Are Web 2.0 Marketing Strategies a Big Waste Of Time
All the buzz about social networking and web 2.0 marketing strategies is here and here to stay. The question I wanted answered for myself was, “Is it real or is it just hype”? After diving into my own research on a top internet marketing guru I have come to find out that it’s more hype than real.
Alright, before you lose your mind and discount this as some anti web 2.0 marketing campaign. Let me explain briefly. I do believe that Web 2.0 strategies are useful, effective and growing rapidly in the marketplace, however, I have come to understand that the million dollar earners on the internet have not totally abandoned traditional wisdom when it comes to their online success.
In my research I followed one very successful marketer that reveled his entire marketing strategy and it was a pretty shocking find.
First, I realized that his system for marketing any one product was the same and it consisted of 15 different methods. His multi-faceted approach was mind blowing as I always thought that 4 or 5 marketing pillars was big deal.
Like social marketing, I found relationship building through joint ventures was a very prevalent tactic used. Unlike social marketing, in my evaluation, these were deeper relationships formed over the phone and sometimes in person as opposed to the shallow tweets and messages in the social networking crowd.
There was an interesting blend of paid versus free advertising, however, it was all based on highly leveraged techniques and strategies. Each method seemed to compliment another in a very harmonious way. This was all done by design.
Since we are on the topic of design, the entire marketing plan was laid out on single sheet of paper complete with flow charts and note sin the margins for maximum effectiveness. This was like an Army General mapping out his war plan and executing it to the tune of thousands of unique visitors and blindingly high conversion ratios.
The underlying fact that revealed that the hype of social networking has permeated the net is that only twenty percent of the methods included social networking, social bookmarking and Web 2.0 strategies.
In conclusion, I recommend that you become an expert at social marketing and bookmarking but do not fall into the trap of making it your only marketing strategy. A combination of the new and old will prove to give you a much broader audience when promoting your products or services.
Filed under: Internet Marketing