers to provide these useful ones.[read more]

While digital gives you the opportunity to reach out to millions with a single click, it also poses a problem: if not monitored properly, it will not be as effective as face-to-face communication. Since your customers are interacting with you through electronic media, they need to be able to see the human side of the interaction to trust you and do business with you.[read more]

If you're using Facebook just to connect with family and friends, than it's not really for business use, and you can use a fun profile pic or whatever you'd like. Many people though will mix personal and professional use. For instance, you might have a Twitter account that you use to follow some celebs, as well as share business-related stories and articles.[read more]

Is the world ready for another social media network? The folks at muvver think it is. "Muuver is a simple to use social app that let's you share your hypes and gripes, kudos & complaints, likes, and dislikes - about ANYTHING. muuver then takes your hype or gripe about an item and adds it to the 'item page' where you can see everybody else's posts who hyped or griped about that item."[read more]

Facebook Guidelines have always been a narrow lane and often overlooked by businesses. One misstep can send all your Facebook marketing efforts in a permanent tizzy and may also result in your page being banned or shut down![read more]

Many branded viral videos achieve that status by being supported by a sizable seeding campaign. When a video is produced, companies will invest huge dollars in paid media to drive views of their YouTube content, pay to have high-profile sites and blogs host the content, and will put PR initiatives in place to raise the profile of their content to garner more views.[read more]

Earlier this month, Tweetdeck ended support for Facebook feeds, becoming essentially nothing more than another Twitter client in an already overcrowded field, which doesn't make a whole lot of sense to start with. To make matters worse and even more bizarre, they pulled their apps from Android and iOS and ended the TweetDeck AIR client. So, to put this in a nutshell, they are now essentially a Twitter client which doesn't even operate on mobile devices. Seriously?[read more]

What does SEO look like when tailored to a Spanish-speaking audience? Here’s a hint: it’s not about a direct translation of keywords. Basic literary translation theory says that good translations move beyond issues of “letter” (that is, a literal word-for-word trot) into the “spirit” of the language.[read more]

You can show your Facebook ad to anyone, people who already like your page, or people who do not yet like your page. However, the “platinum,” is friends of connections. By selecting this option your ads will show to friends of your existing fans (those who already like your page).[read more]

Most of what you read about creating more reach for your Facebook Page either has to do with Facebook Ads or optimizing content. But these three little settings for your Page can also dramatically increase reach.[read more]

Here's a Google+ cheat sheet to keep handy and get the most out of every post. This cheat sheet breaks it all down from post anatomy, notifications, style options, photo editing and more![read more]

Although Facebook tests everything and course-corrects as needed, the challenge here will be to find a balance between generating revenue and the psychology of what Facebook users think the service is (no one likes being sold to).[read more]