We’ve all heard our elders use this line; usually in reference to any variety of mass-produced goods like cars and appliances.  In many cases it’s true.  Automated assembly lines have, in many ways, sacrificed quality in the name of quantity.  But one thing you don’t hear is the same complaint about time.

Time as a measurement of duration has remained unchanged from its humble beginnings.  However, what can be done within the confines of time has been in constant evolution.  Perhaps time is not what it used to be.

As strange as it may seem to wage time against itself, 60 seconds in 2012 bear little resemblance to the same stretch in let’s say…the 1950’s.  Heck, a minute today doesn’t even compare to a minute in the late 90’s.

Remember downloading digital media on your dial-up modem?  It could take hours or days to download music.  All the while creating problems in the household like missing important phone calls because you stayed online overnight or getting booted when someone picked up the phone.

Today, an artist’s complete collection can be downloaded in under a minute and an entire feature length film may take just a few.

We now come full circle and unveil just how this relates to strategic blogging, online-marketing, advertising and ecommerce.  Depending on how fast you read, it probably took about 60 seconds to get to this point.  In that time nearly 700,000 internet search queries took place,  more than 70 internet domains were registered,  over 600 videos uploaded onto YouTube, 695,000 people updated their status on Facebook and over 1500 new blog posts were submitted.

That’s how fast the digital world is working these days; a bunch of  imaginary cogs and gears perpetually winding, spewing information and digital media faster and faster and faster.

Every 60 seconds, millions upon millions of changes occur on the internet.

So how do you compete?  How do you get this massive swarm of internet travelers to take a detour and visit your site?  What makes your blog different than all the others?

With all the click-happy internet users out there offering only 10 to 20 second s of their time before they decide to stay on one page or continue to another, you really have to WOW them.  You have to offer something that the other guys don’t have:

PERSONALITY!!

You want your voice to ring in the ears of everyone who hears [reads] it.  You need to separate your blog from the thousands of others.  Where other blogs lack quality content or a splash of flare, that’s where you need to strike and give your readers the best of both.  Think of blogging as making friends.  Only these friends have hidden agendas.  But remember…you do too.

Know your niche: Know who’s reading your blog.  Or at the very least who should be reading your blog.  Finding and establishing a unique niche for your blog is the very start to creating a strong identity.

Content Style:  If your market demands a formal or professional presentation, then that’s what you need to offer.  On the other hand, if your target audience is more laid back, keep your blog light-hearted and fun while still maintaining the highest standard of quality.

Appearance Match:  Unless you stole your design altogether from another site, your theme is most likely unique in a variety of ways.  But does your design and theme align with the content and approach of your site?  It may take an outsider’s perspective to get an unbiased answer so ask a friend or family member to peruse your website and give an honest appraisal.  Don’t take anything to heart because accepting constructive criticism is the best way to improve ourselves and what we do.

Logo & Domain:  Take time and really consider these items.  Is your domain unique enough to stand out but easy enough to spell and remember?  A great domain will not only make your look like a true professional but it makes sharing easier among your niche.  Also examine your logo.  You may again need to ask a friend or family member for an unbiased eye, but have them consider two things:

Would I recognize this logo if I saw it again?

Does it convey an accurate message to what it represents?

As stated in past articles, blogging poses many challenges and opportunities that can make it fun, strenuous and sometimes overwhelming.  But hang in there.  If you have a great product, service, general concept, philosophy or idea the blog will develop with time.  You just have to be willing to put in the leg work and tweak things here and there.  And if you need help tweaking, feel free to contact Web Chique Marketing with any of your questions or concern.

At this point we have discussed blog scheduling, strategic social networking, content and writing style/format.  Using these tools, and tweaking them to fit your specific needs, will greatly improve your blog and increase traffic on your site.  But how will you know?

In December we briefly touched on the webmaster tools feature for the new Google + for businesses as well as the brain-melting traffic data analysis of Google Analytics.  Since then, a lot of time and effort has been poured into these features and they have been improved exponentially.  That said, at this time we would like to turn your attention to the new and improved Google Analytics.

Using a new set of social reports, you can evaluate the impact of your social marketing initiatives and measure the effect social media has on your business.  These reports include:

• Sources: understanding where your traffic comes from and how it engages with your site.

• Conversions: using algorithms and other quantifiable data, this feature measures the conversion (goals set by you) and the monetary value of your traffic and its impact on your business.

• Pages: as social networks continue to grow, you will gain a better understanding of what content is being shared as well as where and how.  This way, you can optimize your efforts and take full advantage of all the buzz.

• Social Plugins: adding social plugins to your site (Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc) allows users to share your content to social networks directly from your site.  Your plugin data will define what content is being shared and where.

The new Google Analytics also makes it much easier to export and email your reports in the following formats: PDF (portable document format), TSV (tab separated values) and CSV (comma separated values).  You can also set a schedule for you reports to be sent to a mailing list once, daily, weekly, monthly or quarterly.

If your site contains content such as videos, downloads and embedded gadgets you can easily track your user-engagement using the new Events Flow Report.  Not only will you discover what keeps your users engaged but also the path they traveled from one event to another.  This way, you can tweak your site, eliminating features that aren’t working and replacing them with features that are.

Attribution modeling is yet another tool that Google has included in their new bag of tricks.  This allows for better budget allocation across all channels and ultimately leads to better returns.

Building and comparing these models will provide insight to the impact of your various marketing programs as they work together to drive sales.  From this, you can establish budgets and goals with a more realistic foundation.

As you can imagine, the details surrounding each of these features are extensive.  We simply provided a peep-show of these new features and now it’s up to you to explore further and learn how to best implement them for your site.

We hope you enjoyed our Blogging Best Practices series and invite you back next week for something new and exciting.   The world of internet marketing, social-networking and media is an ever-growing one.  As such, we must stay on our toes and continue to expand our knowledge and experience within the industry.

If you have any questions or comments regarding what you have read please feel free to leave feedback or contact Web Chique Marketing directly.

*Source: Google Analytics April 2012 product update

You can also attract loyal followers by interacting on other industry related blogs and engaging your readers in your content. Once you have established this basic foundation for a great blog, you are ready to focus on your presentation and style.

Some of these suggestions may seem simple and otherwise obvious but sometimes it’s the most obvious things that go unnoticed or overlooked.  For example, how many times have you searched for a pen only to discover the one stuck in your ear after looking everywhere else?  Or misplaced your car keys and insist you’ve looked everywhere before patting yourself down and finding them right there in your pocket.  Life is full of these little details that stare us in the face every day until we go looking for them and can’t seem to find them anywhere.

The world of blogging is very much the same.  Some of the most common and often misused writing techniques can both help or hinder your blog’s effect based on their execution.  The following is a brief list of writing techniques that you may use to enhance your blog.

• Don’t be afraid to use BOLD or italicized text.  Using bold and italicized text allows the reader to easily pick out important features in an article as well as read the passage with the intended emphasis of the author.  Just be sure not to overload your content with unnecessary bolding and italics as they will soon lose their effect.

• Break your blog into short paragraphs or bullet points.  Short, evenly spaced paragraphs and bulleted lists give the reader a solid understanding of what separates one idea from another.  Be sure to maintain consistent style and format when spacing and indenting throughout your article.

• Liven it up! Inserting one or more pictures in your blog will help catch the reader’s attention while breaking up the text so that it doesn’t look long and blocky.

• The use of keywords and meta tags is one of the most important features of your blog.  Use them frequently without making them sound forced.  It can drain your creative juices getting them to fit organically but it’s extremely satisfying when the finished product flows nicely and is chock-full of choice words and phrases.  Try to introduce keywords and meta tags early in your blog and don’t be afraid to shove one into your heading.

At this point we have discussed timeliness, behavior, style and formatting in regards to maintaining a successful blog.  Next week we will continue this discussion by outlining a variety of tools that webmasters use to monitor traffic and other things that are happening within their industry.

If you have any questions about what you have read here or another industry related blog, please feel free to contact us.  We also appreciate and openly invite any and all feedback to our blog so that we may continue to grow our business and its influence.

Due do the newness of this medium, there are no real cut-and-dry rules to blogging which makes it both fun and challenging.  However, there are several strategic techniques that we would like to highlight (even though we are sometimes guilty of not religiously following them ourselves).

Scheduling

We recommend blogging once or twice each week.  Blogging more than twice a week is obviously acceptable but make sure you are not bleeding yourself dry of good, solid content.  The time of day at which you publish may not seem very important but it can be the key to your blog being found or not. If you are marketing to people who work for large corporations that might block social media sites you would want to  update within the window of 5-6 and 7-8 when people are most likely to be winding up the workday and just getting home.  If, on the other hand, your clients tend to be on social media outlets throughout the day (such as ours), you would want to post during the workday. The most important part of scheduling is consistency.  You want your readers to count on your blog being updated at or around the same time each week.

Play Nice

Some people say “he with the most toys wins” but here at Web Chique Marketing we say “he with the most friends wins.”  The same is true with blogging.  If we’ve learned nothing from the rise of social media we’re at least aware that networking works.  People also say “it’s all about who you know” and this is something we can get on board with.

If you search for blogs and forums that relate to your industry you can easily redirect some of that traffic to your own site.  Making friends on other blogs and websites is a great way to promote your product or business.  However, this is a two-way street.  You can’t expect to have your back scratched and not be willing to do some scratching yourself.

Another way (the most important way) to play nice is to give credit where credit is due.  If your blog requires that you conduct a little research, be sure to at least mention the site and author from whom you got your information.  The last thing you need for your business, blog or website is to be accused of plagiarism because all your credibility will fly right out the window.

Get Engaged

Ok, we’re almost done.  You’re content is solid, you’ve given props to  your references and you’re communicating with other bloggers and their followers.  Now all you have to do is engage with your own readers.  Yeah…they’re reading your blog on a regular basis, but without an invitation to leave a comment, email or post supplemental content, the relationship may end there.

Fill you’re blog with open-ended questions and ask your readers to give their two cents.  If you’re lucky, maybe your readers will leave a little more than a couple pennies worth of feedback and you can use these conversations for future blog ideas.

See how nicely it all comes together?

We don’t want to spoil you with too much good stuff all at once so be sure to come back next week and we will continue our journey into the world of strategic blogging.  And if you have any questions at all regarding what you have read here or the services we provide we would be more than happy and answer them.  Feel free to click back and read some of our past blogs because within the realm of WebChiqueMarketing.com you will find a wealth of information to help you promote your small business or website.

“ TURN ON PRINTING DEVICE!! ”

At the time we laughed at our foolishness but thinking back, the computer could have been a little more sensitive.  After all, this was brand new technology and turning it on would have been too obvious.

Fast forward…

It’s a sure sign that technology has progressed when it’s cheaper now to simply buy a new printer than purchase replacement ink cartridges.  That said, the ignorance of our first machine would have surely gotten it thrown out the window in 2012.  People these days just don’t take that kind of crap from a machine.

So what’s the point?

The point is that today, our interaction with computers and computer applications is endless.  According to InternetWorldStats.com, nearly 80% of people in the United States use the internet; and this use is not limited to the desktop computer secluded in your home-office as it once was.  We now have internet access on a variety of mobile devices.  From laptops and iPads to Kindle Fires and Smartphones, the internet is literally at our fingertips every second of our lives.

Many of us rely so heavily on constant access to the internet that without it we would surely go insane. Every day I hear at least one person say they’d be completely lost without their phone.  It really makes you think that for people who claim to “need” their phone and other mobile devices, these things have almost become like friends or companions in their everyday existence.

As a result, people have grown accustomed to machines that display personality when they deliver a message.  Whether it’s a navigation system welcoming you back into your vehicle or a parking garage payment station thanking you and wishing you good day, the days of “TURN ON PRINTING DEVICE” are a thing of the past.

People have come to expect technology to express sympathy, humor and excitement when trying to tell them something.  As a result, online marketing and web-design has evolved into a completely different animal in recent years.

When designing web-space, personality can be achieved in a variety of ways.  Just by choosing certain fonts and colors you can create an enticing digital atmosphere.  From there, take your time and develop your content to truly appeal to your target audience.  The goal: you want your site to feel organic and comforting to your visitors.

For example when a webpage can’t be found, people don’t want to see a box that says “Page not found” that’s just rude.  Rather, people want to see something like MailChimp’s humorous apology in regards to the inconvenience.

MailChimp’s 404 page message reads:  “It seems the page you were looking for has DISAPPEARED.  We’ve recorded this vanishing act and our team of chimp magicians will find the missing link.”

Even something as simple as the text that appears in clickable tabs is worth your time in digital gold.  If you remember our Pinterest Gold Rush post then this reference will make perfect sense, if not you’d better check it out.   But Pinterest has tapped another goldmine simply by paying attention to minor details.  As most sites guide users through the registration process, they indicate password strength using bland and aggressive words like ‘weak’, ‘ok’, and ‘strong’.  Pinterest however, has chosen a more friendly approach by enthusiastically letting their users know when their password ‘looks good!’

This may not seem like a big deal on the surface, but when business owners and web-designers are looking for ways to attract visitors to their site and create user loyalty, more often than not it’s the little things that make the biggest difference.  Whether it’s the smiley face that appears in the sign up tab on the Path iPhone app or a snoozing owl that pops-up on HootSuite after a stint of inactivity, these are the types of features that create personality and enhance user interaction and the emotional intelligence of technology.

Chances are, you may not have noticed these little details emerging all around you.  If you start looking for these things on your favorite sites, I bet you’ll be surprised by all the subtle influences that web designers have embedded in their creations.  Let us remind you that the purpose for all this attention to detail is not subliminal manipulation but rather to make users feel emotionally engaged and welcome on your site.  After all, isn’t that what you really want?

What could possibly have gone wrong?

The answer is simple.  After months of preaching social media, marketing strategies and CMS optimization, it all means nothing if you’re not producing good content.  You can direct millions of visitors to your site by cleverly embedding meta-tags into your content, but if the overall experience falls short of superb, the chances for inspiring repeat visitors is slim to none and your SEO rankings are likely to slip.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but these search engines don’t need you the way you need them.  These companies spend a lot of time and money trying to separate the wheat from the chaff and with plenty of grain to sift through they could care less if your seed is in the mix.

Search engines are beginning to pay serious attention to user/content interaction, and the stakes are starting to rise.  Unlike links which can be bought, traded and easily manipulated, user behavior cannot.  Thus, you need to be on your toes and ready to pounce on the opportunity to attract (and maintain) a  fresh segment of an ever-growing audience.

So what can you do?

First, take a deep breath.  The initial moment of panic has long since expired and it’s time to get back in the saddle.  You need to rethink your angle and come up with something truly compelling that search engines can’t ignore and users can’t seem to get enough of.

Whether you decide to start from scratch yourself or hire a professional writer to do your bidding, the most important thing you need to do is establish a powerful connection with your audience.  You need to create a follower loyalty to the likes of Moses, or if you aren’t keen to biblical references…Conan O’Brien.  You want there to be public uproar if your site were to suddenly vanish (similar to the young demographic that abandoned NBC when Coco got dropped from the Tonight Show).

Very much like advanced math, engineering and…driving, I understand that writing is not for everyone.  But there are a lot of ways that you can write good content without being a great writer.  I learned in journalism that if you’re not a strong writer one good way to deliver a story is by using the “golden nugget” method.  Depending on your site, these nuggets could be anything from facts and quotes to a joke of the day; anything that’ll keep your audience on the edge of their seat.  Embed them throughout your content so that even if you begin to lose their attention …BOOM there’s a nugget!

In a nutshell (or nugget shell), your content needs to express your passion.  You need to infuse every word with the emotion you feel about whatever your site is promoting.   Do your best to avoid sounding negative, cynical and sarcastic (unless that’s your angle) because when someone stumbles across your site, you want them to feel at home, or at the very least…welcome.  You need to wow them and inspire their return.  Otherwise, you’re likely to fall into the depths of the SEO rankings along with the spammers and other online urchins that are being ousted by the likes of Google, Bing, and Yahoo.

On the contrary, sometimes you encounter a born story teller.  These are the people that have a natural ability to reconstruct even the most mundane events and turn them into captivating tales.  These are the people that everyone flocks around at cocktail parties.  These are the people who really know how to sell themselves.

Enter:   Facebook

For eight years, Facebook has evolved from an exclusive collegiate network into a social forum that anyone can access and create a personal profile.  Everyone has a past and Facebook provides a blank slate for them to tell their story.  Some stories are better than others and many aren’t even real.  But it’s undeniable that if you want to reach the public and share details about your life, Facebook it the place to do it.

This is especially true if you own a business. If you want to spread awareness of your company or create brand recognition in 2012, you absolutely MUST maintain an appealing and engaging presence on Facebook.  And with the creation of the Facebook timeline feature, the time has come for businesses to tell their story.

Coca Cola is a prime example of a company that has truly embraced the opportunity to share its journey.  Dating back to May 8, 1886 Coca Cola has carefully designed its timeline to outline its 123 year run by including everything from advertising campaigns to consumer quotes like this one from Renee L.:

“At the moment Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon, I opened a can of Coke to always remember what I was doing at that exact moment in history.”

Although Facebook’s timeline has been around for several months, the transition has remained optional.  However, starting March 30, 2012 Facebook is making it mandatory for all ‘brand’ promoting pages to switch to the timeline format.  Whether you’re a web design firm searching for clients, a music group seeking to expand your fan base or an online store owner trying to promote your handmade crafts, the idea is that your timeline becomes the first page that people land on when they search your ‘brand’.

If you are not a fan of the timeline format, unfortunately there is little you can do to prevent the inevitable.  Facebook is moving forward with this initiative and it seems that people will just have to get used to the change.  But on the bright side, EVERYONE loves a good story.  So if you currently have a Facebook page that promotes your personal ‘brand’ you should probably start writing yours.   Creating your timeline may be irritating or even confusing at first but once you learn the design, you’ll be glad you did.  Heck, it might even be fun!!

What does this have to do with online marketing?  Nothing really.  Except that a metaphorical gold mine has emerged in the world of social media which has millions of people flocking to its pages, desperate to secure a presence.  This medium does not yet have the magnitude of users that Facebook and Twitter possess, but the new kid on the block is definitely gaining ground, especially among the ladies.

This new phenomenon is none other than Pinterest, the bulletin board style social forum in which users post or “pin” everything and anything that suits their fancy.  So what’s the fascination?

Unlike Facebook and Twitter, which are more directed toward forming social connections, Pinterest is an ‘idea sharing platform.’  Pins that contain a visual or tactical appeal such as food, fashion, design and travel are a natural fit whereas conceptual or abstract inclusions just don’t fly.

Unfortunately, there’s no mechanism in place for consumers to buy your products directly from the site.  But consider the marketing potential to getting involved in the social platform that recently became the fastest website in history to break the 10-million-visitors-a-month threshold.

So here it goes:  Effectively using Pinterest…

1.  Invest yourself
Like any social network, Pinterest requires the investment of your time.  The key is to build relationships with people known for their “quality” pins.  Once they get to know you and your business, they’re more likely to post about your product or service.  This is a proven method on Twitter: if you follow someone popular and they follow you back, others will catch on and follow the leader (it’s Psychology 101).

2. Simple, Simple, Simple
The attraction of Pinterest is that it’s easy to use.  If you maintain a clean, organized board that generates a genuine appeal, your pin board and host site are almost guaranteed to receive a dramatic boost in page views.

3. Connect the physical with the digital.
If your company has a brick-and-mortar location, connect the dots from Pinterest and your website back to your physical location.  How you do this is up to you but some companies have found that a Pinterest button on their website and promotions pinned to their board seem to work quite well.

4. Matchmaker, matchmaker let’s make a match.
As suggested above, Pinterest caters to those looking for recipes, design ideas, DIY crafts and travel suggestions. If you sell nail guns and hammer drills, you probably won’t have much success on Pinterest.  Consider your demographic when looking into social media outlets and you’ll be better off in the end with less wasted time.

5. Pinterest is new in town…
As the new kid, Pinterest may be getting all the attention, but existing social networks have one clear advantage: a massive amount of users.  Use this to your advantage when updating your Facebook and Twitter accounts and introduce your followers to your board.

6. Establish a routine
By creating a unique routine or changing theme, you can count on repeat visitors.  This can be done on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis.  Or if you’re really bold and full of ideas, try all three.

7. Don’t be greedy
One fatal flaw of many users is to post pins that only relate to their business.  With Pinterest, the key is to post a menagerie of things that relate on a larger scale.  Pinterest users are savvy in recognizing boards that are too self-serving.  By pinning tips and products from other companies you are much more likely to earn the respect of other pinners.

8. You are the judge…and the jury
For the most part, Pinterest is a user managed forum.  By the very nature of its’ being users decide what’s hot and what’s not based on what they choose to ‘re-pin.’

If you haven’t seen Pinterest yet, you’re definitely missing out.  If you’re currently on Pinterest but you’re fumbling through pages and don’t know how to use it effectively, we hope these tips will help you optimize your time spent pinning.  Most importantly though, make sure you’re having fun!

So what’s the purpose of all this blogging?  The obvious answer is to share your thoughts with the world, to make your tiny little voice echo across the globe.  For some of us, that’s not enough.  We have products to sell and services to render.  So why not take advantage of this global echo?

After you’ve shouted from the rooftop (i.e. your blog), it’s time to get creative.  If you can bounce that echo off ohh let’s say a Facebook page, you’re potential audience becomes even larger.  Then, if you can get your echo to reverberate on Twitter, a lot more folks might hear you and decide to follow.  Stick a thumbtack in your echo to keep it in place on Pinterest, and the next thing you know you’ve got too much business to handle.

If you like the sound of all this traffic, a large overpowering mob batting down the hatches to get a piece you’re little business then maybe you should be blogging.

And when you decide to make that leap…this is how you do it.

1.  Display social media icons prominently near the top of your site.

The easier they are to find, the better.  Placing them in the top or bottom margin will keep them from being obscured by the other content of your page.

2.  Every blog must have a Facebook page!

It’s nice to post a link to your blog every time you publish without annoying your friends.  Not to mention, readers who know your blog title but not your name will still be able to find it on Facebook.  You can also use the Facebook social plugin to easily convert readers to fans.

3.  Generate traffic with StumbleUpon.

StumbleUpon is a ‘recommendation engine’ in which users browse pages that their SU friends and SU itself have generated as recommendations.  You can submit your blogs into the system but it works best if you share them with friends and accept their shares in return.  It helps if you have a strong following to begin with but don’t let that deter you from trying.  While people are still puzzled by what makes SU content go viral, many bloggers have seen fleeting traffic spikes using this service.

4.  Imbed your RSS feed onto your LinkedIn profile.

If your blog pertains to your professional aspirations, showcase it on LinkedIn.  You can list it as one of your three websites, where it will be labeled “Blog.” However, in using the Blog Link application, your most recent posts will appear directly on your profile.

5.  Pinterest is the new frontier

Pinterest is like California between 1848 and 1859.  It seems like everyone is scrambling to establish a presence in the land of Gold.  With this bulletin board style forum, blogs that contain a strong visual content, like fashion, food, crafts and travel are a natural fit as users pin photos onto themed boards attached to their original link.  Make it even easier to for your readers to share your content by adding a Pinterest plugin to your blog.

6.  Shorten your link whenever possible.

Pasting entire URL links is a thing of the past.  Twitter automatically shortens your link but this is not so with Facebook and Google+.  Using link shortening software like Bitly, you can easily share, track and analyze your links.  This data allows you to experiment with the various ways, locations, and times to post.

7.  You ARE your Blog.

Your blog is your personal brand.  So why not engage in some product placement and toot your own horn whenever possible.  Try using your blog name as your Twitter handle, StumbleUpon name, Pinterest identity etc.  Not only will people never wonder about the name of your blog, but it will be consistently plastered across a wide spectrum of social networks thus creating your own online community.

8. Bloggers Unite!!

Who knows blogging better than bloggers?  It’s no secret that bloggers like to read blogs, otherwise they’d go insane.  So what’s stopping you from tapping into this valuable resource?  There are a number of very active blog groups on Facebook that can help you through any issue you may encounter.  Whatever your niche, I’m sure that you’ll find a group of others with similar interests who blog.  If not start your own group and watch them flock.

9.  Bloggers Unite!! (Part II)

Now that you’re grouped with other bloggers, promote them.  Recommend them to friends, clients, business partners and colleagues and hopefully they’ll return the favor.  Align yourself with bloggers in a variety of interest topics on every social media stream.  If you see something you like, retweet or repin it on your page.  You may not be able to fight fire with fire but you sure can make a pretty big fire.

10.  Stay social…even if it’s not driving traffic.

It’s frustrating when you do everything right and still don’t see results.  The traffic is light and the clicks just aren’t coming.  But keep your head up, after all how many links do you see in a day that you don’t click?  The simple act of just being on social media platforms is a great way to develop relationships, not to mention keep up with your industry and discover new ideas for future blogs.

I hope these tips will help you become an expert blogger.  If you still need help launching your business or just don’t have the time to do it yourself, feel free to contact us at Web Chique Marketing .

Please join us again next week when we dive head first into the world of Pinterest.

And for that $3.5 million dollars…this is how they get us:

Pets and Babies:  It’s hard to compete with cute.  It’s even harder to compete with cute mixed with a little bit of funny.  And you’d might as well forget it if you’re trying to take on cute and funny served with a side of heartwarming and adorable.

Sex Appeal:  It works.  No room for debate…no need for an explanation.

Financial Gain and Power:  Who wouldn’t like a little extra ching in their pocket?  Oh yeah…that baby that throws Cheerios at Jimmy Fallon.  But for the rest of us…just tell me what I need to do!

Masculinity:  Remind me what it means to be a manly man in this modern, ‘feminized’ world.

Beer:  (fill in the blank this one’s wide open)

Sentiment:  In the midst of all this chaos, we need to be reminded of the little things that mean the most in our lives.

So let’s get to it.  This year we saw a wide range of companies from various industries step into the ring and try their bout at a Super Sunday ad campaign.  From regular contenders to a few new kids on the block, some ads held up to our expectations while others simply flopped.  So who’s doing a victory dance (besides the Giants) and who’s taking the long ride home with Tom Brady and the Patriots?

Using a Facebook based Ad Meter, USA today collected data and compiled a list of Best to Worst commercials.  For the sake of discussion I have included the top and bottom 5 in this article.  For a complete list with all 55 commercials you can visit USA Today /Facebook.

Best:

Dorito’s: Sling Baby

Bud Light: Weego Recue Dog

Kia: A Dream Car for Real Life

Chrysler: It’s halftime in America

M&M’s: Just My Shell

I think we can all agree:

A nude M&M is both weird and strangely appetizing.  Clint Eastwood really spoke to the heart of America when he encourages us that this economic struggle we face is merely our halftime.  A cowboy riding a rhinoceros and lumberjacks sawing through a giant sandwich is about as manly as it gets.  Rescue dogs are precious and really deserve some time in the limelight…especially if they‘re capable of fetching beer.  That snot nose kid in the tree house really deserved to have his Doritos snagged by his flying baby brother.

Worst:

Bud Light Platinum: Factory

GoDaddy.com: Body Paint

Lexus GS: Super Bowl 2012

Bud Light Platinum: Work

GoDaddy.com: the Cloud

The Bottom 5 however, seem to have really dropped the ball.  A Lexus in a steal box…seriously is that it?  We’re really not interested in the bottling process of your Bud Light Platinum…unless you have rescue dogs working in the plant.  GoDaddy.com ads are generally considered chauvinistic and, well, kinda lame.

Yet, despite ending up at the bottom of this poll, GoDaddy founder Bob Parsons told USA Today that their Super Bowl ads this year broke all prior sales records.  Reinforcing last week’s post that even the ‘worst’ commercials can be effective if they incite action or emotion.

As this poll suggests, ads have moved away from merely being water-cooler conversation and into the growing realm of social networking and media engagement.  Prior to the game, some companies had been picking the brains of social media users for months; tweeting for ideas and offering teasers on their web and Facebook pages.  The following statistics are evidence of their focus on social media: 57% of ads included a website or URL, 16% included social media prompts and 11% included emerging media technology including QR codes and text messages.

We hope you enjoyed this light-hearted topic and we invite you to comment and open discussion regarding your favorite and least favorite ads.  Please include why you liked or disliked them, and what general need or desire was being targeted by the ad.  Feel free to comment openly and please contact us if you have any questions regarding the services provides by Web Chique Marketing.