Editor’s Note: With today’s blog post, Bridgeline is happy to introduce our newest contributor, Eric Ritter. Eric joins Bridgeline from our Tampa, FL office, and brings copious experience and professionalism along with him.

With the cacophony – or symphony, depending on your viewpoint and comfort level – of brand messages being transmitted to today’s average consumer, it’s hard to believe that Facebook has made disseminating many of these messages for businesses easier.

Arguably, though – with opinions varying wildly according to whom you ask – that seems to be exactly what the social networking giant has done with its new Facebook business page design, by introducing the soon-to-be-forced “Facebook Timeline.”

And yet, the new timeline template now “available” (read: compulsory) for businesses to display Facebook Pages has many users questioning the change.

Modifications by Facebook to personal profiles are confusing enough, and notoriously cause discomfort at first, but users eventually adapt and settle into their new digital abodes. In time, users even begin to advocate these all-too-regular (judging by the short furor they always seem to cause) profile page updates. Take all of the new photo display features introduced in early 2011, which allow users to view more photos, faster, without losing their Facebook place, for example. Hard to find anyone really complaining about that update – at least, not anymore.

However, with the new Facebook Timeline profile, that comfortable pattern doesn’t seem to be quite as comfortable this time. A boatload of Facebook users – the vast majority of which are consumers – fear their right to privacy is being infringed upon with this new change. And with businesses in the mix, those consumers are beginning to wonder just who they can really trust. Read the rest of this entry »

It seems like every day we hear and read about people’s concerns about online privacy policies. The ability to reach your audience is becoming increasingly challenging as they are wearier of online communication. Despite the growing reluctance, there continues to be a direct line of welcomed communication: email marketing.

With a basic understanding of this valuable online tool you can reap the benefits of direct communication with your audience.

What is different about email marketing from other forms of online communication?
The most effective use of email marketing uses opt-in lists or double opt-in lists. Email users consider their inbox “by invite only.” They have the ability to choose who may contact them, how frequently, and penalize those who abuse their privacy. Understanding and respecting the privilege to email your audience will foster an ongoing and successful relationship. Read the rest of this entry »

Got a special service or demographic you want to target on your website? This happens frequently in business – a change in direction, a new partnership, even a special event you want your online visitors to focus on. Usually it’s something big enough to need more functionality than just a new page or posting, but not big enough to wipe out all of the SEO, design, content and other work you’ve done on your site by starting from scratch.

The answer to your quandary might be to build yourself a Microsite. A Microsite is a smaller, more simple website – a subset of your main website – that’s extremely focused for a specific reason. Usually Microsites are heavily optimized for a small set of specific keywords and phrases, are geo-targeted and meant for a particular demographic or to achieve a particular goal.

Think of Microsites as another channel in your digital marketing toolbox, somewhere between email marketing and SEO of your main site. Like email, a Microsite is targeted for a certain subset of your audience, complete with targeting and specific calls-to-action. And, like your main site, it’s a live website with a full complement of keywords and SEO, designed to attract a certain segment of online search for a specific purpose. Read the rest of this entry »

Download our new whitepaper & then register now for Tuesday’s webinar.

eCommerce has accelerated the creation and exponential growth of the web as the  largest marketplace in history. The rewards of global e-commerce are nearly endless – and by now you must realize that a global view for your online store is absolutely critical.

A company that can successfully expand and embrace a global market – with tactics to address internationalization (i18n) and localization (l10n) – immediately gets access to seven billion potential buyers, from hundreds of cultures. These aspects, however, if they’re to be done right, are anything but small tasks.

To get a jump on the competition, or to check your current process against solid, winning results, download our most recent whitepaper,” Key Factors to Consider When Going Global with Your eCommerce Initiatives,” and then plan to join us for a free, live webinar on the subject. Read the rest of this entry »

Register Now

We’re all familiar with the situation: your marketing directive needs some hands-on support – NOW – and your IT department can only make a couple of things top priority (maybe a few, if they’re superhuman), ESPECIALLY NOW. The scenario skirts around a “Rock ‘Em, Sock ‘Em Robots” style conflagration – with both departments seemingly at risk of having a block knocked off.

But the situation doesn’t have to be like this. Much like David Carradine’s “Caine” (AKA “Grasshopper”), whose sole directive was to make peace and satisfy everyone (that was his sole purpose, wasn’t it?)  – calmly, effectively and, above all, with his own kung fu – these calamities can be handled, neutralized, even fruitful with the right tools and directions.

Register for this insightful webinar and join us as we pass on some collaborative kung fu – and show you how iAPPS can help enhance its effectiveness – to help you make sure your web technology fully supports your marketing strategy. Once adopted, these practices – and the right tools – will result in not only a much more smoothly run, effective and engaging website, but a few less bruises to boot.

Webinar Title: 10 Tips to Make Sure Your Web Technology Supports Your Marketing Strategy

Format: Free Webinar

Hosts: Bridgeline Digital

• Brett Zucker, Chief Technology Officer

• Becki Dilworth, Vice President of Digital Strategy

Date: Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Time: 10:00 am – 11:00 am MST  (12:00 pm – 1:00 pm EST)

Read the rest of this entry »

Photo by BasicGov; Creative Commons share-alike license

The differences are far simpler, and way more important, than you probably think.

Sometimes the best laid marketing plans end up biting back, and in some truly surprising ways. While most cases of this sort of slip up – either positive or negative – can be chalked up to a failure to get the right message across, not many can be attributed to getting a message across a little too well.

Such is the case for the apparent confusion about the differences between “Cloud Computing” and “Software as a Service” (SaaS). As the digital marketing world is clamoring to get you to “move everything to the cloud” before the next guy, it’s become critical to offer clarification to help you make sure you know what you’re signing up for. Put simply, and in strictly logical terms, while all SaaS environments are by default denizens of the cloud, not all cloud environments are necessarily SaaS.

Cloud environments deliver the use of common applications that are served from the internet and are designed to deliver computing and interaction as a utility – Facebook, Salesforce.com and Google Docs are popular examples. SaaS, by comparison, uses specific software and customized architecture to provide services – primarily to enterprise customers (but certainly not exclusively) – based on specific needs. Bridgeline’s iAPPS Product Suite, for instance, is designed specifically to run as optimally in SaaS as it does in a dedicated server environment using a perpetual license. Read the rest of this entry »