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How Do You Monitor Your Social Brand?

It’s essential for you to establish your presence in different social networking sites. This is where most people are currently talking and connecting with others, so you would be amiss if you don’t use these different platforms for engaging your audience.

Word of mouth marketing is more important than ever yet is also a double-edged sword. It has also become vital to your personal brand that you monitor what’s being said about you. Social brand monitoring needs to be an essential part of your personal brand communication plan.

There are many reasons why monitoring your brand can help you in your career or business.

Here are some of them:

1. It helps you understand how your brand is perceived

As a personal brand, it is essential that you know how your audience views you. If the feedback is mostly positive, then you must be doing something right and you seem to be on the right track.

On the other hand, if the feedback you’re getting is mostly negative, then you need to start reassessing. Your reputation is suffering, which is not going to be good for your personal brand. It’s essential that you understand how people perceive you, in order to make changes and improve your brand.

2. It helps you stay ahead in your industry

Monitoring your personal brand, related keywords, and your competitors can help you stay ahead in your industry. It keeps you up to date about the current trends, so you know how to keep your skills and knowledge sharp and dynamic. You don’t want to get left behind as others move forward and embrace what’s new.

3. It helps you make informative decisions regarding your brand

Personal brand monitoring helps you make informative and educated decisions regarding your brand. It gives you a more targeted outreach, and helps you learn what would best engage your audience.

4. It helps you know your audience, your connections

With social brand monitoring, you can learn about your audience’s demographics, and gain insights on what your audience wants. With this knowledge, you’ll be able to enhance their experience and deliver a more targeted message.

Monitoring your personal brand in social media helps you respond to your fans and followers, and really know who they are – not just who you ‘think’ they are. You can learn what engages them, and what doesn’t.

5. It helps you facilitate and filter what’s being said about you

By monitoring your social brand, you can respond to what’s being said about you and try to filter that message. The worst thing you can do is ignore any issues that comes up regarding your brand – you need to address them as soon as possible. That early intervention can prevent something that is small from becoming an issue.

Brand monitoring is essential

In the dynamic and highly competitive world of today, to achieve success, you need to be aware of your reputation. Learn your strengths and weaknesses so you can become a better personal brand.

You see, conversations about your brand happen whether you listen to them or not. So it is in your best interest to find out what people are saying about you.

Here are some tips to help you monitor your brand:

1. Use Twitter Search and Twitter management tools
Twitter Search is a great way to find out who’s talking about your brand and what they’re saying. Use it with a Twitter management tool such as Tweetdeck or HootSuite so you can continuously monitor what people are saying about you.

2. Use the Google Email Alert System
It’s easy and convenient to sign up for Google Alerts so that every time someone mentions your brand or keyword, Google sends it straight to your email inbox so you learn about it.

3. Use SocialMention
Another excellent tool for monitoring your social brand is SocialMention. It monitors more than a hundred sites directly, so you can quickly know who’s talking about you and your brand. You also have the ability to click on the link where your brand is mentioned, enabling you to answer or enter into a conversation with them.

4. Use Brand-Yourself
This is a great free tool that shows you were your search results are when people Google you and what links of information are already out there about you. My favorite part of this tool is that it’s an organic Google Search that you are working with – not a custom search with a link to that search. You are getting feedback and insights when people actually search you on the web. We’ll be discussing this tool more in future posts and on the twitter chat I moderate, #brandchat, this coming Wednesday, March 28th.

Effective Delegation – Management Skills For Plateau Protection

Let’s face it, these are difficult economic times in the job market and for getting promoted within your organization. Budgets are tight. There are hiring freezes and lay-offs. Advancement within your organization seems a distant possibility. For those that are getting laid off, this is a terrible time.So what are you doing about it?The most important thing in any of these tough circumstances will be to pay attention to your management skills. Among the most important of these will be effective delegation and people management. A serious effort to improve your skills and effectiveness will reduce the chance of losing your ground and increase your chances for advancement. Companies and businesses seek results, now more than ever. Take a close look at what the organizations needs are for their management teams.
Ability to execute. Managers are charged with getting things accomplished through others. Leading and managing a team to execute assignments and projects. This has not changed. Most managers do not focus on their management skill improvement in this critical area.
Team building skills. A manager who excels at building a stronger more capable business unit will always be sought after and rise to the top. A candid assessment of the manager’s interpersonal skills such as communication and relationship building id needed in all situations.
Project management skills. The ability to plan and execute projects and assignments is a core competency. Yet managers spend so little time thinking about how to get better at planning the work they are managing. Putting effective project action plans together, even for basic team assignments, really boosts execution and results.
Managers and leaders can not stand still and continue to assume they have these important areas down pat. That kind of “head in the sand” approach can derail a career for sure. What makes a great manager? Taking action and getting things executed. So, why not take action on paying attention to your own development and focusing on continuous management skill development? This starts with making periodic assessments of your skills and setting new professional development objectives.  Here, are three things any manager can do to set themselves on a positive course.
Take some time to complete a “self-assessment” of your management skills. Being totally candid, what areas are you falling short in related to getting business unit results? Ask yourself, “if I were a senior manager, looking at my progress and the results of my business unit, what constructive suggestions would be made?
Seek feedback from key members of your team or peers in the organization. The strongest managers seek and accept constructive feedback. Everyone has one or more “management blind-spots.” Things you can not see clearly about your-self, your skills and your performance.  Don’t be blind-sided by your blind-spots.  Have the courage and maturity to ask how you can get better.
Learn to delegate effectively. It is a premier skill for top performers. Most managers are really rather average at delegating work effectively, but most think they are good at it. You can learn more about the management skills for effective delegation and improve upon them quickly.  They are at the heart of superior execution and building high-performance business units.
The benefits of paying attention to your professional skills are worth every effort. Upper management will start to see your focus and dedication. The effectiveness of your team’s ability to execute will increase and will be noticed. If you are seeking a new position, the time and effort you can demonstrate you have invested in your own development will separate you from the competition. Your business unit will feel the positive effects of your skill development and be will be motivated to perform at higher levels. If you were hiring someone or considering a manager for advancement, wouldn’t you take notice of the consistent self-development efforts and increase in skill? Of course, you would and that’s why you must take action to get better.

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A Short Introduction to Automotive and Car Dealership SEO

Online success for automotive repair shops and car dealerships is realistically achieved through search engine optimization. If you own one or both businesses, it’s time to know how automotive and car dealership SEO strategies work.Knowing SEOSearch engine optimization is a process used to gain higher rankings on major search engines. Companies providing the service often target first page rankings and top ten listings.Basic strategies use keyword research, article creation, and back link building. Keyword research involves finding terms used to search online. These phrases are usually related to the service or product they want. Say, a web user wants to find a clothing store in New York. This user will likely type in those words when looking for listings. The keyword specialists working in SEO firms must anticipate these phrases and relate how these fit with their company’s clients. They can supply terms like ‘clothing shop in NY,’ ‘clothes store NYC,’ and so on.Once they have a list of keywords, the next phase consists of writers and editors. Writers will use the keywords on articles, blogs or other content. They will observe word count along with keyword density (number of times it appears in an article). Word count and keyword density depends on each SEO company. Editors will edit and proofread these before sending these to a submissions team. The team in-charge will then upload these works on different article directories.Back link building combines some writing skills along with finding high page rank (PR) sites. SEO specialists need to make relevant comments on these websites. They incorporate keywords and seed these with the client’s links so the client’s site gains rankings.This process is not just for clothing stores or other businesses, as it’s also for car dealerships and automotive. SEO, when done properly, delivers more sales opportunities to these businesses too.Are car dealerships or automotive SEO processes any different?It depends on the company hired. Some automotive and car dealership SEO businesses employ the steps mentioned. There are also those offering different automotive internet marketing strategies.So what can an automotive or car dealership SEO company deliver?An automotive or car dealer SEO company provides higher web rankings. This visibility allows your company to gain more customers as you maintain better positions. Potential clients can visit your site more and increase web traffic. While they do, they can also explore what your firm offers. They can make inquiries and schedule orders as they please. Overtime, this can translate to word of mouth if they find your product and service consistent.What to do nowThe first thing to do is to find a company offering sound practices and proven results. Find the top ranking car dealership or automotive SEO firms in your area. Key indicators should be their past years’ performance along with client base. The more experience and clients they have, the better services they might give.

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