Facebook recently rolled out the new targeting features for posts, which will make a huge difference in the way businesses reach out to their audience. Instead of broad postings to all of your followers, you can now sharpen the focus of each post in order to fit with only a select portion of your fans.

Having more targeted postings will mean that your posts are reaching the people that will be most likely to interact and respond. That can mean more traffic and increased sales.

You are now able to target posts based on several sets of criteria, including:

GenderAgeEducationLanguageLocationWorkInterestsRelationship status

For example, if you wrote an e-book of natural homemade cleaning products, your target audience may include women, ages 25-50 and anyone working in the housekeeping industry. With a targeted post, you can be sure that only the followers who will benefit from your product and are more likely to purchase it will view the post.

Although you are limiting the reach when you use targeted posts, you avoid having the majority of your followers feel put off by the number of posts that do not apply to them. If all they are seeing from you on Facebook are posts that are irrelevant to them personally, then they may decide to unlike you altogether.

Every post you add will show up on your timeline, even your targeted posts. This can make things look messy quick, so you may want to adjust your settings so that only those that will appeal to your entire audience. With a clean timeline, you will appeal to a much broader audience as new traffic comes to your brand page.

Another new targeting feature for your posts allows you to post in the news feeds of the people who have joined your mailing list or have given you other contact information, including their phone number.

If you already have a customer list, maybe with people who have signed up to receive your emails and newsletter, Facebook will hash the data so that they do not have access. With this information, you will be able to determine which of your customers are a match for your posts. You will be able to set your demographic data as well for more specific targeting.

Even if some of your customers are not Facebook fans, you can still create special ads that will encourage them to "Like" you by visiting your page. You can make the deal even sweeter by offering them something in exchange for becoming a Facebook fan, such as 20% off their next purchase or free shipping.

You can present special offers to a targeted fan audience as well. That will mean an increased chance that people will claim your offer and even share it with their friends and family, increasing your fan base easily.

With targeted posts, you will be able to see more fan engagement and increase the number of shares and followers you have through Facebook. Your fans will feel less alienated when they are no longer bombarded with posts that are irrelevant to them.

The people that you are targeting will feel like a part of a select VIP group on your brand page. You can share information with them that you know they will benefit from and they will be grateful.

Have you tried targeted posts? What results have you seen from them?

Dawn Pigoni of Be Social Worldwide is a certified social marketing specialist and a social media virtual assistant. Dawn offers superb social networking, social marketing and social bookmarking to WAHMs, Small Business Owners, Internet Marketers, Affiliate Marketers, and Coaches who desire to bring stunning internet presence through social networking to their businesses. Get Dawn's free report, Social Networking today & see how she can assist you with being Social Worldwide!

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Social Media nowadays is not just limited to connecting with friends or acquaintances, sharing pictures or life updates. It has become a platform for business marketing as well, both in the global as well as the local field.

Facebook, as we all know, is the king of social networks. It is a good place to reach out to clients and build your brand online. The said social network provides much different functionality in which SEO analyst; web developers and marketers can use to get their business noticed online.

In this article we will be focusing on how you can optimize your local business' online presence with the use of Facebook.

10 Tips To Optimize Your Local Business Using Facebook

• A Good Page Name -It is best to have the name of your business as your page name in Facebook. This will help maintain a consistent identity of your brand and search engines can associate your Facebook page with your business. If you have establishments located in different areas, you can create a page with your business name plus the location, such as: Joe's Diner - Los Angeles.

• Inject Keywords in About Section - There is no need to be an expert web developer in order to get this done. Writing something for the "About" page is quite manageable. Insert keywords, essential business details as well as local address and phone number in the information section of your Facebook page, as this can help in the optimization for search engines. However, always remember to not overstuff it with keywords and keep in mind the proper keyword density, as this will gain high ranking in SERPs.

• Customize Facebook URL - As soon as you get certain numbers of Likes in Facebook, you will be able to make a custom URL for your page. It is best to still use your keywords, company or business name to add into the URL - as this will help in sharing your social profile easily and put a signal to search engines to associate the page with your product brand and services.

• Become a Fan - Use your local business page to become a fan of related local pages in Facebook, however, keep away from competitors. Liking a related local business page will enable you to interact and post comments on their updates, which gives you more exposure to the target audience.

• Target Locations with Status Updates - This is a good function to promote your brand products or services in a certain location. This will allow your status updates only to appear to people in specific locations. You can set this by clicking the dropdown arrow under your status box and change "Public" to Location/Language where you can specify a particular country, city or state.

• Offsite Page Links - Link to your Facebook page from your official blog or business website. This increases the value of your Facebook page in search engines and connects your brand with its social network outlets in the web. You can also consider spending some time commenting or posting to blogs or forums including a link to your page to maximize the backlinks.

• Content With Snippets - Turn your Facebook page into a hub of information where people get relevant answers to their needs in relation to the products or services that your business offers. You can post snippets of articles or lines with keywords from your official local business website then the link towards the page. This will serve as another inbound link strategy that helps in increasing your online presence.

• Add Images - Since Facebook implemented its Timeline version, posted pictures are the first things to capture the attention of many. As such, businesses took this advantage to promote their brands and services. Hence, it is recommended to put a cover photo that depicts the story of your local brand and tells the customers what it is all about. You can also add some graphics and images into your status updates as this will result in more "Likes".

• Regular Content Update - Unique, relevant and interesting content has always been an important factor in SEO. It can add value to your Facebook page. A page update highlights fun and informative contents that drive likes to your page. You can also reward you page fans special discounts on your products or host contests in your local page. This will give followers the idea that you have an active page and increase the value of your SEO efforts.

• Facebook Ads - This is an affordable way in promoting your brand to your target customers in a specific country, city, state, region, and etc. Facebook gives you the capability of serving ads only in a targeted geographical area, you will also know how many people are likely to see your ads, use images, and show up in a user's Facebook News feeds once they click "Like".

These are just some of the countless tips out there for optimizing Facebook pages for your local business. And as with all global or local SEO strategies, never expect increase in conversion to happen immediately, as everything takes time to see the change in results.

However, giving constant reliable and quality content in your page is not rocket science; all you need to keep in mind is what your clients and future customers want and need from a local business, and make sure that you cater to them effectively.

Hi! I'm Jollie Garado and I'm interested in writing about technology and SEO - outsourcing, link building or outsource web development to improve your small business.

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One of the biggest secrets to making money online is building a list that is targeted. Once this list is generated, it can be used to make money almost on demand (if it is built correctly from the get go). This is one of the best ways to make money from being good at and using social networking for business purposes.

Arbitrage is the ability of a person to take something and sell it at a higher price than it took to get the asset. This is extremely useful on the internet where the ability to make a new business is sometimes as easy as building a new social profile. This ability allows a person to create several businesses with low overhead.

What do you do with these profiles?

These profiles should be generated to gain followers for very niched topics. Every topic will generate unique followers who are interested in the product or service. These people are valuable because they have already raised their hand for the information that was promised. There are plenty of businesses that will pay money to have those people see what they have to offer. This is where a person can build a business from nothing and almost no cost.

The action that makes this all possible is list building. There are many marketing gurus who believe that list building is the most important skill (it is debatable whether or not it is). List building is a difficult thing for most businesses to do because they have no idea that they should even be building a list. This is why social networking is a great place to do this, because social networks themselves are list-building products.

This list is valuable because most businesses do not understand how to build a list or how to get in front of prospects who are already interested in what they have to offer. They will pay to get access to the list and are willing to pay top dollar for this at times. All the business owner had to do was open the profile and deliver relevant content to those people so that they can follow the poster.

This is a form of arbitrage. What a business owner is investing in this case is time and knowledge. A person just needs to have the knowledge already or to get the knowledge to deliver to those markets. Those posts that the readers read on the social networks must be relevant and helpful to the readers' situations. The ability to deliver relevant content is the only thing that this business model needs.

List building is really the same as social networking for business purposes. A business owner is trying to generate a larger pool of contacts and possible clients. This is no different on social media platforms where the focus is on generating larger and larger audiences (also known as "friends" and "followers." A person or business owner who is successful at generating a large number of followers or friends has an asset that they can monetize even if the list does not buy their products and services. Every business needs to take list building more seriously than they currently do. Every business should look at their social networking for business purposes as list building.

Scott Buendia consults for Bizbuilt.com. All the views and tactics in this article are tactics and ideas of the author; they do not necessarily represent the ideals, beliefs, or trademarks of Bizbuilt.com. Visit his card on Bizbuilt here, https://www.bizbuilt.com/socialmediaprivacy.

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Developing a business using online social networks is a low tech yet highly effective strategy that does however require a bit of your time! It is important to realize these social communities are not meant to be marketing platforms but with the proper approach they offer much potential! Marketers must accept that patience needs to be applied to make the best out of what can be a very effective strategy for internet business growth!

By putting 'people' and NOT selling first, here's 3 ways 'nurturing' relationships at these social communities can help boost your sales!

Making 'Friends' Take Time

Considering that the best foundation for increasing sales is by building relationships it only makes sense to follow this advise using online social networks! Making friends first will only serve to help you build trust with others so when you do promote, people will be more receptive! Of course meeting new people and gaining their trust takes time so commit to this process and you'll find what an effective strategy it is for business building!

'Small' Talk Matters

Although your motives are to make money working social communities on the internet, do NOT expect instant gratification! Even the most 'trivial' exchange can lead to expanding your network of new 'friends' so be patient! These people are folks you need to make feel more comfortable with you and this does not always require serious conversations or exchanging deep thoughts! Small talk is typically what people engage in to explore if whether there is any common ground upon which a relationship can be built! As a marketer you MUST respect this process when cultivating friendships at any of these communities or you'll find this will not be a very effective strategy for your marketing purposes!

Allow For Follow-Up

Developing interpersonal relationships involves the occasional need for follow-up! This displays your sincerity and genuine interest thus giving any relationship deeper roots! Once again you'll need to exercise patience since the process can take time however when done properly you'll realize why it is such an effective strategy to use! You are basically increasing your exposure, building credibility and eventually reaping the benefits in the form of more traffic and thus sales growth for your business!

Developing a business through the use of online social networks requires placing the emphasis on relationship building! Since these social communities are not primarily intended for business purposes marketers must resist the urge to 'blitz' the site with promotional content! To make this approach a more effective strategy the 3 suggestions above serve to help businesses first establish trust with site members! Only in this way can any marketer expect to experience success working within many of the freely available social communities found online!

TJ Philpott is an author and Internet entrepreneur based out of North Carolina.
For more tips about developing a business through social networking and to also receive a free instructional manual that teaches valuable niche research techniques for your online marketing needs simply visit: http://affiliatequickstart.com/

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A business should expect to make more business contacts at a higher rate of speed when using a social network designed for business purposes. This is because the Internet is a place where a person can meet a high variety of people without physically being in the same room. This allows people to meet without the expenses of traveling or having to go somewhere for lunch. Obviously, this is not always possible. This is why social networking for business is very important. Business can be accelerated to the speed of the Internet, not only for transactions, but also for business meetings.

A business needs more contacts. More contacts can lead to more opportunities in the business space then a business that does not generate contacts at a high rate of speed. Part of being successful in business is being aware of opportunities as they arise. The ability of business to identify opportunities will determine how much revenue they can generate within the year. This is why socially networking for business through the Internet is so important. The Internet opens up a new world of business contacts that a company would not normally have access to in the real world. It is very important for any business to learn how to network effectively using social media to have a chance to succeed in the future.

A business should expect to make more money when they properly network through the Internet. A business is no longer limited to their physical location. The new technologies that have been created for the Internet have allowed businesses to grow outside their physical borders. For example, meetings can now happen on the Internet where they would have only happened in face-to-face meetings. A meeting can be scheduled for a person in the USA with a person in a different country within minutes. This is all possible instead of a sending a sales person to fly to meet with the other business person. This speeds up the rate that a business can close a business deal.

A business should also expect to be able to talk to their employees with a higher rate of speed than was previously possible. We business can also talk to a multitude of employees using the same medium an exact same message without having to pick up the phone and physically talk to every employee that needs to hear the message. This allows for quicker conversations about where a company is going and what the company needs to do. The speed of communication allows a business to move fast on opportunities and to adjust their strategy on the fly.

In general, a business using social networking for business can expect to be more capable to handle the advancements in technology and business. The ability to communicate with employees and perspective customers at a high rate of speed will determine the ability of the business to be successful in the future. A business that chooses the right platform for social networking will dominate their niche and become the most well known name in their market space. In closing, a business that effectively uses social media or social networking for business can expect to make more money.

Scott Buendia consults for Bizbuilt.com. All the views and tactics in this article are tactics and ideas of the author; they do not necessarily represent the ideals, beliefs, or trademarks of Bizbuilt.com. Visit his card on Bizbuilt here.

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