QR codes, those squiggly bar codes, are beginning to appear in print articles, on business cards, in newspapers and even online. But what are they and how do they work?

QR stands for Quick Response. They are 2 dimensional matrix barcodes whose popularity is on the rise with the growth of smartphones. Most phones can download an app like Scanlife that is used to read these barcodes and take the action embedded in the code. The code can direct the user to a web site, video, text message, email link, phone number, social media site, YouTube video, Google map or even a PayPal Buy Now link.

So how do you create this magical code? It’s so easy a caveman can do it (sorry Geico). Google QR Code generator and you will find several. (I’ve used www.qrstuff.com).  You select the type of link you want to create, enter the URL, email or phone number you want to connect to and watch the code created on the spot.  Right click the code and save  to your computer (or click the download link to do the same.)  That’s it.  You’re ready to go.

But before you jump in and create your code, let’s think the process through.  A friend of mine recently showed me his new business card with his QR code on the back, so I pulled out my Droid, opened Scanlife and scanned the back of his card.  It popped up a window with his email and phone number.  Very nice BUT…that’s the same information as  on the front of the card.  So I pulled out my card, scanned my QR code and up popped a mobile landing page with links to my web site, an email capture form attached to an auto-responder and my YouTube video introduction.

Comparing my card to his, my business card has now become a multimedia, lead generation tool.  But again, before you jump in and create a YouTube video and attach that to your QR code, hold on.  Once you create your QR code, it can’t be changed.  You’re either stuck with it or you have to create a new one.  But how long is it going to take you to use 1000 business cards?  And how long to you think your cards will be held on to by your clients and prospects?  What happens when you message becomes outdated?  Or you shoot a killer video that will convert prospects to clients by the dozens?   Oh well, too bad.

My solution (believe me I learned the hard way too) was to create a landing page that my QR code points to.  Now I can change the content of my landing page as often as I want.  Shoot a new video, no problem.  Have a special that I want to showcase, piece of cake.  The QR code link stays the same, but the content changes at will.

Take advantage of the technology, take advantage of growing number of smart phone and put your print media to work for you.

Gary Wagnon and 800biz.com Online Marketing Solutions specializes in helping small to medium size businesses to drive traffic to their door through web site design, search engine optimization, text message marketing and social media marketing and coaching.  Gary is also the co-founder of SocialMediaLab, an online education and training program to help business owners master social media.

While teaching a Facebook for Business class last week, I went around the room and asked why everyone was there.  I was amazed at the number of people (at least a third of the group) that were there because they didn’t have a website and thought Facebook would do the trick.

I immediately pulled out my soapbox and carefully climbed on top.  You’re trying to market online with no website?!?  In today’s connected world, it’s a snap to pop on your computer or smart phone and do a quick search for any business.  Without a website, how are you going to get found?  And assuming someone accidentally stumbles upon your Facebook page, just exactly how much information are they going to get to make their buying decision.   Plus, my totally un-scientific observations tells me that if someone doesn’t have a website, there’s a pretty good chance they don’t have a customized Facebook page either.

Short of suggesting a Facebook business page to friends (which recent changes to Facebook severely restricted), how are you going to drive traffic to your business page?  A “Follow Us On Facebook” link on your website can help drive traffic back to your FB page where you can begin an interactive dialog with your potential customers/clients.

Online marketing is like a big funnel.  At the top of the funnel is Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.  These are like the card tables in the grocery store on Saturday where you can get a taste of new food product.  If you like it, you will go find the product so you can have more.  When people read your 140 character bites and want more, where are they going to go?

Fresh and timely content that showcase your expertise is where you want them going.  And the source for that is your blog.  A blog should give a reader just the right portion for them to digest.  Like the story of the new country preacher on his first Sunday.  With all the preparations made, he’s standing at the door waiting to welcome everyone.  But to his dismay, only one old farmer shows up.  He asks the farmer what he should do and the farmer replies, “Well son.  If I only have one cow in the barn, I feed it.”  So the young preacher launches into his service complete with a 45 minute sermon and 2 alter calls.  As he is standing by the door after the service he asks the farmer what he thought, to which he replied, “Well, I would feed the one cow, but I wouldn’t give him the whole barn full.”  We are an impatient society.  We don’t want the whole barn full in your blog post, just a nice, digestable portion.

Your blog is the bridge to your call to action which should be your website.  (If your website doesn’t tell the browser what action to take, that’s the subject of another post.)

Whether your business is a brick and mortar business, home based business or internet business, having a website is a crucial component that adds legitimacy.  It’s the anchor point of your marketing program, where the efforts poured into the top of your funnel come rushing out.

Gary Wagnon and 800biz Online Marketing Solutions specialize in web site design, search engine optimization, social media marketing and text message marketing. Need to know how to better use social media — check out Social Media Lab, providing step-by-step instructional videos on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Blogging.

The popular apps among business owners right now are Stik and Branchout, apps that tout connecting with other businesses. But before you jump on the ‘Stik’ (sorry, couldn’t resist), read on.

Facebook apps are all created by 3rd party developers. Since they are free to use, why do they create programs like these — just for the satisfaction of creating it? I don’t think so. So what’s in it for them? Money!

I checked out both Stik and Branchout. To join, you signup using your Facebook login. The first thing you encounter is the Facebook permission screen. While most of us just click allow and move on, you might want to look at what you are allowing.

When you click allow, you just gave the application permission to:

• Access your name, profile picture, list of friends and information you share
• Email you
• Post On Your Wall
• Access Your News Feed
• Access your data at any time
• Access your work history and profile likes and interest
• Access your photos and videos
• AND Access your friends information including relationships, likes, music, tv, movies, education, work and their photos and videos.

Why do they want this information?  To build a complete marketing profile on you.  Your Facebook is a pretty complete snapshot of your life.  What company wouldn’t be willing to pay to have a laser targeted demographic of you.

While these apps sound cool, isn’t the purpose of Facebook itself to connect with others?  The initial idea may appear valuable, but think before you “Stik”.

Gary Wagnon and 800biz Online Marketing Solutions specialize in web site design, search engine optimization, social media marketing and text message marketing.  Need to know how to better use social media — check out Social Media Lab, providing step-by-step instructional videos on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Blogging.

As more and more small businesses move into the social media space, the demand for a “Dr. Phil” intervention has increased as well.  It takes a lot of restraint on my part to keep from saying “What were you thinking?” Here are some of the “oh no you didn’t ” moments to avoid.

Just this weekend, I received a Facebook friend request.  The request came from a business, not a person.  What were you thinking? I don’t want to be friends with a business. My business is built on working with local businesses, but never once have I been contacted by a business.  I’ve been contacted by the business owner, manager or decision maker, but never the business.  I actively look for opportunities to recommend local businesses to my network.  But the recommendation is based on the people – the owners, the managers and employees.

Facebook personal pages are designed for individuals.  Even if you and your business are one and the same (as my business is), keep business and personal pages separate. That’s not to say that you never post anything business related on your personal page, but it should be VERY limited.

This same friend request had a second faux pas. While the sender did take the time to write a personal note (not the standard friend request message), the message was the problem.  Their message started out good, we have a mutual friend and I would like to connect with you.  Had they stopped there, it would have been fine.  However the next sentence was “I hope you will become an outstanding customer.”  What were you thinking?

Why not just come out and say “Prepare to be bombarded with my sales message”? Social Media Rule #1 — It’s not about you! Why, when we go to a car lot or furniture store, is the first words out of our mouths, “I’m just looking”?  We don’t want to be sold but we like to buy.

Social media (as in any sales opportunity) is like a piggy bank.  As a business, you make social capital deposits into your customer’s piggy bank.  When their bank get’s full enough, they will cash it in and buy from you.  And how do you make deposits?  By providing valuable information.  If you customer would say, “Thanks.  That was a great idea.” then you have just made a deposit in their bank.

Here’s one more.  Okay, you’ve decided that social media is something you need to do.  Now you are ready to start building your connections.  But your profile has no picture or a picture of your dog.  What were you thinking?

Regardless of how cute your dog is, I’m not connecting with it.  I want to connect with you.  When I see a profile with no photo, it tells me you don’t take social media seriously and are probably not a good connection.

Another instant “no connect” sign is having an incomplete or hidden profile. For some, it’s about how many friends/followers/connection you can get.  But if you’re social media plan calls for building relationships, those relationships will be a targeted demographic, not the masses.  When a profile isn’t visible, there is no way to tell if you’re a serious business minded person, if there is any reason for me to connect with you.  Once you make the choice to be in business, you’re now a public figure so you profile should give me an insight into who you are, what you do and why I should connect with you.

To keep Dr. Phil at bay, treat social media as you would any networking opportunity — build and cultivate relationships that lead to long term business.

Gary Wagnon and 800biz.com specialize in online marketing solutions, including web site design, search engine optimization, social media marketing and mobile text message marketing.  For more tips, watch for Social Media Lab relaunching soon.

Unless you have nothing better to do than read the 100′s of blogs that record the merry-go-round of changes taking place on Facebook, you may have missed a few things.  Here are the 5 things you may have missed.

1. Friend Phonebook — It’s very easy to find the phone number for any friend (that included their phone number in their profile) in Facebook.  The other way phone numbers are listed is from contacts imported from your mobile phone.  To view your phonebook, go to Accounts > Edit Friends.  A link to the phonebook is in the navigation on the left.

If you do not want the numbers listed, you may need to disable the feature on your phone.  Facebook does have a page with instructions on how to disable this feature.

2. Secure Facebook Browsing – Hijacking Facebook accounts has become a common occurrence.  One way a Facebook account can be compromised is by accessing Facebook in public locations.  How many of us have logged into our Facebook account while enjoying our Grande Mocha Latte?

To add a layer of security, Facebook now gives you the option to browse over a secure (https) connection when one is available.  By browsing over a secure connection, your data is encrypted and not as easily hijacked.

To activate secure browsing, go to Accounts > Account Settings > Account Security.  Check the box there to enable.  (As a side note, directly below that is a record of your most recent logins.  By reviewing this you can see if someone else has accessed your Facebook account and possibly head off potential nightmares.)

3. Downloading Your Facebook Data — How many of us upload pictures and videos to our Facebook page so we can share it with all our friends?  But what happens if you get locked out of your Facebook account?  Or it gets hacked like above?  All your pictures and videos can be lost forever.

Facebook now gives you the ability to download and backup your Facebook account data.  The information you will download is :

• Your profile information (e.g., your contact information, interests, groups)
• Wall posts and content that you and your friends have posted to your profile
• Photos and videos that you have uploaded to your account
• Your friend list
• Notes you have created
• Events to which you have RSVP’d
• Your sent and received messages
• Any comments that you and your friends have made on your Wall posts, photos, and other profile content

Unfortunately you cannot choose what you want to download — you get it all.  To download your data, go to Accounts > Account Settings > Download Your Information.  There is a download button there as well as instructions and FAQs.

4. Your Profile is Available for All (3rd Party Apps) To See — If you are a Facebook game player (yes you know who you are), then your profile is open for the game developers to see, access, capture and even sell.

The games on Facebook are created by 3rd party companies, not Facebook.  These developers pay Facebook for the privilege of offering their game to the 500 million Facebook community.  And why would they pay to offer a free game?  When you choose to play Farmville or Mafia Wars, you give the game developer permission to access your profile, your likes and interests.  They then gather your information and sell it for marketing purposes. (Wonder where all the spam comes from?)

5. Hiding Status Updates from Specific People -  You’re taking that dream vacation and can’t wait to post your pictures, but for security, you’re worried about announcing to everyone your not home.  If you have your friends categorized into lists, your updates can be made visible only to specified people (or lists).  Before you click the share button on an update, click the down arrow beside the lock just to the left of the share button and choose customize.  You can make visible or hide the post from specific people.  Just type in the person or list you want to select and Voila!

Now you can go impress your friends with these little known gems in Facebook!

Gary Wagnon and 800biz.com specialize in online marketing solutions, including web site design, search engine optimization, social media marketing and mobile text message marketing.  For more tips, watch for Social Media Lab relaunching soon.

Your blog is written, it’s got the keywords in the right place and it’s posted for all to read. The final step is to spread the word. The purpose of your blog is to drive traffic — either to your web site, landing page or event. And the broader your readership, the more traffic you can expect.

To increase your blogosphere, you need to expose more readers to your content. Sharing your blog through social media is the best place to start. If you have a business Facebook page, you can have your blog automatically update your status. The same can be done on LinkedIn. Assuming you have dynamite content, it’s an easy step for your friends, likers or connections to share it with their friends.

But how do you expand beyond your sphere of connections? One of the easiest ways to do that is through social bookmarking sites, like Stumbleupon, Digg and Reddit. As of January 1, 2011, Stumbleupon generated more website traffic (referrals) than any other social media site, including Facebook. Social bookmarking sites are the equivalent to your favorites, only made public for all to see and share.

There are a number of social bookmarking sites, some general and some industry specific. The most popular general interest sites are Digg, Stumbleupon, Reddit, Diigo, Mixx and Fark but there are dozens more. To submit a site, you will need an account setup at each of these sites. When you are ready to submit your new blog post, you then login to each one and add the link.

But I’m all about time saving. If you have to go to each site, add the link, add an excerpt, then submit it, it’s going to take some time. Despair not, grasshopper. Simply add a plugin to your WordPress blog called ShareToAny. Once you activate the plugin, ShareToAny adds a button to the bottom of each blog post that will automatically connect you with all the above social bookmark sites, as well as Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and close to 100 other potential sites.

When I first discovered this technique, I closely monitored my web traffic to see if it did have an effect. Almost without exception, every time I submit a blog post, I see a significant spike in traffic to my web site as a result.

Now, you’ve learned some of the ninja master’s most guarded secrets. It’s time for you to go forth and make your way in the blogosphere.

Gary Wagnon, owner of 800biz.com Digital Marketing Solutions, specialize in helping small business owners maximize their traffic through web site design, search engine optimization (SEO), social media marketing and mobile text message marketing.

Using social media to market your business is not an option anymore. More than 40% of small businesses don’t have websites and another 25% opt not to sell their products or services on the Internet.  You still have time to join the minority.

Here are the top 10 reasons for you to post, friend and tweet right now:

10. Everyone is out there. Social media sites are the new communities. It’s where people interact, voice their opinions, get their news and shop.

9. The world is your marketplace.Unless you have to physically hold your client’s hand or can’t carry online inventory, with a PayPal account and an “Order Now” button you can do business everywhere.

8. Give them something to talk about. One of the fastest ways to spread your words is with outrageousness. This creates stories to tell. People will love to read them and share them. If their friends love them and share them, the next thing you know, you’re Susan Boyle.

7. Word of mouth is back. Social media is the perfect venue for spreading the much-coveted (and free) word of mouth advertising. The social sites give you access to an audience that has an audience that has an audience.

6. No one is an expert. A handful of people have reached big audiences with their advice or product. But, because of the web’s sheer complexity, no one has mastered any niche. If you really know your stuff, go for it.

5. It’s cheap. If you want to spend the time and learn to do it yourself, you can set up your social media accounts for nothing. Well, it will probably require a few pots of coffee to get you through the process.

4. It’s an addiction. People are spending hours a day posting and tweeting. In the last century, this obsession was known as television. This time around it’s interactive, so get out there and interact. It won’t cost you $1 million for a 30 second spot.

3. Make a difference. Social media communities are at their best when spreading the meaningful – promoting a charity, sending prayers and good wishes and even just putting out positive vibe. Get those stories started yourself.

2. You can be brief. Especially in the social media communities, the shorter your message the better. Isn’t it a lot easier to write a 140 character tweet than a 500 word sales letter?

and the #1 reason to participate in social media:

1. Promote your business. Yes, you can do that here too. The recommended ratio of business to advice and information posts is about 10 to 1. Don’t be obnoxious, promote a good thing and people will buy.

The major social media sites already report over 500 million members. Do the math. You could probably find a few thousand followers among that population, and probably make at least a few hundred sales.

Are you struggling with what to say?  “Open the Door to a World of Mouth, Get Your Message Heard & Create a Following That Does Your Advertising for You” e-book gives you a blueprint for writing compelling copy for the web and for your social media.  Get your copy now at www.writeon800biz.com

After receiving a multitude of complaints regarding Facebook’s lack of privacy, they have instituted new privacy settings. Those settings are now available. But before accepting them as they are, you should review each one to make sure they fit you and the way you use Facebook.

Facebook Privacy Setting

So the first step is to go to privacy settings under your account tab in your Facebook account. The first thing to review is the basic directory information. To begin, click on view setting. The things you’ll find here are the basic information that you want to make public.  For example, whether you want to allow people to search for you on Facebook, send you friend requests and messages, or see your friend list. By default, these are set for everyone to see and probably you won’t need to change these. If someone that you want to connect with searches for you on Facebook, this will allow them to find you and request you become friends. The next sections under the basic directory information are your work and education, your current city and hometown, and your interests and other pages. Once again, this is your choice, with your interests and other pages being the most questionable.

With the integration of Facebook and the search engines, your interests and the pages that you like can be used to design targeted advertising for you. While this isn’t new, it will become more prominent in years to come. Other websites you visit and searches you perform, may accumulate information about you and your patterns and habits so that marketers can laser target your interests. For example, let’s say you went on a website like BestBuy.com to shop for a 52 inch HD TV. A few days later, while reading an article on CNN.com, an ad appears for a 52 inch HD TV on sale in your area. Or maybe a text message gets sent to your phone with that sale. Instead of shopping for products or services, products and services will find you in the future.

Okay, so we covered the basic directory information. The next section on your privacy settings is “Sharing on Facebook.” You have the choice of allowing everyone, friends only, friends of friends, or customizing, who can see your information. There is also a recommended setting. What the recommended setting does is allow everyone to see your status, photos and posts, your bio, and your friends and relationships. It allows friends of friends to see your birthday, religious and political views, and photos and videos your tag in. And it allows friends only to post to your wall, to see your e-mail address, your phone number, and any other address or IM name.

In my case, the settings are not ones that fit my needs. Since my Facebook profile contains my business information, I want my contact information available to everyone. So I chose the custom option which allows me to pick and choose who sees my information. At the bottom of the list, you will see a pencil with the words “Customize Settings” beside it.  That will bring up the menu list of the things you share, as well as what others can share plus your contact information. For me, I want my website, my phone number and my e-mail address visible to everyone.

If you have younger children, you should probably choose to make family only visible to friends. If you are a parent of teenage kids, you probably want to monitor their Facebook page, but not have others see who your kids are.

Another setting on this same page is your album privacy. Click the “edit album privacy” link to open all your photo albums. Once again, if you have small children, you probably don’t want pictures of the family vacation visible for everyone to see. But you don’t care if your friends see them. After all, that’s why you shared them. So change this setting for each album as you need.

The next section is applications, games and websites. Applications such as Farmville, Mafia wars, and the various quizzes, polls and other activities, all are created by third-party developers. They are not associated with Facebook. But, you agree, when you set up the application, to their terms and conditions, which means they have access to all of your profile information. But what is even more intrusive is the fact that these applications have access to your friend’s profiles as well. So even though I don’t take any of the polls, play Farmville, or send hugs or hearts, my profile information is available from my friends sites that do.

With the new privacy settings, you have the option to control what information is available to applications and websites when your friends use them. I chose to make none of my information available to third-party applications. You also have the ability to easily remove applications and websites. I recommend removing any application that you no longer use.

Under the same applications section, you have the option for instant personalization. On Facebook partner sites like Pandora and Yelp (with more being added all the time), your profile information can be pulled in to help design your browsing experience on that site. For example, you login to Pandora, and when it retrieves your Facebook likes and sees you are a fan of 60s rock, it can customize the music it serves up to you. By disabling the instant personalization you eliminate that.

Public search is another choice under applications and websites. This determines whether your Facebook profile is available for search engines like Google to read. Once again, in my case, I don’t have a problem with my profile being searchable. My company information is already all over the web. Also, from the search engine optimization standpoint, my profile provides another inbound link to my website, which improves search engine positioning. However, you may choose to be less visible online, and if so, disable the public search feature.

Do you have a friend that continually sends you invites for applications? While you don’t want to block the user, you now have the choice to block an invites that come from that friend. To do so, choose the  Block Lists section at the very bottom. Here you have the option to block users by name or e-mail or to block invites from a friend.

One privacy issue that was already available is the publication of your birth date.  While it’s okay to show your birthday (everyone likes to get the birthday wishes), you should display only the month and date, not the year.  You can change this in your profile page and click on edit profile (right under your picture.)  Next to your birthday, there is a dropdown box that gives you the choice of showing your full birthday, the month & day only or not showing it at all.

All in all, the new Facebook privacy settings should provide much greater control over your online privacy. But remember, this is only one site. There are hundreds of sites that capture your information, either through cookies, through giveaways or when you register to use the site. So unless you plan to be a web recluse, your information is probably are the out there in dozens of databases all over the web.

I hope this gave you a little insight into how you customize your Facebook privacy and the reasoning behind the vigilance needed to protect yourself online.

What's Your Social Media Game Plan

Every sporting team has a game plan, a series of scripted actions that hopefully will lead to the outcome they desire, a win.  For a football team, it’s inside handoff, a safety blitz or a post pattern.  In basketball, it may be a pick and roll or a triangle and two defense. Baseball players practice, the suicide squeeze while pitchers and catchers go over the pitch sequence for each batter.

The goal of having a game plan is to have a successful outcome, winning the game. And of course it doesn’t always happen, because the opponents have their own game plan. So it comes down to who can execute their game plan the best.

Isn’t the same true for your business? You have a desired outcome, either making more money, selling more products or providing a better service. So shouldn’t you have a game plan?

But the question is where to start? The first step in the process should be defining what outcome you want. Making a ton of money isn’t an outcome, it’s a fairytale. So the first step should be defining the goals for your business. Beginning by setting SMART goals. SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Timely. There are many resources that discuss SMART goals and how to set them, so I won’t cover that here, other than to say, it is critical to know where you’re going and be able to measure your progress along the way.

So now that you have your goals set and know what outcome you want, its time to design the plays to make those happen. The first step is defining who is your target market. The second step then, becomes how do you reach your target market.

That’s where social media comes into play. Sites like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Linkedin have very broad demographics. Facebook currently has over 400 million people with the fastest growing segment being over 35 and female. In fact, Facebook is now the number two most trafficked site on the web. In March of 2010 during a one-week time period, Facebook actually got more traffic than Google.

If your business targets professionals with 100,000+ income, LinkedIn might be your best choice. While not as social a community, the LinkedIn users are categorized by their business and professions. So if you want to target marketing officers in the healthcare industry, for example, you can do that.

The incredible power social media offers to create a buzz in the marketplace is really at the heart of its strength and popularity. You can spend thousands, even hundreds of thousands of dollars, in advertising, and only hope your message reaches your targeted customers. But with social media, you can target those customers, where they’re spending a lot of time with very little cost.

I’ve always said, if I could sell word-of-mouth advertising, I would be sitting on a beach somewhere with a cell phone saying “send me a check for $100,000, and I will deliver the customers to you”. But now, that’s not far from the truth (at least the part about word-of-mouth advertising.) Social media has elevated referral marketing or word of mouth advertising to a viral state. Now, we don’t have to be on the phone or at a party talking to a friend to recommend a business. We do that on our social media sites. And while we only talk to a handful of people on the phone or, at that party, our entire circle of friends will see a recommendation posted on our wall.

So unless your business game plan includes a social media plan, you’re more like the sandlot sports team drawing plays in the dirt. You might occasionally get lucky and throw a touchdown. But if you come up against a team (business) with a well practiced game plan, success will not likely be in your future.

Gary Wagnon and 800biz.com have over 10 years experience in website design, search engine optimization and social media marketing. With over 30 years in business and consulting, we understand your business needs and partner with you to grow your business.