If you have a facebook page for your business and you haven't already, then you need to add yourself as the page owner of your page.
Here's the why:
So people can contact you.
As you may have noticed when you visit any facebook page, there is no function to contact the administrator/s.
You may really enjoy what they're doing, or would like to get in contact with them to find out more information or maybe you have an offer that you wouldn't necessarily post on the wall (no, not that kind of offer!).
Showing posts with label Social Media Muscle. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Social Media Muscle. Show all posts
5 Facebook Tricks That Will Make Your Fitness Business Look Awesome!
If you're not taking advantage of all the little tricks that facebook has to offer your fitness business, then it's high time you pulled your low cut socks up and take some action before your competitors beat you to it!
Here's a quick 5 tips that can make you go from looking like a facebook hack to a facebook mack in no time!
Check out these 5 facebook tips!
Here's a quick 5 tips that can make you go from looking like a facebook hack to a facebook mack in no time!
Check out these 5 facebook tips!
How To Make A Twitter Profile That Converts Leads Into Clients
Did you know that just by having a well designed and interactive Twitter profile you could potentially double your business and open the door to international recognition within your niche?
Crazy huh; but ask anyone that has spent some time on Twitter and they'll all tell you the same thing...IT ROCKS AND IT WORKS!
Here are some Twitter statistics that are the most current that I could find. Mind you they'll be obsolete in no time at all, so enjoy them while they're hot!
- 67% Of Twitter users are more likely to buy brands that they follow
- Businesses that use Twitter average 2x more leads per month than businesses that don't
- Twitter plays an active role in purchasing decisions
- Twitter users have higher incomes than the average population
- There are 75 million active Twitter users worldwide
Facebook - Sales Tool Or Retention Builder?
Facebook - Sales Tool Or Retention Builder?
Facebook is often pitched as a way to gain new business, and that’s true. You can get your message and your offers out to a much broader audience than your own database because your friends have friends and they can pass your information along.
How To TAG Your YouTube Videos For Internet Domination
Just like Google uses keywords to categorize your website or blog for search engine results, YouTube uses keywords and tags to categorize and help users find your videos.
People search online for some obscure things in some obscure ways. If you've ever looked at your site or blogs analytics, you might be surprised by some of the search terms people have used to find your resource and those results inevitably come down to your choice of keywords.
What Are Keywords?
Keywords can be single term (e.g fitness) or keyword phrases (e.g personal training studio) which are a combination of words. Keywords tell search engines such as Google, what your site is about and the same can be said about your YouTube account.
People search online for some obscure things in some obscure ways. If you've ever looked at your site or blogs analytics, you might be surprised by some of the search terms people have used to find your resource and those results inevitably come down to your choice of keywords.
What Are Keywords?
Keywords can be single term (e.g fitness) or keyword phrases (e.g personal training studio) which are a combination of words. Keywords tell search engines such as Google, what your site is about and the same can be said about your YouTube account.
How To Make A Facebook Page
Facebook pages are BIG business! As the power of social media steam rolls it's way into the marketing budgets of the world's largest corporations, it should for you as well.
I was speaking with a brand manager today from of a totally unrelated industry and asked him what the one thing that he's learnt in all his years of marketing and he said with a quip "word of mouth is the most powerful motivator of consumer purchases".
I'm sure you all know about the power of word of mouth; it's basically a referral from a satisfied customer, but the problem remains of how many people will your satisfied customer actually sing your praises to...2 maybe 3 people at best?
Facebook is the most powerful 'word of mouth' device imaginable.
Every time one of your clients writes something on your wall like "awesome workout, you are the best personal trainer in the world!" all of your friends see that. All of a sudden, that one referral is being read by potentially hundreds if not thousands of people.
I was speaking with a brand manager today from of a totally unrelated industry and asked him what the one thing that he's learnt in all his years of marketing and he said with a quip "word of mouth is the most powerful motivator of consumer purchases".
I'm sure you all know about the power of word of mouth; it's basically a referral from a satisfied customer, but the problem remains of how many people will your satisfied customer actually sing your praises to...2 maybe 3 people at best?
Facebook is the most powerful 'word of mouth' device imaginable.
Every time one of your clients writes something on your wall like "awesome workout, you are the best personal trainer in the world!" all of your friends see that. All of a sudden, that one referral is being read by potentially hundreds if not thousands of people.
What Does Your Website Say About Your Fitness Business: Reader Requests.
Last week I posted an article called What Does Your Website Say About Your Fitness Business, where I randomly searched out several personal trainer's websites and gave my honest critique on them based on several factors that in my experience, consider important.
At the end of that post and also on Facebook, I offered readers the opportunity to submit their sites for me to look over and the below reviews are those sites.
At the end of that post and also on Facebook, I offered readers the opportunity to submit their sites for me to look over and the below reviews are those sites.
Why You NEED A Facebook Landing Page And How To Get One
First impressions are everything; in life, in business and in social media. The saying that "you never get a second chance to make a first impression" suggests that you have about 3 seconds to sell yourself, online however, I'd say that it's more like .3 of a second.
I don't know about you; but I've gone to visit websites and changed my mind because it loaded too slow, or I didn't like the colors or the layout made it difficult to navigate...and I just went somewhere else.
As more and more personal trainers come online with blogs and websites, not to mention with twitter, YouTube and facebook pages; consumers and prospects are in the drivers seat, so you need to lock them down instantly!
So that's why today I'm going to show you why you need a facebook landing page and also how to create one to make sure that your hard earned visitors 'Like' your page before they get a chance to think about it and 'Like' your competition instead.
Let's take a look at the My Business Is Fitness facebook page. The first image is just a screenshot of my Wall.
The wall is where most people send prospects. This is where information is shared and discussions develop and that's fantastic, but to a first time visitor it's like being dropped out of a helicopter into a heavy metal mosh pit. They don't know who the band is and all the see is arms and legs flying everywhere...and instinctively, they want to leave and this is bad.
So that's why I created a landing page. My landing page is very simple, it's branded in alluring MBIF black and it gives a very subtle message, "LIKE' THIS PAGE!"
This is actually a new landing page that I created last night in my bid to re brand all of my social media channels more directly.
So based on that quick demonstration, do you see how arriving at a landing page gives a clearer indication of what someone is about to get into? I'm not trying to waste anyones time with my facebook page. I hope that at a glance it says "If you're a personal trainer that is serious about your career...fcuking click 'Like'!".
Oh and it's not just me; here are just a few that I thought I'd share:
Pop Culture Brands Like Diet Coke Have One.
Iconic Brands Like Levi's Have One:
Even Shrek Has One!
As a bare minimum; your landing page should:
My landing page is an image that I created which is hosted through a service called Pagemodo.
Pagemodo is a fantastic service and you can spend time designing your own graphic using their relatively easy to navigate software. However, the fastest, most simple option (and what I did) is to upload a pre-designed branded jpeg image into their free hosting service and call it a day.
Have you begun to move your business and clients away from your personal facebook profile to a business page? How much business is facebook giving you? Do you think that facebook is a passing fad?
If you haven't already; head over to the My Business Is Fitness facebook page here and if you enjoyed this article, please share it on facebook and twitter and have a great day!
Ben
I don't know about you; but I've gone to visit websites and changed my mind because it loaded too slow, or I didn't like the colors or the layout made it difficult to navigate...and I just went somewhere else.
As more and more personal trainers come online with blogs and websites, not to mention with twitter, YouTube and facebook pages; consumers and prospects are in the drivers seat, so you need to lock them down instantly!
So that's why today I'm going to show you why you need a facebook landing page and also how to create one to make sure that your hard earned visitors 'Like' your page before they get a chance to think about it and 'Like' your competition instead.
Let's take a look at the My Business Is Fitness facebook page. The first image is just a screenshot of my Wall.
The wall is where most people send prospects. This is where information is shared and discussions develop and that's fantastic, but to a first time visitor it's like being dropped out of a helicopter into a heavy metal mosh pit. They don't know who the band is and all the see is arms and legs flying everywhere...and instinctively, they want to leave and this is bad.
So that's why I created a landing page. My landing page is very simple, it's branded in alluring MBIF black and it gives a very subtle message, "LIKE' THIS PAGE!"
This is actually a new landing page that I created last night in my bid to re brand all of my social media channels more directly.
So based on that quick demonstration, do you see how arriving at a landing page gives a clearer indication of what someone is about to get into? I'm not trying to waste anyones time with my facebook page. I hope that at a glance it says "If you're a personal trainer that is serious about your career...fcuking click 'Like'!".
Oh and it's not just me; here are just a few that I thought I'd share:
Pop Culture Brands Like Diet Coke Have One.
Iconic Brands Like Levi's Have One:
Even Shrek Has One!
As a bare minimum; your landing page should:
- Create a call to action. i.e. To Like the page
- Introduce your brand
- Distinguish who you are at a glance
- Capture the visitors attention
- Arouse curiosity
My landing page is an image that I created which is hosted through a service called Pagemodo.
Pagemodo is a fantastic service and you can spend time designing your own graphic using their relatively easy to navigate software. However, the fastest, most simple option (and what I did) is to upload a pre-designed branded jpeg image into their free hosting service and call it a day.
Depending on your creative streak, time availability and access to design software; I make branded, custom facebook landing pages (amongst other things) for all my clients for only $50.00. Just send me an email at ben.londons@gmail.com and we can discuss your branding solutions further.
Have you begun to move your business and clients away from your personal facebook profile to a business page? How much business is facebook giving you? Do you think that facebook is a passing fad?
If you haven't already; head over to the My Business Is Fitness facebook page here and if you enjoyed this article, please share it on facebook and twitter and have a great day!
Ben
How To Make A Facebook Ad
Facebook advertising is 'pretty good'...if you have an awesome offer. I've had some promotions that were resounding successes; but 10 times more of them flopped...but that's businesses.
I'm putting this post together as a step by step introduction to facebook advertising mainly for those of you who have thought about it, but never tried, but also for those of you who have run some promotions on facebook, there might be some ideas for you as well.
Lets begin at the beginning:
Anyone with a facebook account can create facebook ads. However, you can not promote personal facebook profiles only facebook pages. So if you're still running your business from a personal account, you should look to create a 'page'...but that's another post.
To Begin:
Click "Promote With An Ad" on the upper right hand side of your page. This will take you to the facebook advertising page.
Starting at the top; from here you can choose to advertise your facebook page (when you click on the arrow it will show you all of the pages you are an admin of) and it will also give you the option to select an 'external URL', maybe your website or blog.
The advertising procedure is the same whether you choose a facebook page or an external link, the choice is yours.
If you choose 'external URL' it will ask you where you want facebook to send your audience by entering your URL.
Once you've made your decision, make sure that 'facebook ads' is selected, not 'sponsored stories'. Sponsored stories is a new feature that facebook have recently added and we're not worrying about them today.
Destination Tab:
If you chose to advertise your facebook page then you will be asked where you want facebook to send people when they click your ad. Never send people to your 'wall', create a 'welcome' page or an 'opt in' page, depending on your offer and send them there.
Title:
If it's your page, it will be automatically generated, if it's an external URL, then simply enter the name of your site.
Body:
The body is the text for your ad. You have 135 characters to dazzle the pants of people and get them clicking, so get straight to the point! Use some of the 25 'power words' I gave you last week and create some energy!
25 Powerful Words That Guarantee Increased Sales
Image:
You can put almost any image you like in there (copyright rules apply). I've tried a few different styles, by having pictures of people by themselves, couples, people doing stuff...but the most successful campaigns that I've run have all been with my logo.
Next comes the fun stuff - Targeting.
First thing you do is select your country or countries if you want to run a huge campaign, but for the sake of this exercise let's just pick one.
You can then choose to have your ad show up all around the country, or by state or even city. For a personal training program, lets just go by city, so just begin typing it in and then select the best one from what facebook provides.
Demographics:
Next, select the age range that you want your ad to appear in front of by considering your target market. You should already have a pretty good idea who you want to see your ad and you can choose an exact age, but put some leeway either side. If you're target market is 40 year old people, perhaps select 37-43.
Then of course you can choose male or female or 'all'.
Likes And Interests:
This is the part that can make or break your promotion. Now that you know where and who your target market is, it's time to really narrow them down.
Facebook gets the the information for this section form what people have in there profile and their 'Likes'. For example, if you 'Like' the TV show 'The Biggest Loser', facebook knows this and will use it against you...so to speak.
If you're targeting 40 year old over weight women, you have to think like an over weight 40 year old woman. What do they like, besides iced coffees and banana bread?
For me, I'd be inclined to think that a 40 year old woman that is likely to want to hire a personal trainer, is probably already working out to some capacity or "likes' some kind of health and fitness magazine.
I was just fooling around with the ad I'm creating as we're going along and put in 'Oxygen Magazine', 'Gym', 'Working out', 'personal training' and narrowed down my audience considerably.
Facebook gives you a running tally on the side what your potential audience will be for your ad based on the information you're giving them and in this situation...less is more.
You want to know that every one of the people that you've narrowed your ad down to is a potential client. Don't skimp on this section, this is what defines a successful facebook advertising campaign from a flop.
Connections on Facebook:
If you're advertising a 'Page', just tick the box that says "Only people who are NOT fans of ...."
Advanced Demographics:
Here you can target people by their birthday, sexual preference, language they speak and even their relationship status.
Education And Work:
You could assume that the people who can afford your services are college grads if you want to and select those or you can go by where they work. You might target a large bank for example or department store...it' up to you, but remember that these people will have had of put that information into facebook and not too many people ad their place of employment.
Campaigns, Pricing and Scheduling:
Name your campaign: Call it whatever you like as long as if your doing several campaigns at the same time you know which is which.
Budget:
Now we get to the nitty gritty. I've run campaigns on as little as $5 a day to test my advertising material. This is completely up to you and your accountant, but I would run a small test trial first to tweak your ad before you go throwing all of your marketing budget into Zuckerberg's pockets.
Schedule Your Campaign.
Run it when people are awake, or at work, or more likely to click, or more importantly, click and BUY. Also by time...run your first promotion for 48 hours. Set the date and time on the little calender and double check it. If you screw it up and your ad runs for 48 days, facebook won't say anything until they debit your credit card and you're broke!
Pricing:
CPM Or CPC...That is the question:
CPM is Cost Per Thousand Impressions
CPC is Cost Per Click
CPM might sound like the way to go, but trust me, facebook can pound out some CPM! I once ran an ad that I'd narrowed down to 2000 people and I thought, "I could make a killing on CPM with this one"...Nope! Facebook managed to destroy my trial daily budget of $5 in about 3 hours...that was about 17 thousand page views in 3 hours to 2000 people and not one sale! Astounding.
CPC means you only pay when people click your ad. CPC will appear to be more expensive, but 9 times out of 10, a click is someone who is interested and your landing page is now in play. Facebook works hard to get your ad clicked on, so it will still get a lot of impressions. If it's not getting clicks though, it will lose favor and or the price will go up. This simply means your ads no good, time to rework.
Facebook will calculate how much this is going to cost you, either CPM or CPC. Again, don't be fooled by the apparent cheaper alternative to CPM; trial your ad with both for at least 48 hours each and monitor the response. The analytics that facebook provides you are very thorough and you can easily see which is giving you the better ROI (Return On Investment).
Go with the bids that facebook suggest. You can bid higher if you're confident that your landing page will convert the prospects; if you bid lower, there is less chance that your ad will be displayed as you'll be outbid by competitors.
This facebook page has some great ideas: Facebook Ads
Have you ever run facebook ads? Do you have an incredible success or disastrous story to share? Any more hints and tips? Love to read your comments below and as always, please whack the icons at the top to share on facebook and twitter!
PS. In case you're wondering, the word facebook appears 31 times in this article...too much?
Ben
Additional Reading:
How To Make A Facebook Page
How To Add A Facebook Like Button To Your Blogger Blog
102 Fitness And Personal Training Blog Post Ideas
I'm putting this post together as a step by step introduction to facebook advertising mainly for those of you who have thought about it, but never tried, but also for those of you who have run some promotions on facebook, there might be some ideas for you as well.
Lets begin at the beginning:
Anyone with a facebook account can create facebook ads. However, you can not promote personal facebook profiles only facebook pages. So if you're still running your business from a personal account, you should look to create a 'page'...but that's another post.
To Begin:
Click "Promote With An Ad" on the upper right hand side of your page. This will take you to the facebook advertising page.
Starting at the top; from here you can choose to advertise your facebook page (when you click on the arrow it will show you all of the pages you are an admin of) and it will also give you the option to select an 'external URL', maybe your website or blog.
The advertising procedure is the same whether you choose a facebook page or an external link, the choice is yours.
If you choose 'external URL' it will ask you where you want facebook to send your audience by entering your URL.
Once you've made your decision, make sure that 'facebook ads' is selected, not 'sponsored stories'. Sponsored stories is a new feature that facebook have recently added and we're not worrying about them today.
Destination Tab:
If you chose to advertise your facebook page then you will be asked where you want facebook to send people when they click your ad. Never send people to your 'wall', create a 'welcome' page or an 'opt in' page, depending on your offer and send them there.
Title:
If it's your page, it will be automatically generated, if it's an external URL, then simply enter the name of your site.
Body:
The body is the text for your ad. You have 135 characters to dazzle the pants of people and get them clicking, so get straight to the point! Use some of the 25 'power words' I gave you last week and create some energy!
25 Powerful Words That Guarantee Increased Sales
Image:
You can put almost any image you like in there (copyright rules apply). I've tried a few different styles, by having pictures of people by themselves, couples, people doing stuff...but the most successful campaigns that I've run have all been with my logo.
Next comes the fun stuff - Targeting.
First thing you do is select your country or countries if you want to run a huge campaign, but for the sake of this exercise let's just pick one.
You can then choose to have your ad show up all around the country, or by state or even city. For a personal training program, lets just go by city, so just begin typing it in and then select the best one from what facebook provides.
Demographics:
Next, select the age range that you want your ad to appear in front of by considering your target market. You should already have a pretty good idea who you want to see your ad and you can choose an exact age, but put some leeway either side. If you're target market is 40 year old people, perhaps select 37-43.
Then of course you can choose male or female or 'all'.
Likes And Interests:
This is the part that can make or break your promotion. Now that you know where and who your target market is, it's time to really narrow them down.
Facebook gets the the information for this section form what people have in there profile and their 'Likes'. For example, if you 'Like' the TV show 'The Biggest Loser', facebook knows this and will use it against you...so to speak.
If you're targeting 40 year old over weight women, you have to think like an over weight 40 year old woman. What do they like, besides iced coffees and banana bread?
For me, I'd be inclined to think that a 40 year old woman that is likely to want to hire a personal trainer, is probably already working out to some capacity or "likes' some kind of health and fitness magazine.
I was just fooling around with the ad I'm creating as we're going along and put in 'Oxygen Magazine', 'Gym', 'Working out', 'personal training' and narrowed down my audience considerably.
Facebook gives you a running tally on the side what your potential audience will be for your ad based on the information you're giving them and in this situation...less is more.
You want to know that every one of the people that you've narrowed your ad down to is a potential client. Don't skimp on this section, this is what defines a successful facebook advertising campaign from a flop.
Connections on Facebook:
If you're advertising a 'Page', just tick the box that says "Only people who are NOT fans of ...."
Advanced Demographics:
Here you can target people by their birthday, sexual preference, language they speak and even their relationship status.
Education And Work:
You could assume that the people who can afford your services are college grads if you want to and select those or you can go by where they work. You might target a large bank for example or department store...it' up to you, but remember that these people will have had of put that information into facebook and not too many people ad their place of employment.
Campaigns, Pricing and Scheduling:
Name your campaign: Call it whatever you like as long as if your doing several campaigns at the same time you know which is which.
Budget:
Now we get to the nitty gritty. I've run campaigns on as little as $5 a day to test my advertising material. This is completely up to you and your accountant, but I would run a small test trial first to tweak your ad before you go throwing all of your marketing budget into Zuckerberg's pockets.
Schedule Your Campaign.
Run it when people are awake, or at work, or more likely to click, or more importantly, click and BUY. Also by time...run your first promotion for 48 hours. Set the date and time on the little calender and double check it. If you screw it up and your ad runs for 48 days, facebook won't say anything until they debit your credit card and you're broke!
Pricing:
CPM Or CPC...That is the question:
CPM is Cost Per Thousand Impressions
CPC is Cost Per Click
CPM might sound like the way to go, but trust me, facebook can pound out some CPM! I once ran an ad that I'd narrowed down to 2000 people and I thought, "I could make a killing on CPM with this one"...Nope! Facebook managed to destroy my trial daily budget of $5 in about 3 hours...that was about 17 thousand page views in 3 hours to 2000 people and not one sale! Astounding.
CPC means you only pay when people click your ad. CPC will appear to be more expensive, but 9 times out of 10, a click is someone who is interested and your landing page is now in play. Facebook works hard to get your ad clicked on, so it will still get a lot of impressions. If it's not getting clicks though, it will lose favor and or the price will go up. This simply means your ads no good, time to rework.
Facebook will calculate how much this is going to cost you, either CPM or CPC. Again, don't be fooled by the apparent cheaper alternative to CPM; trial your ad with both for at least 48 hours each and monitor the response. The analytics that facebook provides you are very thorough and you can easily see which is giving you the better ROI (Return On Investment).
Go with the bids that facebook suggest. You can bid higher if you're confident that your landing page will convert the prospects; if you bid lower, there is less chance that your ad will be displayed as you'll be outbid by competitors.
This facebook page has some great ideas: Facebook Ads
Have you ever run facebook ads? Do you have an incredible success or disastrous story to share? Any more hints and tips? Love to read your comments below and as always, please whack the icons at the top to share on facebook and twitter!
PS. In case you're wondering, the word facebook appears 31 times in this article...too much?
Ben
Additional Reading:
How To Make A Facebook Page
How To Add A Facebook Like Button To Your Blogger Blog
102 Fitness And Personal Training Blog Post Ideas
The 3 C's Of Successful Social Media Channels
Clarity, Commitment, Consistency.
It occurred to me that if we can all adhere to these three principles as a bare minimum, then the chances of building a successful online fitness empire will improve significantly, probably more than significantly...uber significantly if you will!
As fitness professionals and personal trainers, we use these same principles everyday with ourselves and with our clients when we're setting physical goals.
The clarity of what we want to achieve, be it weight loss or muscle gain etc. The commitment to make the decision to change and start living a healthier lifestyle and of course consistently working out, eating right and making healthful decisions.
But for today, let's apply these rules to your social media accounts:
Clarity:
Clarity can relate to many different things; in the context of social media marketing, what I'm referring to is:
- Knowing who your audience is. Use the same principles to discover and market to your readership as you would your target market in the gym.
- Know the objective of your blog, facebook and twitter accounts. What outcome do you want for all of your work?
- Staying on topic. You can use many variables, but essentially, most of your content should relate back to your original agenda; i.e. health and fitness.
Commitment:
Once you've decided on all of the above, make the commitment to stick to your blog for the long haul and set measurable goals.
Measurable goals can be:
- Traffic to your blog or site
- Subscriber numbers
- How many comments you're articles are getting
- Number of fans or followers
Consistency:
Now you know who your people are and you've decided you're committed to your blog, it's time to make consistent efforts to not only please your readers, but increase your audience.
This could be by:
- How many posts you're going to write per week
- How many other blogs you'll comment on
- How much value you will give to your fans and followers on your social media channels
What do you guys think...Have I missed a C, does it seem a bit overwhelming?
Would love to read your comments below and please share this post on twitter and facebook by clicking the links at the top of the article!
Be Awesome!
Ben
PS. The podcast interview was for a new product coming soon by Mr. PT Business In A Box Rick Watson; I'll keep you updated on that as well!
Additional Reading
102 Personal Training Blog Post Ideas
How To Set Social Media Goals
Personal Training Blog Content Ideas
SEO For Personal Training And Fitness Blogs
I Hacked Your Facebook Account; Now Watch What I do!
As fitness businesses move their operations online and begin to rely on social media channels like facebook and twitter to market and promote; it's more important than ever to make sure your accounts are safe and secure from hackers, people you choose to no longer associate with and even your competition.
Ask yourself these three questions:
1. Do you use the same passwords for every online account you have?
2. Do you use things like your postcode or phone numbers as passwords?
3. Are your 'secret questions' easily sourced by industrious hackers like 'mothers maiden name'?
If you answered yes to any of these, I'm sorry, but your accounts are sitting ducks.
Imagine if someone hacked into your facebook account and began posting negative or obscene content to your friends, clients and business associates impersonating you.
Imagine what it could do for your reputation and the amount of damage control that you would have to employ. And here's the kicker; even after you manage to salvage your relationships if such a thing did happen, now you appear to be lazy in how you protect information. Not a good thought is it?
Unfortunately, it's impossible to make your accounts 100% hacker proof, but there are some measures you should take to make it as hard as hell for someone if they do decide to pick on you.
Here's a list of easy things you can do to protect your online accounts:
Change your passwords regularly:
Modify your passwords regularly. One way to do this and not forget them is to look around your space. You might have an inspirational quote pinned to your cork board in front of your desk and you could work your way through the sentence.
You could also use things like serial codes from gadgets you own like ipods or your cell phone.
Use obscure words and phrases for secret questions:
If you do go with things like 'mothers maiden name' as a secure question, add something like 'awesome' after it. So instead of mothers maiden name being 'Smith' you could make it 'smithawesome' or something (I'd go with 'smithboring' myself, but that's me).
Revoke access to applications that you're no longer using:
Maybe you took part in some silly questionnaire like which Sex In The City character you're most like. The application provider holds on to your details long after you found out that you're not the one you thought and has access to all of your information as well as your friends.
Go through and remove any that no longer apply to you or that you no longer use.
Check the URL of the page before you enter your details:
This is most important if you ever use public computers or search for the site prior to clicking. Have a quick glance at the URL to double check that you're not logging into a mirror site.
Take a look through your privacy settings:
Facebook has been under scrutiny over the years for different security issues and from time to time settings seem to miraculously 'reset'. Have a fresh look and make sure things are as they should be.
Don't become friends with everyone who asks:
Have a quick look at their profile before you accept. Do you have mutual friends you like, or are they friends with someone you don't want to have access to your information?
As amazing as social media can be to build your business, it can just as easily destroy it if your accounts fall into the wrong greasy fingers.
I had my twitter account hacked and thankfully no messages went out but it was stressful (just ask @ptbusiness Rick Watson! Haha)
Take your online security seriously and social media will take your personal training and fitness business where ever you want it to go.
What do you think?
Have you ever had your social media accounts hacked? Are you taking measures to make sure it doesn't happen?
And as always; if you enjoyed this post please share it on facebook and twitter by clicking on the buttons at the top of the page!
Now go check your settings and have a great day!
Ben
Additional Reading:
Why You Need Twitter And How To Get Hundreds Of Followers!
102 Personal Training And Fitness Blog Post Ideas
How To Set Social Media Goals
Facebook Deals Will Change The Way You Market Your Fitness Business
Ask yourself these three questions:
1. Do you use the same passwords for every online account you have?
2. Do you use things like your postcode or phone numbers as passwords?
3. Are your 'secret questions' easily sourced by industrious hackers like 'mothers maiden name'?
If you answered yes to any of these, I'm sorry, but your accounts are sitting ducks.
Imagine if someone hacked into your facebook account and began posting negative or obscene content to your friends, clients and business associates impersonating you.
Imagine what it could do for your reputation and the amount of damage control that you would have to employ. And here's the kicker; even after you manage to salvage your relationships if such a thing did happen, now you appear to be lazy in how you protect information. Not a good thought is it?
Unfortunately, it's impossible to make your accounts 100% hacker proof, but there are some measures you should take to make it as hard as hell for someone if they do decide to pick on you.
Here's a list of easy things you can do to protect your online accounts:
Change your passwords regularly:
Modify your passwords regularly. One way to do this and not forget them is to look around your space. You might have an inspirational quote pinned to your cork board in front of your desk and you could work your way through the sentence.
You could also use things like serial codes from gadgets you own like ipods or your cell phone.
Use obscure words and phrases for secret questions:
If you do go with things like 'mothers maiden name' as a secure question, add something like 'awesome' after it. So instead of mothers maiden name being 'Smith' you could make it 'smithawesome' or something (I'd go with 'smithboring' myself, but that's me).
Revoke access to applications that you're no longer using:
Maybe you took part in some silly questionnaire like which Sex In The City character you're most like. The application provider holds on to your details long after you found out that you're not the one you thought and has access to all of your information as well as your friends.
Go through and remove any that no longer apply to you or that you no longer use.
Check the URL of the page before you enter your details:
This is most important if you ever use public computers or search for the site prior to clicking. Have a quick glance at the URL to double check that you're not logging into a mirror site.
Take a look through your privacy settings:
Facebook has been under scrutiny over the years for different security issues and from time to time settings seem to miraculously 'reset'. Have a fresh look and make sure things are as they should be.
Don't become friends with everyone who asks:
Have a quick look at their profile before you accept. Do you have mutual friends you like, or are they friends with someone you don't want to have access to your information?
As amazing as social media can be to build your business, it can just as easily destroy it if your accounts fall into the wrong greasy fingers.
I had my twitter account hacked and thankfully no messages went out but it was stressful (just ask @ptbusiness Rick Watson! Haha)
Take your online security seriously and social media will take your personal training and fitness business where ever you want it to go.
What do you think?
Have you ever had your social media accounts hacked? Are you taking measures to make sure it doesn't happen?
And as always; if you enjoyed this post please share it on facebook and twitter by clicking on the buttons at the top of the page!
Now go check your settings and have a great day!
Ben
Additional Reading:
Why You Need Twitter And How To Get Hundreds Of Followers!
102 Personal Training And Fitness Blog Post Ideas
How To Set Social Media Goals
Facebook Deals Will Change The Way You Market Your Fitness Business
How To Set Social Media Goals And Set Your Shorts On Fire
In yesterdays post about Christmas promotion ideas, I suggested running a themed set of posts and updates over the next few weeks on a certain topic i.e Christmas, with the goal of sparking interest from your readers and essentially building the foundation for your next marketing campaign.
Today I want to discuss how to make those posts, tweets, updates etc. measurable goals that you can use this year and next to fine tune and add to your fire of consistency.
The Fire Of Consistency
Being consistent with social media is hard work. Consistent isn't exciting or brash or extreme, but it is the backbone of social media and one of the most important aspects to any successful account; along with quality content and active marketing.
The fight is won or lost far away from witnesses - behind the lines, in the gym, and out there on the road, long before I dance under those lights. - Muhammad Ali
If consistency is good enough for Muhammad Ali it's definitely good enough for you and I.
My business is fitness has become quite successful in a relatively short period of time and for the first few months, my goal was to simply fill it with content (I wanted 100 posts before I took it to market) and see what happened. In hindsight, that isn't much of a strategy and if one of my clients told me that was their strategy, I'd grab them by the shorts and tell them to set some targets!
So last month I sat down with my trusty magic marker and sheet of cardboard and wrote down some numbers and then transferred that info to a spreadsheet (see below).
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| (Click To Enlarge)This Chart Is Available To Download as a PDF Under The 'Downloads' Tab |
Now that I had these numbers down, I went over my analytics and realised what kind of daily figures I was achieving and what I would need to achieve daily/weekly to hit them.
Right away, I felt like I had a purpose. Every post, link and piece of marketing would have to be 'strategised'. If it was coming close to the end of the day, I'd have to send out another tweet or update to try and drive some traffic onto the blog or my other accounts to make sure I met my daily targets.
All of a sudden; consistency had become exciting!
Now that I had these targets in place, I would consider my posts, tweets and updates in a different way.
For a personal trainer or fitness professional, you may now look at a certain facebook update and notice how many people like it or commented. If no one jumped on board, then perhaps try a different angle. At the same time, if your subscribers or Likes list is building off the back of it, then perhaps it was a good update, it's just that people didn't feel like chatting.
Look Outside The Box
To date; the most popular post on my business is fitness is an interview I had with personal trainer Ellena Tsatsos. It's had the most page views of any other article, was liked around Facebook and people responded well on Twitter, yet it doesn't have one comment. However, my subscriber numbers spiked that day. So my conclusion is that comments are not a true indicator of growth or article popularity.
Now that I have these goals in place, I feel like my accounts have more direction. I can sit down at the end of the day and see exactly what's going on and what worked and didn't work and if I need to do some last minute marketing.
I hope you enjoyed this post. Feel free to share it on Facebook and Twitter and as always, would love to hear your opinion in the comments section below.
Ben
Related Articles:
Why You Need Twitter And How To Get Hundreds Of Targeted Followers
How To SEO Your Personal Training Business Blog And Website
How To SEO Your Fitness YouTube Account
How To SEO Your Personal Trainer YouTube Videos
I read a lot of personal trainer blogs and websites and I've found hundreds with fantastic resources of instructional exercise training videos.
Videos are a great tool for demonstrating exercise techniques because it is much easier to show someone how to perform an exercise than it is to write it.
Not only that, YouTube is fast becoming the worlds second largest search engine which is why it's so important that you take advantage of this opportunity to do it properly and get your fitness business the exposure it deserves.
The easiest way to put videos on your blog or site is by first uploading them to YouTube and then embedding them onto your site by simply copy/pasting an html code that YouTube provides you with.
However, the YouTube upload page has several features about it that you should understand and take advantage of, before you hit that submit button.
The Title: The title of your YouTube video should most accurately describe what your video is about. If your video is teaching someone to squat than have the title "Learn How To Correctly Perform A Barbell Squat".
The Description: The first thing people should see in your video description is a link to your blog or website. After that, you want to put as much information as possible about what your video is about.
Referring back to the learn to squat video, you may want to write a comprehensive worded instruction of how to perform a squat. This way at least you know you will cover every keyword possible.
Choose the correct category: It's one thing to choose the right category, it's another to consistently use the same category. I see a lot of YouTube accounts with similar themed videos that are categorised all over the place. Think about what category your channel will feature in and make sure you use the same one consistently for all of your videos.
Tags: This is YouTube's way of asking you to best summarise what your video is about and where it should be put. Your tags should be separated by commas and be variations of words that best describe your video and blog or site.
Again using the squat tutorial as an example; your tags may be words like: squat, squats, exercise, personal trainer, workout, barbell, Australia, tutorial, how to, gym, etc. etc.
The only way to get your videos watched is by having them labeled correctly, so before you get too excited to push the submit button on your YouTube account, double check you've crossed all your t's and dotted all of your i's and you can be sure that your videos will be valuable instructional resources for thousands of people for years to come.
SEO For Personal Training Blogs And Websites
Search Engine Optimization or SEO is a highly debated and often ‘best guess’ topic on how to rank your personal training blog or website higher and more precisely with popular search engines like Google and Yahoo, by using specific keywords.
There are many and varied opinions on what works and the best ways to structure your content to get the most value from your personal training businesses blog or site, however there are some strategies that appear to work more consistently and better than others.
What do you want to achieve with your blog or site?
To begin, your SEO strategy should reflect the outcome that you want to achieve and for what you want to rank for, which could be one of the following:
• Promotion of your personal training business by targeting a specific geographic community (what I am discussing today)
• Selling online personal training services
• Selling advertisement space on your site or blog
• Promotion of yourself and your personal training products, like ebooks or merchandise.
Once you’re clear on what your blog or site is about and the objective you wish to achieve, you need to begin researching keywords for your particular niche.
I recommend using Google Adwords Keyword Tool for this. You simply type in the keywords you have selected, fill in the CAPTCHA and hit ‘Get Keyword Ideas’.
The resulting information provides you with a specific breakdown of the amount of people searching for a particular keyword or keywords, both locally and globally. You can modify your search to show more specific results, including advertising rates etc., however for now lets just see what the search volume for your keywords are.
I just typed in ‘personal training’ and I can see that the global search volume for this keyword is 823,000, which indicates that a lot of people are searching the net for personal training; this is positive and negative.
The positive is that plenty of people are searching for that combination of keywords; however the shear volume suggests that you will probably never rank for those particular ones, in fact you may be lucky to make the top 100 pages as there is a lot of online competition.
Get specific!
So what you need to do is try new combinations and be more specific in your personal training keywords.
As I mentioned, promoting your personal training blog or site to a specific geographical community is probably the ‘easiest’ way to rank highly.
One way to come up with a keyword strategy is to think about what you would search for to hire a personal trainer in your local community. Let’s say ‘personal trainer Melbourne’.
Let’s go back to Adwords and try ‘personal trainer Melbourne’. You can obviously adjust your search terms to your specific city or town; however for the purposes of this article I’m just using my local region.
The result for this keyword search is 3,600, which is much more positive.
You will also notice that the keyword tool offers a variety of results and by changing the term to ‘personal trainers Melbourne’, the result is significantly different (1,600).
To become even more specific, you may want to narrow down your search even further. I just tried ‘personal trainer Richmond’, which is a suburb just outside of Melbourne where my imaginary studio or gym is located and the result is much smaller.
On the surface this may seem like a bad result, however, the people who are searching for ‘personal trainer Richmond’ are a very specific and targeted audience that are more than likely genuine business prospects and you are in a very good position to rank well for this term if you follow a few simple SEO procedures when you’re writing your content.
What now?
There are many different reasons why websites and blogs rank in search engines the way they do, some of which contribute to:
• The volume and consistency of content
• The age of the blog or site
• Keyword usage throughout the blog or site
For the purpose of this article I’m not going to go into any details about different types of links or the ‘pagerank’ of a site, other to say that the previous 3 factors do contribute to it but I will cover this topic in more detail in future articles.
So using our keywords ‘personal trainer Richmond’, you need to start using them in every post and even in the name of your blog or site.
To rank for a blog post, there is some SEO etiquette that suggests that you should use your keywords in the title of your post, in the first paragraph of your post and then intermittently throughout your article.
We could write an imaginary article as follows:
[Post Title] Richmond Personal Trainer Now Available!
[First Paragraph] “Are you looking for a personal trainer in Richmond? Well look no further!”
And then using the terms a few more times throughout your article...
The SEO rules
Now, the trick with this is that you have to be careful with how you word and format your post.
If you use your keywords too often, it will become annoying to read for the consumer and there is also information to suggest that Google will recognise a heavily repeated keyword post as spam and you will get no rankings.
A rule of thumb is to read your article aloud to yourself and if it sounds corny, then it probably is.
With blogs, each post is its own SEO entity, so the above strategy is fantastic and while Google will establish a theme to your blog with consistent keyword usage, for the most part you will rank one post at a time.
Websites are different to blogs in that Google reads the entire website via ‘sitemaps’ and a few other things to ascertain what the site is about and where to put it in relation to search engines.
If you reread this article, you will notice that I have followed the principles that I discuss in this post using the keywords ‘personal training blog SEO’. I used the terms in my post title and flipped them around in my first paragraph to make it more pleasing to read.
I also used the terms several times throughout the article and sneakily added them again in the previous paragraph.
Depending on how you came across this article should also determine how well I have used the principles.
I hope this has given you an idea of how to re evaluate how you're writing your online content. Keep in mind though, the minute you start writing for the search engines and not your human audience, your content will not make any sense and be boring, so try and find a happy medium and then everyone wins.
Additional Reading: Building Your Own Personal Training Blog
I also read Court's Internet Marketing School, I find this a fantastic resource for well explained, easy to follow internet marketing ideas.
There are many and varied opinions on what works and the best ways to structure your content to get the most value from your personal training businesses blog or site, however there are some strategies that appear to work more consistently and better than others.
What do you want to achieve with your blog or site?
To begin, your SEO strategy should reflect the outcome that you want to achieve and for what you want to rank for, which could be one of the following:
• Promotion of your personal training business by targeting a specific geographic community (what I am discussing today)
• Selling online personal training services
• Selling advertisement space on your site or blog
• Promotion of yourself and your personal training products, like ebooks or merchandise.
Once you’re clear on what your blog or site is about and the objective you wish to achieve, you need to begin researching keywords for your particular niche.
I recommend using Google Adwords Keyword Tool for this. You simply type in the keywords you have selected, fill in the CAPTCHA and hit ‘Get Keyword Ideas’.
The resulting information provides you with a specific breakdown of the amount of people searching for a particular keyword or keywords, both locally and globally. You can modify your search to show more specific results, including advertising rates etc., however for now lets just see what the search volume for your keywords are.
I just typed in ‘personal training’ and I can see that the global search volume for this keyword is 823,000, which indicates that a lot of people are searching the net for personal training; this is positive and negative.
The positive is that plenty of people are searching for that combination of keywords; however the shear volume suggests that you will probably never rank for those particular ones, in fact you may be lucky to make the top 100 pages as there is a lot of online competition.
Get specific!
So what you need to do is try new combinations and be more specific in your personal training keywords.
As I mentioned, promoting your personal training blog or site to a specific geographical community is probably the ‘easiest’ way to rank highly.
One way to come up with a keyword strategy is to think about what you would search for to hire a personal trainer in your local community. Let’s say ‘personal trainer Melbourne’.
Let’s go back to Adwords and try ‘personal trainer Melbourne’. You can obviously adjust your search terms to your specific city or town; however for the purposes of this article I’m just using my local region.
The result for this keyword search is 3,600, which is much more positive.
You will also notice that the keyword tool offers a variety of results and by changing the term to ‘personal trainers Melbourne’, the result is significantly different (1,600).
To become even more specific, you may want to narrow down your search even further. I just tried ‘personal trainer Richmond’, which is a suburb just outside of Melbourne where my imaginary studio or gym is located and the result is much smaller.
On the surface this may seem like a bad result, however, the people who are searching for ‘personal trainer Richmond’ are a very specific and targeted audience that are more than likely genuine business prospects and you are in a very good position to rank well for this term if you follow a few simple SEO procedures when you’re writing your content.
What now?
There are many different reasons why websites and blogs rank in search engines the way they do, some of which contribute to:
• The volume and consistency of content
• The age of the blog or site
• Keyword usage throughout the blog or site
For the purpose of this article I’m not going to go into any details about different types of links or the ‘pagerank’ of a site, other to say that the previous 3 factors do contribute to it but I will cover this topic in more detail in future articles.
So using our keywords ‘personal trainer Richmond’, you need to start using them in every post and even in the name of your blog or site.
To rank for a blog post, there is some SEO etiquette that suggests that you should use your keywords in the title of your post, in the first paragraph of your post and then intermittently throughout your article.
We could write an imaginary article as follows:
[Post Title] Richmond Personal Trainer Now Available!
[First Paragraph] “Are you looking for a personal trainer in Richmond? Well look no further!”
And then using the terms a few more times throughout your article...
The SEO rules
Now, the trick with this is that you have to be careful with how you word and format your post.
If you use your keywords too often, it will become annoying to read for the consumer and there is also information to suggest that Google will recognise a heavily repeated keyword post as spam and you will get no rankings.
A rule of thumb is to read your article aloud to yourself and if it sounds corny, then it probably is.
With blogs, each post is its own SEO entity, so the above strategy is fantastic and while Google will establish a theme to your blog with consistent keyword usage, for the most part you will rank one post at a time.
Websites are different to blogs in that Google reads the entire website via ‘sitemaps’ and a few other things to ascertain what the site is about and where to put it in relation to search engines.
If you reread this article, you will notice that I have followed the principles that I discuss in this post using the keywords ‘personal training blog SEO’. I used the terms in my post title and flipped them around in my first paragraph to make it more pleasing to read.
I also used the terms several times throughout the article and sneakily added them again in the previous paragraph.
Depending on how you came across this article should also determine how well I have used the principles.
I hope this has given you an idea of how to re evaluate how you're writing your online content. Keep in mind though, the minute you start writing for the search engines and not your human audience, your content will not make any sense and be boring, so try and find a happy medium and then everyone wins.
Additional Reading: Building Your Own Personal Training Blog
I also read Court's Internet Marketing School, I find this a fantastic resource for well explained, easy to follow internet marketing ideas.
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