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Archive for the ‘Social Media’ Category

In December, Vistage International speaker and social media expert Dave Nelsen addressed our two Vistage Tucson CEO groups.  Dave’s task–introduce the CEO to the plethora of social media channels out there so he or she can make the right social media investments. Dave presented 21 options, and explained each.

1. Use QR codes
2.  Ensure your social media has personality, is interesting and is entertaining.
3. Run an idea exchange
4. Set up  Google alerts
5. Tune in with Twitter search
6. Explore yammer or chatter
7. Video your happy customers
8. Consider WordPress for your website
9. Read a high profile blog and comment
10. Subscribe to something
11. Write a blog of your own
12. Explore Google and Alexa for keywords
13. Set a social media policy
14. GetSatisfaction for support
15. Compare your site to others using 4 low cost tools
16. Make a Facebook fan page
17. Use Google+
18. Join appropriate LinkedIn groups
19. Create a Ning network
20. Save money by using Crowdsource for your design needs
21. Transform your monologue into dialog

According to Jeff Korhan at www.jeffhorhan.com, there are 7 secrets to getting more for your time invested at LinkedIn. Among them are:

1. Use appropriate keywords in your heading and title.
2. Be diligent about updating your connections
3. Add video to your page to create impact.

By Jessica Forrester at Hanover Research

There are many ways to use LinkedIn as a marketer and many tools available. In this post we will focus on the use of display advertising on LinkedIn, which has shown particular promise as a lead generator for B2B firms.

Case Study: Vistage International

Vistage International faces a social media marketing challenge common in the B2B space: their success is dependent on their ability to network with executives. An executive coaching and peer advisory group headquartered in San Diego, CA, Vistage targets small to medium-sized companies as clients in order to provide training in corporate leadership and effective management tactics.

Read more at the Hanover Research Blog

1. You will take a cold call over a warm, or even hot, call every day of the week.

2. You think business can only be done face-to-face even though relationship building (isn’t that what business is all about?) happens every single day online.

3. You believe that you (and your employees) 30% complete profile with no summary, no picture and zero recommendations doesn’t reflect poorly on you or your business.

4. You don’t have time to spend a couple of hours on LinkedIn each week to research prospects because you are too busy doing the same sales techniques you’ve used your entire career.

Read more here. at Blue Gurus.

Thanks to Business Insider.

Guy Kawasaki wears many hats.  He‘s the founder of Alltop.com, a bestselling author on social media and marketing, and still somehow manages to fit in about 75 speaking engagements each year. Here, Inc.com reporter Eric Markowitz chatted with Kawasaki to get his thoughts on how entrepreneurs treat social media—and how they’re doing it all wrong.

First, to what extent has social media changed the way companies and entrepreneurs fundamentally express themselves to customers?

It is marketing at this point. Luckily, social media enables you to do that in a fast, free, and ubiquitous way. You really can’t spend money on social media unless you really try. Social media is really more about effort than expense.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/guy-kawasaki-explains-how-entrepreneurs-are-getting-social-media-all-wrong-2012-3#ixzz1oYQ5Cioi

More here.

There are a lot of reasons why content marketing doesn’t work for some companies. If we were making a list, they would include:

• A lack of understanding reader/customer needs
• Focusing on the wrong metrics and objectives
• A soloed approach to content marketing
• Poor execution
• Bland storytelling
• Lack of authenticity
• Creating information that, simply put, is not helpful or engaging
• Sales pitches disguised as content

Thanks to Joe Pulizzi at Content Marketing. Read more here.

Houle calls 2010-2020 the “Transformation Decade,” during which businesses will need to leave 20th century business principles behind and adapt to the changing global economy or risk becoming less competitive.

According to Houle, qualities business leaders need to have during the Transformation Decade:

1. Adaptability: Business owners need to consistently redefine their markets and adjust products and services in order to reach the most consumers.

2. Collaborative ongoing reorganization: Decisions should be addressed by management as a whole instead of by an individual, and innovative employees should be utilized to ensure that your business is consistently evolving.

3. Vision: Set goals as a leader, and then do what is necessary to reach those goals.

With so much data becoming available, businesses will be better able to predict consumer-buying patterns and structure their companies accordingly.  Technology will begin shifting to “brain wave interface,” which will allow users wearing specialized headsets that map brain waves to control actions on their computers.

Advancements in medical technology will enable people to live longer, and as the U.S. continues to morph into the world’s leading producer of intellectual property, Americans will be physically able to work well above the current retirement age. Also, as the percentage of college-educated women as well as those pursuing master’s degrees and PhDs in most developed countries has increased to levels above men, more companies will be run by women.

Houle believes the fundamentals that will shape change over the next 15 years are as follows:

The Flow to Global: Economics have gone from micro to macro, and most of the challenges businesses face are on a global scale.

The Flow to the Individual: With such a vast and growing variety of choices of all the products and services that people use the power has shifted “from the producer to the consumer.”

Accelerated Connectedness: Technological advances in communication such as mobile phones and the Internet have broken down the limiting factors of time, distance and place, which have traditionally hindered both personal and business connections.

As the need to stay connected at all times in all places has increased, so has the popularity of smart phones. 2012 will mark the first year ever that smart phones will outsell computers, and this trend is only the beginning. As computing shifts more to mobile, business owners should address this market accordingly.

Currently, about 3 billion people around the world use the Internet, and by 2025 that number will double, and the amount of data will increase exponentially. The widespread use of social media has given consumers both a “physical reality” and a “screen reality,” which is an identity that has been established online. Social media enables people to voice their opinions for all Internet users to view, so businesses should focus on social media marketing as it can reach more people than traditional word-of-mouth marketing.

Internet content is evolving, and an expected 90% of the Internet backbone in the world will be video in 2015. Houle suggests that companies should have video on their sites, specifically, testimonials from customers.

TEN DO’S AND DON’TS OF SOCIAL MEDIA

Social media and social networking are quickly becoming “de rigueur” for business. A recent study by a Chicago-based firm, Slack Barshinger, showed that small and medium-size businesses are getting “heavily involved with social media, with about half using blogs, wikis, Twitter or other social media channels for business purposes.” If your company is not yet engaged, it’s time to jump in before your competitors beat you to the punch.

If you’re not familiar with social media, check out YouTube, Twitter, TalkShoe, or any blog–these publishing and broadcasting democracies involve hundreds of millions of people. While most of these services were originally conceived for consumers, social media allows businesses to engage in many-to-many conversations with customers, accelerating their learning and building trust. This is not your father’s marketing.

Here are ten basic rules for what to do and not do:

DON’T

1. Don’t get started if you have significant product weaknesses or customer support issues. Engaging in social media makes good products more successful, and bad products… dead. But don’t delay for long; address the issues and then jump in.
2. Don’t use social media to overtly market or sell. Instead educate, enlighten, inform, and entertain your audience. In this way, you’ll position yourself and your company as an expert in your field and benefit from the “media halo.”
3. Don’t “set it and forget it.” This makes you look worse than not showing up at all. Once you get started, sustain your participation and interaction.
4. Don’t go negative. Emphasize your strengths and advantages rather than making claims about a competitor’s weakness.
5. Don’t mix personal and business accounts/personas, etc.
6. Don’t expect to fully control the conversation. Social media is not an advertisement, product brochure, newsletter, email blast, or one-way monologue; it’s a conversation. Conversations are bi-directional and can have rough edges. Even if you don’t want to participate, your customers and prospects are already talking. Join them.
7. Don’t worry about some negativity for online users. Studies show that a little negativity increases credibility and empathy. Paraphrasing Abraham Lincoln: “You can’t please all of the people all of the time.” Be responsive to the negative.
8. Don’t feel the need to disclose everything. Not everyone who likes sausage wants to see exactly how it’s made. Be open and honest and use discretion.
9. Don’t be a generalist. With literally hundreds of millions of blogs, videos and podcasts to choose from, every individual can precisely tailor their consumption to their interests. Focus on one topic and do it well (the narrower the better).
10. Don’t overwhelm your followers with too much information, or too frequently. Everybody’s got a busy life and nobody enjoys getting “Twitter-ria”. Focus on the highest value information and content.

DO

1. Do the same up-front planning you would for any important business initiative. Define your target audience. Detail how you intend to create value for them. Map out how you expect them to create value for you. Document your approach and objectives per medium (blog, Twitter, Facebook, etc.).
2. Listen and learn from others for a few weeks before responding. In general, spend twice as much time listening as responding.
3. Display your Personality, and keep the content Interesting and Entertaining (the old radio adage “PIE”). Remember, people buy from people; show your professional self.
4. Be authentic. Never before has a medium and its participants been more skilled at smelling a rat and turning against the perpetrator.
5. Remember that social media is about two-way conversation (see “Don’t try to control” above). Conversation builds trust; trust leads to more sales.
6. Favor timeless content over time-sensitive content (note: this varies based on the medium and there are exceptions). We live in a time-shifted “Tivo” world and there’s wonderful leverage in creating a blog post (for example) that will have value to new readers weeks, months, or even years from now.
7. Remember that “push” is out and “pull” is in. Direct mail, traditional advertising, and unsolicited email are forms of “push” — the content producer chooses who to target. “Following” on Twitter, “subscribing” to a blog or podcast, or viewing a video your friends “liked” on Facebook are forms of “pull” — the content consumer decides what to listen to. In today’s information-rich world, people want to opt-in, choosing where to spend their valuable time. Give them a reason to choose your content.
8. Keep your eyes open. Use Google Alerts, search.twitter.com, relevant Linkedin Groups, Ning networks, and other sites to monitor or “listen in” on conversations about your company, your competitors, and the best practices in your industry.
9. Show patience. As the party with more power (a business relative to a customer/prospect), attacking or being critical will frequently backfire and word will propagate quickly.
10. Learn from your audience (as they will learn from you). Be prepared to rapidly evolve your products and services to meet their needs. They’ll suggest valuable ideas you never thought of.

In the next few years, social media will become a primary vehicle for interacting with your customers, partners, suppliers, and even employees. By getting started today, your company can adapt to a changing world more quickly than your competitors. What are you waiting for?

Thanks to Vistage member and speaker, Dave Nelsen, who helps companies develop social media strategies to improve their marketing, sales, customer support, and even internal communication. He’s the Founder of podcasting pioneer TalkShoe and a long-time entrepreneur. You can contact Dave at dave@get121.biz.