An interview with Mathew Ray, a Social Media Marketing Specialist at Global Crossing  

Our group for our Internet Marketing class interviewed Matthew Ray who is a local Social Media Marketing Specialist and expert for Global Crossing in the Rochester, NY area. He is also a graduate of RIT and exist on social media sites such as LinkedIn, Twitter, and others. The following links will take you to his LinkedIn public profile, and his Twitter blog. Matt started his experience with social media as a hobby, since during his time in class it was never really a intricate part of marketing like it is today. After analyzing some blogs and experimenting a little, as a business analyst at the time, he decided to push some ideas regarding social media to some people in the marketing organization who decided to give him a chance after seeing his knowledge of the technology.

Matt states that most of his work consist of working with marketing and communications organizations across the company and mainly to monitor, organize, and execute through the multiple communications that the company has to the multiple social channels that exist on the Internet today. Since almost everybody with the exception of some "mom and pop" stores has a presence on the Internet, social media is definitely a tool to invest in to reach target markets. Advice Matt gives for a smaller business with a tight budget is to invest in a Web site that can be updated, search engine optimization (SEO), and your keywords which can also be tied in to your Google ads for better results. As for what the future holds, Matt says we will listen to our influence-rs, and that social media will become even more integrated into business. He states being a key influencer, being a thought leader, knowing your technology will help you be successful in the field of Internet Marketing.