Social Media and ORM - The SEM Twist

Social media websites have only but taken over the WWW. Anyone spending time on the internet is signed into at least one of these websites, and more than likely signed into several.

To name a selective few there are: Facebook, Myspace, Furl, Del.icio.us, Digg, Reddit, Twitter, Stumbleupon, Rojo, Meetup, Linkedin, Technorati, Slashdot, and more. With this kind of interactivity, companies are blind not to use these websites as advertising mediums, especially with the increased ability of demographic targeting to millions of people 24/7.

The best thing about exposing your brand in this medium is that your brand’s popularity can spread faster than any other means. In fact, you can be the talk of the web in just one day: thanks to extremely powerful advertising.
You can also be the talk of the web on the opposite scale however.

The one thing about Social Media that hardly anyone ever talks about is how it also influences your Search Engine positioning. It’s such a simple thing, yet no-one is leveraging this? So let me give you a really useful tip.

Search Engine Marketing itself is one of the more traditional methods of online marketing, comprised of two parts: organic (or natural) and paid listings. However traditional they might be, they remain powerful instruments of the web. Who does not turn to Google to find anything? (I even use it above the YellowPages to find contact details…!)

Search Engine Marketing (SEM) is all about placement on search engines, which in itself is all about content. With the rise of Social Media, harnessed in the right way, the combination packs a powerful punch for any SEM campaign.

With all this activity on the web, keeping track of what is being said about you becomes of utmost importance. Not only for your brand’s reputation, but also for harnessing your potential search engine leverage.

The best way for companies or individuals to keep track of their brand’s reputation is through what we refer to as Online Reputation Management (ORM). And it’s much simpler than you think.

Setting up your ORM
There are three basic steps involved in implementing Online Reputation Management, which will be discussed hereunder: Monitor, Analyze and Influence.

Monitor: Know what is being said about your brand. You might think that perceptions are impossible to track and monitor as news travels at such an incredible speed over the internet, thanks to blogs, forums and podcasts, and Twitter – however there are various internet monitoring services available to solve this problem. Some pre-packaged for a powerful punch (although there will always be manual intervention and strategic analysis required), others, for personal monitoring specifically, as simple as setting up Google Alerts to observe what is being said about your brand on the web. You can also use sites such as Feedster and Technorati to follow your brand conversation. These simple methods will also help you be aware of exactly what your competition is up to and counteract intelligently.

Analyse: To keep track of your search engine environment, you need to know your competition in depth. The manual way is to make a list of the sites that have information concerning your brand, based on the monitoring process. Split this list into positive and negative feedback, as it is good to know where the bad and good publicity is coming from. It is also good to check their relevant search engine standing and optimisation levels for any strategic counters later.

Now that you’ve monitored and analysed the information, you need to influence it with a SEM twist.

Influence: Participate by getting involved in the conversation. Become a regular contributor to blogs and forums where you found most activity involving your industry or niche. The golden rule when doing this is to stay honest about your brand. If for example, someone in the blogosphere said an inaccurate statement about your brand, you are able to clarify it by giving them evidence that supports your case and in so doing removing the error concerning your brand.

Give it the SEM Twist
Leverage the conversation, track it and influence it the search engine way.
Ensure wherever you are part of the conversation that you are constantly linking it back to your own online presence. With this one small tip you will increase your own standing in the search engines.

So next time you’re out and about on the social fields of the web, join the conversation and build your hub of expertise. The search engines will pick it up and reward you for it.