What is Digital Marketing? | SEO | SMM | Website Development | PamTen

 

 

 In our previous blog, we showed you some of the steps you need to take to layout your Digital Marketing plan. Now we’ll start looking at the various types of Digital Marketing you can employ to boost your business. Some may be more appropriate than others for your particular business.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Online Reputation Marketing (ORM)

Pay Per Click (PPC)

Social Media Marketing (SMM)

Content Development Services

Email Marketing

Web and Creative Services

Affiliate Marketing

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Making sure your website is googleable is one of the most important aspects of getting found online. Ranking in Google can be tough when you look at the competition for space and placement. The goal is to get as close to the top, preferably on the first page, as possible. There are 3.5-4 billion searches that take place every day in Google. And there are hundreds of algorithm updates released by Google every year. Each update can affect the search results and where your business will land in the ranking. Whether you’re a Fortune 500 company, a top leading organization in industry, or a small start-up, optimization is very important for visibility in this competitive world.

Search Engine Optimization is a practice of developing content and promoting the website in various Search Engines. This practice includes Keyword research and optimization, content organization, and content promotion. Good SEO practices incorporate on page, off page, and technical aspects to provide the strongest opportunities for increased visibility.

What are the Benefits of thorough SEO?

• Primary Source of Leads: SEO plays a crucial role in bringing your company up in the ranking through organic search results. Higher ranks make you easier to find.
• Promotes Better Cost Management: With good SEO that is well maintained, the search results rank your company higher so there is less of a need to spend extra for paid promotions to advertise your website.
• Encourages Local Users to Visit Your Physical Location: If you have a store or business where potential customers are encouraged to come in, strong SEO will help bring your ranking up and make it easier for people to find your location and visit your store. That improves the probability of them making a purchase, and possibly becoming a long term customer.
• Builds Brand Credibility: Improved rankings give you greater visibility, which lets users know that your company is a top player in the industry.

PamTen’s SEO Services Process
Website Audit  Competitive Intelligence  Market Analysis & Keyword  Content Development  High Quality Link Building
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Social Media Marketing (SMM)

Social Media Marketing is probably something you are very familiar with. It brings your business right to the audience with your story in your own words. It is the best way to communicate with a broad audience. However, there are methods to help you build a more targeted audience.

Social media is just that – social. The key to a successful social media presence is your engagement with individuals and other groups that will help build your online reputation as an authority and as a great company. There are subtle differences between the various platforms for types of content, image sizes, hashtags, and other aspects of your posts. It’s also important not to always sound like a commercial. Providing information, insight, and other interesting facts help build the relationship you’re looking for with potential and current customers. You might be surprised to know that the quality of your contacts and customers and their interaction is almost more important than the number of likes and follows.

What can Social Media Marketing to for you?

1. SSM builds recognition and a personal connection.
2. Optimized Social Media pages improvements the rankings in search results.
3. Improves Customer Satisfaction and feedback through interaction with people interested in you and your business.

Need Help to build your Social Media visibility and presence?
Social Media Audit & Strategy  Content Development & Promotion  Competitor Analysis  Trend Discovery  Hashtag Research  Scheduled Posting  Paid Ad Strategy and Management  Analytics & Reporting
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Content Development

Have you heard the phrase “Content is king”? Because it certainly is. The words you write, the stories you tell, the excitement you share through your website, blog posts, social media, and press releases are the keystones for building, growing, and developing an audience of potential customers.

Google uses machine learning and AI algorithms to scan the content, quality, and relevance of your pages.  But when you’re building your content, it shouldn’t just be promotional or “salesy”. Look to write content that is educational or inspirational, content that’s resourceful, and relevant to your market. Your website content should incorporate keywords and generate backlinks, but maintain a balance so it doesn’t look or feel forced. This not only helps your rankings, but it continues to build trust and your reputation as a resource.

Before we move to advanced Digital Marketing options, let’s take a look at the importance of your main digital asset – your website.

Website Development

You have a story to tell about yourself and your business. It’s an interesting story, and your site should be interesting as well. You need to think about your site from the perspective of your customer. What are they looking for, and how can you weave your story into their search?

For your business, exposure is key to attracting customers. An effective Website with great content and design increases the probability for sales and business growth. It needs to incorporate a good user experience, so they’ll continue to come back.

A major factor to consider for your website is the design – the layout, style, and font choices should be a pleasant composition that’s easy to read on any device. You may LOVE those fancy fonts, but do they translate well on cell phones? You have hundreds of pictures you want to add, but if you put them as a background, do they distract from the story? Can people easily find how to order or contact you?

There are a variety of platforms to choose from for hosting your site. Take time to do the research to find the one that best suits your needs.

Or PamTen can help!
Website Design  Responsive Design  Creative

We’ve covered some of the key elements to include in your Digital Marketing arsenal. In our next blog, we’ll cover additional aspects of your program you should take into consideration.

How Digital Marketing helps you to Grow Your Business | PamTen

   

 Understanding the Changing Landscape of Digital Marketing to Grow Your Business

You hear it all the time. If you’re in business – any type of business – you need to have an online presence and use digital marketing. But digital marketing is such a broad, almost vague phrase. Adding to the confusion are the constant changes in social media platforms, new platforms coming out, the use habits people have, search engine algorithm changes, and even current events. How do you know what to do, and when do you do it? What do all those names like SEO and PPC mean?

We’re here to help you break down those pieces and see what works best for your business. Much like the olden days of ink and airtime, different Digital Marketing methods work best at different times and when you understand where your audience is looking for information.

Who do you want to reach?

Let’s start by looking at you and your business. Understanding your customers is always important for a solid marketing plan. Are you selling products or services to other businesses, or to general consumers? The SBA has some great courses and worksheets to help you build a strong understanding of your customers.

To further build your online marketing plans, you’ll need to determine what you want to do for your company, what is the purpose of your digital marketing plans? Do you want to generate leads, develop and increase direct sales, building your company’s name recognition, build a mailing list, promote your events, something else, or a combination of these? Your purpose may change on occasion (you have a special event to promote or you want to build your email list), but the overall purpose remains fairly steady. Your plan should be adaptable to grow as your business changes and grows.

What are your digital assets?

You probably have digital marketing assets that you don’t even realize. Anything that is a marketing asset in digital form fits that category. Think about all of these, and make a list that can be updated and adapted as your business changes. Keep them in an encrypted or safe folder for easy access by those who need to use them – but not necessarily everyone. Any marketing tool you have that goes online can be considered. Here are just some of the examples:

• Your website or websites
• Logos, icons, or any branding
• Videos such as ads, product demos, interviews, etc.
• ALL Images (infographics, product pictures, company photos, event images, ads or social media images)
• Written content for everything from website content to blog posts, eBooks, product descriptions, testimonials, postings, white papers, manuals, etc.
• Online products or tools that you utilize frequently
• Reviews by others about your company on YouTube, Google, Yelp, Glassdoor, etc.
• Your business and, depending on your company, your personal Social media pages

Now that you know who you are trying to reach, and the assets at hand to reach them, let’s looks at the different types of Digital Marketing available to you. You may find that some are less stressful to navigate on your own, but others may require a helping hand. PamTen is here to help you.

Pieces of the Digital Marketing Puzzle

Customers for both B2B and B2C want personalization, relevance, convenience, simplicity, and proximity in the content they read online. For your business to achieve greater visibility and accomplish your digital marketing goals, your message (whether it’s email, social posts, or your website) needs to be accessible and clearly visible through multiple devices, optimized for search engines, and effectively engage customers. An integrated digital marketing strategy creates a synergy across marketing efforts and channels across the various media available.

It’s challenging, but it’s important to understand the strengths and weaknesses of each of these channels of communication to use them effectively.

These are some of the various types of Digital Marketing:

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Online Reputation Marketing (ORM)

Pay Per Click (PPC)

Social Media Marketing (SMM)

Content Development Services

Email Marketing

Web and Creative Services

Affiliate Marketing

In our next blog, we’ll break each one down further to give you a better understanding of what exactly these are and how they can help your company succeed.

 

The Ticket to Finding Good Tech Talent

Prasad Tenjerla, COO

Finding the right talent for that critical technical position in your company is like winning the lottery. When you are trying to acquire the right person for a technical position, it takes tremendous effort: screening, testing technical skills, evaluating equivalent positions, assessing personality, etc. These are all very time consuming and could involve many current employees.

There are many procedural frameworks available in the market to distinguish if a potential recruit has the technical expertise they claim, or if they merely talk a good game. Common mistake supervisors or managers make is expecting a new person, who has a different history of specific experiences and successes, will be able to perform instantly to the same ability in a new and dissimilar environment. There are new people, different personalities, procedures, equipment, expectations, etc. This is where the expectation and reality of life differ.

INCREASE YOUR CHANCES FOR SUCCESS

When going through the hiring process, especially for a non-technical person looking for an IT professional, it’s important to keep certain things in mind to help you recognize the correct talent. Whether it’s for full-time permanent employees or contract consultants, the first time you’re hiring technical employees or the hundredth, remember these:

• Candidates are trying to get the job. Although they may be very knowledgeable in the technical area you’re looking for, they may answer questions based on what they think you want to hear.
• References are always helpful, but keep in mind that they are given to you by the potential employee. They are only going to give you people that will provide a positive picture of their abilities and performance. That doesn’t mean it’s a wrong picture, but do listen to the references input knowing they already like your candidate.
• For the technical side, there are different online resources available, but it always helps to have another person assist with the evaluation. Make sure to ask questions that require a description of an issue they needed to address and ask the candidate to draw out or whiteboard how they solved this problem. Tell them of a problem your company has had and ask how they would resolve it.
• It’s easy for interviewers to do some research and discover the type of questions that your company asks during interviews. Glassdoor is a growing resource for job seekers and often has interview questions posted in their reviews. Being aware of this can help you assess the candidate – are they using the information just to get the right answer, or to better understand the needs of your company and how it works?
• Remember the soft skills. For tech positions, tech skills are essential. But the soft skills of conversation, communication, and personality can determine if this candidate will be a good match for the current team or situation.

PROVIDE A WINNING STRATEGY

Once you’ve vetted your new recruit and made them your new employee, it’s important to give them the opportunity to succeed. It’s not uncommon to have probationary periods so that both you and the new IT employee can determine if this really is a winning combination.

To help give everyone the best chances for success, it’s important to have a plan for integrating the new team member.

• Provide the time and training needed to understand your companies procedures, processes, and idiosyncrasies. Both sides need to get better acquainted and allow for an adjustment period.
• Supervisors and management should take some time and develop an understanding of the person’s strengths.  Assignment for deliverables, tasks, and duties should progress as this assessment takes place. It’s easy for managers to get carried away when they have additional help and assign new employees too much too soon.
• Create an environment where their talent can grow and flourish. Keep challenging them to present solutions to problems, since they have a different perspective as the new person. Don’t be quickly dismissive, or they will stop suggesting solutions and eventually be discouraged. Then the process of hiring could need to start all over again.  
• Keep inspiring them. Allow your new team member to showcase their talents. Provide them with guidance on ways to improve. Provide specific objectives and driving milestones to encourage reaching their potential and hopefully exceed your expectations.

Despite all the money, time, background checks, and review, you’ll only know if you’ve hit all those lucky numbers when the new technical recruit begins working. That is when you’ll find out if you’ve hit the jackpot.

5 Tips for a Top Tech Resume for IT Professionals

Prasad Tenjerla, COO

You have 6 to 10 seconds. That’s the amount of time an employer looks at a CV or resume before deciding whether the applicant should be considered for a technology staffing, job, or any position. That isn’t much time, and may seem unfair. However, snap decisions need to be made when you have hundreds of people applying for the same job. Harsh, but very true.

There are some keys to making sure that your resume gets you to the next step in the interview process.

1) Adjust your resume to target the job:

There was a time when you would write one resume and send it out to every position that vaguely looked interesting. Those days are gone. With the volume of positions open and the amount of applicants coming through, it’s important to look at the technology staffing description and target your talents and skills to meet the employer’s expectations. Use the same keywords in your resume that they’ve used in their job posting. Reorganize your project work with the most relevant being at the top of the list.

CV’s tend to be longer than resumes, but that doesn’t mean they should be a short novel. After reading all of these resumes, the recruiter or Human Resources person will get bored after only a few pages. The traditional rule still applies – resumes should be no more than 2 pages (1 is better) and CV’s should be more than 4 pages (3 is better). And again, target the important information towards the beginning.

2) Put those IT Skills at the top:

List out your IT skills and specialties, keeping your strengths first, and progressing down. Remember, you’re targeting the posted job so start with your most relevant and strongest technical skills. Leave off things like Microsoft Office, or Excel. These day’s you’re expected to have a good knowledge of standard office software, regardless of the type of work you do.

If you are applying for specific type of job, HTML specialist, for example, don’t just mention HTML expert in your skills and then never mention HTML again. Make sure you have utilized it in other projects and jobs and mention what you did. This is something that will catch the resume reviewers’ eye and corroborate your statement that you are an expert.

3) Focus on Accomplishments, Leave off the Objectives:

There may be some fields where it’s still appropriate to list out objectives, if you’re just out of school or looking for a different line of work for example. For the most part, it’s unnecessary for IT professionals. Your objective, by submitting your resume, is to get the job. Don’t waste the CV real estate on that and put the focus on your accomplishments. Include details about your software solutions and specific projects.

Emphasize the accomplishments of your positions over mere duties. Don’t be vague by saying things like “reduced downtime”. Include quantifiable details such as “reduced downtime by 20% which increased customer satisfaction by 30%.” Add some detail on how you accomplished this and what tools you used.

4) Don’t be overly Technical:

It’s important to be clear and concise in your presentation. As counter-intuitive as is sounds, don’t be too techy or use too many technical words. The person doing the resume review may not have a strong IT background so they may not be able to follow along.

Also, try not to use too many acronyms or buzz words. Each company has its own way of referring to certain procedures or things, so it might not translate well for another company.  At least once layout what the acronym means (Sealed Air Container) and from there you can use the abbreviation (SAC).

5) Be neat, clear and concise: 

Keep your CV or resume neatly organized with a logical progression. Make sure to double and triple check all spelling and grammar. Spell Check catches certain obvious misspellings, but it can also miss certain phrases and words, especially for fairly technical documents. Have several people review your resume, or use some of the online tools, to make sure your grammar contains no glaring mistakes.

It’s also important to have a professional email address. Daydreamer2121 doesn’t match the professional and security requirements for a high-level position at a pharmaceutical company. When attaching your resume, you should make sure it has your name instead of something vague like myresume.doc. BobSmithHTMLResume.pdf makes it easier for the technology staffing team and recruiters to find again when they need it.

Overall, details matter when putting together a CV. It shows your professionalism as well as your skill level. It lets the recruiter know that you are the one they want to hire and gives you the best chance to get that job you want

All about Facial Recognition Technology

Srinivas Chintakindi, Manager – Technology/Products at PamTen

WHAT IS FACIAL RECOGNITION?

Facial recognition is the least intrusive and fastest-growing field of biometric technology. Biometrics, in general, is the body’s measurements and calculations – the metrics of the human body and characteristics.  The study of the body’s measurements and relationships goes back throughout humankind, but the technology to quantify it has been significantly advanced by current technology.

There are several forms of biometric technology:

• Retinal and/or Iris scans
• Fingerprint recognition
• Palm scan
• DNA matching
• Facial Recognition

Focusing on Facial Recognition, with the latest developments in technology, systems are now able to identify a person’s face and verify who that face belongs to from any digital image.

HOW DOES IT WORK?

Facial recognition analyzes the characteristics of a person’s face through the input of a digital image. It measures the overall facial structure, including certain measurements of distance and depth that create the hills, peaks, and valleys of a face. These measurements are retained in a database as a faceprint and are compared when a user stands before the camera or sends another digital image. It is estimated that biometric facial recognition technology will soon overtake fingerprint biometrics as the most popular form of security for user authentication. Currently, Apple’s iPhone X and some Android phones include Face ID technology that lets users unlock their phone with a Faceprint mapped by the Phone’s camera.

There are a variety of facial recognition methodologies, but in general, they work by comparing selected facial features from the given image with already stored facial data within a data source. When the image is fed into the software, it maps the individual’s facial features mathematically and stores the data as a faceprint. Then the software uses machine/deep learning algorithms to compare a live capture or digital image to the stored faceprints to verify an individual’s identity.

Every face has numerous, distinguishable landmarks; the different peaks and valleys that make up unique facial features. Each human face has approximately 80 nodal points that are measured for verifications. Some of these measured by the Facial Recognition Technology are:

• Distance between the eyes
• Width of the nose
• Distance between nose and lips
• Depth of the eye sockets
• The shape of the cheekbones
• Eye shape
• Skin texture
• The length of the jaw line

These nodal points are measured creating a numerical code, the faceprint, representing the face in the database.

Have you posted a picture to Facebook and noticed that the system often automatically asks if you’d like to tag other friends that are in the picture? That’s because Facebook uses facial recognition software to tag individuals in photographs. Each time an individual is tagged in a photograph, the software stores mapping information about that person’s facial characteristics. Once enough data has been collected, the software can use that information to identify a specific individual’s face when it appears in a new photograph. As the largest social media platform in the world, it’s building quite an extensive data base of faces.

WHAT CAN IT BE USED FOR?

Facial recognition is getting more popular and being used in many commercial and governmental industries. Below are some of examples of how facial recognition is currently being used.

• Law enforcement is using this software more frequently for a variety of reasons: to scan crowds for wanted men and women, check suspects against mug shots, and protect the nation borders. It can also be used to find missing children and victims of human trafficking. In the event of missing child or person, their image can be added to the database and security systems at public places like airports, train stations, and bus terminals that can scan the crowd continuously. It can alert the law enforcement if any matching Face is found.
• For large events and concerts, facial recognition software can be used to identify the guests at the gate and can decide whether the person purchased the tickets for that event or not. If they did it can check-in the guest automatically.
• Facial recognition can be used to diagnose diseases that cause detectable changes in appearance.
• Face recognition is currently being used to instantly identify when known shoplifters, organized retail criminals, or people with a history of fraud enter retail establishments. Photographs of individuals can be matched against large databases of criminals so that loss prevention and retail security professionals can be instantly notified when a criminal that prevents a threat enters a store.
• Dating sites match the people with similar features, because some people are most attracted to those that look like them.
• Social media sites use this technology to tag the people automatically every time images are uploaded.
• Casinos can use the facial recognition software to help addictive gamblers. It can also help the casinos by identifying the cheaters or advantage gamblers. It can identify members of voluntary exclusion lists and alerts the casinos. These people can cost casinos big fines if they are caught gambling. Along with casinos, bars can also use this technology to identify the underage drinkers.
• Mobile companies can use the Face as an authentication mechanism to unlock a phone or smart mobile device. Mobile purchases can also be purchased with facial recognition.
• Face recognition surveillance systems can instantly identify when expelled students, dangerous parents, drug dealers, or other individuals that pose a threat to school safety enter school grounds. By alerting school security guards in real-time, face recognition can reduce the risk of violent acts. In addition to making the schools/universities safer, this technology can also be used to take student attendance automatically.
• Advertising companies can use Facial recognition technology to identify the age and gender of people by making educated guesses based on previous biometrics and provide targeted advertisements in open spaces like gas stations.
• Face recognition can work as a means of access control to ensure that only authorized individuals get into facilities like labs, boardrooms, bank vaults, training centers for athletes, and other sensitive locations.

Facial recognition technology has many positive applications. But it also raises many questions about personal privacy and governmental and commercial intrusion. How do you feel about the growing incorporation of facial recognition technology in our lives?

Quick Tip to Strengthen Your Password

There are certain applications and websites that you use on a regular basis. Do you cringe every time that application you are logging in to says, “Time to Change Your Password”?  Most people do. Trying to figure out a new password AND remember it is a challenge to almost everyone trying to practice better cybersecurity.

One thing you can do to help make your password more secure is to make it longer. Passwords that are only 4 or 5 characters long can be cracked by hackers in seconds. The strongest passwords are now 8 to 12 characters long and contain capital and lower case letters, numbers, and characters. If the system you’re using allows it, upwards of 15 characters provide even better protection.

If you’re worried that a longer password will be harder to remember, there are ways to overcome that and make it memorable but not easily recognizable.

For example:   I<32b@t8Ec#  That’s 11 characters long, using all the components for a strong password. How is it memorable? If you look closely it says I love to be at the beach. Memorable, but not easily recognizable.

You can also use a phrase and turn it into a password. Think of a phrase or song lyric that you can associate with the website. For example: Don’t stop believing.  If you do some substitutions and use underscores for the spaces, you can get D0n+_$tOp_b31i3viNg. That would definitely be more challenging for a hacker to crack. It’s a phrase you’ll remember and will likely remember the substitutions after a time or two.

Cybercriminals are getting smarter and their code-breaking systems are starting to recognize some of the substitutions: @ for a or at, 3 for e.  Long passwords, though, are still your best protection.

It’s also extremely important to change your password on a regular basis and do not repeat a password on a given website or across accounts.

Make Two Step Verification Part of Your Cybersecurity Routine

An extra coat helps keep you warm. A deadbolt lock on your door, along with your regular lock, makes the door harder to break into. Doesn’t it make sense to up your cybersecurity and give your personal data the same level of protection?

Two Factor Authentication (often abbreviated to 2FA) adds that extra layer of protection to your online presence.  Sites like Google, Twitter, Facebook, Apple, PayPal, and others have been using it for a long time. More and more websites and applications are adding it as an additional way to protect the information that users share with them.

Many of the apps you use frequently might have been asking you if you’d like to activate Two Factor Authentication. Don’t think of it as another annoying thing to enter, but think of the extra protection it adds. Hackers are actively looking at ways to acquire your personal data and everyone is a target.  

Entering your user name and password is one step of verifying your identity. 2FA typically comes in 3 methods:

• Something common that you set such as a password, PIN, zip code or answer to a question
• A code or response sent to a phone, credit card or fob
• A biometric response, such as a fingerprint, retina, face or voice

After entering your user name and password, you’ll be asked for authentication based on the method used by the system you are logging into. The most common is a code texted to your Smartphone. That code must then be entered to gain access. Typically there is a very specific time frame to enter the information. This is important because it also limits the amount of time a cybercriminal would have to gain access.

There are several benefits to using Two Factor Authentication. It improves general security by making it harder for attackers to impersonate you. In doing so it helps reduce fraud and identity theft. This builds a more secure online relationship for businesses and consumers.

Two-factor authentication comes in various shapes and sizes with varying levels of protection.  While 2FA is an added layer of protection it is only as good as the owner’s security. If the owner shares the authentication information, misplaces the physical token, or stores the authentication information in an unsecured manner, then no two-factor authentication technology is going to be able to protect your accounts. 2FA is a great way to improve your security if you follow best practices and stay alert.

Adding extra security to your online life does require an extra step, but the protection it provides is as cozy as that extra winter coat.