Friday, November 25, 2011 

Occupy Social Media | The "Good" 1%

I was invited to an early-morning "networking" event last week at a pancake house, with the premise of social media being used to promote the respective businesses of the various 20-ish small business owners & salespeople in attendance. Walking away after over an hour of the moderator barking at people for talking over her, other people fooling with their mobile phones/ignoring her as she spoke, and generally doing my best to keep my mouth shut with this colossally uninformed person leading the innocent down the wrong path, my dominant thought was this: Even today, maybe 1% of the "marketing" and advertising people I talk to really understand how to use social media to advance their brands. And these aren't "random hires" either: These are extremely well-paid people working for huge corporations, with some of the best marketing and advertising degrees their parents could afford.

NOTE TO THE PANCAKE HOUSE ATTENDEES: Anyone who isn't using Facebook fan pages as part of their marketing mix is completely clueless - YOU'RE WELCOME!


Labels: ,

9:37 AM | |

Sunday, May 01, 2011 

How To Get Rid Of Extra Characters With A Facebook Biz Name (fb.com/totallychipotle)

If you're like me, you're seeing & hearing more and more about Facebook these days, especially as it relates to marketing a business. Privacy issues aside (i.e., their whole business model appears to be based on mining your personal email database and cross-referencing those against other user's databases), any business NOT using FB these days is, in my opinion, losing money.

DISCLOSURE: I'm no expert at Facebook - although it is fair to say they seem to be adapting/mutating/expanding things on a nearly day-to-day basis. I also think, in many ways, they're eliminating the need for a "real" website. 

All that aside, I thought I'd share something I had one hell of a time trying to get info for online: How to get rid of all those extra random characters with a business name FB address. 


NOTE: I just tried this with a new business and Facebook wouldn't allow it; therefore, I'm thinking you either have to 1. Have at least a few "likes" on your page already or 2. Not be a new page?


Not sure if this works with a personal account or not, but here's what to do with a business page (you have to already have a business page ready):

1. Go to: www.Facebook.com/username


3. Follow the instructions and pull up the existing business page account you'd like to condense into a properly spelled name; 


4. It will check the availability of the name; if it's available, it will assign that user name to you. 


EXAMPLE: I just did this for Totally Chipotle (www.Facebook.com/TotallyChipotle). 


MUCH BETTER! (hope this helps others out there who want to clean up their names)





Labels: , ,

2:19 PM | |