Are you new online? Here are a few tips I put together for a potential client and larger ministry.

Perhaps you can use this information to get your own projects started.

Tools for your project & Strategy tips:

• Facebook – Make sure you use a business page. There are 4 types of accounts you can setup but make sure you choose the right one. A group will make it hard for anyone to join who has too many groups, business pages you can never cap out on. A profile is technically against Facebook rules and if you are caught with a business account as a personal profile they block your address. A community page is more like a wiki page and has less management tools and can’t be customized the way a business page can. See Facebook.com/AgencyCouture for an example of custom tabs. In the end the tabs could be customized with FBML (a type of code) to add your events, store, membership sign up and automate pulling in your blog. Use the side bar under the photo to enter contact information, other social networks and your site and a little tagline about the ministry. This NEEDS to be updates a min. of once a week and no more then 3 times a day. Too much you annoy people and too little they forget about you.
• Twitter – Choose wisely on your name, this can be changed but you want to make sure people remember it. Be sure to fill out the information in the profile completely, this will help you be found. Add your site address to it and on your background (image) add any other relevant information on contacting you or other social networks. You can automate pulling in you blog here, find other ministries, and connect with patrons. This is a great relationship tool, but beware of using it too much like a broadcast channel. People resent being talked “at” on Twitter rather then being talked with. Use tools like Tweet deck to find other users and manage lists and chatting.
• YouTube – technically YouTube boasts being the second largest search engine around, knowing that anyone would be a fool to be online and not utilize this as a free channel for connecting with people. Again, fill out your profile completely, and make sure you have a nice photo for the profile. You only get to choose your username once so choose wisely. Use a background to tell more of your story, but also make sure it matches your site and other social networks. This is a big part of branding. When you upload your videos, time of day is important. Think: will more people be online at 2 am or 10am? You’ll get a hang of when people watch your videos the most by watching analytics, in YouTube analytics are called insights. If you use a tool like TubeMogul you can get even more analytics and auto-upload your video to multiple sites saving you energy and time. Descriptions and titles are as important as anything in this process. Be sure to use keywords that describe your videos and descriptions that have keywords, links to your other social profiles, and links to your website. If one video is a follow up to another, make it a video reply. At the end of every video ask people to subscribe, it helps to remind them that they have not yet. At the beginning and end mention your site and use YouTube tools to add a link on your video to the site. Ask viewers to like your video, the more comments and likes the more popular your video is, the better it ranks on YouTube. You can use the embed tools to add your video to your site.
• Feedburner – is another great FREE tool that will allow you to auto send posts to followers via email, track readers, and promote the site.
• Mail chimp is another great newsletter tool, very affordable. Many people love constant contact but it costs 5 times as much.
• If you don’t have it already added, use google analytics on your site.
• Make sure all the pages of your site have a common template with a global navigation – meaning it looks the same on every page. This is important so you don’t confuse new comers and make it easy for them to find what they are looking for.
• Submit your sitemap to Google Webmaster tools. Add the sitemap as an auto xml to your site, you’ll need WordPress to do this.
• Build your site on WordPress. This should only take 8-10 hours to transfer the current template into WordPress. It will also make setting up new pages and a blog a hundred times easier. Make membership sign up part of your blog. You can bill people but you should also give them an option to pay online via Google Checkout and Paypal so you get money instantly. WordPress will also make it easy for multiple writers to contribute to your site and you can restrict access to certain parts of the site, like pages or publishing protocols.
• You can also let people subscribe to your Google events via your site (add your events to their Google account).

Social media tracking techniques analyze the results of all purchases, website views, and “friend” interactions to determine the most successful social networking channels with a company’s target demographic. This develops a pattern of communication which allows us to optimize your social channels, post topics, and online strategy while mitigating risk.  Analyzing Social Media Networks with NodeXL: Insights from a Connected World is a book that can help you discover a new process for analyzing social media, pre-optimizaiton. I would also recommend looking into Radian6, Hubspot, Post Rank, Brand’s Eye, Reputation Defender, and Yack Track.

Analyzing Social Media Networks with NodeXL: Insights from a Connected World

Social Media Performance, Transparency and Communication

It is imperative to have a social marketing strategy and a consistent voice that is prepared for the constantly adjusting world of business and with the volatility of new social networks. Technology is ever-changing and because of this it is important not to place your eggs all in one basket, or build all your hopes and dreams around just one network that is here today and potentially gone tomorrow. Even if that network is the fad of its day, Facebook for example is very popular today as is Twitter, but MySpace was everyones hot news just a few short years ago. Who knows what networks will be the Pownce, AOL, Google, Lifestream, or Yahoo of tomorrow (note that I mixed it failed platforms with widely successful ones). Please make it the goal of your small business or personal branding efforts to plan out your strategic campaign by effectively utilizing metrics to reach the not only the right audience, but also to incite action so you can prove that your campaign is generating results, while being conscious of the financial goals and objectives rather than just guessing if your campaign is successful based on the number of people who follow you on Twitter. Anyone can build a spam bot, not everyone can generate true fans, friends, or evangelists of their business or cause.

Services include:

• Web Design
• Marketing
• Social Media Marketing & Customization
• Online Training & Etiquette Workshops
• Book & Gadget Reviews
• and Graphic Design

My company, Agency Couture, specializes in bringing small businesses online. We leverage social media to reach your target demographic and bring consumers to your website. If you are new to the online space you may be interested in a training workshop or one-on-one classes in person or via Skype. These courses can be customized to your needs. What takes the most time out of your day? Let’s put together a plan to show you how to simplify your tools and the time you spend online using the right databases, social media tools, metrics, and by implementing an easy-to-use back-end on your site called a content management system (CMS). How can I help you and your business succeed online? Let’s chat about web design, social media customization, or speaking opportunities, send me an email or use my easy to use contact form.

Web Design and Social Media

Are you afraid of the internet? New to the web? Computers can be scary for anyone, especially with all this ever changing technology and a new gadget coming out every week. So consider me, Desarae Veit, your web mercenary armed with a MacBook Pro, lots of professional software, know-how, and the ability to protect your company from the run-of-the-mill break downs, short comings, and hackers. You don’t have to build your own site, maintain all those security updates, or figure out Photoshop. That’s what I’m here for.

Wikipedia loosely defines a mercenary as an independent party who is motivated to take part in the hostilities essentially by the desire for private gain and, in fact, is promised, by or on behalf of a party to the conflict, material compensation substantially in excess of that promised or paid to combatants of similar ranks and functions in the armed forces of that Party.

I’m not a hired gun or some spiritual guru, but I’m here for you. I can:

• Get your company online
• Build your website
• Design any graphics you need
• Develop, Design, and Print Business Cards
• Customize a Facebook Business Page
• Maintain your website
• Keep track of website updates, CMS updates, and plugin installation
• Teach you how to use a content management system
• Install a web design template
• Social Media Marketing Training
• Offer integrated search marketing, integrated digital marketing and social media marketing training
• Setup a blog
• Promote a blog
• Advertising Alternatives
• Customize Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Linkedin, WordPress and many more.

Freelance Web Design Consulting

If I can’t do it, I will introduce you to other freelance web design consultants who can. Looking for web designing software? No need. Seriously, why bother when you could just have an experienced professional do it for you. No mess, no fuss. You don’t need to learn programming or learn web design. Plus I will never outsource your web design or social media project without your consent. Your project is completed in America (well unless I travel overseas short term for vacation). I’m a qualified WordPress designer with a bachelors in design from Iowa State University.

Web Design Courses & Graphic Design Tutorials

Social Media Tutorials, Tips and Tricks

Public Speaking on Personal Branding or Social Media

On the other hand if you are looking for online web design courses, graphic design tutorials, or social media training my block is chalk full of useful information. If you want that information customized to you project I offer individual training, group training or your organization can hire me as your next speaker. My favorite topics are personal branding, social media tools, and web design tips but I can customize my speech for your audience. Check out my page called “Speaking” for more information.

I wrote the following post to Elizabeth Gilbert and was originally posted on the Eat, Pray, Love Facebook page. Just thought anyone following my trip may also be inspired by it:

This movie is incredibly inspirational. I saw it in theaters in September when it first came out. Was at Icon VIP theater, so got to sit in comfy chairs with a bottle wine with my best friend. Loved the movie. Walked out of there with a bigger outlook.

Two weeks later I put in my apartment lease. Something I’ve wanted to do for over a year.

Two months later everything I own that I don’t need is in storage.

Two days later I was on the road.

First Iowa then South Dakota to see family now Washington state. I’m on a horse ranch relaxing and enjoying life. Like you I love to travel. So I’ve decided to devote a year to discovering myself and figuring out who I am and where I want to be in the world. Fortunately I own my own company doing websites, social media and business strategy online so I can live anywhere that I can get wifi and still make a living.

A couple days before the start of my big adventure I bought the audio version of this book and have been listening to it every night before bed (still not done yet). It’s like a deeper look into the movie and only inspires me more that I’ve made the right decision (trust me a couple days I wondered if I made a big mistake leaving Minnesota). This is the dream though, a dream I had long before seeing the movie but the movie just showed me it was possible and gave me a few ideas for my plan. The book has given me a deeper look into my spiritual path. So I just want to say to Elizabeth Gilbert, thank you. Oh and since you didn’t want to share the name of your medicine man in the book.. if you want to email it to me, I would love to meet him.

If you want to read a little bit about my trip, thoughts and what I’m learning from this travel and Elizabeth’s book I’m writing a blog at http://desaraeveit.com and twittering @Desaraev

Eat, pray, love everyone!

Resources:

• Elizabeth Gilberts thoughts on the movie
• Eat Pray Love on Twitter
• Eat Pray Love Blog on Twitter
• The author, Elizabeth Gilbert, on Twitter
• Elizabeth Gilbert, the author of Eat Pray Love, speaks at TED
• Eat Pray Love on Facebook

The New Rules of Viral Marketing – David Meerman Scott
Marketing Apple – MarketingApple.com
Masters of Marketing – Startup Internet Marketing
Podcast Marketing eBook – Christopher S. Penn
Google Adwords Secrets – SEOBook
Get Viral Get Visitors – Stacie Mahoe
Marketing With Case Studies – Dynamic Copywriting
How to Write a Marketing Plan – Geisheker Group
SEO for WordPress blogs – Blizzard Internet
Social Web Analytics – Social Web Analytics
Geeks Guide to Promoting Yourself With Twitter – Geekpreneur
The Zen of Blogging – Hunter Nutall
What is Social Media – iCrossing
A Primer in Social Media – SmashLab
Effective Internet Presence – Effective Internet Presence
Introduction to Good Usability – Peter Pixel
Increasing the Response to Your Email Marketing Program – CRM Transformation
We Have a Website. Now What? – Craig Rentmeester
Blogs & Social Media – PRSA The Podcast Customer Revealed – Edison Media Research