YouTube vs the Boob Tube

 By Hector Cisneros

Image courtesy Pixabay

If you own a business, you’re always looking for ways to promote yourself, your products, and your services.  One of the most dynamic ways of showcasing all three is via video.  Video allows you to show as well as tell what makes your business special.  It can take viewers inside your operation to get a peek at the people and processes that make your business tick.  In short, video can help you part the curtain that separates prospects from clients by letting them know, trust and like you.  And you can do this in a way that informs and entertains.  Then all you have to do is deliver your message to the masses.

A Comparative Look at Google’s Top Applications and its Competitors

Episode 2 of 3 – Can Google be all things to All People?

By Hector Cisneros

Courtesy of Flickr

There is no doubt that Google dominates the Internet today. However, the Internet is rapidly evolving into multiple arenas that include organic and paid search, cloud storage, and computing, video and photo storage and streaming, social media, browser, and OS connectivity and office productivity suites. These subsets of the Internet are becoming productivity and marketing arenas on their own. Google’s competitors are eager to knock Google off the top of its dominant position on the World Wide Web. The companies that control the sub arenas will directly affect our lives in many ways. Soon everyone will have to choose a camp to maximize the benefits of what the web should offer. In episode 2 of this 3-part series, we will explore Google's top offerings along with its top competitors including; Apple, Microsoft, Facebook, Amazon, and others. So, get ready for a comparative look at Google’s apps and its top contenders and their Internet applications as they slug it out to gain supremacy.

Lights! Webcam! YouTube action!

Courtesy of  en.wikipedia.org

By Danny Murphy

Did you ever wonder how some businesses have the time and resources to make videos for YouTube and other social media outlets? What is the difference between videos that go viral and videos that are just out there? What does it take to make an effective video for a small business? This article is about the way some businesses are using video as part of their marketing mix. One surprising thing it that production costs are way down and it doesn’t take much to get started. Read and learn from this week’s Working the Web to Win article about businesses that use video and how you can get video to work for your business. These days almost anyone can make a video and put it on YouTube. Millions and millions of videos are being produced, posted, and shared. Here are a few interesting stats from YouTube. 

The DIY Online Marketing Solution

Courtesy of Pixabay

By Carl Weiss

“We’re Number ONE!”

That’s what everyone strives for in the USA. Whether you’re talking sports, business, academics, or keeping up with the Jones’, Americans are extraordinarily competitive. This is especially true for online position of Google search. Ever since the first search engines appeared more than 20 years ago, website owners vied for the top spot on every keyword combination imaginable. Today, a Page One position is more competitive and more important than ever before. There are nearly 600 million websites and only 14 to 20 Page One positions for any specific keyword combination. Talk about competitive!

Hector's the Connector’s Predicts Social Media changes for This Year and Beyond

By Hector Cisneros

Courtesy of blog.buzzoole.com

Social media has seen radical changes over the last three years. Their level of acceptance and use has Social networks now have the eyes and ears of billions of subscribers. The impact of organic search ranking is indisputable today. Also, its effect on product acceptance, adoption and loyalty has become so important that large companies are spending vast amounts of advertising money to create and measure its influence on their product sales and profitability. Cyber criminals are also taking advantage of this mass migration to social networks. My last two prediction articles have come in with a 95% accuracy rating and this year I am going out on a limb with a few of my prognostications. So read on and find out what I foresee the New Year will ring in for Social Networking in the year to come (including Facebook, Google+ LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, Pintrest and Blogger).
exploded. Many of the top social networks are now monetized and have become publicly held companies.

Maximizing the Plus in Google+ Brand Pages

Courtesy of mashable.com

By Hector Cisneros

Do you use Google+? Are you using, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube or Twitter for your business? If you are using any of these social networks, but not using Google+, you’re missing one of the biggest boats in the social networking ocean. The fact that Google Brand pages are tied into Google Search, Google Local and Google Maps, is crucial to your online marketing success  since they all contain the magic word “Google.” Google has 81% of search, this is reason enough for you to start utilizing Google+ Brand pages for your business. On top of that, it has in excess of 500 million subscribers.

The World Wide Weird

By Carl Weiss

English: Microchips (EPROM memory) with a transparent window, showing the integrated circuit inside. Uploaded by Richard Wheeler (Zephyris) 2007. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Who would have thought when Robert Noyce invented and patented the silicon based integrated circuit way back in 1959 that the world would forever more be changed.  While the initial uses for the computer chip were initially limited to big business and military applications, within a dozen years, the computer revolution would enter consumer electronics with the founding of Apple Computer.  Since then the integrated circuit has become part of virtually every consumer electronic gadget from cellphones and televisions to the cars we drive.  Just when you think that just about every possible application has been thought up, some enterprising entrepreneur comes up with another use for the computer chip.  While there are a number of useful creations such as medical prosthetics that have been known to improve the quality of life for many, what I want to bring to you today are the “out there” applications that seem to be some sort of technological outgrowth of the lunatic fringe.

Using Video as a Social Media Platform

Courtesy of Pixabay

By Carl Weiss

Everyone is talking about social media today. Network TV stations tell you to follow them on Twitter. They ask you to like them on Facebook or ask you to upload your pictures to their Facebook page. Radio stations are doing the same thing. As a matter of fact, even newspapers and magazines are getting in on the act. All of these old players (established networks and communications conglomerates) all are moving towards social media communications. However, there is a new sheriff in town that most people never even think of as a social media giant!

The Care and Feeding of the 800-Pound Gorilla in the Room Named Google

Courtesy of www.fanpop.com

By Carl Weiss

When I was a young boy I saw the movie "King Kong." It was just an amazing movie for me. Kong was gigantic, he could do what ever he wanted on his island. He was the undisputed ruler of his world. Like King Kong, we now have a new undisputed ruler of the internet world. Our new gorilla is often gracious in what it provides and yet can be ruthless when obtaining what it wants. So who is the new King Kong? It's google of course. Here are some fact worth noting.

The Future of Web Video – Candid Camera for Everyone

Courtesy of Piqsels

By Carl Weiss


If you were born in the 50s, you remember the TV show Candid Camera. It always had funny clips of people doing crazy stuff of saying funny things. It was an immensely popular show. TV continued to evolve through the 60s, 70s, and 80s, but when the 90s rolled around, something new happened: the Internet. At first, video was not big on the Internet because connections speeds were too slow. However, by 2000, speed was no longer and issues and video started to take off. 

Hector The Connector's Social Media Marketing Predictions for Next Year and Beyond

Listen to internet radio with workingthewebtowin on Blog Talk Radio

By Hector Cisneros

It’s almost 2013 and what a wild year, it’s been. We had people predicting the end of the world. A wild and woolly presidential election and Social Media has ushered in so many changes that you have to step back just to try to get the big picture. Speaking of big, last year I predicted growth and lots of it. I made several predictions about specific big-time players and I was right 100% of the time. This year things are wilder than ever. If you use Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, YouTube or Pinterest, you are going to want to read this blog. So let’s get started with the connectors Social Media Marketing Predictions for 2013.

The End of Conventional Advertising as We Knew it Would Be

Courtesy of Flickr

By Hector Cisneros

With the Mayan Prophecy of 12/21/12 only days away, I thought we would take the time to talk about how the Internet has already changed the world as we knew it.  In fact, when it comes to life as we know it is irrevocably altered, there isn't much that can hold a candle to the World Wide Web.  Think about it, the Internet is less than a quarter of a century old, yet it has infiltrated every facet of humanity, from telecommunications to computers, from newspapers to books to televisions, from yellow pages to the postal service. Even automobiles and medical devices connect to the web.

Will Web TV Change the World as You Know It?

By Carl Weiss

Courtexy of Pixabay

When it comes to the Internet, there are a number of sites and technologies that have truly been game changers. When Jeff Bezos founded Amazon.com in 1994, he started an etail revolution that would eventually put the fear of God into brick and mortar retailers. In 1995, eBay was founded, which would change the face of auctioning forever. Then on September 4th of the following year, a pair of enterprising Stanford University students named Larry Page and Sergey Brin founded Google, the search engine that would later go onto dominate web search.

Along the way, technologies came and went.  Online empires (such as Netscape) rose and fell.  It wasn’t until February of 2005 that three former PayPal employees named Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim started YouTube.com.  A little more than a year later, on October 9, 2006, it was announced that the company would be purchased by Google for $1.65 billion in stock. And the rest is history.

Social Media Marketing via Online Video

Courtesy of www.abhikarma.com

By Carl Weiss

When we talk about social media we immediately think of Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn, but often overlook the video option of YouTube.  I know what you're thinking, "YouTube is a video portal, not a social network."  When you get right down to it, what is a social network? It's an online diary that can be used to update friends, family and associates about your life and/or your business.  Better still, it's an e-diary that you not only allow, but encourage others to peruse and redistribute.

Now I ask you, which  would you say is  more compelling, Text or Video?

What's the Best Social Media Site for a Small Business?

Courtesy of www.lostintechnology.com

by Hector Cisneros

A common question I get is: "What's the best social media site for me to be on?"  Alternatively, they will ask: "What social media site will bring me the most internet business?"  My answer to these questions may surprise you, but here it is:  There is no such thing as "what is the best" social media site for a small business. A small business should create a presence on as many platforms as they have time for.

Six Clear Reasons Why You Should be Using Social Media to Build Your Credibility

By Hector Cisneros

An ad agency client asked me the other day to provide them the primary reason why their clients should use Social Media as part of their advertising mix. Specifically they were talking about Facebook, Twitter and Angieslist. The answer to this question is often confusing and misstated. This article provides six concise reasons why Social Media is so important today.  Reading this article will make it easy for the reader to see why Social Media has risen so quickly in advertising circles and it will help them prosper from using it.  Here are a few reasons why they should use Social Media as part of their marketing mix. 

The Tao of SEO

by Carl Weiss

Courtesy of flickr.com

When it comes to search engine optimization, most people think of it as some kind of religious cult where members speak in tongues, intoning such mantras as “SERPS,” “Meta Data,” “Linkbait,” and “AJAX,” as though they were trying somehow to transmute lead into gold.  Worst of all, there is so much conflicting data out there regarding the ever changing world of SEO that keeping current is almost a full time job in itself.  Add to this the fact that no sooner do you get a bead on what the search engines want, when they up and change their algorithm (as Google recently did with their Penguin Update), making the analogy to sorcery even more poignant as your listing disappears like a puff of smoke.  So, if you don’t want to have to start the process from scratch every time the search engines decide to do a little spring cleaning, this is what you need to know: