8 interesting facts about Mobile SEO

Journey of Chaiwala to Prime Minister

Narendra Modi’s life has been a journey of courage, compassion and constant hardwork. At a very young age he had decided to devote his life in service of the people. He displayed his skills as a grass root level worker, an organiser and an administrator during his 13 year long stint as the Chief Minister of his home state of Gujarat, where he ushered a paradigm shift towards pro-people and pro-active good governance.
Narendra Modi’s formative years taught him early tough lessons as he balanced his studies, non-academic life to spare time to work at the family owned Tea Stall as the family struggled to make ends meet.At the age of 17 he left home to travel across India. For two years he travelled across the expansive landscape of India exploring various cultures. 
In 1987 a different chapter began in the life of Mr. Modi when he started work as the General Secretary of the BJP in Gujarat. In his first task Mr. Modi won a victory for the BJP in Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation elections for the first time ever. He also ensured that the BJP was a close second to the Congress in the 1990 Gujarat Assembly elections. In the 1995 Assembly elections Mr. Modi’s organizational skills ensured the BJP’s vote share increased and the party won 121 seats in the Assembly.It was in September 2001 that Mr. Modi received a phone call from then Prime Minister Vajpayee which opened a new chapter in his life taking him from the rough and tumble of Organizational Politics to the world of Governance, which led him to Chief Minister of Gujrat.
Narendra Modi’s evolution from quintessential Organization Man of the BJP to one of India’s best known leaders recognized for his Good Governance over a span of a decade tells a story of grit, determination and Strong Leadership in the face of grave adversity. Narendra Modi’s transition from the world of Political Organizing to the realm of Administration and Governance neither had the luxury of time nor the benefit of training. Shri Modi had to learn the ropes of Administration while on the job right from Day One. 
Apart from all these today PM Narendra Modi, who extensively uses social media has 11.9 Mn followers over twitter with 7578 tweets. While over facebook he is having 28 Mn fan followers taking him to top 3 social media favourites. 

Even though he kept on attending the public rallies during he Prime Minister electorial Campaign, he was also well connected with the country over social media. Which also led him to become a well known global leader of his era and taking him in the league of Prez. Obama.

Reference: pmindia.gov.in

The Pied Piper of Digital Marketing: On the Pathway of Chief Minister to Prime Minister

Recently on his show, Koffee With Karan, Karan Johar asked three celebrity youngsters who’s the President of India. Responses varied from Manmohan Singh to Prithviraj Chauhan to pass over. Perhaps, Johar would have received a correct response to the question, “Who is the Chief Minister of Gujarat?”

He’s neither a marketing guru nor has he formally studied the Keller's Brand Equity Model; however Narendra Modi has successfully advanced on the brand pyramid starting from creating brand awareness to defining brand purpose to gathering brand response and to building brand advocates. He’s the undisputed Pied Piper (Politician) of the Indian Social Media but the question still remains - will he be able to win the 2014 elections and if he does, how much credit can be given to Social Media? Here’s a review on his journey from - being the Chief Minister of Gujarat to a universally accepted National Leader.

In 2007, YouTube was the first social platform that Modi befriended. His journey on Twitter and Facebook commenced in the month of Januray 2009 and May 2009 respectively. On 14th April 2009, on the occasion of the 118th birth anniversary of Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar, Narendra Modi started blogging and he also had a personal website by then. In 2010, Modi’s Twitter follower base increased to one lakh and by December 2011, he had over four lakh followers which finally crossed the one million milestone in October 2012. He’s named to be the first Indian politician to use Google Hangout and have an App on his name, ‘iModi’. As per FollowerWonk, as on Dec 30, 2013 Modi has about 3,040,192 followers on Twitter and his social authority is 81 (on the scale of 1 – 100; where 1 is lowest and 100 is highest). On Facebook, Modi has 7,549,972 likes and 960,914 people talking about him.

Modi’s content strategy changed as per his objectives. In the early days of creating a brand identity, he established his presence on various social platforms. His Facebook posts were simultaneously sent to Twiter; the content revolved around inspirational quotes (his favourite leader is Swami Vivekanand), quotes from scriptures and his daily activities. In this stage, Modi certainly measured the number of posts and also the content; perhaps he was testing the water then!

In the second stage of building the brand meaning, Modi focused on "performance" and in turn built his "imagery." He started taking about his achievements and the developments in Gujarat; his fans and followers had started engaging by liking, sharing and commenting. While he garnered support, he also invited criticism by opposition, media and a few citizens.

In the thirst stage of building brand response, Modi’s focus shifted on helping his audience build "judgments" and "feelings." This was the stage where Modi built his credibility, increased his consideration and amplified his superiority. He took to an unusual move by mass following people on Twitter. As on January 01, 2012, he was following 174 people and as on Dec 30. 2013 he is following 885 people. Apart from following his colleagues in the BJP, international leaders, eminent celebrities, Modi also followed a few of his fans and well-wishers. A top public figure’s 'following back’ spree indicated that he is as much a people’s person; this created an army of advocates. Now here I can say that Narendra Modi is the Pied Piper of Twitter (Politician) and his magical pipes (loyal advocates) are:

@MrsGandhi, @sunandavashisht, @tajinderbagga, @anilkohli54, @alok_bhatt, @ratigirl, @KiranKS, @ThinkersPad, @nanditathhakur, @VarshaRitu_, @shilpitewari, @sureshnakhua and more…

By that time Modi has tweeted 724 tweets and since then the frequency of his tweets and posts increased. Also, there was a notable change in the content strategy; in addition to sharing his credentials, he turned more vocal about the opposition and created strong statements to express his opinions. He managed to draw attention of many, reinforced confidence in his existing followers and built conviction of those who were neutral about him. Beginning 2012 up to date, Modi has remained the most talked about politicians on the social media creating a Twitter trend every now and then. Those who were pro-Modi helped in elevating his image and those who were anti-Modi coined the term “Feku” for him. Several questions were raised on genuineness of his fans and followers; controversial stories around he manipulating online poll results to elevate his image were all over. Also, question was raised on how fan following on social media would translate in to a vote for the BJP.

Sentiments on the Social Media clearly signalled appeal for the brand “Modi”. In September 2013, Modi was declared the BJPs prime ministerial candidate for 2014. Now begins Modi’s final stage of buildingbrand resonance with active campaigning for election. Jiten Gajaria of the BJP’s social media cell said, “We are bringing about convergence of social media with ground-level mobilisation. Although many claim that social media had little penetration among the “masses”, who actually come out and cast their ballot, even a minor swing in votes could change fortunes.” The party has now set up 12 tables from where volunteers, who are not party members, can tweet minute-by-minute updates on election rallies. Since November 2013, the party has been extensively using SMSes, emails, Twitter and Facebook to garner support for various rallies. All his events are available LIVE on the YouTube.

A survey earlier this year had claimed that social media could influence the outcome in 160 of the 543 Lok Sabha constituencies, of which the maximum — 21 were from Maharashtra. A coincidental fact to support the claim, that social media could influence the outcome of election, is four of five state elections have been won by the BJP. We’ll watch and see the outcome in 2014, but certainly Social Media has contributed in the making of the brand “Modi”.

Reference : intelliassist.in

7 Ways To Increase Your Klout Score

1.       If you have a Twitter account, you most likely have a Klout score. If, however, you have a protected Twitter account, your score will not move much beyond 10 even if you are the most active tweeter on Twitter. This is because Klout can only access public data. Twitter engagement is a huge factor in your helping to raise your Klout score so I would advise making your Twitter account public.

2.       Connect all your social media platforms to Klout.com. Klout.com currently has 13 social media platforms built into their measurement sticks; Twitter, Facebook (personal profile or fan page), LinkedIn, YouTube, Google+, Instagram, Flickr, Last.fm, Foursquare, Tumblr Blogger and WordPress. They are going to be adding Quora, Yelp, Posterous, Livefyre, Disqus, Bit.ly and Brandout in the near future.

3.       Twitter engagement will play a huge roll in increasing your Klout score so make sure that you reply to people when they tweet you. Thank people when they retweet your tweets and work on building relationships so that people will be more apt to share your content when you tweet it.

4.       Content is KING so make sure that you are sharing your content and even other people’s content that is relevant to your niche and that you believe your audience would find beneficial. Make it easy for people to share your content directly from your website by having social sharing plugins installed. Trending topics or curated content is a great way to find value based content to share on your social media networks. I use Google Reader to curate great content from my favorite blog sites.

5.       Engage influencers in your niche. Klout rewards you for engaging with people who have higher klout scores than you do so it is beneficial to reach out to influencers in a positive and authentic way. Respond to what they are tweeting or make a comment on their content. Be unique and stand out in some way so that you will grab their attention. 

6.       Ask questions because people LOVE to give their opinions about things. Random questions definitely work but you can actually turn every day topics into questions. Perhaps you are in the market for a new phone. Asking people their opinion on whether you should buy an iPhone or an Android will get you tons of responses! 

7.       If you want to be retweeted, start by tweeting others. This will start you on the path to building relationships that you did not have previously as everyone loves to be retweeted.

Remember, more engagement will help you to increase your Klout score.

Some Mind-Blowing facts about Social Media

18-24-year-olds on Facebook have 510 friends on average. (Marketing Charts)

87 percent of bullied teens were targeted on Facebook. (DailyMail)

59 percent of parents have talked to their children because they were concerned about something posted to social media. (Pew Internet Project)

43 percent of parents check their children’s Facebook profile daily. (Education Database Online)

Facebook collects over 500 terabytes of data every day. (GigaOm)

One out of every seven minutes spent online is on Facebook. (Mediabistro)

35 percent of employers have found information on social media that’s caused them to not hire a job candidate. (Mindflash.com)

85 percent of women are annoyed by their friends on Facebook. (Web Pro News)

Links about sex are shared 90 percent more than any other link on Facebook. (Go Globe)

61 percent of Facebook users have voluntarily taken a break from it. (Pew Internet Project)

Facebook has been linked to 66 percent of divorces in the U.S., with 81 percent of the nation’s top divorce lawyers claiming clients have cited using social networks as damning evidence against their spouses in the past five years. (Third Age)

One-third of Facebook’s 18-34 aged female demographic check Facebook when they first wake up, even before going to the bathroom. (Qbee Media)

Some Must-Know Facts about BRANDS

Joseph W. Luter, IV, evp of sales and marketing at Smithfield Foods, is the highest paid brand marketing executive, having earned $4.5 million in 2012. (Forbes)

The average retail brand site takes 2.5 times longer to load on tablets than it does on desktops. (L2 Think Tank)

86 percent of people skip TV commercials, yet brands still spent $19.8 billion last year on TV spots. (Outside the Beltway and PR Daily)

Up to 50 percent of digital marketing activities are outsourced by brands. (Gartner)

243 retail brands have gone out of business in the last five years. (Retail Research)

Spending on social, including influencer outreach, makes up only 10 percent of brands’ digital marketing spend. (Technorati)

Annual digital marketing operating budgets represented 2.5 percent of a company’s revenue in 2012. (Gartner)

The average large brand has 178 social media accounts. (Altimeter Group)

The average brand CMO tenure is 43 months. (Forbes)

Facebook brand pages achieve an average engagement rate of 1 percent. (MediaBrix)

About 20 percent of digital marketers are looking for a new job, and more than 66 percent will be doing so in the near future. (Digiday)

86 percent of consumer feedback online is being missed by brands. (Social Media Explorer)

70 percent of marketers do not collect social media data about competing brands. (Loyalty 360)

70 percent of consumers prefer getting to know a company via content marketing such as sponsored articles rather than ads, but brands spend more on advertising than on this type of content. (Content Plus)

The average post from a Facebook brand page only reaches 16 percent of fans. (The Next Web).

Reference: digiday.com

Why Invest in Social Media Marketing ?