Why I Killed My LinkedIn Account

In a new article on HRExaminer.com, Heather Bussing details why she deactivated her LinkedIn account.

“I deleted my Linkedin Account last week. It’s not because I hate Linkedin…I killed the account because I don’t agree to their Terms of Service, and I don’t need LinkedIn enough to put up with it.”

Read the full article here.

Search Engine Optimization for Jobs

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View our YouTube video which goes into detail about SEO and how our Talent2You Job Optimization platform can help you:

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Socialize Your Public Relations

Influencing public opinion is oftentimes the lifeblood of small-, mid-, and large-sized businesses. And there’s no medium where this fact becomes more sharply crucial than media relations. What many public relations departments are learning is that social media, mobile applications, and “gamification” of a company’s more traditional assets can offer huge boosts to PR success. Here are a few emerging spaces for your public relations content to live—and how best to engage.

Pinterest – As one of the fastest-growing websites/platforms in history, Pinterest has assembled hundreds of thousands of fans, followers, and “pinners”. It’s a great time to engage these ready-made consumers of media by re-pinning messages and developing your own place on this gigantic virtual pin board.

Youtube – This media mogul has stumped many PR professionals for years. The trick to getting noticed is NOT to use your company’s video presence as a marketing platform, but rather to tell the human story behind your business. Evoke drama, get personal, and stay funny.

Twitter – The key to success in the Twitterverse: have an opinion. With scant few characters to punctuate your point, it’s up to you to figure out a way to connect with industry issues people really care about. Be specific and chatty—a high frequency of posts will keep you relevant.

Good luck!
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Turkey Day Hiring Strategies—Online Edition

Congratulations—you’ve survived another holiday. As the season heats up, don’t fall in the habit of neglecting your hiring strategy. If you’ve taken a traditional approach to recruitment, it’s a great time to flesh out your online and social media plans. The best part: there are a lot of advantages attached to starting today.

The most important thing to remember is that an online hiring campaign isn’t strictly a game of numbers. You’ve furthering your employer brand. You’re increasing engagement. You’re disseminating information about your place of business. To evaluate effectiveness, you need to look at traditional online metrics including page views, landing page visits (if you’ve set up your system that way), and fan/follower counts. Actual conversions or hires remains a solid method to determine whether your campaign is working or not.

New, Web 2.0-savvy ways of tracking your hiring efforts include counting the frequency of re-tweets and searching out mentions of your campaign in other “new media” sources such as blogs and on personal posts. Using traditional and emerging metrics, evaluating your campaign makes a shift from quantitative to qualitative, but is still a very real and obtainable goal.

Until next time,

Buyer Advertising
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4 ‘DON’TS’ FOR TWEETS

Investing in your social media strategy—for recruitment or marketing initiatives—is a sound plan. Not only can you get your message out to more people in record time, social media can do it cheaper, faster, and more effectively.

The trade-off? There are a lot of pitfalls to make as a company exploring Twitter, especially those who are taking a first stab at the big blue bird. Here are 5 no-no’s to consider as you prepare to tweet.

1. Honking your own horn constantly. Good news is great. Good news 100% of the time is bad. Aim for a mix of announcements, industry information, and peeks behind your office doors. Above all, provide a reason for people to subscribe to your feed. Which leads us to number 2…

2. Not being a resource. Even though your social media output is free, provide value to your customers. Let people know what’s happening in your business, your field, and how they can improve themselves or their operation.

3. Spamming up followers’ feeds. Nothing makes netizens click “unfollow” faster than 5 tweets in one hour. Keep content brief and information moderate—a post a day, at most, will do the trick.

4. Being dull. Be confident. Be whimsical (but still professional). Mix up your messaging and use clever headlines to hook interest.

Signing off for now,

Buyer Advertising
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Steve Jobs and the Timelessness of Innovation

Last night, the nation began mourning the loss of Steve Jobs. His personality and brand represented more than just the genesis of a successful company (Apple Computer)—his vision and pursuit of new user experiences, as well as infusing life and charm into an all-too-often dry technology sector, changed history.

But if one were to distill his legacy to tactical moves, there’s a lot to unpack. Black turtlenecks instead of suits. Revolution instead of status quo. Calm, personal speeches instead of hackneyed, over-exuberant displays that similar companies had employed in the past (cough, cough, Microsoft). Above all else, Steve employed a willingness to ignore everyone else while following a rhythm all his own.

Innovation comes in many forms. For Steve, they were in the promotion of the user experience, and a new amalgamation of great music and geek tech. For you, they can be an exploration into new arenas, a marketing message unique to your organization that’s never been heard from before. Above all else, never stop innovating and amazing results will follow.

‘Til next time,

Buyer Advertising
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Weird-vertising

Finding the balance between “edgy” and “on-point” can be a tricky tightrope to walk. You watch in wonder as the goofy commercials from Old Spice become viral hits on YouTube, and can only sit back and contemplate if a similar strategy would work for your company. But for every successful venture into the land of bizarre advertising, there are a hundred examples of spacey videos, confounding print ads, and even re-brands that have left company loyals confused and consumers scratching their heads.

As always in our industry, we need to think of the customer first. Old Spice is deodorant that goes under the armpit so you smell nice. Medical instruments and baby formulas have an entirely separate consumer base—weird shouldn’t be part of your vocabulary. In order to be different, make sure your customers are hip enough to “get it”. Even if you do decide to take a plunge in to the odd, make sure
you still convey your message. Advertising that doesn’t make a point is just… well, weird.

Above all, challenge the conventional with a fresh approach that doesn’t sacrifice your integrity, offend the masses, or lose track of your message. You’ll be surprised at the results.

Signing off for now,
Buyer Advertising
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Anatomy of a Viral Video

Ah, the viral video!  It’s both a striking media debut and a tool many marketers aspire to, but few achieve. There is no 100% magic success formula that will send a video spiraling across Facebook pages and racking up the “likes” on YouTube, but there are some common themes and characteristics you can aim to hit when crafting your own spot. Here’s what it takes:

Short. A viral video needs to be fit for mass consumptions, and if there’s one thing the masses have in common, it’s a short attention span. Keep the length of your video under a minute.

Weird. Puppets smelling fingers? News reporters flubbing it on air? Shirtless men swan diving out of kitchens? Viral videos all have a touch of the bizarre, and it’s often that impulse to “figure it out” that keeps people viewing and sending it to their friends to weigh in. Aim for the offbeat if you’re looking to go mainstream.

Accessible. Make sure your video is hosted in a place that can support the bandwidth that you’re hoping to achieve. Keeping it on your website is great for company exposure, yes, but if your counter hits the tens of thousands, your site will be down and your video’s 15 minutes will be over before they begin. The tried and true usually works: go with YouTube.

Siging off for now,

Buyer Advertising
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Reading into QR Codes

You may have seen them everywhere—from restaurant menus to car dealerships. QR codes are a sign of the times: the ability of our smartphones to quickly decode short bits of information that are the hallmark of these digital stamps. QR codes, short for “Quick Response” codes, can be quickly scanned into smartphones and decoded with an appropriate “app”. The result could be a short, meaningful phrase, an “ecard” with information about an individual or business, instructions on how to enter a contest, or an email contact. The amount of data varies by type of QR code used, and the possibilities are many.

While an interesting diversion, the ability of QR codes to convey meaningful information is limited as things stand right now. As most things in the advertising world, it is up to the businesses and people therein to employ a tool like QR codes creatively and effectively. Look to utilize QR codes as part of a larger strategy: a campaign or a viral endeavor. Don’t pin the hopes of your business on a QR code effort without the gusto to back it up.

Signing off for now,
Buyer Advertising
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Is Google+ a Positive or Negative?

Announced just days ago, Google has fired a shot over the port bow with its newest attempt for a piece of the social media pie. The appropriately-named “Google+” is made on the heels of two rather striking social media failures—Google Buzz and Google Wave—but this time around, the social media universe (yes, that includes the Twitterverse) has high hopes.

Google’s new innovation includes “Circles”, a new feature to counter massive lists of friends that’s the mainstay of Facebook. By dragging and dropping individuals into these customizable groups, users will have a tighter control over who sees what information (or that drunken party picture from last night). A piece of media shared in one circle goes out to all members of that group.

Google+ holds new opportunities for advertisers. With “Sparks”, an integrated feature of this new platform, Google will tailor entertainment information specifically for users based on their lists of interests and activities while logged into the platform. With a more comprehensive analysis of user data, we wouldn’t be surprised to find more targeted opportunities for HR professionals and marketing gurus to pinpoint their target demographic.

Google+ is still undergoing testing, but keep an eye out for future development!

Signing off for now,

Buyer Advertising
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