Week 12 Blog Post

Week 12 Post

The two options that I chose to research for this week’s blog post are Google+ and LinkedIn. Let’s start with Google+ which is a Social networking site. It was created in 2011 and has become one of the top social networking sites in the world. Features of g+ are Profile, People, Photos, Collections, Communities, Events, Hangouts and Pages.

Profile is the Main account of Google+ and helps get other features like photos, circles, communities, pages and so on. To get a Google+ account you should have a Google account.

People connects you with anyone on Google+, you can search people by name or email. You can use pre-designed circles or create your own.

Photos lets you share pictures and videos with people in your circles. You can organize them by creating albums and edit them online.

Collections is a new way to group your posts by topic. This is an easy way to manage posts based on its subject and nature and helps keep you organized.

Communities is a way to start discussions on any topic and involve other people into it. You can also get regular updates through notifications.

Events allows you to create an event, schedule and share it with everyone. It allows people to sync to your activities.

Hangouts is used to broadcast live feed through Hangouts on air, connect with YouTube or video chat with friends or colleagues through video feed.

Pages is one of the most important tools of Google+, promotes your business. You can create a page according to your business needs. It is treated like a separate Google+ profile altogether, followers get constant updates. I found this to be a very useful platform.

The next platform that I researched is LinkedIn which is a social network for businesses & work professionals. Individuals create profiles and connect with contacts who can endorse their skills. Companies can advertise and post job openings.

There are 7 key features to LinkedIn

1.       Put your work experience on your profile so potential employers can see it.
2.       Allows companies to create profiles to show themselves off, connect with potential partners, hire new employees.
3.       LinkedIn can help you establish and expand your professional network.
4.      LinkedIn helps you show off your skills/credentials. Connections can endorse the skill you list on your profile.
5.       Companies can post job listings on LinkedIn. If you’re running a business yourself, you can post job openings to find new employees.
6.       Get job advice from people in your field. Join groups of people with similar jobs or skills, discuss professional matters that relate to your work.     
7. Get the latest business news.

Week 10 Blog Post 2

Blog Post Week 10 Post 2

To help keep my business blogs organized the categories I would utilize would be any “Special Events” my business may participate in such as RAGNAR Relay Race, Special Olympics. I would also have one for “Existing Customers” I am currently doing business with. “Potential Customers” I’m trying to gain their business.

I think that organization is one of the most critical segments in running a business. By creating categories when utilizing social media will help the business owner keep things straight and help keep them focused.

Pages that I commented on this week.
Devil Dog BBQ Catering, Gus's Really Good Fresh Jerky and Moody Bits. Great job guys!!!

Week 10: Blogging for Business

Week 10 Blog Post 1

After reading this week lecture I learned that utilizing human interest topics in your blog post is an effective way to attract readers to your blog post. This is a great way to keep your readers interested in your blog.

 Human interest plays well on the emotions of the reader. A good example of this is if I were blogging about a business or organization that finds homes for displaced animals and I added a story about pets who were displaced during a hurricane and included pictures or videos of these animals in a pound or facility for animals. This could play on the empathy of the reader and could peak their interest to read more of my blog.

Then I show how my organization was either able to reconnect the animals with their owners or find a new forever home for them.

The reader if they are an animal lover would more than likely find this story interesting and would read further into my blog or try to learn more about my organization on how they could adopt a new pet.

Snap Shot of Scheduled Post

Week 9 Post

Week 9 Post

 The search words on twitter that I used to find potential customers that would coincide with my trucking business were distributors, distribution, retail, retailers and load board. These searches produced a few ideas on potential customers. I had to do a lot of playing around with these words. They gave me some ideas but nothing concrete that I could really use. I did use some of my personal experience of being an over the road truck driver to come up with businesses that I knew that would need additional carriers to move their products such as Walmart, Target, Dollar Tree, Family Dollar, Wilson Creek Winery to name a few.

Although some of these companies have their own driver fleet that handle the bulk of their freight movement they do hire 3^rd party companies to handle loads that have been oversold in a particular market or handled dedicated accounts that they can’t utilize their own driver fleet. My thought is to follow these companies on Twitter to try to connect with them and try to solicit some of their business.

The two list I created were FA18 CSIT 155 1873 and NY Giants more or less just trying to understand how to do it and add members. These lists don’t necessarily have anything to do with my business but I do see that by creating list such as these would be very helpful to keep yourself organized on Twitter by keeping your business and your personal account from overlapping.

  

Week 8 Post 2

Week 8 Blog Post 2

After researching four businesses that are similar to my own that utilize visual media and what I found is that all four utilized visuals on social media. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Instagram. I reviewed the images and in particular some of the videos that they displayed on their sites and I found that they were very effective in how they explained the services that their organizations provide.

The companies I researched were Schneider National, Werner Enterprises, Swift Transportation and JB Hunt. All four of these companies utilize Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, You Tube and LinkedIn. The number of followers varied for each company. The one with the most followers are Swift Transportation with 98,370, followed by JB Hunt with 76,023. Werner Transportation with 52709 followers and Schneider National with 41, 966.

What I found was the effectiveness in which they used visuals such as photos and videos of their drivers, the equipment they utilize such as trucks and trailers and also the behind the scenes folks such as sales associates, maintenance, managers of the drivers who are coordinating the loads behind the scenes.

As an example, Schneider National transports freight across the border to Canada as well as Mexico. On LinkedIn they have videos displayed on their page explaining the process to move the freight from the U.S. into Mexico. One video is in English and the other is in Spanish. I thought that was a very effective tool to not only reach potential customers but explain their process to both English speaking and Spanish speaking customers.

In reviewing the use of these sites by these businesses it appears that they are very effective. They receive a good share of likes and comments on their pages. You Tube and LinkedIn seem to be the most effective for this type of business they can use the visuals of photos and videos as well as testimonials from their driver associates and existing customers that use their services.

Week 8 Blog Post 1

The Visual Networks

The visual networks are an amazing phenomenon in which individuals can utilize social media and interactively link to other users through sites such as You Tube, Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and Snap Chat. These are ideal tools to help business owners connect with potential customers.

The use of pictures, blogs, videos the business owner can utilize these tools to gain followers by getting them interested in their content. Even if the content does not directly relate to the product or services they are trying to sell.

Getting the individual at least interested in the content; once they click or like the page they are then exposed to what the business owner is trying to sell and can explore the page and then make the determination whether they are interested and venture more into the page or not. I think this is a critical tool for any business.

I think that in my business Williams and Sons Trucking where I am providing services that sites like Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter would be the most effective for me to locate customers. Pinterest is a site where people would refer to get ideas on projects and look for services so I think this would be a great place for me to have a business page established.