Currently, you can link to your Facebook page from YouTube in two ways. There’s the more official way, which will only link to your personal profile on Facebook, not your business page — the beginning of that process is represented by the blue arrow in the first picture below. We’ll take you through the steps. On the DexKnows Weddings YouTube channel, we prefer a workaround — you can see the final product below, where the red arrow is pointing. This links to our Facebook business page. First, I’ll take you through the blue arrow process for those of you who are your brand and would prefer to link to your personal profile. After that, the red arrow process.

Option 1

Step 1

Go to your You Tube channel page and start by clicking the Edit button (blue arrow).

Step 2

Then click Connect Accounts by the Facebook logo.

Step 3

Click the Connect” button by the Facebook icon and then Save Changes.

Step 4

This is where it gets a little clunky. You now have to get out of edit and go back into it. So select My Channel from the drop-down menu by your channel’s name in the upper right-hand corner.

Step 5

Then select Edit again.

Step 6

Next to the Facebook icon, there will be an empty box called Show. Click on it. (Here, it’s displaying my name because it’s linking to my personal profile, not my business page.) Then click Apply.

Step 7

It now displays a big Facebook button on my YouTube channel that connects to my personal profile page. (After completing this, I disabled the feature because I prefer the second method, which I’ll show you now.)

Option 2

Step 1

Click that same Edit button in Step 1 of Option 1. Under “Add a new link,” you’ll see Title. Type in whatever suits you. You can write “Facebook Page” or the name of your business and “Facebook page.” Then copy and paste the url of your business’s Facebook page. Then click Add.

Step 2

YouTube pulls in the Facebook icon and now you have a clickable link to your business homepage. Of note, you can link to whatever you want through this mechanism, so be sure to link to your website, blog, Twitter feed and more. And don’t forget to click Apply at the top, as we did in Step 6 of Option 1.

Be sure to follow us on Facebook for more great tips!

Direct mail can help you score new customers; email marketing can help you hang on to them. Combine these efforts and you have a dynamic direct marketing campaign that can improve response rates and boost business.

The two are top methods for delivering the strongest return on investment for consumer acquisition and retention. According to a Target Marketing survey done this year, marketers said they were going to spend 34% more on direct mail and 65% more on email.

Are you ready to launch a successful integrated direct marketing campaign? Here are some ideas on how to leverage the best of print and online marketing:

Combine Efforts

The most cost-effective way to reach customers is to find an all-inclusive vendor with direct mail and email lists to eliminate unnecessary back and forth. Such a firm has the most up-to-date, targeted customer lists and can create eye-catching marketing material with a can’t-miss call to action.

Use Social Networking

Improve your chances of connecting with customers —  without blowing your marketing budget — by integrating social networking into your direct marketing campaign. The key is to find a platform that’s niche-specific. If you’re in real estate, for instance, create Twitter and Facebook accounts and establish a presence on a real estate network site. To learn more about being a business on social networks, go here.

Keep It Personal

Personalization is easier and less expensive than ever before, thanks to improvements in technology. And including prospects’ names within direct mail pieces is a move that works. Highly personalized direct mail allows you to tailor your marketing message and generates a higher response rate than non-personalized direct mail.

Ask Permission

Obtain consumers’ consent before adding them to your email list. And provide a working opt-out link and clear instructions on how to be removed from your email list. If you receive an opt-out request, you must remove that consumer from your email list within 10 business days. For more information, read about the Federal Trade Commission’s CAN-SPAM law and how it applies to businesses.

Have Multiple Touch Points

Typically, it can take at least three to seven connections to get a prospect interested in responding. That’s why direct mail and email work hand in hand. To implement your campaign, send an email announcing that the direct mail piece is on its way. Then, a week later, follow up with a personalized direct mail piece that has the same look and feel as the email and contains a meaningful call to action and a coupon. About three days after the direct mail piece arrives in your prospect’s mailbox, send a follow-up email; include a link to your website for another way to receive the coupon.

Ramp Up Your Website

Make sure your website contains forms for collecting prospects’ contact information. This will help you keep a better database of people who respond to your efforts. Also channel your energy into improving your website’s search engine optimization so that it’s more likely to pop up during organic searches. If you need to know more about SEO and how it can help your business, read this.

Today we tackle the latest social phenomenon: Pinterest!

Because I’m already on Pinterest, I’ll take you through the step-by-step process to add a Facebook link to your Pinterest profile if you’re already a member of Pinterest. The steps shouldn’t vary much for a new user.

Step 1

You can have a live link from Pinterest to your personal Facebook profile but, currently, not to your Facebook business page. To do the former, go to the arrow by your name in the right-hand corner of your Pinterest profile. Click on the arrow to get the drop-down menu and select Settings.

Step 2

Next to “Link to Facebook,” click the Off button to On and then click Save Profile.

You’ll get a pop-up that says Log In with Facebook. Select it.

Step 3

When you go back to Pinterest, you’ll now have to option to Add Pinterest to Facebook Timeline. Select this only if you want to broadcast your Pins to Facebook. If you’re a heavy Pinterest user, you may not want this because your Pins can inundate your friends’ or customers’ Tickers on Facebook. If you like, you can also Find Facebook Friends on Pinterest to follow your friends pinboards.

Make your selections and then click Save Profile.

When you go back to your Pinterest profile page, you’ll have a little clickable Facebook symbol.

Full disclosure: I went through these steps to demonstrate how to connect to Facebook from Pinterest but then disabled the feature. My Pinterest profile is affiliated with my job and connecting it to my personal profile page doesn’t make sense for me personally. But if you are your brand and don’t need to separate the two, Pin away!

Another option: You can include live links to your Facebook page in your Pinterest photo captions. Doing this sparingly can help get the word out about your Facebook page.

Read about the benefits of having separate work and personal Pinterest profiles on our sister blog. If you’re a local business, follow us on Facebook for more tips! And if you’re in the wedding business, follow me on Pinterest!

Here’s Part 4 in our series of posts on how to promote your Facebook Page in response to questions we received after our successful Facebook for small business webinar. Previous installments included best practices for promoting your Facebook page on websites/blogs/newsletters, email and LinkedIn.

Twitter only allows you to link to one property on its page. In most instances, businesses link to their websites or blogs. But if you prefer to link to your Facebook Page, you can do that.

You can also create wallpaper that touts your Facebook url, like Nordstrom did above. (Click through for a better look at their page.) Mashable also has a good example of this.

A company called Clickable Now at one time offered a service where you can make a background clickable. Many using it included a Facebook badge in their wallpaper and made that clickable. However, that company no longer exists. If you know of another company that offers a similar service, please tell us about it in the comments! As a side note, you’ll most likely have to pay to create clickable wallpaper.

One thing you can (and should) do: Tweet about your Facebook Page once in awhile. Not daily, but it doesn’t hurt once a month to say, “Like us on Twitter? Then Like us on Facebook!” And then include the link to your Facebook Page. If you post an interesting photo on Facebook, feel free to create a tweet around that as well.

And be sure to follow us on Twitter and Facebook!

Previously, I discussed best practices for promoting your Facebook page on websites, blogs and newsletters, as well as how to put the Facebook logo into your email signature. Today, I’ll show you how to promote your Facebook Page through the professional network LinkedIn. I’ll do this by taking you through the step-by-step process as I link my LinkedIn profile to our DexKnows Weddings Facebook Page.

Step 1

There’s no official space on LinkedIn to fill in your Facebook information. The only way to link to Facebook from your LinkedIn profile is to click Edit in the Websites section to add a site there. You’re allowed to list three websites total.

Step 2

Once you click Edit, you’ll be taken to another page. From the drop-down menu next to Websites, select Other. Another box will appear called Website Title — title it whatever way makes sense to you. I’ve called mine Facebook Business Page because I want the word Facebook included in the title, and I didn’t want it to be confused with my personal profile. I could also title it DexKnows Weddings Facebook Page. In the third box titled “url,” copy and paste the url of your Facebook business page.

Step 3

Click Save. Now you have a clickable link to your Facebook page!

Be sure to follow Marketing Matters on Facebook!

1) Cover photo and profile photo

By now most people using Facebook realize that they’ll need a cover photo for their page as well as a profile photo. As Christine Landry pointed out in our March 7 webinar on Facebook for local businesses, think of the cover photo as your magazine cover and your profile photo as your logo.

The cover photo must be a minimum of 399 pixels wide to be used and the maximum dimensions are 850 pixels wide by 315 pixels high.

Some things that may trip up businesses are the rules and restrictions about what you can and cannot do with your cover photo. It’s important that you follow these rules or you will be in violation of Facebook’s terms of service and your page could get shut down.

When you go to select a cover photo you will see a message from Facebook:

If you click Learn More, you will find out the rules.

Cover images must be at least 399 pixels wide and may not contain:

• Price or purchase information, such as “40% off” or “Download it at our website”
• Contact information, such as web address, email, mailing address or other information intended for your Page’s About section
• References to user interface elements, such as Like or Share, or any other Facebook site features
• Calls to action, such as “Get it now” or “Tell your friends”

All cover images are public, which means anyone visiting your Page will be able to see the image you choose. Covers must not be false, deceptive or misleading, and must not infringe on third parties’ intellectual property. You may not encourage or incentivize people to upload your cover image to their personal timelines.

So, bottom line, be sure that your cover photo doesn’t include information, calls to action, promotions/discounts or any graphic or text that encourages people to like or share. Again, probably best to just stick with a great photo of your company or your product.

2) Applications – New Position on Page, New Functionality

One of the biggest changes for Facebook pages is that you can no longer set a custom tab as a default landing page. This does not mean that you can’t continue to have great custom tabs and drive traffic to those tabs. There are some other changes about where applications, including custom tabs, appear on your Facebook page.

First, let’s discuss the new position of your applications. It used to be that your applications appeared on the left-hand side of the page. Now, with the new timeline design, those applications appear as thumbnail images below the title of your page.

Old location of apps:

New location of apps:

Now that you see where your applications are, let’s review a few changes.

First of all, you can display up to 12 applications. However, there are only 4 slots that you can move into the top row, which are the most visible.  One of these four slots will always be taken up by Photos. So you really can only move three applications into that top row.

In addition, you can change the thumbnail image that shows up on the tab. Here are the directions for how to do both.

To edit which applications you are displaying, do the following:

Click on the arrow next to the applications:

After you do this, you will see all of the available applications (up to 12) display. From here, click on the right hand corner of any of the applications you want to move around. When you do this, you will see a pencil appear and a menu of choices below it. In this case, if I wanted to swap positions with the videos, it would take the application I was on and swap it into the videos position.

In this instance this business is not displaying all of her apps in all of her available positions. You can see that this business has two blank application spots in the second row.

When you click on the right-hand corner of one of the “blank” applications you’ll see a “+” sign.  And the menu prompts you to add one of the other choices (in this case Events, Notes or “stella industries store” as a favorite. If I were to choose any of these, that application would appear in that position.

Another important thing to know about the applications is that you can change the thumbnails for most of them (not for photos though).

To change your app photo, you need to click on the arrow next to the top line so that all your apps are showing. Then you click on the right-hand corner of the app you want to edit.  From there, select Edit Settings.

Once you select Edit Settings, you will see a pop-up appear that allows you to change the Custom Tab Image and/or the Custom Tab Name.

If you leave the Custom Tab Name field blank, then it will use the default name. Type in any changes to the tab name you want. Click the Change link if you want to change the image for the tab.

You can upload a new photo. Once you do, you’ll see that new image as the custom tab’s thumbnail.

3) Messages Functionality

With the new timeline design comes the new messages functionality. Previously, if a consumer wanted to contact a Page, they had to do so by posting a message on that business’s Wall, which was publicly visible to everyone.
Previously:

Now, with the rollout of the new timeline design, every Facebook business page has a Message button on it.

When a customer or client clicks on the Message button, they have the ability to send a private message to the business owner.

Administrators of Facebook pages will find these messages within the new Admin Panel of their page. See below.

Finally, if you don’t want to allow your customers or clients to send you messages, you can always disable this functionality. Just go into your Permissions (to get to your Permissions, select the Manage menu within the Admin panel, then click Edit Page to get there).

4) Build Your Audience

Facebook has added a Build Audience drop down that is available within the Admin panel.  Within this drop down you’ll see choices to invite email contacts or friends to your page. Also, there’s the option to Share Page as well as to Create an Ad (Facebook ad).

If you click Share Page, you will see a pop-up that gives you some choices. The admin of the page has the ability to share a link to the Facebook page from their own personal timeline. They can also post a link to the page on their friend’s timeline, send it in a group, or post it to another page of which you are an admin. You can also share a link to the page in a private message.

If you choose to send it in a private message, you can add a note and send it to any of your Facebook friends.

5) Insights

You can find Facebook’s Insights within the new Admin panel.

6) Milestones

With the new timeline design comes the ability to add milestones onto your business page.
Click the the Milestone button to add one to your page.

You can add photos to your milestone, a description, a date. You have the ability to hide it from the News Feed.

7) Keep Exploring & Learning

Facebook has done a really great job of providing tutorials and information about the timeline changes for business Pages.

If you want to learn more you can click on the Help menu within the Admin panel to Take the Tour, read the Pages Product Guide or watch the Learning Video.

In addition, here are some other great resources for keeping up on the latest Facebook changes:

Facebook Marketing Solutions:
https://www.facebook.com/marketing

And Facebook’s Marketing Classroom: https://www.facebook.com/marketing/app_210703889028624

For starters, an email signature is simply a block of text that will always appear at the end of your message. Different email systems have different ways to do this. In Outlook 2010, for example, you can add a signature through a message. Microsoft Office explains here how to do this.

You can also hyperlink text of your choosing to your Facebook page, or you can add a little icon. Save the official Facebook button below by right clicking and selecting “Save as,” then save it to your computer. It’s a small size appropriate for an email signature.

If you prefer to work with a larger image and downsize it to your desired proportions, you can save this button.

After you have saved the icon, in Outlook 20120 you should open a message and under the “Message” tab (indicated by the blue arrow), click on Signature (the green arrow). Select the image symbol (the red arrow). Insert the image.

Next, select the icon (black arrow below), click the hyperlink button (green arrow), then copy and paste the link to your Facebook page into the “Address” area (red arrow). Click OK, and you should be good to go.

If you use a system other than Outlook, here’s an explanation on how you can link an icon in other systems.

Be sure to tell your staff to include a link to Facebook in their signatures as well — send them this post so they can do so easily. And check back soon for our next post in this series!

I covered different tactics for promoting your business in our webinar for small businesses. Due to popular requests, I’m going to break down each tactic I mentioned in a series of posts here, starting with how to promote your local business’s Facebook page on your website, blog or newsletter.

There are a few ways you can do this. The most common way is to place a Facebook button on your website/blog/newsletter that links to your Facebook business page. Of note: You’ve probably seen spiffy-looking customized Facebook logos around the web. Technically, Facebook doesn’t allow these. The screenshot below is from Facebook’s Logos & Trademarks page, displayed under the header ” ‘f’ logo” and the subhead “Usage.” It demonstrates which usages are allowed and which aren’t. Under the next subhead “Downloads,” there are official Facebook buttons that you can use in a variety of formats.

Some prefer Facebook buttons with instructions, such as the one above, which says, “Find us on Facebook,” because it’s a direct call to action. (In fact, in our webinar on QR codes, a QR code expert said something similar — that people are more likely to scan a QR code if instructions accompany the code.)

Remember to place your button “above the fold,” meaning, make the button visible when someone first lays eyes on whatever medium you’re using — don’t make them scroll down to see it.  Here’s an example from our blog.

Also, whatever button you choose, place it on all pages of your site or blog — not just the home page. Visitors don’t always enter your site through your home page. If someone links to a different page or a specific blog post, new viewers will see your site or blog for the first time through that page. If they don’t see a link to Facebook, then they won’t Like your page, and that’s a missed opportunity.

Another option is a Facebook plugin, which serves the same purpose as a button but highlights what’s happening on your Facebook business page. Some experts say plug-ins encourage more Likes than icons. Keep in mind, plugins require a little more technical finesse than buttons.

We use two different plugins on our various sites. On the Bridal Banter wedding blog, the Facepile plugin displays the viewer’s friends who follow your Facebook page if that viewer is logged into Facebook at the time.

On Marketing Matters, we use the Activity Feed plugin, which displays our latest update.

You can find more options under Facebook’s Developers Social Plugins.

Lastly, if you blog, once in a while give a shout-out to your Facebook page. Example: Be sure to follow our Marketing Matters Facebook page. And if you’re involved in the wedding industry or are getting married, follow our DexKnows Weddings Facebook page.

That was an example, but also a request — please follow us!

And watch for additional posts on Facebook for your business in this series on Marketing Matters.

With the increasing importance of local search — and the growing use of mobile search — being found is one of the more important strategies for a local business.

Citations — or Mentions — are a key component in the way search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Bing determine the ranking of your business. For small businesses, citations can work especially well because many local businesses do not optimize their sites to be found (it’s also called SEO). This is particularly true in service businesses such as  plumbing or electrical, where the businesses do not have websites. So if you want a competitive advantage, be sure to have a website. Here is where you can start.

What Are Citations?

Citations are “mentions” of your business name and address on other web pages. They are sometimes called “web references.” We are not only talking about links to your web page. Citations can also be information such as your business address, phone number and reviews. In these cases the search engines depend on whatever they can find about your business from other sites. The search engines value authoritative web references to rank your business high in the results.

How Citations Are Used by Google

Google uses citations to verify the authenticity and credibility of local businesses while listing them on Google Places, the business search results that appear on Google Maps. According to SEO expert David Mihm, there appears to be a strong connection between a good Google Place page ranking and the number of citations/reviews the page has. To see the citations for your business indexed by Google, log in to your Google Maps account and go to the tab “Web Pages.” You will find your citation sources in Google Local.

How to Build Citations or Mentions

In Google Places, citations are sourced from three places:

1. Google Maps users.
2. Google checks other websites for information
3. Third-party providers, such as Dex One

For local businesses, third-party providers give an easy opportunity to get good web references. For example, getting citations from well-established and well-indexed portals such as DexKnows.com helps the authenticity and credibility about your business to the search engines. The best thing you can do to help your ranking is to  have a current and complete profile on sites such as dexknows.com. This builds a strong citation source for the search engines to find your business.

Other sources you can use to build your citations include:

• infoUSA
• InsiderPages
• SuperPages
• Yelp
• Localeze (used by DexKnows.com)
• Yahoos Regional Directory

How You Can Improve Your Citations or Mentions

Here are some steps you can take you to rank higher in Google Places.

1. Claim your listings on review sites related to your business.
2. List your business in reputable business directories.
3. Be consistent with your business information on all external web pages that cite your business.
4. Be current on the information.
5. Pay attention to reviews and answer complaints.

Citations, or web references, are a great way for local businesses to improve their Google Places ranking. Paying  attention to your online presence is a sure way to get your business listing near the top on search engine results. To keep track of where you are cited online, Dex One offers a free Reputation Management tool.

There are two things you can change: your Page name and your user name, also known as your custom URL. Let’s first take a look at where these elements are.

Your business page name is found here:

The user name or custom url is what you see here:

If you want to change the name of your page you can do this, but only if you have less than 100 Likes. The steps are listed below. If you have already requested from Facebook a user name (name that appears as your web address), you cannot change it. If you haven’t yet requested a user name/custom URL, you can do so if you have at least 25 Likes.

If you want to change your Page name, you can do the following:

1) Go to your page, click “Admin Panel”

2) Select the Manage drop down > Click “Edit Page”

3) Select “Basic Information”

4) Once you are on the Basic Information page, you will see the Name of your page. If you have less than 100 Likes, you will be able to change the Page name as below:

However, if your page has more than 100 Likes, you will not be able to change the name.