News Years Resolution: Make Money Online with Social Networks (Part II) December 20, 2009
Posted by Rohan in December.Tags: community site, develop social network, entrepreneur, Facebook, linkedin, make money online, myspace, new year, New years resolution, Ning, recession, resolution, rsitez, saas social networking, social network software, social networking, social networking software, socialengine, twitter
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In part 1 of this article I discussed how you can identify your target niche, create your social networking site, and market the site to start building your own social networking online business. In this article I will discuss how you can manage, monetize, and incorporate you business from any browser anywhere in the world.
Manage Your Business
If you think of your social networking site as just a website to hangout and share pictures then you have a nice hobby, not an actual business. Like any business, you will have some management responsibilities that will need to be done.
Engage your members: You will need to add value to the site by posting newsletters, responding to forums, add interesting photos, highlighting active members. You will also need to deal with the abusers of the site by warning, blocking or deleting these members. You should host contest, provide reward programs, and find advocates on the site. The more you engage users, the more they will feel a part of something live and keep coming back.
Provide more value: In addition to engaging members you should find ways to provide more value to this audience. The audience is niche and you should have some knowledge of the needs of the industry or the audience in general. What kind of content or articles can you provide that they cannot find anywhere else? How can you provide opportunities for them to gain recognition or financial value from the site? How can you create opportunities for them to use the site to help make their business successful? How do you add value to their personal life? What’s in it for them?
Track site visitors with Analytics: The best way to do this is to get a few lines of code from Google Analytics (google.com/analytics) and add to your site. This will show you how many visitors you have daily, where they came from, which page they visited etc. You will be able to see which marketing activities yield the best results and focus more on the message or source of the article that is providing the most visits.
Manage your Reputation: Among other things, Reputation Management includes the ability to see what people are saying about you online. Google has a free service called Google Alerts (google.com/alerts). With this service you can see each time Google index content with a specific keyword. This is important because you can tell Google to notify you by email each time they index new content with your website name in it. So each time there is a blog, forum, article or other content posted online by anyone that includes your website name Google will send you an email so that you will be aware of it and can take any necessary action. Additionally, this is a way to see what your competitors or others in your industry are saying or doing.
Monetize your Site
There are different ways you can go about doing this. It really will depend on your site, the amount of members you have, and the focus of your site. However, here are some ways you can monetize your site.
Advertising: This is the most common ways. You can sell advertising to the specific industry you are targeting for your social network. Once you have created a membership base you will be able to sell ads to businesses who want to sell their products or services to that membership base.
Membership Fees: Sites with a clear and specific value may be able to monetize via membership fees. With this you will be able to charge a monthly or yearly fee for access to the site or for access to premium content or features of the site.
Online Store: You can sell relevant product to your site members. If your site targets university students you may be able to sell books, laptops or other products they may find useful. If your site targets parents, you may be able to sell children toys, clothes, or products.
Sell Services: You may also be able to sell services that are relevant to your audience. A site that targets small businesses and entrepreneurs may be able to sell accounting and legal services. You do not have to perform the services yourself. You may be able to partner with service providers and use the site as the means to finding customers in need of these services.
To learn more details about monetizing your website please read my other blog How to Make Money Online like Myspace and Facebook.
Incorporate your Business and Open a Bank Account
Once you are able to monetize the site you should create a business structure with a business bank account to collect and protect revenue, and to minimize personal and business liability.
By having a business entity and a bank account, you will be able to create merchant accounts and collect payments from credit cards, debit cards, Visa, Master Card, Amex etc. You will also be able to write off business expenses to reduce your tax liabilities and separate your personal assets from your business expenses – therefore reducing the chance of personal risks.
1 – To start your business online:
Get your Employer Id Number (EIN) from the IRS. This is done completely online and can be done in a few minutes. Your EIN will be needed to start your business bank account and online merchant account
http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/0,,id=102767,00.html?portlet=4
2 – Register your business with your State
To do this you will need to go to the ‘secretary of state division of corporations’ website for your state. On this site they will have an online form or pdf to allow you to register with your state. For instance, if your state if Florida, search for ‘Florida secretary of state division of corporations’
3 – Create your Bank Account online
Most banks today allow you to create an account online without ever having to go to the bank. I don’t remember the last time I have had to go to a bank for any reason except to sign a couple documents here and there. Go to your bank’s website and find the link to open your account online. You should be able to manage and monitor your financial transactions from your bank’s website.
4 – Create your Merchant Account
You will need a merchant account to collect funds online. Some social networking site includes the ability to collect payment via different payment sources. However, you will still need to create the merchant account yourself that is needed for you to collect the funds.
Vendors: Paypal.com, authorize.net, paysimple.com
Summary
Once you have created your social networking business you are now on the path to participate in one of the most active and high growth areas in business. There are no real overnight successes and you will need to work at this business as you would any other business venture. But you will now be able to start pursuing your dream of building your own online social networking business.
To learn more about creating and monetizing your own social networking site please visit www.rsitez.com.
About the author
Rohan Hall is the Founder/CEO of rSitez, Inc. (www.rsitez.com), a technology firm that helps entrepreneurs create unique revenue-based social networking sites. He is the author of Stop Working, a book that teaches entrepreneurs how to use technology, globalization, and networks to build a global business. He has developed technologies for a wide range of entrepreneurs and Fortune500 clients including HP, Corning, Oracle, Honda and various others.
News Years Resolution: Make Money Online with Social Networks (Part I) December 18, 2009
Posted by Rohan in December.Tags: community site, develop social network, entrepreneur, Facebook, linkedin, make money online, myspace, new year, New years resolution, Ning, recession, resolution, rsitez, saas social networking, social network software, social networking, social networking software, socialengine, twitter
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2009 was a tough year for many people and businesses as we experienced the largest economic crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s. We saw many the largest companies fail, countries bankrupt or on the verge of financial disasters, and trillions of dollars in consumer wealth disappear. But during the same year, Twitter.com audience grew 343%, Tagged.com grew 330%, Ning.com grew 251%, and rSitez.com grew 151%. Not only that, Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook.com Founder/CEO at age 25 ranking in Forbes.com went from 321 to 158, as his net worth went from $1.5 billion to $2 billion during this same period in the last year.
If these businesses did this well in such a terrible economic period imagine their possibilities in the next 1 to 5 years as the global economy recovers. Could you have your own social networking business and possibly benefit as the global economy recover as well? Have you ever thought it would be nice to ‘get in the game?’ Have you thought about trying to position yourself to benefit from what could be the next stage of growth for online businesses? If your answer is yes to any of these questions, then please read on. Here are some things you can do to get your own online social networking business started today and to start positioning yourself to take advantage of what will certainly be a new recovery period for building wealth in a new global market.
Identify a Niche Market and a Clear Value
Creating a website like Facebook or Twitter will not be enough. Even though members will have membership to multiple social networking sites, the key driver will be the value you provide to this audience. Therefore, you should have a good understanding of the audience you will want to join your site and the clear value you will provide to them. Why should someone who is a member of Facebook and LinkedIn also join your site? What clear value do you provide? What problem do you solve? Once you are clear about this then you are ready to move to the next step.
Create your Social Networking Site
There are different ways you can go about this. To learn about some of these options you may want to see my blog about the Top 4 ways to create a social networking site like Myspace and Facebook.
When selecting a vendor to create your site you should consider what you want your site to do to create a clear and unique value to your audience. Can the vendor provide this to you? Do these features exist in the core application? If not, can the application be customized or modified to provide this value? What costs are involved with this?
Vendors: rSitez.com
Seed your Site
Once your site has been created you will need to pre-populate it before your launch. No one wants to go to a ghost site. If you were to go to a newly launched site with only 2 members you would probably leave and not come back. Recruit friends and family or a focus group to help you add photos, blogs, articles, videos etc to the site so that when members arrive they won’t feel like they are alone on the site and they can start to immediately receive the value provided by the site.
Market your Site
‘If you build it they will come’, phrase is not true in this case. There are many social networking sites with very few or no members. The correct phrase for online businesses is ‘if you market it they may come’. Here are some ways to market your site.
Press Releases: You can post free or inexpensive press releases about your site and demonstrate the value of your site. Even though press releases are traditionally targeted to journalists with the hope of someone writing about your product, this has changed somewhat. Press releases are now picked up by the major search engines and can be used as another way to inform internet surfers about your product and services even if no journalist pick up your release. Press releases have become multi-media and social. So now you can push multimedia content to social networks and online communities. Multimedia content including photos, videos, links and other content can now be embedded in your release.
Vendors: seopressreleases.com, pitchengine.com, prbuzz.com
Blogs: Blogs are one of the best marketing tools available. You can write about any information valuable to your industry or niche group to bring attention to your website. Blogs are free and with the correct content and tagging, can bring a lot of visits and attention to your site. You should always include a link about your site or reference to your site as a part of the blog or in the credits so that people will be able to find your site or click through to your site. Blogging also helps you to demonstrate your expertise in your specific niche area.
Vendors: WordPress.com, blogger.com
Social Bookmarks: Social bookmarks sites allow you to bookmark your site online. A bookmark is basically a link to your site, blog, or article. This link is then shared by others on the social bookmark site. The more people that bookmark your site or content, the greater relevance the article has. But also, the more links you will be able receive to your site from the article.
Vendors: delicious.com, stumbleupon.com
SEO your site: Search Engine Optimization (SEO) helps programs from Google, Yahoo and other search engines (called bots or web crawlers) to understand your site and to index your site so that the site can be easily found when people are looking for similar or related content. The more search engine friendly your site is, the more likely it will be positioned highly when people are looking for this kind of content. Your site and all content you post online should have SEO involved to help increase visits to your site. Your blogs or articles should be tagged to increase your SEO relevance.
Post Articles: Writing articles is similar to blogging. The main difference is that with blogging you are typically posting general or targeted information on your own or related blog. With articles, you are typically writing content as an expert which you can submit to be posted on other sites. These articles can be posted on online magazines, expert magazines, online newspapers etc. These online journals can often have high ranking and prestige that will create greater credibility for your site and drive a significant amount of traffic to your site. Each online journal will have different rules for submitting articles so you will need to read these rules before submitting them. This is also a great way to demonstrate your expertise in a specific area.
Vendors: ezinearticles.com, ezinearticles.com/
Google AdWords: You can be placed in the top of any search results based on the amount of money you can afford to spend on Google Adwords. The concept is very simple but brilliant. You can try every way to be found ‘generically’. A generic search result is the list displayed on the left side of the google search results page. Or you can be guaranteed to be found among the millions of sites at the top of the page or the right of the page under the list of ‘Sponsored’ site. You can set whatever budget you like. Each time someone search on a keyword you set your ad is displayed. Each time someone clicks on your ad, you are charged a set fee by google.
Vendor. Google.com, yahoo.com
In part 2 of this blog I will discuss how you can manage your site, monetize it, incorporate a new business entity and collect money without ever having to leave your home or without even needing to go to the bank.
To learn more about creating and monetizing your own unique social networking site please visit www.rsitez.com.
About the author
Rohan Hall is the Founder/CEO of rSitez, Inc. (www.rsitez.com), a technology firm that helps entrepreneurs create unique revenue-based social networking sites. He is the author of Stop Working, a book that teaches entrepreneurs how to use technology, globalization, and networks to build a global business. He has developed technologies for a wide range of entrepreneurs and Fortune500 clients including HP, Corning, Oracle, Honda and various others.
rSitez Customer Success Story: Social Networking for Social Change December 16, 2009
Posted by Pamela DeLoatch in December.Tags: online social community, rsitez, Shawn Hyland, social change, social networking for nonprofits, youmovetheearth.org
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It was late 2008, and Shawn Hyland was contemplating a change. As president of Move the Earth, a faith based ministry, he wanted to establish a separate organization that could bring people together who were eager to make a difference in their communities, but weren’t sure how to get started.
“We wanted to connect people who have personally experienced ‘change’ in their life (former drug addicts, prostitutes, criminal offenses, etc)…. and now wanted to reach beyond themselves and change their community and change the world,” Shawn explained.
Historically, grassroots organizations have sprung up through word of mouth, as people from all over unite to work for a cause. Shawn decided to take that idea and expand it through technology and social media by creating a netroots organization called YOUmovetheearth.org.
“We see a need to empower passionate people who wanted to know one another based upon the desire to make a difference in certain social problems,” he explained.
But in order to bring–in essence—strangers, together, Shawn needed a site that had the right components to help people find and communicate with each other.
Fortunately, he found rSitez, a social networking site that uniquely fit his needs.
“In other social media sites, you have to personally know people to connect with them online or you search for people based on career, education, and pop culture,” he remembered. “There was no social media site where you search for people based upon their passions to take on certain causes i.e. pro life, environment protection, religious persecution, child abuse, domestic violence, etc.”
The search component that rSitez offered also allows users to perform a geographic search. For example, once a member has identified a cause, he can then search geographically to find other members near him who are also interested in that cause.
“This was the perfect way to connect LIKE MINDED people around a cause as an individual,” Shawn said. While major organizations may have mailing lists than can be sorted by state and cause, the average person who wants to make a difference doesn’t usually have access to that information.
Of course, the best site in the world won’t help if it’s not user friendly. And with the potential for so many individual users, YOUmovetheearth.org had to be easy to navigate.
While Shawn had a clear idea of what he wanted for YOUmovetheearth.org, he didn’t have web building technical skills. rSitez’ combination of a pre-built site that also allowed for customization was the answer.
A bonus: the pricing. As a new organization, money was tight.
“Many other people wanted $10K to build a great site,” Shawn recalled. “rSitez allowed room for growth in their program and a small start up fee.”
Now that his site is up and running, Shawn is very pleased. The ability to use the site’s web 2.0 tools has really allowed members to reach out to each other. In fact, his site has been effective in reaching a new generation of members that his mailing list campaign did not.
The tools rSitez provided, along with great pricing and ability to customize gave Shawn Hyland just what he needed to make the right change.
To learn more about creating and monetizing your own unique social networking site please visit www.rsitez.com.
Top 4 Ways to create a Social Networking site like Myspace or Facebook (Part II) December 14, 2009
Posted by Rohan in December.Tags: community site, develop social network, entrepreneur, Facebook, gennextmusic, linkedin, make money online, myspace, Ning, recession, rsitez, saas social networking, social network software, social networking, social networking software, socialengine
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In part one I discussed the market and the opportunity that still exist to create niche social networking sites. With this post I will discuss the technology required to create these sites and the leading vendors you can use to do this.
The Technology
The problem with creating a social networking community site or business is the complexity of creating a site like Facebook or Myspace. How can you do this? Is this only for techies or can anyone do this?
Can you make money from this type of online business? For the answer regarding monetizing these sites, please see my other blog post How to Make Money Online like Myspace and Facebook.
The fact is anyone can now create their own social networking site and a surrounding business from it. There are basically 4 different approaches that you can use to do this. Each approach has its advantages and disadvantages. The level of technical knowledge you need vary based on the vendor and product. Here are the 4 main ways you can go about creating your own social networking site and the current market leader with each method.
SaaS Sites
SaaS means Software as a Service. Vendors that provide these products will automate the creation of the social networking site for you. The sites are typically point and click to create and completely managed online from a browser. You will be able to upload logos, banners, and content based on different payment plans offered by the vendor. Some sites will allow advertising and possibly membership fee collection as revenue options. The features of the sites will vary depending on the vendor that provides the technology. Your main job will be to put your own branding on the site, do minor configuration, and invite members to start using the site. These sites are often white label social networking sites, meaning that you can put your own brand or label on the site to hide most or all of the vendor’s own branding. In most cases you can do this within a few minutes or a few hours. After that your main job will be to market the site and manage the site members and content.
Advantages: You can literally have a social networking site up and running in minutes. Typically, they have an established and stable architecture. You never really have to worry about the technology; everything is taken care of for you. You don’t have to worry about servers, IT staff, backups or other related issues because this is normally included with the service or there may be a cost for some of these items.
Disadvantages: You may not be able to completely have your own branding, depends on the vendor. You may not be able to use your own domain name or there may be an additional cost. You will not have ownership of the code. You may not have ownership of the content uploaded to the site. Normally does not include software development services to modify the standard application, therefore all sites will have the same basic structure and features based on the selected plan.
Primary Vendor: www.rsitez.com, Ning.com
Premium SaaS Sites
These social networking sites offer the same advantages of other SaaS sites. You are able to create a complete social networking site in minutes. You can upload your own banners, logos, content and configure the site as you like. These sites can often be 100% white labeled, meaning that you can completely remove the vendor branding and label from the site and replace it with your own. Your site can be up and live within minutes or hours. They will have all the same features or sometimes more features than some SaaS sites.
In addition to the SaaS model, these vendors also provide premium software development services to their customer base. These services include the development of new site features, the modification of existing features and modules, the development of custom themes and widgets, custom developed revenue models or payment options, custom logos and banners, or even major site rewrite. The goal of these vendors is to provide SaaS sites then surround the site with various software development services to create unique products for their customers.
Advantages: You can literally have a social networking site up and running in minutes. Typically, they have an established and stable architecture. You never really have to worry about the technology; everything is taken care of for you. You don’t have to worry about servers, IT staff, backups or other related issues because this is normally included in with the service or there may be a cost for some of these items. Plus, you can have new premium features developed by the vendor that none of their other customers have, or features changed or written to your specifications to create a unique product offering.
Disadvantages: There may be additional cost for premium features developed by the vendor or to own the code.
Primary Vendor: rSitez.com
Downloadable Software
Some vendors provide complete social networking applications as a download that can be installed on a server. Once the site is installed and configured you will have similar advantage of their SaaS counterpart.
Advantages: You and your IT staff have full control of the application and code. You may be able to customize the site yourself or hire software developers to make changes to the site for you. You may be able to change the code to add more features, if the vendor permits this.
Disadvantage: You will need to pay IT resource to install and support the application. You will need to pay for servers or hosting, backups etc. You will need to pay server admins to protect the application from hackers and malicious individuals and programs. You will need to rely on software developers that may or may not have expertise on the particular application. You will need to be responsible for the ongoing upgrade, maintenance, and support of the application and their related cost.
Primary Vendor: SocialEngine
Write your Own Code
You may be able to hire a team to build a social networking site for you. They would write all the software code needed to create the site. Since Social Networking is still a relatively new type of software application you will need to find individuals who specialize in this. Your local website designer or corporate IT programmer may not have the required experience to build the architecture needed for this kind of application. The site could be built to your exact specification and once completed can be launched online like any of the other options above.
Advantage: You will have full ownership of the code and site content. You can have the site built to your specification. The site can be branded or targeted with features to any group or audience.
Disadvantage: There is an extremely high risk of finding experts in this area to develop these products. There is a very high cost in developing a social networking application from scratch, even if outsourced. The time to develop a full social networking site and take it to market can be 8 – 12 months or more with an experienced team or longer with an experienced team. The product could have bugs that are not discovered until after launch and the team may no longer be available to fix the issues. You will need a development team, design team, server admin team, servers and other ongoing overhead cost to support and maintain the application long term. With the long development time, you may lose your early to market advantage by time the site is launched.
Primary Vendor: No clear market leader
Summary
Anyone can create their own social networking site today. You can use any of the above options and make that choice based on your research, cost, risk, and value. Most importantly, if you plan to take advantage of this market you will need to clearly understand how your site will create value for your members, and this value will need to be a part of your offering.
Please let us know of vendors in any of these categories that you would recommend to other readers to create their social networking product.
About the author
Rohan Hall is the Founder/CEO of rSitez, Inc. (www.rsitez.com), a technology firm that helps entrepreneurs create unique revenue-based social networking sites. He is the author of Stop Working, a book that teaches entrepreneurs how to use technology, globalization, and networks to build a global business. He has developed technologies for a wide range of entrepreneurs and Fortune500 clients including HP, Corning, Oracle, Honda and various others.
Top 4 Ways to create a Social Networking site like Myspace or Facebook (Part I) December 14, 2009
Posted by Rohan in December.Tags: community site, develop social network, entrepreneur, Facebook, gennextmusic, linkedin, make money online, myspace, Ning, recession, rsitez, saas social networking, social network software, social networking, social networking software, socialengine
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The Market
Social Networking sites like Myspace, Facebook, Linkedin and others are the buzz of the day. But more than being the buzz of the day, they are the faster growing segment on the internet today. Additionally, the founders of these companies seem to enjoy unprecedented wealth valuation in only a few short years.
Facebook Founder Mark Zuckerberg, at age 25, is now worth an estimated $2 billion and is now placed at #158 on Forbes list of wealthiest people in the world, according to Forbes.com. He’s the youngest self-made billionaire ever since Forbes has started publishing this list.
According to Nielsen, a respected consumer and business research organization, in their March 2009 Social Networking Global report – Social Network grew twice as fast as email, search and any of the other popular online sectors. Just think about that … I (and everyone that I know) use email and search everyday and cannot live without them on a daily basis. But Social Networks grew twice as fast last year.
Nielsen also reported that ‘Time spent on Social Networks and blogs grew over 3 times the rate of overall internet growth’.
But is Social Networking mainly for crazy American teens, as some would suggest. No, Nielsen reports. Their report further concluded that ‘The greatest growth for Facebook has come from people aged 35-49 years’. They also found that ‘The number of unique visitors who are 65 or older on social networking and blog sites has increased 53 percent in the last two years alone.’ Facebook is the #3 most visited destination for people who are over 65 years old, according to Nielsen.
I make these points to illustrate that we’re at the beginning of a global phenomenon… not the end. That this could be a significant shift in how we communicate, network, and interact with each other on a local as well as on a global basis. But this is not just an American phenomenon. Germany had the ‘strongest growth’ for online communities according to Nielsen. The UK, Spain, Italy and Switzerland also had very strong growth, according to Nielsen.
The Opportunity
Given the above facts, one may ask themselves, ‘is it possible to create a similar site or business to take advantage of this trend?’ And, is it possible to still create a successful business from this technology or is it too late? Because, make no mistake. Myspace is not just a website. It’s a business! Facebook and Linkedin are not just places to network, they are global businesses. Both rSitez.com and Ning, social networking website providers, announced over 150% percent growth in 2009 – that’s more than doubling the business they did before the recession. These are businesses expanding at an incredibly rapid pace in a global market, even during the worst economy in our lifetime.
Facebook, Myspace, and LinkedIn are some of what we consider the ‘first wave’ sites. They paved the way for other sites and benefit from this by having tens or hundreds of millions of members. These mega sites will most likely be around for a long time and will continue to grow globally as long as they continue to provide value to their audience.
However, we’re now seeing what we consider the 2nd wave of social networking sites. These sites are niche social networking sites. They cater to specific groups and niches, instead of a general product like Myspace or Facebook. To be successful, sites like these will need to cater to the specific needs of a targeted group or audience. They will need to provide more than technology. They will need to provide true value and hopefully solve specific problems faced by this niche or affinity group. In many cases, providing technology will not be enough. They may need to provide related services as well. By providing the appropriate technology and targeted services, these sites will be able to prove value and as well have options to monetize this value.
For members of these niche sites that provide real value, it will not be a choice of Facebook or this targeted niche site for consumers. It will most likely be Facebook AND one or more targeted niche site. The reality is that no one particular site will serve ALL our needs. We will most likely belong to multiple sites that serve different needs. A musician, for example, may use Facebook to keep up with friends, but may go to a site like GenNextMusic to listen to or sell his own tracks, but then post and manage his business profile in LinkedIn.
Therefore, entrepreneurs who understand this opportunity and create a specific niche social networking site to target a specific audience that they can add value to, still has the ability to create a successful online social networking business even today.
In Part 2 of this article we will discuss the technology and leading vendors that you can use to create your own niche social networking site and the advantage and disadvantage of the different ways you can create your site.
About the author
Rohan Hall is the Founder/CEO of rSitez, Inc. (www.rsitez.com), a technology firm that helps entrepreneurs create unique revenue-based social networking sites. He is the author of Stop Working, a book that teaches entrepreneurs how to use technology, globalization, and networks to build a global business. He has developed technologies for a wide range of entrepreneurs and Fortune500 clients including HP, Corning, Oracle, Honda and various others.
rSitez Customer Success Story: Networking Across the Seas December 3, 2009
Posted by Pamela DeLoatch in December.Tags: networks for recruiting, online communities, Rohan Hall, rsitez, Sean Blaise, social networks in job hunt, yachtcircle.com
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Imagine a luxury yacht heading into the open seas. The wind is calm; the weather is mild. Best of all, a well trained, reliable crew is expertly handling the boat with care.
Finding the right crew, whether for one trip, or for one year, is a result of diligent recruiting and networking. For the crew, finding the right position is just as important. A mismatch on the high seas can lead to long-term misery.
Captain Sean Blaise understands how essential it is for crew and captains to find each other. He created a way to help that process with his company, Yachtcircle.com, which is a placement service that uses social media to match employers and employees.
“We saw a demand for low priced crew placement for the yachting industry, and furthermore we were pioneers in taking social media and adapting it to meet the varied and diverse interests and needs of the international yachting community,” Captain Blaise said.
One of the most essential aspects of Yachtcircle.com was to give both the employers and employees an opportunity to talk with each other, and become comfortable with each other before making a long-term commitment.
Although Yachtcircle.com’s business concept was sound, it was difficult to find a software application that fulfilled the company’s needs.
“We were unfortunately misled by a software company that claimed to have the social media chops to meet our complete requirements,” Captain Blaise recalled. But undeterred, he continued to look for vendors who could incorporate social media into his site in a very dynamic way.
Then, he found rSitez.
“What initially appealed to us about rSitez was their extensive and robust social media platform,” he said. In order for Yachtcircle.com to be successful, it had to first provide a network for yacht crew. From this, recruiting services could be developed.
Like its competition, Yachtcircle.com provides a resume and job listing site but it also provides opportunities for members to network through blogs, forums, email and chats. Members can stay updated about current events in the yachting world, share videos and photos and issue invitations to upcoming events. By working with rSitez, Yachtcircle.com was able to build a community.
While the quality of rSitez exceeded Captain Blaise’s expectations, the price did not. Although he had previously invested in a software product that didn’t meet his needs, the great price points and reasonable start up costs that rSitez offered made it easy for him to try again. And since rSitez version of Yachtcircle.com went live, results have been impressive.
“With our first website, we barely gained a few hundred members in our first six months due to the poor software conceptualization. With rSitez, we have grown to over a thousand members in a very short period of time,” he said.
If the captain has any regrets, it’s that he didn’t use rSitez sooner. “Had we discovered the strong platform of rSitez, we could have invested a substantial amount more and have had a successful initial launch.”
When on Defense, Be Aggressive November 11, 2009
Posted by Pamela DeLoatch in November.Tags: entrepreneur, Facebook, Microsoft 7, rsitez, small business, social media
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When the competition comes out with a new product or service, it’s easy to feel a little defensive. Will our customers be so impressed with the idea of a new, updated version that they’ll dump us like the proverbial hot potato?
One company in that situation recently took a different approach.
When Microsoft released Windows 7, rival computer maker Apple decided to be aggressive with a new commercial. In it, a woman is deciding whether to stay with her current PC and upgrade to Windows 7 or switch over to a Mac. Her dilemma? While Windows promised wonderful new abilities, the last upgrade, Windows Vista, had provided PC users with more headaches than solutions. In contrast, Mac had a proven reputation for reliability and simplicity. In the end, the woman decides to go with a Mac, despite the newness of Windows 7.
What lesson can small business owners and entrepreneurs take from this? If your product or service is good enough, you can go toe to toe with any new competition. Don’t allow your competition’s positive publicity be the only thing your current and prospective customers hear. Know what your value proposition is, and make sure your customers do too,
Since most of us don’t have Apple’s advertising budget, we may not be able to put ads on TV, but we can get our message across by marketing through social media.
Use Facebook fan pages to talk about your product and services. Make sure your website has clear, updated information. In each case, make sure you tell your readers how your product or service can solve their problem.
With Facebook fan pages, however, you are competing with all of the other companies on the site. You can differentiate yourself by developing your own social networking site, like the ones offered by rSitez.com. It’s a way to stay ahead of the competition, reach your audience directly, and not get lost in the fan page crowd.
Be sure you don’t neglect your current customers in your quest to attract new ones. If you already have a community of customers, fans or followers built up, remind them of how you can help them do business more efficiently. If you have established customers on your own social networking site, like rSitez, it is easy to develop blogs and forums that are tailored to their needs and that encourage their interaction.
Remember, though, that establishing relationships through social networking takes time. It is not something that can be done as a quick fix. But the benefits of making connections with your customers are also long lasting.
Does Social Media Work for Small Businesses? November 3, 2009
Posted by Pamela DeLoatch in November.Tags: entrepreneur, small business marketing, social network, social networking websites
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That’s the question Citibank asked in a recent survey and the answer it got? No. Many small business leaders said that they did not see results from their efforts on social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter.
Over 60% of the 500 respondents said that social networks did not help generate leads. Only 12% found social networks somewhat or very helpful, and 13% said they were not very helpful.
Why does it seem to be all the rage for larger organizations, but not so much for smaller ones? Here are some of the stumbling blocks that small businesses may have when it comes to social media.
1. It takes time to get results. The whole aspect of social media is about building relationships, and that can’t be done over night. If a small business starts a Facebook Fan page or a blog and hopes for immediate results, she will be disappointed.
2. It takes up time. Small business owners have a lot to do just in running their business. Building and maintaining online social networks takes time and consistency. And, unlike larger organizations with more staff members to delegate to, in a small business, it’s hard to let someone else convey the corporate message.
3. It takes resources. Not only do small businesses need manpower to handle the online communication, they also need sources of information and research in order to establish that role of a “thought leader.” Large companies can do surveys and hire researchers to write innovative white papers, but with their limited budgets and staff, it’s more difficult for small businesses to offer new and fresh information.
4. Some businesses may make a half-hearted entry. For the businesses that are doing social media because they are “supposed” to, it won’t take much to convince them it won’t work. The company president may have a LinkedIn.com account, but has few connections and doesn’t strengthen those or build more.
5. Lack of hard results. It’s true. Most of the stories of success using social media are anecdotal. Factual, but not always in hard numbers. So it’s difficult sometimes to show the actual benefits of using it. How do you know, for example, that a potential customer decided to call you because he saw you on Facebook? Can you measure the amount of people who developed a favorable impression of you after reading your blog?
Despite the negatives from this survey, social media experts are sure that small businesses can benefit from this form of marketing.
Mashable, a website specializing in social media, countered with several examples of small businesses that have seen sales growth and increased brand recognition through their social media efforts.
Other examples abound throughout the Web, from the success of Chicago’s Sprinkles Cupcakes on its Facebook fan page to the non-profit organization Epic Change and how it effectively used social media for fundraising.
But maybe there’s another option. Maybe small businesses could use a different type of social networking system that’s more tailored to their size and need for flexibility. rSitez, a software development company, helps entrepreneurs and small businesses create their own social networking sites by taking the best attributes of the popular sites and blogs and tailoring it to the individual company’s needs. In effect, they create a community for each company, making it much simpler for businesses to reach their target audience.
Where are you on the social media spectrum? Have you been using it for years? Thinking about testing the waters, or somewhere in between? What results have you seen?
New to Twitter? Don’t Worry, Just Follow November 2, 2009
Posted by Pamela DeLoatch in October.Tags: entrepreneur, internet entrepreneur, new Twitter users, rsitez.com, social networking for small business, social networking sites, Twitter for small business
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By now, most people have heard of Twitter, which is a microblogging tool that allows people to broadcast short updates of 140 characters. It’s used by celebrities like Ashton Kutcher, who challenged CNN to see who would be the first to get 1 million followers. (Kutcher won.)
It’s been banned by the NFL for use by players during the game.
It’s being used by every Tom, Dick and Harry with a (little) something to say.
But is it useful for small businesses?
Think about this: according to the New York Times, more Twitter accounts belong to small businesses than to large companies. And it makes sense, really. So much of a small business’ success rests on word of mouth marketing. And that’s what Twitter helps provide.
But here’s another reason to enter the world of tweeting: Twitter also lets you as a small business owner or entrepreneur tap into a wealth of resources.
When you look at some of the active tweeters out there, you’ve got a real-time encyclopedia at your fingertips. Social media experts like Chris Brogan, entrepreneurial advocates like Guy Kawasaki. Experts from businesses that work with small businesses like Business Week’s Entrepreneur or Dell Small Business. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to see what some of these folks are thinking, would it?
When you first log onto Twitter, one of the biggest stumbling blocks is figuring out how to find the people you want to get tweets from, or follow. An extremely useful application that can help is Tweetdeck, which can be downloaded for free. With Tweetdeck you can categorize your list of people to follow. Whenever someone from your list sends a tweet, you can see it on your deck.
Check out Small Business Trend’s Ultimate Small Business Twitter list for an excellent start.
You can also set up a search for a phrase, such as “social media for small businesses” or “independent grocery stores” or even your name or the name of your business. Whenever someone makes a comment, positive or negative, discusses a trend or proposes a problem, you’ll be in the know.
Look for people in your industry or community as well to create a network of information that benefits you both.
Keep in mind that, despite the PR, Twitter is just one tool in your arsenal for communicating with your audience. There are still plenty of others.
Small businesses can find success connecting with customers by setting up their own social networking sites, like those offered by rSitez.com. There, businesses can create a community that encompasses a specific audience with similar interests. Members can communicate through blogs, forums, articles, videos, photos, and chats about important issues.
So don’t think of Twitter as being an all or nothing proposition. Instead of feeling the pressure of creating brilliant 140 character posts, think of how to funnel the up to the minute information on Twitter in a way that is convenient and useful for you. And consider it one more tool to help your business grow.
Eventually, the rest will come.
Luis
Rohan
Pamela DeLoatch
