Trip Tips and Tricks to become #1

As a #MarketingDirector you need to be versed on many different social mediums to give your clients the best service. Over the next couple of weeks we will discuss how to excel at different platforms out there, this week we will start with #Tripadvisor!

Have a restaurant, spa, yoga studio or hotel as a client? These are only a couple businesses that flourish on Trip. It’s important to build up your clients presence here to gain customers that aren’t from the area, or are doing research on these types of businesses in the city you reside. Did you know Trip has over 200 million unique monthly visitors? What a large network with #targeted audiences! Below are a few tips on how to #mazimize your Trip presence.

#1: Have your past #customers help you. The amount and quality of reviews your profile has is crucial on Trip.  Getting those reviews is also a tricky part because of the #1 DON’T RULE: Do not ask co-workers or you yourself to review your business – They must be real customers! Instead.. you know that monthly newsletter you send out to your past customers (you better be doing that!) include a link to review your business so customers can easily go there.

#2 Encourage #Pictures & #Videos. This trick is technically involved with the above tip, however it’s so important we wanted to make it it’s own! Ask your past customers to upload #PICTURES from their trip or experience with you. Ever heard the saying, “A picture says 1,000 words” – so you get the picture ;)

            “According to TripAdvisor, properties with 30 or more photos have 41% more engagement than those with 10 or fewer. When it comes to video, the same is true. North American properties with at least one video have about 34% more engagement than properties without a video.

#3: Holla Back. Have you ever written a review and received a response “from the owner”? Well, not only do you feel even more connected to the business but it made you want to go back, no? Funny thing is….You most likely were messaged from their marketing director. A lot of business owners do not have the time to manage their review sites, so responding to EVERY review is very important! Positive or negative, you need to respond, and if it’s negative… that leads us to tip #4!

#4: When responding, never admit fault. Say a customer was mad about the wait or simply the food wasn’t cooked to their expectation. Apologize that they had a bad experience and invite them back. Do not include “Sorry our Chef messed up your order” because that has a negative view to your business. Apologize that their experience was not the 5-star experience that your restaurant is expected to give, and you’d like to invite them back to change their perspective!

#5: Include Trip icon on all social sites and website. Make it EASY! #EASY EASY EASY for your customers to click and review. The longer it takes to do something, the higher % chance you will lose their interest.

#6: Keep it fresh. Update new images monthly if not weekly, make sure hours and business info is up to date… with minor changes from month to month to keep it fresh.

Do you have other #TipsandTricks for Tripadvisor? Comment below and thanks for reading!

CGC

The Art of the Hash

Ever wonder why everyone uses hashtags and what they even do? How to use them properly?

Well for starters, it's important to know what social mediums the "hashtag" works on.

Twitter, #Facebook, #Pinterest, #Googleplus, and possibly in the future (but not right now) LinkedIn.

So, what exactly is a #hashtag? It's "#"

Alone, it does nothing.. but attach a word behind it with #NOpunctuation what-so-ever and you have a link to another community. A community that also used that exact word or phrase, and all of a sudden you're thrust into a news feed of similar posts. The hashtag is used to draw attention, organize and promote your post. Whether you're uploading a picture of your puppy and including #frenchbulldog or your beverage of choice and putting #cocacola - the hashtag has a use for every person. Whether marketing your brand, or trying to find other french bulldog lovers ;)

The hashtag was created by #Twitter, but it's use didn't stop there. You cannot use punctuation, spacing or special characters in your words or phrases. For example, #you'regreat would translate to #you since the 'regreat portion will be cut off. Instead you have to go against ALL grammatical rules and change to #youregreat (makes me cringe) or find another way to say it! 

So why use them? First off... they help you find your target audience. Using the above two examples again, if you wanted to find more profiles on instagram that also are about french bulldogs, click on your #frenchbulldog link and you will see a feed of other profiles. And it works the other way around, you're more discoverable! 

Hashtags also improve your clickthrough rate. According to research from #BuddyMedia, tweets that hashtags receive double the engagement as posts that don't! Another great way to use a hashtag is for market research, ask a question to high school professors and #highschoolprof and see who is out there! 

There is so much more into the hash tag and it's uses... we'll dive even deeper next week! And we will discuss how LinkedIn doesn't have #'s but uses a variation... 

Thanks for reading!

#CGC

#theartofthehashtag #ormondbeach #marketing 

If you're not using Google Drive & Drop Box... you're missing out!

Sending and receiving photos, videos or large files can sometimes be a huge pain due to email size restrictions. When working for a communications firm like us, you constantly find yourself being blocked because that graphic is double the size of allowable files in outlook or gmail. What is the best solution though?

We have used Google Drive and Dropbox for awhile now and I'm still amazed at their ease of use. Whether I am uploading 150 pictures from a #photoshoot with one of our clients, or sending a large PDF to a newspaper, Google Drive is on everyone's list of go-to's when sending. Want to collaborate with a couple different people? No worries... avoid sending an email with a lot of attachments to everyone who then needs to download each file separately, invite them all to your file on google drive and boom - instant access!

Dropbox is another great system when sending a lot of photographs to another person. You upload everything you need and send a link to their email, once clicked they can see everything you've sent and don't have to download each component separately.

Save time, frustration and future headache with #GoogleDrive and #Dropbox. Want to learn more about them? Call us today and we can chat!
#CallanGroupCommunications

EatBreadToday

I don't know what tomorrow holds, so today I'll eat bread!
By Digital Di, Callan Group Communications

What a wonderful #Thanksgiving2014 I had. Two days of spending precious time with friends I consider family. #MarkPullin, executive chef for #31SupperClub cooked for a crew Wednesday and my old Buy Me Love Benefits partner had me spend Turkey Day with his amazingly loud, beautiful family in Tampa. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. It was the only holiday our family celebrated other than birthdays which I don't consider a holiday so of course it's my favorite. It's the holiday of thanks, gratitude and good food. I love that!

Today we were discussing the delicious dinner and how eating fresh food with no can openers and made with love made such a difference. Speaking of fresh...the rolls...um, yeah! No Pillsbury rolls up in here..nope! Straight fresh bread made by #therealchefmark. Yummy! He didn't make enough! He mentioned when he caters he usually has a ton of left overs. I can't believe people have bought into this whole "bread is bad for you" thing. Have your bread and eat it, too, I say! Who knows what tomorrow brings, eat bread today! 

Ask and ye shall receive

Ask and ye shall receive
Welcome, Brittny Machel Lowe

It hit me one night while I was talking with Chef. You know, Mark Pullin, the executive Chef of 31 Supper Club. We were talking about our aspirations and it was like a slap in the face. I had to find a way to free up time to start writing my book, The Legacy. I decided right there and then that I was going to find the perfect marketing associate who was motivated, a self-starter and a natural born entrepreneur…no big deal, right? Yeah, not so easy but I put pen to paper, created a job description and let it go into the social universe. No responses. Not one. Although one of the people I was considering “liked” my post. She didn’t PM me but she liked the post. Making progress? Not quite.

A few weeks later, I’m dining at Grind Gastropub with one of my favorite mentors, Debbie Allen, who flat out said I have to offer an internship option before opening up an opportunity for full employment. She said that would show a truly determined candidate who would see true benefit in Callan Group Communications. I agreed although felt frustrated as I couldn’t even get a candidate who I was going to pay let alone one who would donate their time. Then our server, Brittny Machel Lowe came up to take another drink order. She was the one who I had my eye on. We chatted her up and before I knew it Debbie was encouraging her to intern for me. Brittny seemed interested and explained her aspirations of starting a non-profit to help families of incarcerated men and women. She was already an entrepreneur with her own apparel company, Twin Flame. She was perfect. I explained to her what the job would look like and asked that if she was serious that she should reach out to me the following morning. The voicemail is still saved on my phone. Her enthusiasm resonated through the message. She began interning and was promoted to marketing associate as of today, November 10.

With her support, I can not only grow the company helping businesses to grow theirs through marketing initiatives but I can follow my dream of writing a novel. It’s an amazing thing, this universe. It’s a crazy feeling when you realize that if you simply ask for what you want you receive it. I’ve practiced this “secret” for most of my life but more lately. It works. It really works. I feel so blessed to have this opportunity to invite Brittny into our family. As we teach her, she’ll teach us and together we can create amazing work in our community.

Cheers to those who believe in themselves.
Cheers to those who take risks.
Cheers to the ones that see opportunity.
Cheers to the ones that have gratitude.
Cheers to Brittny Machel Lowe.

With gratitude,

Diane Michael

Political Season in Volusia County has Arrived!

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This package provides a multi-media strategy that directly targets your constituents providing you with "all bases covered".

We haven't seen a program quite like this before...contact Diane directly by clicking here or call me at 386-538-1083.

You're beginning to get sleepy, very very sleepy!
By Diane Michael, Communications Director at The Callan Group

So I haven't been sleeping lately. I go to bed and lay there uncomfortable with thousands of thoughts going through my brain. Tossing and turning for the third night in a row I decided to write about it.

My Reiki Massage Therapist said that if you can't sleep it's because you're in someone's dream. Even though that's a nice thought - not buying it!

So I Googled "what does it mean to not sleep" and choose the fifth selection from the top which greeted me with a ton of...don't drink coffee, don't watch TV, don't drink alcoholic beverages, don't smoke, don't do anything that sounds fun to me! Not buying this one either.

Sixth selection down are common sleep myths. Ok, graphic of a pretty girl sleeping at top - I'm intrigued!

I'm on myth two and I see "don't text in bed"...well how am I suppose to finish this article without typing away on my phone? As I continue I realize there's a bunch of blabber on the internet! Geez!

As far back as I can remember I didn't want to go to bed early and I would lay there daydreaming about the following day. Some things never change, they say, but do they?

Can we reprogram our minds?

Of course we can. Just because we've always done something one way doesn't mean we can't adapt and improvise to change based on our needs!

So why can't I change my awful sleeping pattern and why have I been restless for the past three nights straight and still not tired?

I can change the way I look at sleep. That may help! Yeah, I'll get right on that!

I can stop writing articles in bed. Yeah, probably won't be doing that!

I can write down all the things I want to accomplish tomorrow before I go to bed. Check!

I can get up earlier to help my body shut off earlier. Doesn't sound fun but we're making progress!

I can focus more on my breathing.

I'm starting to feel sleepy...very, very sleepy!

Good night, cuties!