Studies have shown that too much Facebook can be a bad thing. In fact, there is an op-ed piece in the New York Post where they say that Facebook could be potentially damaging to your mental health. With the average Facebook user spending 50 minutes a day on the site, (or if you are like me, you're are spending more than 12 hours a day on it), and getting bombarded with tons of content, it seems like it might be getting a little too much for some. It might mean taking a break from the social media site all together.

One of the biggest mysteries on the internet is how can I get verified on Instagram? Any non- social media users might think it's silly to get that blue check mark next to your name for anyone that is not a public figure. However, for many influencers on Instagram, it's a necessity in order to get things like sponsorships and brand deals. It's also a big ego boost, you know the "I got the blue check mark, so you need to take me seriously" sort of deal. Yet, up until recently it was a huge secret on how people could get verified on Instagram.

In 2011, Siri was first introduced on the iPhone 4s and the world became fascinated with of the idea of an assistant just for your iPhone. The thought of someone creating appointments, reminding you of that appointment, calling people for you, looking stuff up for you, and booking tickets for the latest concert was once seemed so absurd ten years ago, is now reality. We now have at home "assistant-like" devices that can do all of the above, but in a different convenient way for a household. What does an Amazon Alexa or Google Home have to do with social media marketing? A lot!

Use of social media in 2018 has not only increased for small businesses, but it has grown exponentially in usage. In fact, social media users are expected to hit three billion in 2021. Yes that's right three BILLION, in three years. While there has been controversy over the past year, especially with Facebook, about privacy and manipulation concerns on many social media platforms. There is no doubt, there is a lot of power in these platforms, and with these numbers only growing it's important to know what the usage will be like in future, so you can grow on social media!

I've been wanting to do this post for a while, because I think the comparison is very true. Like online dating, when anyone starts they don't know what they could be getting themselves into. They meet people that are friendly at first and might seem like they could be the perfect match, however upon meeting in person, they find out it's not the case. This happens way too often in business as well; you see a great potential customer or client, you even talk on the phone a little bit and meet them in person, but when it comes to closing the deal, you get ghosted. Or maybe you do close the deal, only to figure out they lied on their profile and wanted to hookup with you.

One of the biggest questions I get asked on a daily basis as a digital marketer is "how do I get people to my website with social media?". It's a great question , it's one I get a lot on discovery calls from clients in all different industries and to be perfectly honest it differs from industry to industry, but the digital space remains the same for all. Over the many changes that the internet experienced over the last 20 odd years, the one thing the has remained the same is people wanting to connect with others. We've seen that through email to chat rooms and message boards all the way to instant messengers and of course social media. Another question I get asked is "how do I do it without being too spammy to people?" I've got five great ways on how you can do that.

Like many other sites back in the early days of the internet, we saw message boards and chat rooms. AOL and Yahoo! had their own versions of topic message boards, like if you wanted to talk about boy bands you were getting the latest dirt from there. No one ever saw this one coming, Reddit is slowly becoming one of the bigger named social media sites out there. It used to be a site known for (and still is in some aspects), it's trolling but these days, Reddit has become one of the bigger social media platforms on the internet! How does this particular platform work and how can you be a part of it? I answer this question and more in this week's blog.

As I've talked about many times before, it's important for you to create your own content on social media, but how can you create amazing quality pictures that can generate the engagement you are looking for? Getting pictures on your social media sites that are on brand, relevant and will get you followers are all the ingredients you need to get the ROI you need for your time on social media. How do do you get there? Most smartphones these days have the same quality as your standard DSLR camera, and with a little help, you can create stunning photographs for your social media sites as well that would be #amazing!

When you are running a business, especially a service based business, one of the last things on your mind is creating new content for your social media pages. You have social media accounts, but you aren't experiencing activity or you do have some activity but it's not the engagement or content you know like or know that you can get. Does this sound familiar? A lot of businesses experience this common social media issue and there's really no organic way to solve but to create engaging content, but how can you create fresh and new content that is not only engaging but can make you go viral? There are plenty of ways you can do that.

Imagine that you just opened up your small boutique in the middle of a busy plaza, or your second restaurant after the first one was so successful, or you just got a few life coaching clients. Your business is thriving, so much so that you got a couple of amazing reviews on your Facebook page. You now have an amazing reputation and business is going well, until all of a get a terrible review. It brings your entire rating down on Facebook (or Google and Yelp), and you worry that people are hesitating to come to your business because of one bad review. This is an incredibly common problem for many business owners who market their business online and unfortunately there isn't a clear cut way to handle a negative review. However, there are plenty of ways you can respond.

Ahhh robots! We are constantly surrounded by artificial intelligence every day, from Siri to Cortana to Alexa. As social media grows into the big conglomerate that we know it will be in a few years, many small businesses are struggling to streamline the process. The truth of the matter is that there are over two billion social media users in the world. That is the size of the two largest countries combined! More people are responding to businesses via social media than any other platform. I think it's safe to say if you struggling to keep up, there are ways to do it! We've talked about how AI can be beneficial to your business, however I want to talk about how AI can impact social media marketing directly.

Are you obsessed with video? If you are not using video to brand yourself on social media, you need to start! YouTube, Facebook, SnapChat and Instagram have all come up with video options that could lead to very lucrative opportunities for your business. In 2019, 80% of all internet content will be video, and as a small business that is trying to build your brand, that's an important statistic to know. This isn't getting on a camera, posting a video to Instagram and hoping you will go viral. It's creating content that you know will create the buzz you need, and the content that people are searching for. Instagram has created a solution to this problem; IGTV. It's spontaneous video combined with planned engagement strategy will get your small business to the next level.

You know what they say, becoming a successful brand is easy, maintaining your status and business model is hard. This is especially true on social media because 96% of the people that discuss brands online do not follow those brands’ owned profiles. In 2018, if you are not on social media, your brand does not exist. While some may consider this faulty logic because they get their business via referral, but, the truth of the matter is that their audience is already on social media. With over 2.6 billion users, you can easily find ten people you know that is one at least one social media platform. If you are one of those brands that does not know what to do on social media, here are five things you shouldn't be doing.

We are almost at the end of the 2010's and it's been a wild ride technology wise since the start of the decade. We've got tablets, smartphones and messaging systems in social media sites that are more effective than email ever would. The numbers show that more and more people use social media devices to find brand new products, and many of those social media sites will direct message those businesses on social media rather than finding them on a website and getting their email address. As I have explained in my post about emails going extinct, the way we communicate with our teams are drastically changing.

We are on our phone daily as a society. Whether we are talking to a family member, texting our friends, or taking a picture of that salted caramel donut that you had for National Donut Day yesterday and posting it on Instagram. As a society, we crave the attention and we crave the approval we seek from others. This is why social media is so popular, especially on mobile devices. If you are a business that deals with e-commerce then according to the famous Mary Meeker Social Media Trends List, you would've seen a drastic increase in sales over the years if you were marketing on social media.

As you probably already know, if you want to have a great online presence, then getting fresh new content on all platforms across the net is key. It's not just a good social media practice, it's great internet practices for your small business. Original and raw content that gets people excited about your business is the perfect way to bring brand new customers that convert! One of the biggest questions I get asked as a digital marketer is "how do I create new and raw content that doesn't bore people?" and the best way to do it is to use what you already have!

It's not just the biggest social media site but it's also one of the biggest sites on the internet. Facebook proudly announced a year ago that they have reached over two billion users, yes that's right, billion with a b, on their platform. That is almost as big as the population of China and India combined! However due to the recent data crisis Facebook went through in Q1, they've deleted 548 million accounts in Q1 of 2018, which is down from 694 million in Q4 of 2017. Either way, it's still a lot of fake accounts being made and a lot to delete.

When a person starts their business, it's usually out of necessity, for me it was me being tired of the corporate scene (okay well I still am in the corporate scene but it is not as bad) and I was done with people not listening to my ideas. It's Mother's Day, and I've been wanting to do a blog post about my mom for a while now. A lot of people find inspiration for their businesses within their kids, significant others, siblings, or even within themselves. Me? I found my inspiration within myself, and my mom. I was in a rough situation and I wondered what my mother would've told me. I know she would've said "Supriya, if you are unhappy then find happiness elsewhere". So I did.

If you are familiar with AMAs and nosleep, then you might know a thing or two about Reddit. Since it's debut in 2005, Reddit has grown to be one of the most frequented sites on the web and it also gained a reputation for being one of the snarkiest. With the amount of digital foot traffic that this site has received over the years, Reddit has become one of the top go to's for virality, and to build any business owner's credibility. The question of the hour is why has Reddit become the new Twitter? The answer lies in the numbers.

Selfies, models, celebrities, and pictures of food is what most people think of when they think of Instagram. Beyond the #notfilters and the avocado roses is a useful tool that can build brands on one of the most frequented sites on the internet. Instagram has 800 million users and about 500 million are daily active users. In addition, most of the users are between the ages 13-30, and even more important 73% bought a product or service they saw on Instagram. Creating content on Instagram isn't just about applying filters, hashtags and expecting likes. It's all about targeting your audience, creating a demographic, and cleverly putting your product or service in the forefront without being in your followers face.