Posts Tagged ‘facebook for home care’

Small Business Blogging & Social Media Marketing

Tuesday, February 9th, 2010

Your home care agency’s blog is more important than your Facebook page

You want to take advantage of the latest in social media, but aren’t sure how to prioritize.  Here are reasons why including a blog should take precedence over starting a Facebook page:

Branding: Facebook doesn’t allow you to brand the entire Fan Page experience to the extent that you can and should brand your agency’s blog. While you can customize up to 10 Facebook tabs (using the Static FBML application), that doesn’t compare to the unlimited branding options on your own blog using company colors, messaging, logos, and more.

Blog entries are better than Facebook Notes: Blogs allow you to categorize posts, thread comments, optimize content for search engine optimization, and so much more. Facebook Notes, aside from barely being read, fail to stack up against even your run-of-the-mill blog post from the most basic of blogging platforms.

You can run third-party analytic tools on your blog: You need to know what’s working and what’s not, where website visitors are coming from, what they view, how long they stay, and why some wander off. You need to know which campaigns are driving the most traffic to your content and how effective you are in converting that traffic into targeted behaviors. Facebook offers you only limited visibility into these and other key areas, whereas the vast array of web analytics software and services available for your blog provide a deep view into the types of metrics that actually matter to you and your homecare agency.

Here are some other things to consider:

  • Business-to-business decision makers (i.e. referral sources) aren’t likely to look for and connect with your business on Facebook.
  • While Facebook Fan Pages are available to the public, registration is required to fully participate. (You can make registration optional on your own agency blog).
  • On your agency blog, you can turn commenting on or off or have comments moderated on a post-by-post basis. Not so on Facebook.
  • Your blog is far less distracting than Facebook, which means no one else’s advertisements, applications, pages, notes, videos, photos, etc. can pull focus away from your content.
  • Plug-ins and widgets allow you to scale your blog based on your business goals. Facebook doesn’t offer the same type of scalability.

Submitted by: David Goodman, President Companion Connection Senior Care, the leading “no royalty” membership organization serving the non medical home care & licensed home health business communities. The need for home based senior care is soaring! We will help you start your own highly successful Home Care Agency business. Earn an excellent income while helping others with their activities of daily living. Contact us today for your FREE Business Info Kit1-800-270-6949

Use Technology to Grow Your Home Care Business

Sunday, October 18th, 2009

Five opportunities for the home care  entrepreneur to grow  business in the technology age

Conducting business is different in today’s technology age, and entrepreneurs have to be able to explore those opportunities that exist during a time when an ad in the Yellow Pages or direct mail may not be the best way to reach their prospects.

Here are some things to consider:

Business cards: While exchanging business cards remains fairly common, more professionals are choosing to use Web-based card exchange services and digital business cards. Companies like BusinessCard2, DubMeNow, CloudContacts, TwtBizCard, Bump, BeamMe, SnapDat, Retaggr, and Poken offer digital business card options. Do you still use the traditional business card or have you transitioned some or all of your homecare agency’s card exchanges to the digital format?

Reputation: Do you actively monitor your home care agency’s reputation online? If so, what tools do you use to stay on top of what customers and potential customers are saying about you and your homecare business?  Can you create an opportunity for positive testimonials to appear and can you reduce the damage any negative feedback might create?

Search Optimization: For generations, getting good placement in the Yellow Pages was key to exposing one’s company to the public.  Today, that’s changed as more people shop for home care services online.  So, how can you maximize your exposure to online shoppers?  Find out about search optimization tools and how you can improve your placement and reach shoppers when they are in the market for your services.

Social Media: Let’s face it – this is not even your “father’s Internet” any more.  If Facebook members were residents of a country, it would be the fourth largest in the world.  The reality is that more and more companies are getting their messages out by taking advantage of such social media sites as Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and Flickr.  Learn how they can support your business.

Website Retention: When people come to your website, how can you get them coming back?  To accomplish this, you may want to consider running news, weather or sports; health care information; blogs; or even contests that keep people coming back.

Posted by: David Goodman, President of Companion Connection Senior Care, the premier No Royalty Membership Organization serving the non medical home care and licensed home health business communities. Demand for home based elder care is soaring! CCSC will help you start your own highly successful Home Care Agency business. Contact us today for a FREE Business Info Kit1-800-270-6949