Are you looking to take advantage of social media for your business or organization? With easy-to-understand introductions to blogging, forums, opinion and review sites, and social networks such as Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn, this book will help you choose the best -- and avoid the worst -- of the social web's unique marketing opportunities. The Social Media Marketing Book guides you through the maze of communities, platforms, and social media tools so you can decide which ones to use, and how to use them most effectively. With an objective approach and clear, straightforward language, Dan Zarrella, aka "The Social Media & Marketing Scientist," shows you how to plan and implement campaigns intelligently, and then measure results and track return on investment. Whether you're a seasoned pro or new to the social web, this book will take you beyond the jargon to social media marketing mastery. Make sense of this complicated environment with the help of screenshots, graphs, and visual explanations Understand the history and culture of each social media type, including features, functionality, and protocols Get clear-cut explanations of the methods you need to trigger viral marketing successes Choose the technologies and marketing tactics most relevant to your campaign goals Learn how to set specific goals for your campaigns and evaluate them according to key performance indicators Praise for The Social Media Marketing Book: "Let Zarrella take you to social-media marketing school. You'll learn more from reading this book than a month of research on the Internet."--Guy Kawasaki, co-founder of Alltop.com "If I could be any other person for a day, it would be Dan Zarella. Either him or Brad Pitt. But Dan's smarter. This book is why I say that."--Chris Brogan, President of New Marketing Labs "This book demonstrates a beginning to the endless possibilities of the Social Web."-- Brian Solis, publisher of leading marketing blog PR 2.0

Front cover “Too many people are running around nowadays calling themselves ‘social media experts.’ Simon doesn't call himself that. His clients do. And they're right. I'll read anything this man writes.” –Peter Shankman Back cover Social Location Marketing Breakthrough social location marketing techniques for promoting your service, product, or venue! Social Location Marketing offers powerful new ways to promote practically any product, service, or venue. Now, pioneering expert Simon Salt shows exactly how to make the most of it! Salt introduces Foursquare, Gowalla, Yelp, and other apps, helping you choose your best options, and build cost-effective marketing programs that work. Through real examples, you’ll learn how to reach your key audiences and segments…craft and execute winning strategies on realistic budgets…measure activity and calculate ROI…avoid costly mistakes…and much more! Whatever your goal, role, or industry, this book will help you find new customers where they are, strengthen loyalty and retention, and supercharge profits! You’ll Learn How To: • Understand how social location marketing works and what it can (and can’t) do for your business • Learn the surprising realities about who uses social location software • Know your customers and their motivations–and build marketing plans around them • Develop communities of customer advocates who’ll work on your behalf • Use games, competitions, time-limited offers, and other innovative approaches • Successfully reach teens, tweens, women, or men • Discover proven approaches for fashion, retail, hospitality, and restaurants • Effectively handle criticism, and transform negatives into positives • Preview brand-new social location tools, including Google Hotpot • Understand the privacy issues associated with social location marketing SIMON SALT is a key social media influencer who works with large brands and international PR companies. After participating in three succes1tups, he now leads his own marketing communications firm, whose client list includes Fortune® 500 companies. Salt is now conducting a Social Media roadshow, speaking on social location sharing across the United States. He has spoken at major conferences including BlogWorld, Internet Summit, and will speak at SXSW 2011.

Create and maintain a successful social media strategy for your business Today, a large number of companies still don't have a strategic approach to social media. Others fail to calculate how effective they are at social media, one of the critical components of implementing any social media strategy. When companies start spending time and money on their social media efforts, they need to create an internal plan that everyone can understand. Maximize Your Social offers a clear vision of what businesses need to do to create—and execute upon—their social media for business road map. Explains the evolution of social media and the absolute necessity for creating a social media strategy Outlines preparation for, mechanics of, and maintenance of a successful social media strategy Author Neal Schaffer was named a Forbes Top 30 Social Media Power Influencer, is the creator of the AdAge Top 100 Global Marketing Blog, Windmill Networking, and a global social media speaker Maximize Your Social will guide you to mastery of social media marketing strategies, saving you from spending a chunk of your budget on a social media consultant. Follow Neal Schaffer's advice, and you'll be able to do it yourself—and do it right.

Provides more than one hundred practical ideas, action plans, and implementation steps to help businesses identify unconventional social media opportunities to increase online presence, attract customers, and improve profits.

In the digital age, numerous technological tools are available to enhance business processes. When these tools are used effectively, knowledge sharing and organizational success are significantly increased. Social Media Marketing: Breakthroughs in Research and Practice contains a compendium of the latest academic material on the use, strategies, and applications of social media marketing in business today. Including innovative studies on email usage, social interaction technologies, and internet privacy, this publication is an ideal source for managers, corporate trainers, researchers, academics, and students interested in the business applications of social media marketing.

Social media has quickly become part of the fabric of our daily lives, and as we have flocked to it, so have most companies and organisations from every sector and industry. It is now the place to attract and sustain our attention. But how is it a new marketing activity and how is it similar to previous practice and customer behaviour? Does it require new modes of thinking about human networks and communications or do the existing conceptual models still apply? This book offers a critical evaluation of the theoretical frameworks that can be used to explain and utilise social media, and applies them to fun real-life examples and case studies from a range of industries, companies and countries. These include Unilever, Snickers, American Express, Volkswagen and Amnesty International, and span campaigns run across different platforms in countries such as China, Canada, Sweden and Singapore. Readers are invited to think about the different types of social media users and explore topics such as brand loyalty, co-creation, marketing strategy, measurement, mobile platforms, privacy and ethics. As well as tracing the emergence and trends of Web 2.0 and what they mean for marketing, the author also considers the future for social media marketing. Discussion questions and further reading are provided throughout, and the book is accompanied by a companion website.

How to implement a best-in-class visual marketing plan It's no secret that visual content online really draws in viewers. People love Pinterest, Facebook, and the like for visual sharing and engaging. Smart marketers know their companies need to tap into this, but where and how to start? Visual Social Marketing For Dummies offers a clear roadmap for creating effective, well-defined visual social marketing strategies as part of your overall marketing and social media plans. From defining goals to developing highly visual content across a range of social media platforms, this book is the perfect step-by-step guide to get you there. The book explores Pinterest, Instagram, Vine, Tumblr, YouTube, SlideShare, and Twitter, among many topics and resources, and includes useful examples from leading brands and companies across a variety of industries. Helps you set goals that align with your budget and resources and then lay out a visual social marketing plan Covers image-based platforms, such as Pinterest, Instagram, and Vine, as well as social media platforms including Facebook, Tumblr, YouTube, Twitter, and SlideShare Explores visual tools, including infographics, presentations, and video Explains how to track and measure the effectiveness of your visual marketing efforts Make your brand stand out from the crowd with the information, tips, techniques, and examples you'll find in Visual Social Marketing For Dummies.