The View From Here

By Melissa Campanelli

About Melissa

Melissa Campanelli is the editor-in-chief of Target Marketing's eM+C brand and Retail Online Integration, a monthly print magazine, website and e-letter (The ROI Report) that's all about the integration of sales channels, including print/catalog, transactional websites and retail stores, as well as email, mobile, social media and more.

Prior to becoming editor-in-chief of eM+C, Melissa spent ten years at DM News, where she was first a senior editor and then deputy editor. She's also a leading expert in small business e-commerce and author of the books "Entrepreneur Magazine's Open an Online Business in 10 Days" and "Start Your Own e-Business."

Conversations

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Pinterest is the new hot property. Overnight this visual curation powerhouse has generated more traffic to websites than Twitter, Google+,...

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Engagement Matters

3 Key Lessons for Mobile Email Marketers

Mar 1, 2012

With mobile devices ranging from smartphones to iPads to e-readers to netbooks, the question isn't if you need a mobile strategy for...

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Inside Mobile Marketing

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Dec 15, 2011

Mobile is a revolution. The power of the personal mobile device has created the potential for businesses to build stronger...

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Redefining Performance Marketing

Facebook's Timeline for Brands: A Facebook Performance Opportunity

Mar 29, 2012

Facebook's new Timeline for Brands enables marketers to foster engagement with participants. This engagement can equal Facebook performance. Brands can...

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15 Minutes Ahead

How Evolving Mobile Behaviors are Raising the Stakes for Marketers

Jan 5, 2012

While none would argue that 2011 was the year of the mobile app, marketers have been hearing more noise about...

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Digital Marketing Takes Action

Which is Better for Mobile Shopping, Tablets or Smartphones?

Jul 7, 2011

Are you wondering whether it’s worth providing your online retail offering on tablets, particularly the iPad? Are you also facing...

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Ways of Thinking

A Facebook Fan is $136 in Lifetime Value, $3.60 in Media Impressions

Jun 29, 2010

The lifetime value of a Facebook fan is about $136 to top brands, according to this study on Facebook fan...

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5 Social Media Best Practices for Publishers

By Melissa Campanelli | Posted on October 07, 2008

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When it comes to social media marketing, some magazines and newspapers are doing it right, while some could improve their strategies. These issues were discussed at a session called “Social Media Marketing For Newspapers & Magazines,” held during the Search Marketing Expo East conference in New York, Oct. 6-8. During the session, Adam Sherk, a search specialist at New York City-based search engine optimization firm Define Search Strategies, revealed the results of a survey showing that between the first and third quarters of this year, traffic on magazine sites coming from social media sites ranged from 0.6 percent to 18 percent of total traffic. Definitely a wide berth. The session also discussed best practices in terms of getting a high percentage of social media traffic to a magazine or publisher Web site. With this in mind, Chris Winfield, president and co-founder of 10e20, a New York City-based social media marketing consultancy, offered the following strategies for serving up a successful social media plan. 1. Research. “Find out where your visitors are already coming from,” he said. If they’re coming from Facebook, for example, start there. In addition, Winfield said that marketers should determine on which sites people are talking about you and who is already linking to you by tracking your inbound links. In addition, “figure out what has worked so far in terms of social media marketing,” he said, “what hasn’t and what sites have the most potential for growth.” 2. Decide. “Once you figure out where your audience hang outs and what the demographics of these people are,” Winfield said, “decide if you should continue focusing on these areas. Also decide which specific media sites are right for your content and focus on those as well.” 3. Get your content up to snuff. “Make sure your content is easy for consumers to consume,” Winfield said. “Make it easy for people to share your content.” But, Winfield warned publishers not to go overboard with social media buttons that users can click on to share content. “It’s a turnoff and people are not going to use them,” he said. He also suggested looking out for evergreen content that can be “easily updated and prettied up.” 4. Make internal changes. “Get key employees and stakeholders on board with your social media marketing plan,” Winfield said. “Get your existing readers on board. You’ll want to educate them and explain to them how your strategy works and how it can help them.” While it’s important to make internal changes, Winfield cautioned attendees not to alienate their existing audiences. 5. Open up. Once your strategy is up and running, Winfield advised to maintain it by continually adding fresh content to your blogs, while also having a good RSS strategy. “Many companies are not really sure what they are doing now when it comes to RSS feeds,” he said, “and they don’t understand how important a good RSS strategy can be.” When working with microblog sites, such as Twitter, “don’t just be a feed,” he noted. “This can be boring. You want to be more than that — to gain new followers.”

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Social Media