Facebook’s new “Timeline”  feature is undeniably a craze that has taken the social media giant’s website by storm since its launch in March. There was some controversy about Timeline taking over the face of Facebook but now that the new look is front and center, let’s see how it is affecting the user experience and why it is important to understand this new feature as an online marketer. Here are some of the surprising things one should know about Facebook Timeline when it comes to social media marketing:

1. One new and enticing feature of Facebook Timeline is the cover photo. It’s a new feature that helps highlight your page, represent your brand, and gives curiosity to the viewer by applying Murphy’s Law to web design. Cover photo has a size of 851 x 315 pixels and can be very complicated because of its terms and conditions. To avoid risking your entire Facebook Timeline account, be sure to research the terms and conditions that Facebook has set out regarding what you can or cannot post here.

2. With Facebook Timeline, you can now customize your Facebook applications. By customizing your Facebook applications, you can create all of the call-to-actions and personalized icons you want. Your Facebook Timeline will appear more personal and organized according to your brand or personality, helping you stand out among competitors.

3. “Highlighting” and “pinning” are a few of the new most commonly used features available in Facebook Timeline. By “highlighting” and “pinning”, your key moments, important dates, cool pictures and links are emphasized throughout your social media campaign. Unlike the old Facebook, this format in Timeline gives you a unique and more strategic way of emphasizing your important moments or things you want to stand out.

4. As a Timeline user, you should become familiar with the Admin panel of your account. “New likes”, insights, personal messages and activity logs are just some of the great new features that help you observe your fans as well as the activity of your page.

5. With Facebook Timeline, Ads are even more important than before. Although it has to be approached differently, its importance gives highlight to the very use of Timeline. You can directly post your Ads to any of your chosen applications where a specific call-to-action is available. Also, with the help of your current fans, engagement may be more important than likes.

6. Another cool feature of Facebook Timeline is being able to enjoy your favorite songs and music along with your friends. Once you switch to Facebook Timeline, you are given ample time, probably seven days, wherein you can personalize and organize your profile in such a way that you want others to see it. Within this span of time, your Timeline will be invisible, giving you a chance to make another change that you want for your Timeline.

Although it might have caused some controversy at first, Facebook Timeline has certainly shaken things up in the social media world. Whether you are a fan or not; it is important to be aware of how Facebook’s Timeline can work for you and your page as an online marketer. Unlike the old Facebook format, with Timeline you are able to personalize your account and create a fresh, dynamic new Facebook profile, exactly the way you imagined it to be. Sometimes, change is good. Especially when it makes you appear more creative and more up to date. As a marketer, we all know that this is an essential aspect of success. So keep an open mind when it comes to managing your Timeline.

Today, all eyes are on mobile – literally. People seem to be using and viewing their mobile phone screens more than anything else. With so much attention being paid to our phones on a daily basis, online marketers are racing to get their products and services showcased front and center by going mobile. From mobile websites to applications, multimedia channels and beyond – the online marketing industry is becoming more apparent to mobile users.  The mobile environment has also seen the presence of Internet marketers making use of features like IVR calls, MMS and text messaging or voice calls. With so much to offer, the mobile landscape seems to be one for the taking by professionals in the marketing and advertising realm.

The interesting thing about mobile marketing is that, while we’ve seen a rise of web marketing campaigns beginning to infiltrate the mobile environment, the concept is really not that new. Mobile marketing began before the dawn of the smart phone. However, the rampant expansion of gadgets like the iPhone and Android gave way to a mobile renaissance. The massive implementation and acceptance of smart phones has also paved the way for marketers to hone in on other platforms to relay messages to the audience and target customers. Mobile marketing is becoming the best and most efficient way to interact with customers. Top brands all over the globe are utilizing the power of mobile to be in touch with the people of today by means of text messaging, social media and email.

Smart phones have given marketers the freedom to develop quality communication channels with their mobile audience, which can sufficiently boost  customer retention and loyalty. Mobile devices and phones possess the capability to take orders when your goal is an upfront sale. Products, services and businesses have the opportunity to not only advertise and sell products but use mobile Internet sites and systems that can even take orders through voice ordering and mobile commerce. Companies can sell applications and downloads with the help of accepting payments through credit card transactions. This can be done by simply charging the sale through the mobile phone bill of the customer. Mobile phone technology has even gone as far as serving as digital wallets that people can use to pay for things through point of sale systems.

The emergence of mobile phone systems has taken online marketing to a new level and has become a crucial element of marketing techniques; not only for small and medium scale companies but large corporations as well. Businesses of all sizes don’t have any means to ignore the beauty that mobile marketing has to offer because Internet is the best source of sales as of the moment.

The age of mobile is in full swing. With so much of the general public using their phones to do just about anything in their daily lives, it’s no surprise that online marketers have joined in the revolution by appealing to consumers through their phones.  Mobile technologies have brought a new era to the world of marketing and for those looking to succeed in the field, it is essential to be taking advantage of the new opportunities mobile has to offer.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is critical when it comes to running your own business on the internet. One of your main objectives as a blogger or a webmaster should be to increase as much traffic flow to your website as possible. There is a greater chance of owning and operating a successful business and website with more publicity your content receives from the amplified traffic.

Here are some helpful SEO suggestions that you might want to try out!

Original Content

Ok, this might seem like it is an obvious tip that you have already picked up on. But, there are so many reasons why it is imperative to have your own quality and unique content up on your site. It may take a lot of research and time, but in the end it will all be worth it.

When you do research and spend time keeping yourself updated on the latest websites it may help to fuel your own fire and give you new ideas, which is so important because people do not want to read the same content that they saw on someone else’s blog, or see the same material that is on another site.

Furthermore, search engines are looking for unique content.  Bing, Google … you name it – they’re all crawling for unique content.

Keep your material unique and flavorful. Hopefully this will make it resonate with your site visitors and search engine crawlers, resulting in greater rankings for your website.

Keeping Up

One of the worst things you can do is let your own website fall behind because it has old content that no one is interested in anymore.

As a blogger, you should make sure that you keep yourself updated with current news. If anything, as a blogger, it is important to be one step ahead of the game and get brand new information before anyone is aware of it or has published it.

This also is true if you have a website for your company. It is good to ensure to your visitors and customers that you are up to date with current technologies that they are searching for. Stay on your toes and work hard to provide your site visitors with fresh information and that will be a sure way to gain traffic for your website.

Just make sure not to slack off; the internet and technology are constantly changing, so just because you may want to take a break, think again!

Social Media Marketing

Now, more than ever it is very important that you are participating in social media marketing. Almost everyone has hopped onto the social media craze whether it is via Twitter, Facebook, etc. So it is important for your blog or business that you stay connected with the community. Social media is a great and simple way to bring in more traffic.

Google has also introduced Google Real Time Search, which is very useful when it comes to SEO. The way that it works is when something is typed into a Google Search the results that appear feature the most current Tweets and messages about a topic. The search results also contain links from sites such as Twitter, which encourages the visitors to interact with your website.

So the more that you participate on social media websites, the better it is to bring in traffic to your own page.

Hopefully these tips are useful to your blog or your business. Let us know if you have any insight on what could boost SEO.