AVL Marketing

Asheville Local Social Media Case Study

Posted on 22. Jun, 2010 by Tracy Sigler in Blog, Blogging, Video Marketing, WordPress

At home we have a problem with our neighbor’s yard, Grove Park Inn’s golf course, causing major runoff problems almost every time there is a burst of rain. This particular time I decided to step outside and make a little video with my cheap Flip video camera. It ended up being the lead story on the 6 o’clock news that week. This is how that happened, and how you can use video and social media to get some attention:

1. Capture simple video of something “remarkable”
2. Upload video to a sharing site like Youtube, etc.
3. Write a short blog post about and embed the video on the page
4. Mention it on Twitter, Facebook etc. (There are tools that can tie all these accounts together and make sharing easier.) (more…)

Video and Movie Making Tips from Make Magazine

Posted on 13. Mar, 2010 by Tracy Sigler in Video Marketing

This video is a quick insider’s look into how Kip Kay uses microphones, soft boxes for lighting, video cameras, reflectors (even how to make your own), and a lot more to produce videos or “movies” for the Make Magazine Weekend Project series. For editing Kip uses Adobe Premier Pro CS4, some spendy Windows hardware, and some other desirable gear.

SEO Content Creation Mind Map

Posted on 02. Oct, 2009 by Tracy Sigler in Blogging, SEO, Video Marketing, WordPress

I recently spoke to the incoming class at the business incubator here in Asheville about creating content to promote their businesses. This video shows the mind map I used in that talk. There are a lot of benefits to creating content for your site, no matter type of business you have. The ideas presented here are things anyone can do to get started.

Download the entire interactive SEO Content Creation mind map.

Let me know if you want info on a particular topic.

Social Media Marketing Lesson from a 12 Year Old

Posted on 18. Sep, 2009 by Tracy Sigler in Social Media, Video Marketing

Here’s a quick lesson in using social media to market your business from my 12 year old (almost 13!) son Mars. He likes fingerboards, tiny skateboards you can ride using your fingers. Turns out millions of kids like them. And apparently a lot of those kids have Flips or other affordable ways of making videos to show off their skills and creative ideas for “skate parks.”

Just Google “fingerboarding” to see how popular it is. Most of the search results will be for Youtube videos. Many of these fingerboarders now have very popular channels on Youtube. These kids don’t know a world without the web and social media. Sharing and interacting online is completely natural to them.

Fingerboarding as a hobby has now branched into kids making their own boards, from scratch. There are even videos about how to do this. So serial entrepreneur Mars, who is always making something, decides he is now in the manufacturing game, albeit at the hand made level. He has some friends on Youtube who have become fingerboarding new media celebrities. This is how Mars plans to pull it all together to sell his product:

1. “Sponsor” some “celebrities” by giving them his products to use
2. Ask the celebs to “endorse” his fingerboards by using them in their next video, get a mention
3. Funnel that traffic to his own Youtube channel or Etsy store

Some high level steps to using social media for business, that every 12 year old already knows:

1. Interact, engage, comment, compliment, make friends in the networks that make sense for you
2. Create your own related media (tweets, videos, blog posts, etc.) to show you’re legit
3. Partner, sponsor, joint venture, with players bigger than you to tap into their audience

That is all for now. Tell me in the comments if there is something you want me to talk about.

Video Marketing Webinar by Andy Jenkins

Posted on 28. Aug, 2009 by Tracy Sigler in Video Marketing

If you’re considering using online video for marketing or even just presenting information I highly recommend downloading this tutorial from Andy Jenkins and Frank Kern. It’s a full hour of Andy explaining everything from the technology you need (not very much in fact) to scripting and editing for maximum effect. The image here is a snippet of a massive mind map Andy created as a tool to help make successful video making a repeatable process.

I listened to it live, there were some glitches, and the sound could be better, but this is some very solid content. Well worth the hour.

You can get it here:

http://www.andyjenkinsblog.com/JumpStart/