Want to know how to tie in your business with social marketing but can’t quite figure it out? Social marketing is such a big part of businesses that Social Networking San Diego is offering a free weekly Webinar to educate anyone interested in “Social Networking 101”. Social Networking San Diego services local and global clients to help them completely wrap their heads around social networking and media, and how to then take that knowledge to another level. This new class focused on up-grading your business development and marketing tactics helps you learn how to generate prospects from on-line tools, how to get more clients from the social networks, to understand the internet and overcome the competitor, and more. This class being offered with such enthusiasm just goes to show once again how much social networking sites like Twitter, Linked-In and Facebook have such a great business value that needs to be taken advantage of. Social Networking San Diego suggests attendance from Marketing Managers, Business Owners, Entrepreneurs, Vice Presidents, Business Development Managers and Sales Professionals, joining everyone in the mix with one easy online sign up sheet. This is a great class to take advantage of for those who are struggling with the concept of the value of online marketing. Because unless you really know what you are doing and how to fully engage with your contacts, you probably wont be seeing much progress.

To sign up for this free weekly webinar, please visit http://www.socialnetworkingsandiego.com/free-webinar/

Keeping up with Facebook best practices is a full-time job. The most important (and practical) advice I can give is to make a commitment before you get in the game. If you are not ready to distribute relevant, entertaining and highly engaging content, don’t bother. Also, make sure to make an effort to build your “fan base.” It takes time and effort.

Try to also stay up-to-date with Facebook’s latest offerings. For example,  Facebook is now making vanity URLs. So, now you can replace www.facebook.com/profile.php.123lotsof&nonsense&ref=name with www.facebook.com/yourname.

Have you met with a successful money manager that didn’t tell you that diversification was a must? The first recommendation a financial advisor typically recommends is diversification. It seems obvious and makes perfect sense, right? Why would any reasonable investor put all their eggs in one basket? They wouldn’t!

So, why do marketers feel they can spend their available advertising budget in one (or maybe two) initiatives?

The number of messages the average consumer is bombarded with is unheard of. The average consumer: reads the paper in the morning, listens to the radio on the way to work, passes a few billboards on the way in to work, fires up their office computer to read their latest RSS feed, checks their email, bookmarks their favorite site, reads the rest of their newspaper online, sends a few Tweets, comments on their favor blog, opens up their mail and the list goes on, and on, and on. And, in many cases, consumers are “consuming” two or more of these initiatives at the same time.

Not only do advertisers need to break through the clutter, they need to make an imprint on consumers in many, many different ways.

The whole idea of “social engagement” or “conversational marketing” is on my mind. (It’s hard not to be when just about everything I read related to advertising or marketing lately is centered on this concept.) It’s fascinating to watch the world of marketing change.

For years we have helped clients implement “socially engaging” campaigns to reach their customers, but the whole notion of social marketing has created a new buzz in marketing.

To quote a quintessential marketing cliché, it’s “top-of-mind” for most marketers. We often get questions about how to implement effective social marketing campaigns. Advertisers say they need to be on Twitter and need help implementing a campaign on Facebook that will result in a “good following,” but they don’t understand WHY it’s important to communicate to their customers through these vehicles. Really — how can you blame them when you see companies from the local gas station to dry cleaners asking customers to follow them on Twitter?

We explain to clients and prospects that it’s not just about adding a social marketing line item to their budget. It should be viewed as a new way of marketing and communicating to customers. Customers have opinions and they want to be heard. Brands that are not willing to listen, engage and respond will end up with unsatisfied customers.

From a personal perspective, when was the last time you made any major buying decision and did not consult a friend, family member or glanced at a network or review site to get information about the product/service you are about to purchase/use? Customers want to be heard and advertisers who are not listening are going to be left questioning why their customers are turned off and their bottom lines are in the red.

In just seven short weeks, over a million users have downloaded the free course to learn all about iPhone applications. Students are going crazy over this new class, learning all about the applications, and trying to create there own, so they can “make it big”. On iTunes U, a feature that has over 100,000 educational video and audio files available to the public, they are reaching a new world of learning. We already bring our laptops, mobile devices and iPod with us everywhere, so why not have an educational tool at our fingertips at all times? It’s just that much easier to learn new things and further your education, for free, and from an accredited University! It really doesn’t get much better than that in terms of easy and available education. Some Universities make their applications private, and only accessible to those who attend the school, but many offer the app. to anyone and everyone to enjoy and learn, the only thing is you usually can’t receive credit unless your enrolled as a student of the University. But this is free knowledge were talking about here. Free, accredited University classes which usually would cost a fortune. And, to some the lack of these courses is the downfall of IF you even get the opportunity to obtain a college education or not. This tool is a key to an up and coming way to have school lectures and educational video at your fingertips – literally, and I feel it will be spreading quickly, through both schools wanting to contribute to iTunes U, and through the opened mind of the learners.

http://news.stanford.edu/news/2009/may20/million-052009.html