The Success Center

It’s the end of the month and officially the end of my little experiment of focusing on social media for the past couple of weeks. I hope you all learned a lot and were truly blessed to exploring this new marketing medium. This week we explored some basic moves for Twitter Newbies and Power Users also, how Darren Rowse Uses Social Media to Promote his Blogs, and my 5 Keys to Blogging Success.

When talking about social media many entrepreneurs (who aren’t familiar) tend to shy away from it. Or only consider it as a fad or something the “college kids” are doing. But, I want to challenge you to get out of your comfort zone and go wherever your market is. If potential customers are on Facebook, then you need to be there too. If you’ve got clients talking on Twitter, you need to get in with their conversation. All of these tools will help you round out your web presence, carve your niche, and establish your brand. Below, you’ll find the poll results from this week with a thought or two on why each is great for business. We’ll review the top 3 and get into the others tomorrow.

Poll Results

Twitter - was the overall winner which lets me know that you social media ninjas are really aware of what’s going on. Twitter is an excellent way to engage in conversations, share information, news, and connect with people on a level that was previously unheard of (in terms of speed of connection).
Business Use: When maximizing it for your business be creative. I use it to start conversations that might end up in discussion on another social networking site or even a blog post. I’ve seen other entrepreneurs and corporations use it as another form of customer service. If I have a problem with this site, I sent a quick tweet to my web host and they respond almost instantly. Now, that’s great customer service! You can also use it to share information, timely updates, and tips with your customers to keep them engaged with your brand.

Blogs – Coming in second is the oldest tool on the list, but one that is still relevant, alive, and just as important as the rest. A blog in the general sense is an interactive or live journal. Meaning, people can respond, converse, and share the content you create however they want. It’s a great way to establish a “home-base” for your web presence because you can create a community that supports your brand. In the marketing world, if you have a basket to pull sales out of, the easier the sale. Especially if you’re grabbing something out of the basket that wants to be grabbed. Get it?
Business Use: If you have a product write “how-to” articles that illustrate different uses of the product. If you have a service, write articles that show people how to maximize the service, issues within your industry, or interview prior satisfied customers. Be creative! This is an excellent opportunity to show potential customers who you are, what you’re really made of, and how much you value them by giving them a reason to connect with you.

Facebook – Number three is not for the college kids only anymore. Beyond the games, applications, quizzes, and extras that Facebook offers, it’s really a great CRM (Customer Relationship Management) tool. Why? Where Twitter is great for instant communication or breaking news and info, Facebook is really all about the relationships and deepening  your connection with customers. You’ve got chat built in, alerts to birthdays and events, status updates, and even an email system built in. Why not use it like that?
Business Use: Share articles with your market (friends) that relate to them, their needs, or their wants. Start a fan page for your company or even yourself and give people a way to engage with you on a deeper level. Create exclusive content for your fan or group members like videos or pictures directly from you or employees. Stay on top of customer birthdays and events and snail mail greeting and birthday cards when something special comes up. It’s really an open sand box . . .

Here are your top 3 best social media tools for business. Since you all are social media experts, how are you maximizing each tool for your business? Do you feel like you’re using them to the fullest? What are some things you can do differently to be more strategic with your social media marketing? I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

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Rod Kirby

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7 Tools for Power Users in Maximizing Twitter

1. Tweetdeck – lets you retweet, reply, search, create groups, follow categories of tweeps like celebrities, and it even incorporates other twitter services and Facebook.
2. Twitalyzer – is an interesting tool that shows you how effective your tweets really are. It rates you on how often people retweet you, mention you, and many different interesting variables.
3. Cotweet – if you’re trying to manage a large company brand then this is the twitter tool for you. It allows you to tweet from the same or multiple accounts, link tracking, scheduled tweets, and even lets you monitor keywords like your brand name to see what people are saying about you.
4. DM Whacker – I LOVE THIS TOOL! It’s a bookmarklet that you select when you want to bulk delete Direct Messages with no hassle. Nuff said, try it for yourself! (Be sure to read the instructions carefully, it’s not hard but it took me a minute to get it to work the first time.)
5. TwitTip – This is the definitive twitter blog on the web from Mr.Problogger himself Darren Rowse.
6. Mashable – has some great Twitter guides that will satisfy any social media ninja’s thirst for knowledge.
7. Bonus: They key to Twitter success is listening, engaging, and repeating the process as mentioned by Annie Sorenson in 4 Steps to Success with Social Media for Entrepreneurs

Twitter 101: Getting Started (A Newb Quick Guide)

Twitter is an online social network.

So, I’m sure you’ve heard about twitter on the radio, television, or while surfing the net. What is it? What’s the big deal behind it? And what in the heck is a “tweet?”

Today we’re going to explore the wonderful world of twitter. You’re going to learn what it is, what it isn’t, why it’s popular, how it can help your business, and how to start on the popular online social network.

twitter homepage

What is twitter?

First and foremost, twitter is considered a micro-blogging social network. For those of you who write blogs, when you create a post for your blog what you’ve written is in real time. That’s all the information you give your readers until the next time you create a new post for your blog. But what if you shared information with readers of your blogs in between the blog posts? What if you stayed connected with them throughout the entire day?

That is essentially the essence of twitter. Where as other online social networks require you to create a spiffy profile, add some pictures, music, and create an entire online identity; twitter simply asks, “what are you doing?” It cuts out the fat and gets straight into the “meat” of online social networking. And the best part of all, you have to write your posts in 140 characters or less. So when you send a post or “tweet” you have to be very selective and strategic with what you share.

Why is it so popular?

Twitter is popular for a number of reasons. I personally believe that it connects people in a unique manner and that’s why it’s so successful. You’ve got geeks, nerds, professionals, entrepreneurs, politicians, and even celebrities tweeting away on the platform. One reason it’s so popular is because of the “real time” flow of information and news. If there’s an accident on the highway in Memphis, I can let my Memphis “tweeps (aka twitter peeps)” know right away. That message might break the story of the accident hours before a news crew arrives on the scene.

How does twitter work?

Well the user end of twitter works in a sms or text message styled fashion for sending messages. I won’t go into detail on the backend . . . it’s no telling how the twitter engineers are keeping it all together! You can update your status via the twitter website, text message from any cell phone, or using any of the slew of twitter applications for desktop and mobile use. I use a twitter application called twhirl and more recently I’ve been using something called tweetdeck. For a beginner I would suggest posting directly from the twitter website until you’re more comfortable with the service.

Once you sign up to the site you can then find friends that are already using twitter via email and “follow” other people’s updates. When you “follow” someone you are saying, “I want to hear what you have to say and be connected with your updates.” And when someone follows you they’re “saying” the same thing. The more followers you have the more people you have to share your information, news, resources, services, life, and world.

I’m on twitter what do I do now?

Rod's twitter profile

Above you’ll see a snapshot of my profile on twitter. In the upper right hand corner I have my wonderful picture and profile with a link to my blog. Notice my stats below my picture? I’m “following” 70 people and I have around 100 followers. In the center where it says, “what are you doing?” that’s where you update your status. And below it displays the updates from everyone that’s in your network (people you follow).

If someone shares a link to a website that had an interesting article and you wanted to tell that person how grateful you were of that information you would “reply” to their tweet. To reply, all you do is place your mouse over their update, click reply, and send them message in 140 characters or less. Or, within the “What are you doing?” box you can reply by typing, “@username and then type your message.” For example;

Rod – @Oprah Good morning Ms.Winfrey!  (2 minutes ago from twhirl)

Oprah – Good morning twitterverse! (6 minutes ago from web)

Notice how my message comes before Oprah’s. That’s because twitter displays messages in chronological order in real time. If someone says something inspiration that really moved you and you want to share it with your followers, then you would “retweet” their message. Retweeting is reusing someone else’s update as your own and it gives the original author credit as well. It’s kind of like saying, “Hey man, that was really awesome what you said, I’m going to share it with my network!” Using twitter applications like tweetdeck allows you to retweet anyone’s update simply with the click of a button. Unfortunately, when you’re logged into the twitter website you’ll have to do it manually. To retweet do this;

Rod – RT @Oprah – Live your best life and be fulfilled!

Oprah – Live your best life and be fulfilled!

“RT” as you can guess, means retweet. It let’s everyone know that the statement following is not something you thought of yourself. Retweeting messages is a great way to show appreciation to other twitterers for their insight, information, news, wisdom, or resources. The more you share the more you care – remember that!

What if you have a specific message for a specific person and you don’t want everyone “all in your business?” Then send them a “direct message.” This is how you do it; the first way is to go to that person’s profile page (by clicking on their picture) and send them a message. Or you can do this within the “what are you doing?” box;

Rod – D @Oprah I’m going to be late to our dinner date in New York tomorrow. Can we reschedule?

The “D” indicates a direct message and only the receiver can view it. Simple huh? Now that you’re equipped with the tools to network, engage in conversations and start tweeting!

What do I tweet about? (Creating your brand)

Ok, so you’re on twitter and you’re wondering, “what in the world am I going to talk about?” Well, first you need to identify the reason you’re on twitter in the first place. Is it for professional networking, keeping up with friends, making new friends, generate sales for your business? Why are you here?! Once you’ve figured out why you’re here then you can start communicating effectively to your followers. When I first signed up my initial intentions were purely personal and I just wanted to connect with friends. However, as I’ve continued to use the service my goals are more professional.

My updates usually run the gamut of inspirational quotes, technology and business news, updates on my business, and finally just the general run of the mill “what I’m doing at the time” type of updates. Notice the order in which my updates run. If you’re here to generate sales for your business you won’t do it if you advertise, pitch, and try to sell people on here.

The key to success on twitter is sharing, being a resource to others, networking, engaging, and building relationships.

That’s soooo important to understand. No one likes to be sold to but people love to buy things. If you give your followers something substantial in terms of information or inspiration then you’re twice as likely to make sales by garnering respect. When I first signed up I followed just about everyone. But I started noticing that some of the people I followed wouldn’t shut up about their products or services. And I “unfollowed” them as a result.

If you’re on twitter for personal reasons then just stick to letting people what you’re doing. If you’re here for professional reasons share your insight and knowledge on a particular topic. If you’re here for sales then share resources that will help people understand your industry (people will appreciate you being a resource to them and naturally gravitate to your products or services). One rule of thumb, if you’re trying to intentionally sell something, let your intentions be known. For example;

Rod – Ad: 2 for one sale on all computers, shop today! (4 minutes ago)

And just because you made your intentions known doesn’t necessarily mean it will sit well with other twitterers. If you are going to advertise remember to share, engage, and connect first with your community and keep your ads to a minimum (Don’t share a quote and every 5 minutes make an ad).

Review

There you have it, twitter in a nutshell. I hope this guide has at least settled any fears you had of the network. If you have any questions, comments, or concerns let me know in the comments below. If you think this guide should be expanded in any way drop me line here. Below you’ll find some useful articles that will further help you in your twittering. Until next time share, connect, and engage to twittering success!

p.s. – you can follow me on twitter by clicking here!

Need More Twitter Help? Get the Twitter for Dummies Book!

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About The Author

Rod Kirby

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For the past couple of weeks we’ve been exploring the wonderful world of social media. For most of you this is nothing new, but there are a select few that are just starting on their own journeys. My goal is to empower you with the basic understanding (and a few advanced principles) to help you be successful with your “social” endeavors.

This week’s poll simply asks, “Which Social Media Tools are Best for Business?” If you’re a social media ninja, which tools are absolute musts for being successful within the social media space? If you’re still trying to figure out how to fit social media into your business, let me know which tools you want to learn more about. If you’re currently on Facebook and have no idea how to use it for business, let me know. Also, check out 5 Tips on Managing Social Media for Entrepreneurs if you ever feel overwhelmed with it all.

Leave your mark in the poll and leave a comment or two about your answer below. See you at the polls!

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Rod Kirby

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Note: This weekend I presented at Social Camp Memphis on Treating Your Blog Like a Magazine and Taking it to the Next Level. I wanted to share with everyone the source article for that presentation. I think it fits into the exploring of social media we’ve been doing as of late. Also, you can check out my presentation slides on Slideshare.net.

This was a guest post I made at Darren Rowse’s Problogger site. There were some pretty interesting comments left there so stop by and take a look at what some of your peers thought about the ideas presented.

3 Magazine Advertising Strategies for Blogging Success

Magazines have been a medium to contend with for years because of their influence over readers, large subscription bases, and their power to generate big advertising dollars. By maximizing these 3 advertising strategies you’ll begin the profitable transformation of weblog into web property;

Seek Featured Advertisers
Strategy: Think of it as a “one advertiser to rule them all” type of deal. A featured advertiser should be one main company or brand that can get their message across effectively through every opportunity available on your site. This includes; a written featured article about the company, its products and services, a 1-on-1 interview to coincide with the article, a product or service review, and banner ads across high traffic areas of your site. Essentially you’ll come out from behind the desk as a blogger and into the arena of journalism and entrepreneurship. It’ll take some work, a little networking, and some sales tactics, but once you land that first account it’s all money from there.

Why is it a win for you? – You’re able to charge a premium advertising fee depending on your site’s traffic, your online social status, and how much targeted content you can generate for the advertiser.

Why is it a win for the advertiser? – It’s simple, less competition for your readers’ attention on your site = more traffic and profitability for them.

Note: Create different advertising packages with different price points. Depending on what the advertiser spends will depend on how much, “content coverage,” he or she receives. (Don’t go overboard with the pricing, if you’re a new blogger then you probably haven’t built up a large enough audience to entice big dollars from a major advertiser. Be strategic!)

Tools: When you write the featured article, use tools such as twitter search (real-time conversations) and yelp.com (community reviews) to find out what others are saying (only the good comments) about your featured advertiser. Also, try out Blogtalkradio.com (internet radio show hosting) for conducting your interviews, and possibly shooting video for the product or service review. The more dynamic the content the more engaged your readers will be which = an epic win for your advertiser.

Get Sponsors for Featured Content
Strategy: When I say featured content I don’t mean your life tips  or opinion piece typed articles. The post has have a certain level of marketability. Something that will resonate with readers and be a perfect fit for a sponsor. For example; “Black Enterprise’s Top 100 Entrepreneurs under 40 Sponsored by Bank of America.” Or, “50 Greatest Gadgets of all time Sponsored by Microsoft.” Get it? This featured content becomes less of an article and more of a multimedia presentation as you should incorporate video, audio, and written pieces to drive your main points of view home. It’s a more targeted piece of content than that of the first tip. Where as the latter is kind of spread around with a focus on the advertiser, here, the advertiser focuses on a particular topic.

Why is it a win for you? – When you have a Featured advertiser as mentioned above, they will take up all the attention of your readers. However, having sponsors for your featured content easily allows you to sign as many advertisers as you would like since they’ll be attached to specific pieces of content on your blog. Say it with me together kids, “M-O-N-E-Y!”

Why is it a win for the advertiser/sponsor? – The first thing sponsoring featured content does is; it gets the advertiser closer to their target market. Trust me; Pepsi’s not going to sponsor a list of the “50 Greatest Kool-Aid Flavors of All Time.” The second thing it does is; it positions the advertiser’s brand as a participant in their market. It shows market engagement and a form of connection to who they want to buy their products or services.

Note: Brainstorm and come up with lists or featured stories that would resonate within your blog community. Select a few companies (online or off) who target the same kind of market, put together sponsorship proposals, and be persistent in pursing them. It might also be a good idea to partner with different bloggers and come together for a huge collaborative feature and seek sponsors together. The greater the “market basket” for a potential sponsor, the easier it is to seal the deal for the sponsor seeker.

Create a Classified Ads Section
Strategy: Every magazine I flipped through had a classifieds section toward the back of their books. It listed every company under the sun that offered just about every kind of opportunity, service, or product. No doubt, this was the last line of offense for generating revenue for a magazine. Why can’t it work for bloggers as well if it’s done in a tasteful way?

Note: Keep your ads specific towards a certain market and you’ll attract more relevant advertisers. That means if you’re running a Christian blog then there shouldn’t be any Viagra ads on your site. Consider having a “free” classifieds section and run ad sense or other affiliate ads of your own for “traffic generating money.” Also, as mentioned above, you might pool your resources with other bloggers and split the costs, workload, and revenue of this marketing technique.

These are just a few examples that magazines give us as bloggers on effective advertising for our blogs. While ad sense, affiliate links, and text links are great ways to generate income, these techniques will take your blog to new heights. I would love to hear your feedback on this topic in the comments below.

Disclaimer: We will never share your email address with anyone, period.

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Rod Kirby

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Poll Results

This week’s poll really tied into our exploration of social media for your business. The majority of you would like to learn how to maximize social media tools for your business, and understandably so. Social media includes your customers into the very fabric of your business. As we discussed in What’s the Big Deal about Social Media? the power of social media is in its transparency. It’s connecting with your customers and not just trying to sell to them.

Question: what tools do you think you need a little help in maximizing? Why do you think you need to use the tool you’re thinking of and what do you think you’ll gain from it? To help you, here’s a list of social media tools and services according to Wikipedia.

You tell me what you want to learn and I’ll make sure we explore the answers together. Deal?

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Rod Kirby

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The past 2 weeks have been rather interesting around The Success Center. We’ve been exploring social media;

5 Tips on Managing Social Media for Entrepreneurs

4 Steps to Success with Social Media for Entrepreneurs

Even with this week’s poll question

Why Get Social Anyway?

The whole idea is to help you be successful within this new frontier because it’s here to stay. Smart marketers always put their messages where their market is. If your target customer is on Facebook then you need to be on Facebook. If they use Twitter then you should have an “outpost” on twitter as well. Go wherever your market is, reach, connect, and engage with them there as well.

What’s the Power of Social Media?

I believe the power of social media lies in it’s transparency. I can see you and you can see me. It’s like the George Foreman grill of marketing. Social media can potentially cook more meals (sales) because it cuts the fat (distrust). However, just like with anything, it only tastes good (successful) if you cook it right.

What Should You Do Next?

To help you gain further knowledge, wisdom, and understanding I want to present to you a buffet of social media goodies straight from The Success Center’s kitchen.

Maximizing Social Media after you Start a Business

5 Keys to Blogging Success

“3 Money-Making Magazine Strategies for Blogging Success,” (At Problogger.com – written by yours truly)

8 Magazine Strategies that add Value to Your Blog

Twitter 101 – Getting Started

These are my thoughts on social media, what are some of yours? Is it a huge part of your marketing strategy? What challenges are you facing in maximizing some of the many tools out there? What have you yet to master and need more instruction on? Sound off in the comments below.

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Rod Kirby

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In last week’s poll results, 50% of you said that you are either overwhelmed with social media or learning to manage it. So this week I wanted to take things one step further. What part of social media would you like to learn more about? If you’re an entrepreneur and new to all this social media “stuff” do you want to learn how to start a blog? If you already have a Twitter or Facebook account would you like to know how to maximize it for business use? What else? What about using video or the other myriad of tools out there for social media? Cast your vote in the poll and give a thought or two about your answer in the comments below.

By the way, check out yesterday’s post: 4 Steps to Success with Social Media for Entrepreneurs I would love your thoughts on that as well if you haven’t read it.

Disclaimer: We will never share your email address with anyone, period.

About The Author

Rod Kirby

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I was actually a bit surprised with the poll results this week. I didn’t expect the majority of you to be social media ninjas as you all claimed to be.

Still, half of you get pretty overwhelmed and the other half are learning to manage it. That speaks volumes to the average reader of this blog. I’m grateful for those that are comfortable with social media . . . but I’m excited about the 25% of you who aren’t.

Why? It presents an opportunity for me to delve deeper down the rabbit hole of social media and to show you a world that might seem a bit scary to you. But, I promise, mountains always seem large from a distance. For those of you who are social media ninjas I think there are a few things I can share to enhance your ninja weaponry.

In the end this poll proved one thing, there is an opportunity to grow new muscles and enhance the ones some of us already had. No matter which group you fall into, thank you for allowing me the chance to be your social media trainer. What are your thoughts on the poll results? If you’re a social media ninja what kinds of things would you like to learn to enhance your ninja weaponry? If you feel overwhelmed with social media, what confuses you? What would you like explained? What would you like to learn? My gym doors are always open and available for your comments below.

If you missed it, don’t forget to check out 5 Tips on Managing Social Media for Entrepreneurs

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About The Author

Rod Kirby

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I found this great story of Paul Galvin, the founder of Motorola. I love his passion for the company and his leadership strength really shined bright. Enjoy the video.

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About The Author

Rod Kirby

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I’ve had many conversations with friends on the sheer amount of social media tools and networking sites there are and how overwhelming it all can be. Especially if you’re an entrepreneur who keeps getting asked, “are you on Facebook?” and you have no idea what it is or why your business should be on there. I’ll explore this and share some tips on managing your social activities for business use tomorrow. Before then, let me hear from you and get your point of view. Do you ever feel overwhelmed with social media? Do you feel like it’s all “a bit much?” If you’re not new to social media, how are you managing it all? What tools do you use? Share your stories, trials, and tribulations in the comments section below.

Disclaimer: We will never share your email address with anyone, period.

About The Author

Rod Kirby

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