Having grown up with Outlook 2003 & 2007 , Thunderbird and other PC/Laptop based email clients, moving to Gmail was a little daunting, but I felt the advantages out weighed the comfort of staying put with Outlook. In those years of using Outlook I developed my own way of maintaining an empty inbox, or near empty, like I’m sure many of you have. Its about routine and practise, which then becomes 2nd nature and you almost achieve autopilot type procedures.
The biggest benefit is the portability of maintaining all my emails on any device, Laptop, desktop, phone and tablet. So 2014 begin with a shift to using Google Apps for Work (Gmail) for all work and private emails. I have multiple domains pointing to a single Gmail account was my way, kept costs down and had everything in one place.
In this year of using Gmail it soon became obvious I was not maintaining my inbox in the way I should. 3822 emails had accumulated in my Inbox with nearly the same again having been archived or stored folders (folders are not the correct description btw, we will talk about this shortly).
Now I am not saying that everyone should achieve Inbox Zero, it’s a personal thing, but for me it was something I needed to do for my own sanity and decluttering of the work environment. By creating a method that works, I achieved Inbox Zero in about 4 hours. Anyone can do this immediately if you suffer Inbox Chaos in Gmail.
Using social media and blogging has become a way of life for many people whether its personal, small business or larger companies, it’s important to choose the right tools to distribute your social media marketing messages.
There are many platforms out there for distributing these social media messages via e-mail marketing, many with great features but many with poor features. In the early days of doing Email Marketing I reviewed many products, the popular ones being Aweber, Constant Contact, Vertical Response, Benchmark Email and IContact are just but a few.
You are living in a Social Media Revolution!
Where’s the proof?
Many statistics are been observed and collected, but not until Erik Qualman of Socialnomics produced a video and concentrated statistics, was the true impact of Social Media realised, both personal and in business. I have re-posted his work here just so you can get a sense of how important we all understand the power of what is happening.
When you look at the numbers from just the top 3 social media entities, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, you get a num feeling that the world has changed in the blink of an eye.
Long gone are the days of paid printed advertising being the most powerful method of reaching new and existing customers. Do you remember getting quotes from your local newspaper for an advert and getting a price that reflects their potential circulation, maybe 55,000 for the local informer of which they were very proud of. Now stack that against the numbers you see in this video below, makes interesting viewing!
You are in a Social Media Revolution, but are you taking advantage of it to help your business! Most are not, yet, but as time progress’s that will change.
Don’t get left behind, understand, plan and get your Social Media business strategy moving.
By Erik Qualman
It’s amazing how fast the world of social media moves! As many of the statistics from the original Social Media video have changed, I took a moment to refresh the video with a few new statistics and graphics. Thanks to all of you for your support in making the first Social Media Revolution and Social Media ROI videos such a huge success and I hope that you enjoy this refresh!
Stats from Video (sources listed below by corresponding #)
Below are the sources I used to compile this video. Keep your feedback/questions/challenges coming as it will collectively make the next video better – be social.
A huge thanks to all below: