Social Media's Role In Reputation Management

It hasn’t escaped the attention of the savvy business that online reputation management is becoming more and more important pretty much by the day. With almost everyone now turning to the Internet before making any real spending decisions, it’s hardly surprising that what’s said about you and your brand online counts for more now than largely any other form of feedback. There were once only select service industries that were dependent on positive online feedback – the same now extends to every business and service across the board. But here’s the real kicker – a full 23% of people admit that they will take to the web to say bad things about a brand if need be, but less than 10% will sing the brand’s praises when absolutely delighted with their services or products. As such, the vast majority of online feedback has the potential to be negative and paint a picture of a brand that’s neither balanced nor fair – especially where everyday social network gossip is concerned.

This makes it hugely important to tap into the power of social media for positive reputation management and promotion – here are a few tips from the pros on how to go about this:

Optimize Social Media Pages

If and when it gets to the point that entering your brand name or other keywords returns a list of results where several are negative, you’re in trouble. The last thing you want is for the first thing people to see about your brand to be negative comments and reviews in Google. In order to prevent or treat this, optimize your social media pages and create more pages to optimize, in order to get these higher in the rankings and push the negative feedback further down while you go about addressing it.

Choose Social Media Carefully

Don’t fall into the trap of thinking the world of social media begins and ends with Facebook. Not only is this not the case, but Facebook might not be the best platform for you to choose – not even close. Take into account the various platforms out there in accordance with the target market you’re trying to reach, in order to tailor your decision accordingly. The power of Pinterest and LinkedIn for example cannot be overstated for a great many business areas.

When You Find Praise, Run With It!

Without getting carried away and coming across as desperate, it’s never a bad idea to spread the good word about you and your brand every time something positive is said about you. If you happen to find some really glowing feedback in a dark corner somewhere that most folk won’t come across, bring it to light on either your primary page or via social media. Likewise, be sure to draw further attention to any glowing praise you receive by responding to it or leaving your own comment thanking the reviewer. In addition, don’t ever be worried to reach out to your target market and actually ask them to leave you a positive review. Assuming of course you haven’t let yourself down and did a great job living up to expectations, some will be more than happy to do so.

Embrace the Criticism

It might not appear so on the surface, but negative criticism can actually be better for your business over the long-term. Not only does it show you where you need to improve, but you can turn any negative into a positive by following it up and responding to it in order to win over the part responsible party and anyone else coming across it.

Listen and Learn

And finally, the most important thing of all to take away from social media in terms of reputation management is constructive feedback as to where you’re going wrong and what is going down well with the punters. Don’t weigh up what you read against your own biased views of the business, take them as the most valuable insights you will ever have as to how you can better your operations.

Author Bio
Rocky John Tayaban, for the past 8 years, has been helping small and large companies all over the world in their online marketing. At the moment, Rocky is the managing director of iSolutions Media - a search engine marketing firm in the Philippines. Follow him on Twitter @SmartOnlinePros to stay updated on all the latest in social and search.

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How To Sell Stock Photos Online And Make Good Money

With the world becoming a digital village, photography has also gone digital. The on-line photo market has become so vibrant, that a photographer can take photos and instantly, sell them online. Selling stock photos online however, can be tricky, especially if you do not match up the style and modern trend of photography. With the increased use of online technology across the world photographers are making good money by selling their photos to online users and clients. However it is important to remember that not all images or photos can be sold on-line. Online photo buyers are looking for quality and only quality and high standard photos will sell fast.

How to sell photos online
The first step for any photographer wishing to sell photos online is to register with a photo agency. It will be easier to sell your photos through the agency rather than doing it on your own. Online photo agencies have a constant and reliable customer base, this means that your photos are more likely to be sold out faster.

After registering with a photo agency the next step will be to capture the best images that will attract the attention of any photo lover, and then upload them and mail them to the agency. If your photos become so impressive, you will become a reliable source for the agency. Remember the more pictures you submit to the agency the more cash you receive.

Factors to consider when taking photos
The quality of your pictures will determine how fast you sell them, let your pictures speak for themselves, photos you take should be able to tell a story.

• Make sure that your photos are well lit and cropped. A well lit photo will attract someone at first sight. A photo that is well lit is more appealing and clearly brings out the idea and the message of the photo.

• Do not try to submit plagiarized photos or photos that might turn out to be defamatory. Online photos need to be of high resolution, therefore if you want your photos to sell faster ensure that they are of high resolution.

• For your photos to sell online, ensure that they have appropriate captions and key words if necessary. Photos with captions and key words are more complete and will sell easily.

• Photos that are unique are more likely to sell on any online website, therefore as a photographer ensure that you capture what people want to see, capture unique photos but not obvious photos. Do not submit what has already been submitted before, always submit new content.

• Ensure that you have the exclusive rights over your photos, this will prevent your photos from being used without your consent. For your photos to sell faster ensure that they stand out from the rest, always capture the extraordinary and always take your photos from a unique angle.

Generally for you to sell your photos online you need to have high quality, unique and clear photos. Always send your photos to a reliable agency, this will ensure that you are not conned in any way.

Sean Kelly is a blogger at acceleratingpossibilities.org. With a background in seo and affiliate marketing, he enjoys writing about creative ways to make money Online.

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The Easy Fundamentals Of Building Car Websites

The Internet is full of acronyms these days, and SEO, short for search engine optimization, is one of them. However, it's not just another set of letters that have no real meaning. When it comes to the building blocks of SEO for auto dealerships and their car websites, there's a few specifics that marketers should keep in mind.

Avoid These Mistakes
Auto SEO has a lot to do with optimizing for local buyers. But's not just about a single geographical area. For example, neighborhoods and suburbs are also important. Secondly, consumers aren't just concerned with make and model. As a salesman, you might know which cars have what features, but consumers don't. They might be shopping for an SUV with four wheel drive or a luxury sedan, so don't forget about keywords that describe vehicles rather than just naming them.

Lastly, smart SEOs recognize the value of targeting car buyers based on the stage of the buying process. People who are searching for a vehicle are comparing features and look at options, which ties into the previous though. As they move through the process, consumers will want real choices, which your dealership may be able to provide them. Obviously, there's a lot of keywords that you can focus on, but you don't want to try to do everything at once, especially when you're doing SEO yourself. Instead, consider the keywords that will have the highest conversion and focus on that. You can always tweak or adjust your campaigns in the future, but you don't want to spread yourself too thin when you're getting started.

Getting Social with Content
The obvious way to avoid low-quality content is to create content that visitors will find useful. Car dealers have a specific advantage because there's so much that consumers don't know about cars. First-time buyers will especially find comparisons and feature guides useful. Plus, a car blog is the perfect way to advise drivers on keeping their vehicles in the best condition for resale. In locations where snow is a concern, dealers can populate their blogs.

This content is perfect for sharing on social media, too. An article or image that goes viral brings traffic to your website, and those visitors can become customers. Social media has become increasingly more important. Google counts retweets, shares and +1s when ranking pages in the SERPs. Furthermore, Google shows results from its own social network, Google+, above organic results in the search engine, so it's vital that you promote content from your dealer website and blog on Google+.

Embracing Your Identity
Authorship is another opportunity of which you should take advantage. When you link to your Google+ profile from your website or blog and place the link of your site in your profile, you've claimed your site as an author. When you post content to your site, your Google+ profile picture will appear next to that content in the SERPs along with links to your profile. This visually separates your content from others on the results page. This is important for salesman because it shows a real person associated with the content. If yours is a trusted name, why wouldn't you want to take advantage of it?

SEO is a big task, which is why so many dealers hire on a freelancer or even a team of SEO pros to help with the job. An SEO may be able to see where your campaigns are lacking or provide knowledge gained through experience in other industries. Of course, this comes at a price. Whether you're simply paying cash or spending your time on SEO, it's important to get it right.

By Andrew Handley
I write weekly articles for a car blog. I've had experience with car dealerships and maintenance business websites, as well as car hobby communities.

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How To Draw A Circle Form In C#

 

I have seen some controls/components that can change the form into circle.. today I came up with something very simple umm well, it’s done with drawing. You’ll need to add the namespace : using System.Drawing;. We’ll do the drawing in form_load if you want you can do it under a button_click event or something else..

This is the code :

System.Drawing.Drawing2D.GraphicsPath XY = new System.Drawing.Drawing2D.GraphicsPath();
            XY.AddEllipse(0, 0, 300, 300);
            this.Region = new Region(XY);

GraphicsPath() : Initialize a new Graphics Path.
AddEllipse() : Adds a Ellipse to the Graphics Path.
new Region() : Describes a Graphics Shape.

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Investing In Office Hardware - Why Not To Overlook Telephony Headset

It’s not uncommon for business owners to occasionally take stock of the equipment currently in use around the office and plan a bit of an overhaul when and where needed. However, something that rarely fails to escape the attention of those concerned is the contingency of telephony hardware sitting around every desk and workspace. In essence the reason for this is pretty simple – something along the lines of the old ‘If it isn’t broken then don’t fix it’ way of thinking. After all, the standard analogue phone lines and devices themselves have been serving businesses faithfully for decades, so is there really any need to start replacing them all now? Well, you could argue whether the need exists as such, but when it comes to the business that really wants to keep itself ahead of the game, telephony is a very good place to start.

New Standards

Across pretty much every business area the world over today, standards have never been higher and neither have the expectations of clients, customers and peer businesses alike. This of course includes communication which despite having shifted in many circles primarily to the internet still for most means the good old-fashioned telephone. So the phone still counts for a great deal, but what won’t be put up with by anyone these days is the unreliable, low quality or out-of-service telephone number. Likewise, high-rate calls are a thing of the past and so too are enormously irritating call-waiting systems. This is precisely why remaining with an outdated office phone system has the very real potential to leave any modern business trailing dangerously behind its rivals. It’s not a case of going OTT with the most cutting edge gear available, but rather one of responding to precisely what it is that people are expecting these days and not building a reputation for all the wrong reasons.

Ease of Use

In addition to the above, it might seem like staying with legacy telephone systems makes sense for the sake of simplicity, but in practice it can be anything but. Today’s cutting-edge internet phones make it child’s play to operate anything and everything you can possibly think of on the subject of office communications. From the simple corded phones to wireless headset accessories to large-scale conference calling and the most comprehensive caller-ID and recording systems ever devised, all of these features and more are as easy to use as a quick point and click via a computer program. The days of bashing buttons and wiggling wires to try and get telephones working properly are mercifully over.

Cost Reductions

And here comes the real kicker of all – the most advanced digital and internet phones you can buy today are in fact 100% guaranteed to pay for themselves. Sure they cost most to buy than the cheapest legacy phones, but when you consider the gigantic savings made every day in every call made and service used, there’s really no comparing the two. So when the time comes once again to revamp the office, take a look at your phones consider the fact that you’ve already got the necessary internet connections installed and mull over how much better off you could be by making the switch.

Author Bio
John Baron has been writing full-time for over 5 years. He regularly blogs about the Internet, tech gadgets and web development. John is also an animal rights activist and an active member of PETA. Follow him on Twitter @SEOquickrank to get the latest technology updates.

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Automated Material Handling Systems The Power And Benefits

From the moment man figured out how to move objects from one place to another, the world changed forever. Manual laborers armed with the tools to handle and transfer materials quickly and efficiently, soon transformed manufacturing and distribution---giving rise to whole new industries. Today, thanks to the power of automated material handling systems, a new transformation has occurred, allowing small and large businesses to thrive like never before. Here’s a look at some of the many benefits of automated material handling systems.

Reduced labor costs – From handling raw materials during manufacturing to the handling and transportation of finished products to facilities for storage and distribution, the costs of manually handling materials can be considerable. Automated Material Handling Systems can dramatically reduce costs by minimizing manual handling or eliminating it altogether.

Improved efficiency – Despite best efforts, the manual handling of materials has traditionally been plagued by inefficiencies, due to the human factor. In contrast, an Automated Handling System (AHS) maximizes efficiency by handling and delivering the correct materials and products---in the correct quantities to the desired location at the correct time---in the most economical manner.

Reduced damage – One of the downsides of the manual handling of materials and products during all phases of production and distribution is that damage can often occur during storage and movement. Automated handling systems are designed to minimize damage through proper material handling systems. In addition, reduced damage can mean substantial savings.

Reduced waste of space – Unlike the manual warehousing of materials--- which often results in less than optimal space utilization---automated handling systems are designed to make the most of every available inch of storage space, thus reducing both handling and storage costs. In addition, automated systems can also free up valuable floor space in production facilities.

Reduced accidents – The human handling of materials carries inherent risks of accidents, such as slips, trips and falls. Not to mention the Cumulative Trauma Disorders that are the result of repetitive movements such as lifting and twisting. Along with exacting a human toll, accidents additionally result in lost productivity. By eliminating manual handling, automated systems minimize accidents while ensuring a safe and efficient flow of materials and products. In addition, automation typically allows for a cleaner more orderly environment than found in operations that are dependent on manual product movement.

Increased scalability – As businesses grow and expand, one of the challenges they face is being able to expand operations in order to meet increased demand. Automated handling systems have the ability to scale up quickly and easily to meet new production needs---along with larger and heavier product units if required---without prolonged downtime for adding and retooling equipment.

Real-time control – In order to better meet the often stringent demands of today’s customers---who typically want things “yesterday”---more and more facilities are turning to automation and computerization to give them complete system control in real-time. This type of flexibility allows for the accurate and fast fulfillment of all orders, the net result being better customer service, higher profits and a greater competitive advantage.

David Glenn is a home improvement expert. He occasionally freelance writes about home security and DIY home repair. 

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Top Technology Gifts For Her

Are you looking to surprise your girlfriend by giving her an unexpected gift? Would you like to buy something special for your wife? Whether you are planning on buying a video game console or a brand-new mobile phone, this post will help you select the best technology present for your loved ones.

Enjoy the New Nexus 5
If you are interested in purchasing one of the most powerful and innovative mobile phones on the market, the Nexus 5 is a great gift for every occasion. This smartphone has been designed by Google, making it one of the lightest and more refined devices ever manufactured, and while the Nexus 5 offers a wide variety of features, it is a much more affordable mobile phone than the Samsung Galaxy Note 3 or the Apple iPhone 5S. The Nexus 5 features a 5-inch display capable of offering a great image quality, but also an 8-megapixel rear camera that will allow your significant other to capture some of her most special moments. Last, but not least, thanks to Android 4.4, Nexus 5’s new operating system, she will also be able to download some of the most popular applications on her smartphone, such as Twitter or Instagram.

Discover the New Xbox One
There is always an occasion for buying a new gift, and what better present than one of the latest and most exciting devices on the market? While just some years ago consoles were only able to play video games, the brand-new Xbox One is capable of much more, including the ability to stream music or movies from the Internet. Thanks to its innovative user interface and its new operating system, you and your girlfriend will be able to use the Xbox One as a multimedia device, giving you the opportunity of using popular applications such as Skype or Internet Explorer from the comfort of your couch. Whether she would like to follow her favourite TV series or download the latest films, this video game console is compatible with some the most widely used streaming services, including Hulu or Netflix, something that will allow both of you to benefit from your hyperfast fibre optic internet connection. 

Give Her the New Amazon Kindle
If you are looking for a convenient and light reading device, the Amazon Kindle is one of the best options available on the market. This gadget is able to provide hours and hours of reading with just a single charge thanks to its improved battery life. On top of that, she won’t have to worry about reading in bright sunlight thanks to the Kindle’s high-quality electronic ink screen, a unique technology that avoids glare while using your device. Additionally, Amazon offers a wide selection of books in its online store for her to download on the Amazon Kindle, allowing her to easily purchase books from her favourite authors. Moreover, it is also possible to download books in the public domain from the Amazon store, a very interesting option if she wants to enjoy classic books without having to spend any money.

Take a look at this :  Best Apps To Make Christmas Easier

Sarah is a writer and blogger with a special interest in technology. She has little patience for things which are slow and so is constantly on the search for the latest technological developments. 

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How To Login To Instagram Using The API In VB.NET

Instagram is a photo and video sharing app for smartphones, we can call it a social network. As I said It's a smartphone app but you can view photos, like photos, comment on photos and follow/unfollow users via their website from computer also there are more than 10 popular websites where you can view photos, like photos, comment on photos and follow/unfollow users, browse hashtags and view stats they use the API to do the works.

Without much talk let's get into it..

Remember you're just going to make a Instagram Login, you won't be able to view photos or do anything. You need two textbox and a button you can also add two labels to make it look good. The textbox1 is for username and textbox2 is for password.

Time for some codes...

Required Namespaces :

Imports System.IO
Imports System.Net
Imports System.Text

Functions(We need two functions) :

  
 Dim CC As New CookieContainer
    Dim RQ As HttpWebRequest
    Dim RP As HttpWebResponse
    Public Function GetResponse(ByVal url As String, ByVal referer As String) As String
        RQ = CType(HttpWebRequest.Create(url), HttpWebRequest)
        RQ.CookieContainer = CC

        If referer <> "" Then
            RQ.Referer = referer
        End If

        RP = CType(RQ.GetResponse(), HttpWebResponse)

        Return New StreamReader(RP.GetResponseStream()).ReadToEnd()
    End Function

    Public Function GetResponse(ByVal url As String, ByVal post As String, ByVal referer As String) As String
        RQ = CType(HttpWebRequest.Create(url), HttpWebRequest)
        RQ.Method = "POST"
        RQ.CookieContainer = CC
        RQ.UserAgent = "AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1) Chrome/28.0.1468.0 Safari/537.36"

        If referer <> "" Then
            RQ.Referer = referer
        End If

        Dim byteArr() As Byte = Encoding.Default.GetBytes(post)
        RQ.ContentLength = byteArr.Length

        Dim dataStream As Stream = RQ.GetRequestStream()
        dataStream.Write(byteArr, 0, byteArr.Length)

        RP = CType(RQ.GetResponse(), HttpWebResponse)

        Return New StreamReader(RP.GetResponseStream()).ReadToEnd()
    End Function

This code is for your login button :

Dim html As String = GetResponse("https://instagram.com/accounts/login/", "")
        Dim token As String = html.Substring(html.IndexOf("csrfmiddlewaretoken")).Split(""""c)(2)
        Dim username As String = TextBox1.Text
        Dim password As String = TextBox2.Text

        Dim S_B As New StringBuilder
        S_B.Append("csrfmiddlewaretoken=" & token)
        S_B.Append("&username=" & username)
        S_B.Append("&password=" & password)

        html = GetResponse("https://instagram.com/accounts/login/", S_B.ToString, "https://instagram.com/accounts/login/")

        If html.Contains("""username"":""" & username) Then
            MsgBox("Successfully Logged In", MessageBoxIcon.Information)
        ElseIf html.Contains("Please enter a correct username and password.") Then
            MsgBox("Invalid Username or Password", MessageBoxIcon.Error)
        Else
            MsgBox("Unable Login Error", MessageBoxIcon.Error)
        End If

Now run the program and test it..

If you enter correct login credentials you will get this message :

I am looking to develop a Instagram picture view if everything goes well I will let you all know. Follow me on Instagram @54j33dh4.

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How To Detect Real Time Browser Size In JQuery

This JQuery script detects the dimensions of browser's size onload and resize...

Add these in your head :
<meta name='viewport' content='initial-scale=1.0'> <script type='text/javascript' src='http://code.jquery.com/jquery-1.9.1.min.js'></script>  <script type='text/javascript'> $(function() { // Declare the load n resize on event handlers $(window).on('load resize', function() { // Show/Detect browser size on specified elements. $('#width').text($(window).width().toString()); $('#height').text($(window).height().toString()); }); }); </script> <br>

Add the styles(not so important) :
<style type='text/css'> /* Body + Text Color */ body { background:#ccc; color:#000; } #detectsize { position:absolute; top:0; left:0; width:100%; } </style>

Add these to your body :
<div id="detectsize"> <center> <h1> Width: <span id="width"></span>px</h1> <h1> Height: <span id="height"></span>px</h1> </center> </div>

Now just save the document and run in your browser :)

All the credits goes to Michael(mikethedj4)

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