Meetup 1: “Make $$$ With Blogging”
Thursday, August 5 from 7-9 PM
Link: http://www.meetup.com/The-Los-Angeles-Small-Business-Internet-Marketing-Group/calendar/14217997/

Meetup 2: “The ABCs of SEO”
Thursday, August 12 from 7-9 PM
Link: http://www.meetup.com/The-Los-Angeles-Small-Business-Internet-Marketing-Group/calendar/14218264/

Meetup 3: “Make $$$ with Blogging”
Thursday, August 19 from 7-9 PM
Link: http://www.meetup.com/Online-Branding-Reputation-Management/calendar/14218065/

The most anticipated feature of the iPhone 4 is its front facing camera. This feature allows for what Apple is calling “Face Time.” Face Time allows video chatting over the phone using its front and rear facing cameras. This feature will be limited to Wi-Fi hot spots, at least in its early stages. Although, we can be sure the developers are hard at work, scouring the iPhone 4 SDK for ways to make Face Time work over 3G. Could this be the reason that AT&T recently announced caps on its subscribers monthly data consumption? That point is up for debate, but there is no doubt in my mind. Much has been made about mobile video chatting in the weeks since Gizmodo revealed the new phone to the world.

Apple's Promo Video of iPhone Features

I must admit that at first, I was really excited. It will also be nice to talk to friends and family, face to face from anywhere in the world. In a business sense, this will be a great tool as well. You can tell a lot about what the person is saying and thinking through their facial expressions—good or bad.

That said, it is a cool feature and will certainly change the way that we communicate with each other.
Some of the other features the Apple unveiled were:

• Multitasking
• 720p HD video and editing on the phone
• The front and back is made of aluminosilicate glass held together by a custom alloy band that also acts as a antenna
• 960X640 LCD display that is said to be the highest resolution phone screen ever made.
• Other features.

All told, this past Monday was a great day for Apple and its legion of fans. The iPhone 4 represents another huge step forward for the mobile industry. Apple has once again set the bar. It is now up to everyone else to catch up.

Your move Google.

Okay, now that that’s out the way…I’d like to compare arguably the top CMS players out there right now – WordPress, Joomla and Drupal.  In the last couple years, WordPress has gone from being a blog publishing application to a full on CMS so I’m definitely comparing apples to apples.

WordPress

WordPress is deeply rooted in the Blogosphere, so you would be okay to assume that its CMS blogging software reigns supreme to Joomla and Drupal.  For the relatively inexperienced web developer/designer, WordPress may be the best CMS to quickly start sharing your thoughts.

Comments, blogger profiles, trackbacks, and pinging services are default features already built into the CMS, so getting viewers to your site and analytics on this traffic is pretty much a click away.   You can get your site or your clients’ websites up and running in little time.

The Cons of WordPress:

- Currently a smaller community of users than Joomla or Drupal

- Not the most developer- friendly CMS.  Sometimes upgrades by WP developers can make your site disappear.

- Upgrades and plug-ins can sometimes render more glitches than fixes

Joomla

Joomla is probably the most favored open source CMS amongst web designers.  Joomla’s engine has the ability to make websites look amazing.  Some developers like it because they feel it provides them a lot of freedom to develop and customize.  Joomla has an incredibly large community also, so it’s really easy to find support with the creation of websites.

One cool feature that separates Joomla from the pack is that anyone with even the most modest of developing skills can override the default Joomla CMS without actually modifiying it’s original code.

The Cons of Joomla:

-When compared to WordPress or Drupal, Joomla has a lot to catch up on especially with being user-friendly.

- Coding is inflexible

- Can be confusing for someone to integrate into especially their experience with building sites is minimal.

- Many users rather stick to the old versions of the system

Drupal

Drupal is the open source CMS of choice for web developers who rather hand-code content than use a “What You See Is What You Get” Editor.  Yes, it’s fair to say that Drupal is for the quintessential techie web developers more so than the everyday blog site owner.

Because the community using Drupal is predominantly web developers, there are many out there to really help you with building a really powerful website that can really stand out from the majority of them out there.

The Cons of Drupal:

- The design/theme element of Drupal can be lackluster, perhaps because Drupal attracts web developers instead of designers.

-  Not designer/user-friendly.

- Publishing on content with Drupal can be time-consuming, frustrating, and expensive.

My Preference

While I see the advantages in all three, WordPress is my personal favorite and that’s primarily based on the fact that its easiest for my clients here at Highly Relevant to use. The other two are great for the reasons mentioned above but my goal is to get clients setup so they can change or add content to their sites.  It’s important for clients to share their thoughts on their site and because many have former experience with blogging on WordPress, it’s actually pretty simple for them to navigate through the CMS.

Update: Watch Video Below!

Below is information on what we learned.  Check back on Monday to see the video of the event in its entirety.

1.     It’s easy, 5-minutes easy, to setup Google Analytics – As John Shiple mentioned…it’s easier than going to your local café and ordering coffee.  Many content management sites such as WordPress and Blogger make it so easy to track the behavior of your visitors by allowing you to copy + paste a tracking code in the headers or footers of your site.  You’ll be collecting analytics data in no time!

2.    Having the Right Goals in Mind – Many people focus their energy towards driving large volumes of traffic to their site, which is great, but what you do with that traffic is even more important.  Is your bounce rate high? Are you experiencing a drop-off on certain pages? Google Analytics tracks all that.  By making your conversion goals more deliberate and spelled out such as “collect an email”, “add an item to shopping cart”, “spend X dollars to buy my product”, and “confirm sale” , you greatly improve your metrics  and are more enabled to make more informed decisions to improve your company’s online marketing campaign and overall bottom line.

3.    Tracking Inbound Traffic – Learning where your traffic came from and how they got there is just as important as what they do once on your site. So make sure you code your links to be human-readable.  Use us for example; we over here at Highly Relevant like to comment often on interesting social media blogs found on Mashable as well as other blogs regarding online reputation management. In this case, of commenting on Mashable we would use the http://www.highlyrelevant.com/social-media-marketing.html as s opposed to http://www.highlyrelevant.com/online-reputation-management.html.

This helps online users on Mashable know we are part of the social media community plus it also helps us determine where most of our traffic is coming from – social media blogs or online reputation management blogs.

4.     Need Help? Don’t fret.  GA help is Everywhere – The panel members provided the following resources:

• Avinash Kaushik – the GURU of Google Analytics has a blog on the subject:  Click Here.
• Google’s Conversion University has a bunch of training guides.  Here’s the link:  http://www.google.com/support/conversionuniversity/
• Google Analytics works within Facebook.  See this link:  http://www.webdigi.co.uk/blog/2010/google-analytics-for-facebook-fan-pages/

5.    Creating Funnels –Funnels are great (and illustrative) tools for building the steps towards your company’s goal.  They also show you how to identify your user drop-off rate at each step.  Essentially, if there’s drop-off for every step you will want to limit and simplify the number of then in order to successfully convert into sales.

A special shout-out to the very informative speakers– You guys were great!

Check them out on twitter to see what other projects they are working or if you have any questions.

Serena (Host): @serena
Erica: @SnowboardWomen
Alex: @aybecker
Andrew:@andrewhahn
John: @FreelanceCTO

Are your tweets not helping your company’s bottom line?

Fortunately,  Alex Becker, Co-Founder & President of Highly Relevant and panel member of Social Media Club Los Angeles, along with a few of his friends want to help you take your online media strategy to new levels.

Join us on Tuesday, February 23^rd from 7-9:30 pm as we jump head-first into one of easiest ways to measure online social media efforts—yup, Google Analytics.

Location: Mahalo (902 Colorado Avenue in Santa Monica, CA)

Buy Your Ticket Here!!!

Featured Speakers Include:

John Shiple, CTO of Ultralive

[www.linkedin.com/johnshiple]

Known within the industry as General John Shiple is the founder of Startup Army and one of L.A.’s most sought after CTOs.  He’s been making huge waves in the internet world since its birth.  In 1994, he became a founding member of HotWired’s engineering team – the first commercial magazine website on the internet.  He’s had his hands in many other big projects such as redesigning the front-end of GeoCities (then the 4^th largest site on the web) and introducing pop-up ads to the world (yep, that’s his fault but it was and still is kind of a big deal).

Alex Becker, Co-Founder and President of Highly Relevant

[www.linkedin.com/in/alexybecker]

Alex Becker, actively involved in online marketing since 2004, began as an Affiliate and Product Manager for a pair of multi-million dollar affiliate programs while still a student at University of Indiana – Bloomington.  After graduating in 2006, he made the full-time transition to interactive content and became the SEO manager for Spine-Health.com, a position previously occupied by Ben Parr, the current co-editor of Mashable.

Alex teamed up with Rex Freiberger after working with him at DONE! SEO to form Highly Relevant.  For more information on Alex, please check out his Chicago SEO blog.

Erica Forrette, Event Moderator, Online Marketing / E-commerce Expert

[www.linkedin.com/in/ericaforrette]

Erica online has  online marketing experience dating back to 1999. She has experience on the brand side, vendor side and even the agency side.  She currently oversees the online marketing efforts and analytics for Internships.com.    In the past, Erica has worked as a consultant for lead generation and e-commerce site projects, Senior Manager of Online Acquisitions at PacSun.com, Director of Marketing for Adapt Technologies, and the list goes on.  She’s a much achieved online marketing professional and we are very happy to have her as this event’s moderator.

Additional Speakers TBD, including:

Andrew Hahn of Luxury Link and Familygetaway.com

[www.linkedin.com/in/andrewhahn]

Since back links were so important in getting top rankings in Google people soon realized that they could begin spamming blogs and leaving comment link farms on thousands of sites and soar to the top of rankings. Google had a problem, their formula to protect top rankings was misfiring. Change was necessary and came in the form of a “NoFollow” tag.

What is a NoFollow Tag?

A Nofollow tag is a simple piece of code that you put in a link. Here is an example:

This link is passing strength to the Los Angeles SEO page it’s linking to.

This link is NOT passing strength to the Los Angeles SEO page it’s linking to.

Why Do NoFollows Now Matter?

Google originally introduced the nofollow tag to combat spamming and the like. Now, Google, Yahoo & Bing seem to be rewarding websites who are actively commenting on blogs, forums and other web properties that don’t pass strength through these social media links. BUT THEY DO PASS STRENGTH. Social networking profile links, blog comment links and forum signatures now matter — again. The difference is that you need to keep at it and be participating in relevant, authority/industry blogs/forums.

NoFollows Matter: A Case Study

Below is a screen shot that shows Highly Relevant’s top 10 back links. As you can see, 5 out of 10 of the back links are social media blog comments — Including our #1 back link being a blog comment on Chris Brogan’s site.

The advent of the personal computer, cell phone and miniaturization of technology have all greatly contributed to the “anytime, anywhere” world we live in today but we must note that the “always on” consumer actually has its beginnings in the late 1960s, as does continuous brand management. AT&T created its first 1-800 toll-free number in 1967 for customers to make “automatic collect calls.” The concept didn’t make big waves immediately, but by 1992, approximately 40% of all AT&T calls were dialed using 1-800 numbers. This theoretically simple service dramatically changed how consumer-oriented companies would eventually manage their businesses.

The first of many major changes to be made by the telephone company was the discussion (or lack thereof) with the customer. Large call centers would be trained to answer phones and follow service scripts in an effort to have an actual dialogue, which was uncommon at the time. More importantly, companies such as AT&T were beginning to recognize the importance of cross-selling and making outbound sales calls. These services performed by the early call centers were the predecessors to both the world wide web and mobile web, as they provided the customer with the ability to reach the company anytime, anywhere.

Read Pt. 2

First, they will expect continuity in their brand experience across all devices and platforms. For example, their favorite website, Facebook, must be experienced similarly across the web, iPhone, and yes, their Playstation 3 or Xbox360. If you take a deeper look of the continuous shuffling between their devices, you will notice more – their continuous access to communication and information. Google is everywhere as are their friends, and as a result, their unwillingness to separate themselves from these devices. Companies need to react to this social media-laden landscape by effectively implementing continuous brand management efforts that seamlessly cover all devices, something that is still having great disconnect between customer contact channels.

Another impact that Generation 10:45 will have on companies is their desire for transparent service—to be “seen” at all times. Generation 10:45ers are constantly providing status updates about where they are and what they are doing and will expect companies to provide the same kind of transparency with regard to service and instant information on any order, service, and requests.

Finally, Generation 10:45, like people in general, believe what they hear through word of mouth well before anything you have to say as a company. People generally trust customers far more than any company selling to them so expect Generation 10:45 to be disseminating/recovering customer reviews and ratings online, all the time, and on a continuous basis.

Read Pt. 1

Google Buzz Advertising

What is Google Buzz? Watch the video below, I’m not going to explain it better than Google.

Here’s a rundown of what it does:

• Update All of Your Social Media Sites all from one place (I don’t see facebook yet)
• It’s built into gmail – How many people know and use gmail everyday already?
• Picture Viewing capabilities – “Pictures seen the right way”
• Embeddable Videos inside of Buzzes

Here’s why Buzz Matters:

• It shows up in Google’s Search Results
• We are using Google More often and for longer (More pageviews, more time being spent on site = more advertising revenues for Google, Inc.).
• Everyone who is adopting early is probably doing the right thing. I have 2 email accounts setup through google mail and i LOVE THEM.
• For all you gchaters out there, this is sorta cool…

In closing, make sure you realize that already 10,000,000+ engagements have already taken place and that number will continue to soar. The sky is the limit. Google has quietly become a player in Social Media Marketing Overnight.

Check out Google’s video demo:

The two core philosophies behind Google Buzz, as described by Bradley Horowitz, vice president for product management of Google, was people’s fondness of sharing life experiences and being able to do so in-real time.

Todd Jackson, product manager for Google Buzz, began his demo by logging onto his Gmail account, which captured plenty of interests because of the curious splash page introducing the company’s newest release. He described it as, “an entire world within Gmail” and that is exactly what it is. Whether Gmail users want to be part of another Social Network or not, one thing is certain and that is for Google to create a seamless transition between email, social networking, and sharing media.

Some of the main features showcased were Google Buzz’s ability to allow users to autofollow, share rich content (in private or publically), all at a fast rate and within a newly integrated inbox decked out with plenty of new press-of-a-button shortcuts. For instance, in the same way that users press “C” to compose an email, they will now be able to press “R” to comment/reply to a buzz post. Picasa, Twitter, Flickr and plenty other sites will be aggregated and allow for one-site access.

Additionally, Google is implementing a system in which they will email you about any updates on comments you or others made, much like Facebook, but with media attached to it so you won’t always have to log-in to see all the buzz you’ve created.

Google Buzz will be rolled out on mobile web via Google’s Mobile website, of course Buzz.Google.com, and from Google Mobile Maps whenever you “buzz” in from a certain location. Like any major release similar to this, it is being done in phases so expect Google Buzz to eventually become part of your life—willingly or not.