5 Characteristics of Marketing 2.0 and Why You Should Care

This is a previous post from my blog, www.eggmarketingblog.com

If youre online at all these days, you probably hear a lot about Web 2.0. Marketing 2.0. is the counter to the latest engaging tools of technology. Here are five characteristics of Marketing 2.0:

First, it is interactive. No longer are we forced to sit on the couch and take our daily dose of advertising. We now can jump in the television (or computer) and change the color of the background, choose what pose the personality takes, and tell them how we like to get our messages. More or less.

Take YouTube, for example. What started out as a way for teenagers to post inane videos of skateboarding falls has turned into the single biggest factor affecting media today. Yes, there are still the idiot videos, but now theyre mixed in with product spoofs, commercials that are actually interesting, and now even political debates. What used to be solely for the tech-savvy consumer is now being wooed by major players like CNN.

YouTube works because it is interactive. Once you view a video you can share it with friends. Thats how something like a silly Transformers rap has been viewed over 510,000 times!

Marketing 2.0 is a conversation between consumers and companies. Since we have all but removed commercials from our television viewing repertoire thanks to Tivo, companies have to find new ways to reach their audience. That means they have to ask consumers what they want. Theyre listening for once!

Blogs and forums allow companies to take off their professional mask and get comfortable with their customers. It gives a comfortable, informal voice to the company. Take the Apple Blog. Readers can get updates on Apple products as well as comment on posts. Theyre in essence creating a dialog that hasnt previously been available.

Democracy is what Marketing 2.0 is all about. If the public doesnt like it, it wont float. Or will it? Sometimes there is a public outcry so loud you can hear it from cyberspace. A few months ago, an illegal HD DVD encryption code was posted online. Bloggers found the code and spread it like wildfire, using, among others, Digg as a tool to spread it. The problem? HD DVD is one of Diggs sponsors, so the founder of Digg received a cease and desist order from the company.

The original post was removed, but it was like pulling a leg off a centipede. The code continued to spread. Eventually the founder had to throw his hands up, knowing that democratic media had gotten the best of the situation.

Marketing 2.0 efforts are always non-traditional. There are no rules. This is good in that any business can devise a new method of marketing, but bad because nothing is guaranteed.

Heres an example of Marketing 2.0 gone awry: at the beginning of 2007, Cartoon Network launched a marketing campaign for its show Aqua Teen Hunger Force in Boston. The campaign involved the placement throughout the city of several lightboards with cartoon characters on them. Someone cried terrorism! and the project was shut down. Hard. With police action. The situation might have been an overreaction, but the head of Cartoon Network resigned as a result. Not every idea is a good idea.

Finally, Marketing 2.0 is flexible. If youre used to booking year long phone book ads, this is the complete opposite. Any marketing tool can be changed or stopped relatively easily, and the majority of Marketing 2.0 is affordable (blogs, for example, are free). Creating a strong marketing mix will involve hits and misses, so it is important that you be able to change your marketing plan on a dime.

Now that you understand Marketing 2.0, how will you use it? The longer you take to shift gears from old school marketing to Marketing 2.0, the more customers you will lose as a result. Take the plunge with me into the future of marketing. Trust me, it will be refreshing!

Susan Payton is Managing Partner of Egg Marketing & Public Relations. She assists small businesses with marketing strategy and corporate communications. She is also the author of 101 Entrepreneur Tips, a handy guide that helps entrepreneurs make repeat customers, close the sale, and delegate work. For more information on Susan and Egg Marketing, visit http://www.eggmarketingpr.com or email her at smpayton@eggmarketingpr.com. Get free shoestring marketing advice on Susan's blog, http://www.eggmarketingblog.com.

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Google Cash Frenzy

Google, sometimes referred to as the Big G, has once again proved to the world that it still is the dominant and greatly profitable leader in the Internet search market. Recent reports indicate profits are up 110% to $721m in the three months to June 2006. Much of these Google profits come from their clever and very successful advertising program called Google Adwords.

Google, essentially a search company, had gained market dominance through smart ranking technologies that provided the user with the most relevant search results ever possible to date. Its simple user interface, coupled with smart algorithms combined with a snappy name and logo has made it the most used search engine today, putting itself years ahead from its closest rivals. A listing for a targeted search term in the first page or two of Googles organic listing is every webmasters dream. This means huge success in terms of traffic, sales and hence money in the bank! But, unfortunately, it is not possible for every website to be listed on the first page or two. Google saw the potential for offering paid listings that will appear alongside organic results for a search term. In this way, a webmaster can still get his website onto the first page or two under sponsored listings but for a price. Google launched their pay-per-click program an advertiser only pays when someone clicks their ad, called it Adwords and the rest, as they say, is history!

Google then followed up with a progam called Adsense which is linked to Adwords. Adsense is where any ordinary webmaster (called a publisher) can display relevant ads from Googles advertisers on their site. When a user to that site clicks an ad, Google pays them a percentage of that click cost.

Google, by its very existence, has given webmasters a chance to earn money in ways that wouldnt have been possible. Currently, people make cash out of Google by using Adwords and/or Adsense. Thousands of ordinary people are sharing in on Googles success and profits, making for themselves nice checks every month in the process. Lets see how.

Adwords

Adwords are used by off-line and online businesses alike to advertise their products or services. But, for ordinary people, thats not where the money is. Thousands of people are combining the versatility of affiliate programs with the reach of Adwords, making themselves a lot of money in the process.

People search for products that they can promote and more people turn to www.clickbank.com for this. Clickbank, a large Internet company, acts as reseller, payment processor and affiliate commission payer all in one. It works like this. A publisher, wanting to sell his/her products signs up with Clickbank and enters Clickbanks marketplace. Affiliates wanting to promote the publishers products, signs up with Clickbank first as an affiliate and obtains an ID which is used in a special link called a hop link.

The affiliate then markets the publishers products by way of advertising, especially on Google Adwords (but can be by any other means although Google Adwords produces best results) in an effort to drive traffic to the site of the publisher. If the referral results in a sale, Clickbank processes the transaction, takes a percentage of the sale, allocates the commission to the affiliate and the balance to the publisher. Clickbank pays affiliates and publishers every two weeks.

This appeal and popularity lies in the fact that affiliates dont need to have a product or website of their own and the commissions offered are very generous, sometimes as high as 75% of the product price. Affiliates also have the luxury of marketing a number of products from different publishers all at once.

But, a word of warning. Adwords is a bit intricate and very few people understand the system fully. If you dont know what you are doing, you can lose a lot of money in a very short space of time. My advice would be to learn the system thoroughly, try a few small test campaigns and tweak as you go along. Never spend more than what you feel comfortable with and intensify your campaign only when you see positive results.

Adsense

Here, publishers on Googles Content Network receive a commission when someone clicks on Google ads on their site. When an advertiser advertises with Adwords, he is given a few options. He can advertise on Google Search ads appear as sponsored results alongside organic search results when users search using Googles Search Engine, Google Search Network ads appear on Googles search partners and Content Network independent websites that host Google ads ie. the Adsense sites we are talking about.

Participating in Google Adsense is relatively easy. You simply sign up for free at Google and when your site has been approved, you will be given Javacript code that you place on your website. Google provides publishers a range of options when it comes to ad sizes and colors in order to complement their sites design and theme.

There are numerous tips to increase your Adsense revenue too numerous to mention in this little article but Ill tell you the most important ones. Firstly, build a website for the user and not Adsense. Put quality, fresh content that is relevant to your website and not duplicate, trashy content. Google is clamping down on sites made just for Adsense that offer the user no real benefit. Secondly, optimize your web pages correctly. Lastly, concentrate all your efforts on getting good, regular traffic to your site - after all, if no one visits your site, who will click on the ads?

Yes, making money with Google is possible but wont happen overnight. Continuously research and test but most of all go slow, put in some hard work and keep up with it! All the best!

Copyright 2006 Anwar Ahmed Ally

Anwar Ally has been in the work at home industry for over 18 years. He is the founder of: http://www.thehomeworker.org and blogs at: http://2work-at-home.blogspot.com.

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Striking Accessories For Your Equipment

Though there are many products available in the market but to enhance the functions of these products, there are accessories. These enhancements serve as additional benefits for the products. For various products, there are different types of enhancements available in the market.

MP3 is an essential item used by most of us to catch up our favorite music. However, there are also many accessories that can be used along with this MP3 player. One such accessory is a holder of MP3 players. It averts any damage or harm to a player. It is a good investment option as this improves the functional life of a player and makes the money worth spending for. There are also remote controls that can be purchased for MP3 players. This helps in controlling the functions of players without moving from a place. It is specifically beneficial in cars. This is because while driving people who do not want to distract their attention from the road can attach these remotes onto the steering wheel of their vehicles. This way they can easily adjust the volume and channels without any hassle. Another product relating to music is iPod. It is generally accessible in two colors, white and black. Moreover its cases are available in all the colors of the rainbow.

There are also accessories that can be used with spy or hidden cameras. Wireless hidden cameras can be put into sunglasses. There are special spy camera glasses that are used. They can also be hidden in nosepieces and are capable of capturing images. They also allow a wearer to record everything without anyone else realizing it. These look just like our normal sun glasses. However, these glasses are especially used in criminal journalism and spy journalism so as to collect solid evidence against criminals that can be further produced in a court. Increasing crime rates has also lead to an introduction of many equipment and accessories for safety and self-defense. Pepper sprays and stun guns are the equipment of self-defense that has come up. This, when sprayed, hinders the action of an attacker for few moments. This gives a victim an opportunity to run away from the place. Stun gun is a devise used for low ampere shock with a high voltage put onto an attacker. This also disables the attacker for a small while so that benefits the victim a lot.

Needless to say, along with the products their accessories have made the life all easier to live.

Copyrights protected article written by Andrew Stratton for Surveillance Technology. More articles and information about the security camera and accessory products can be viewed easily altogether at this location http://www.surveillancetechnology.com/security-camera-accessory.htm. Please be free to explore the website for more information on every surveillance products and their features.

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