Top 5 Inbound Marketing Articles to Start the Week: Business Social Networking

Social media can help achieve a number of business and marketing goals, whether it's by facilitating customer service, helping connect with prospects, generating leads , etc.  Another great use of social media is for professional networking.

Our top inbound marketing article from the past week discusses just how social media helps you with professional networking and why you should invest some time in it.

1. 7 Ways Social Media Helps With Business Networking  

Author: Chris Garrett on chrisg.com

Networking has always been a part of business. Now that social media has made it onto the playing field, the opportunities afforded by networking are even more numerous.  Chances are, you've heard at least one story about how social media has helped a person land a job or business opportunity (maybe it's even helped you personally).

Chris' article emphasizes seven ways social media helps facilitate business networking .  These ways include visibility, pace, common interests, shared goals, a sense of connection, self disclosure and community cohesion.

Marketing Takeaway: Use social media to enhance your professional networking efforts.

2. The Three-Step Guide to Getting More Traffic by Writing Less

Author: Jonathan Morrow of Copyblogger

If you're a blogger struggling to find the time to blog consistently and promote your content, you're really going to like what Jonathan has to say in this article.  In a nutshell, stop trying to write more, and start writing less.  Like what you hear?

Jonathan's article discusses his three step strategy for getting more out of your blog by writing less and is based on research he conducted on 50 bloggers in a year's time. By writing less, you'll have more time to spend on things like promotion and guest blogging, which will help you make the connections needed to create a successful blog .

Marketing Takeaway: Free up some time to promote your blog.  It's critical to a blog's success.

3. 5 Tips for Email Marketing Deliverability

Author: Maria Pergolino on MarketingProfs Daily Fix

With all the buzz about social media, email often gets overlooked as a powerful B2B marketing tool.  Maria therefore offers 5 must-follow tips to optimize and ensure email marketing success:

1. Always include a compelling welcome message.
2. The cleaner your list, the better.
3. Always authenticate.
4. Organize your infrastructure.
5. Send ultra-relevant messages.

Marketing Takeaway: Make sure your emails are optimized and relevant for email marketing success.

4. How to Supercharge Your Social Media Presence With Online Surveys

Author: Amy Porterfield on Social Media Examiner

Are you connected to your audience's needs? Are you aware of your prospects' and customers' needs, wants, dislikes, etc.?  With social media , it's easier than ever to stay engaged with your constituents, which can ultimately help grow your business.

This Social Media Examiner article focuses on the concept of using online surveys to boost the effectiveness of your social media presence .  The article emphasizes why knowing your audience is helpful, how to create online surveys and how to promote them to generate helpful responses.

Marketing Takeaway: Knowing your audience has a number of business benefits.  Use online surveys to help you make the best use of your social media presence.

5. Landing Pages Are Your Secret Conversion Weapon

Author: John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing

Attracting visitors to your website is a great thing, but once they're there, you need to know how to capture them as leads.  The best way to do this is through landing pages. 

While John admits it's somewhat of a science to make a landing page work, he offers some great tips to get you started on optimizing landing pages to drive leads .  John's tips include focusing your landing page on one offer, testing variations, using video, making it easy for the visitor, offering sharing and thanking the visitor with a bonus offer.

Marketing Takeaway: Landing pages are a great way to convert visitors into leads .  Make sure you're optimizing them for the best results.

Photo by Andy Roberts

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