Marketing Talk

Lately, and I don’t want to get into any specifics here, I’ve seen a disturbing trend. Maybe you’ve noticed it too if you hang out on Twitter. If you don’t then maybe it hasn’t been as prevalent. But lately, I’ve seen a lot of “hater” behavior. My friend Nic Wirtz mentioned a similar trend during the Tweetdiner chat this past Saturday. Now, just like silly bands, hater behavior can come in all kinds of shapes and sizes. For example:

Arnie the Argumentative Aardvark: This kind of hater will argue with certain people until said people react, usually in a not good way.

Sally the Slap-Happy Sloth: It’s really easy to “slap” people, especially in Twitter. Sally figures that since the Twitter stream rolls by so quickly, the person she is slapping may not even notice. It’s really easy, in 140 characters, to take a little slap at somebody.

Eva the Explosive Emu: This kind of hater seems to go along all nice and happy until suddenly, for no apparent reason, they explode at somebody, taking that poor somebody off guard.

The list goes on and on. Maybe you have some other members of the set at home.

Here’s the problem, though. When you are on the receiving end of this kind of haterific behavior, the pressure is on you, not the hater, to act in a mature fashion.

Bummer, right? However, I’ve seen this played out over and over again. Someone says something mean to person A. Person A retaliates. Everyone says tsk tsk tsk to person A. For whatever reason, no matter how unfair it is, the person who reacts gets a lot more attention than the person who initiated the squabble in the first place.

Avoid becoming Victor the Victimized Vampire Bat

There are a lot of ways to handle haters without making yourself look bad. The following are some of my recommendations. Maybe you have some as well?

• Shine out an aura of unending patience: The online world is kind of nice in that the general public only sees what you type. If you find that someone is driving you batty, go ahead and punch a pillow, kick a blanket, hit your bed, but when you come back to Twitter or your blog or wherever it is, be as calm and as still as a sea in Summer. Agree that the Arnie the argumentative aardvark is totally entitled to his point of view. Ask Ellen the explosive emu if everything is okay. If a person is truly trying to be a hater, nothing will upset them more. If something more friendly is going on, you’ll get down to the nugget of it rather than becoming an explosive emu yourself.

• Ignore the person: I know, this seems like it might be really boring, but just a thought – if you see a train crash, do you drive your car right into the middle of it, or do you drive away as fast as you can (while maybe looking at the madness in your rear view mirror)? If someone is trying to bait you into an online fight because they’re having a bad day, just refuse to participate. If they keep bugging you, unfollow them, report them as spam, or tell your friends what’s going on so you can get some back-up.

• Pay more attention to people who are treating you well: A lot of haters are fed by the attention they receive for their unseemly behavior. It’s kind of like Ghost Busters II, which altogether was not a great movie, but remember how the slime kept feeding off of everyone’s misery? Online haters are just like that sometimes. So, instead of blasting out a really happy and uplifting song, sing out praises for valued members of your community. Tweet out really good blog posts. Show the hater what he or she could experience if only they would stop hating. And if they’re just plain hungry for misery, let them go somewhere else.

• Explain to the hater that their behavior is unacceptable: I view this as a last resort, as it’s only a step or two away from engaging. However, if you’ve had friendly communications with the person, it sometimes doesn’t hurt to send an email or a personal message just to say, “Hey, you’re really not doing yourself any favors here. I’m concerned about you.” Now, you could also tweet this out in public but that just seems really passive aggressive. And it’s feeding the beast.

Don’t fight fire with fire

Whether you choose any of these methods or none of them, one core fact remains. In the online world, you are what you type. Very often, your followers or the people in your community will only see what you are saying to someone else. If they see you ranting and raving at someone, it’s kind of like seeing someone ranting and raving in the middle of a sidewalk for no apparent reason. They don’t see that someone is irking you. They don’t know that you have been patient for 27 months and now finally you’re losing it. They just see what you’re doing and what you’re typing. This is always the case. You never get a break. So before you retaliate, try to weigh the usefulness of your fireball against what it might cost you in terms of trust and credibility from people who like and respect you. Usually – this makes the decision pretty easy.

Oh, and by the way…

It’s really easy to come off as a hater in a place like Twitter-world. People don’t know you. They don’t know the tone of voice you have in your head. Always play on the safe side, even if you think you’re getting to know someone well enough to joke around with them. As somebody really smart said one time, “Better to be safe than sorry.”

Agree? Disagree? Hate? Love? Share in the comments below!

Image by Felix atsoram. http://www.sxc.hu/profile/atsoram

Tell me if you’ve had an experience like this before.

Once upon a time, I saw a link to a blog that seemed pretty interesting. It was a somewhat controversial blog post, the general jist of which being that the blogger in question was always getting blamed for not following through on what was promised. “I always comment back to my commenters” was one of the statements in the post. Well, being the sympathetic, heartily interested type, I left a comment. It seemed like the blogger was making good on their promise. Lots and lots of comments back. But then, after about a day, the comments stopped. This was about 3 or 4 months ago, and do you know what? I still haven’t gotten a response back.

I’m not the kind of person who really stresses if I don’t get a response back on a comment. However, if you make a big stink about how good you are at replying and then you don’t, it makes me stroke my invisible beard.

It can happen a million times a day

Now here’s the reason why this post is not going to turn into a “boy did that person smell like old baked beans” post. We’ve been talking about the quid pro quo nature of Social Media, right? The “give to get” modus operandi for success. This means that you are constantly faced with a situation where you could be saying yes to people because you honestly want to help them in whatever way you can. You say yes to reading a blog post. You say yes to proofreading something. You say yes to offering advice.

In addition to all of that, there are blog posts you write talking about how you’ll never do this or you’ll always do that.

Are you keeping track of that?

Keep it simple

It’s not a bad thing to have high objectives for yourself. In fact, it’s a very good thing. But in the world of Social Media, your words leave prints, and people seem to have a knack for remembering your words exactly when you don’t live up to them (it’s an odd quirk, that). One way around this problem is to verbalize your goals, but to be a little…imprecise about them. For example:

Instead of saying, “I will respond to every single comment,” set the expectation that you will do your best to respond to comments.

Instead of saying, “Yes, I can definitely do that for you,” set an expectation for the person. “I’ll try to get to that tomorrow. Is that okay?”

Honesty is really important in Social Media. A lot of people talk about transparency, but this is a little bit different. It’s honesty in the old-fashioned, “I mean what I say, Horton Hears a Who” kind of way. So, if someone asks you to read a 75 page novelette and you know you just don’t have the time for it, say so. Right then. My experience has been that if you say no (apologetically is nice), the person will rush to find someone else. If you dangle a person, they will start to get frustrated, and rightfully so.

Before you hit send or publish, do a gut check

If you are not sure if you are over-promising, take a period of time and really look carefully at what you are saying in your blogs and/or in your tweets. Are you using words like “never” or “always?” Are you using words like “yes” instead of “maybe”? If you were a stranger coming to your blog, would you have certain expectations (there’s that word again) based on the language you see?

The bull in the china shop

Walking your talk is a very delicate dance in the online world. You’re communicating a lot with a lot of different people. The more you make good on your promises, the better your reputation will become, which is great. But if you make a real big disconnect between a promise and an action, it can be like a bull in a china shop, and all of that hard work building trust will go down the toilet.

As we have discussed, we can’t control others’ expectations of us, but we can strive to set our own expectations, and we can strive to live up to those expectations. Make sure the expectations you are placing on yourself are achievable and realistic. Better to create small goals and always meet them then to publicly set a large goal and miss it.

Does this make sense? Any questions?

Tonight, TweetDiner will be marking its approximate 3-month birthday! By the time a baby turns 3 months old, they are starting to learn how to do a few things, like smile and roll over maybe. Well, in our efforts to grow and develop, we are going to be starting something new tonight (at 9 PM EST on Twitter, using the hashtag #Tweetdiner).

Because Tweetdiner’s primary mission is incorporate people new to Social Media and help them get acclimated to Twitter and the world of chats, we are going to exemplify the good spirit of sharing, promoting others, and “giving to get” by asking that everyone come in with a link to 1 post that they read during the week that really stuck with them.

Envision it like we’re all sitting around a table at a restaurant (or a diner), and we go around with everyone listing 1 thing they really liked during the week.

There are only two rules.

In good faith – don’t share a link to something that some folks might deem offensive (bad language, etc)

And don’t promote your own blog as part of this exercise.

I’ll publish a list on Sunday with all of the blogs that folks mention so that we can all go back and review.

Sound good? Any questions?

Image by Jonathon Monk. http://www.sxc.hu/profile/jon3782001

A new member of my community here at ye olde blog, Juan Pablo Hurtado, asked a really good question in response to my last post, so I thought I would share it, and my answer, for everyone to see.

Juan asked how we can tell whether we are sharing or pushing, and how we can avoid pushing.

Great question, right?

Here’s my take on it, and we’ll see if you agree.

Show and Tell

Remember show and tell from when you were a kid? You’d stand up in front of your classmates and say, “Well, this is a very spiffy pencil that I got and it  has feathers on it and it’s very pretty.” Okay, so you probably wouldn’t show and tell a pencil, but anyway, show and tell was not inherently about bragging per se, right? It was more about, “Well, here is this thing that I want to tell you about.”

If you want to make sure you are sharing in the world of Social Media but you’re not sure where that line of icky is, try to imagine you are standing in front of, well, everyone who follows you, and it’s show and tell time.  If you have a new post up on your blog, say, “Hey, I have this information I’d like to share with you if you want.”

Ways to share

There are a lot of ways to share with this kind of tonality. A lot of it is just using your common sense. Here are some great ways to “show and tell” blog posts or other content without being pushy.

• If/when you tweet out your posts over a certain time period, try to vary how you present the information. Like anything, try to make it interesting and conversational. This has several benefits. First, it shows that you are not just broadcasting information but rather are legitimately trying to share. Second, for people who see your tweets on a regular basis, they won’t feel like they are experiencing deja vous all over again. Adapting how you share also allows you to evolve with the situation. For example, if you are getting a lot of good comments on a post, maybe tweet just that fact out instead of the name of your post.

• If you are engaged in a conversation and you just happened to write a post about that specific subject, mention that you have written on the topic and include a link to your post. Don’t press people to “go read now.” Just let it sit there. This logic holds true for Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and even, on occasion, in comment sections of other peoples’ blog posts. Use this last one sparingly though. Pointedly linking to one of your blog posts when on someone else’s site can be a bit like showing everyone pictures of your new house at someone’s house warming party.

• Perhaps the trickiest method of sharing is CCing someone or mentioning someone when you tweet out a post. If you have a genuine reason to do so, it can be nice. For example, when I wrote my blog promotion post, I wanted Dawn and Dan to know that I had mentioned them, so I CCd them on Twitter. However, if you CC or mention different people over and over again as you promote the post, and if there’s no mention of them in the post, that can start to rub people the wrong way. My personal preference is for someone to ask me directly, “Can you please help me promote my post.” This is often done via email or direct message.

What is being pushy?

So if all of the above could be categorized as sharing, what is pushing? Let’s go back to the show and tell scenario. Imagine that another kid is presenting his cute pencil. Suddenly, you storm out from the corner of the classroom and shove him out of the way. Then you calmly start talking about your pencil.

That’s being pushy.

So what is the online version of being a Kindergarten wrestler?

Think about what the opposites of the above actions would be. So, in other words:

• Send direct messages to 27 people with a link to your post, but do not otherwise speak to them (there’s that get to give again, right?)

• Pepper all of your comments with links to your latest 5 blog posts

• Promote other people but always tack on a link to your own content or project at the end

• Tweet your post half a dozen times, each time listing 6 or 7 people after the link (for no apparent reason)

I’ve seen a couple of scenarios recently where people have, in my opinion, crossed the line between sharing and being pushy. They are good people, so I am sure they are not meaning to be pushy. But that is what can happen. You can start to rub people the wrong way, and rather than confront you, people will just say, “Oh, man. That person. Well, I’m unfollowing, unfriending, unsubscribing, and uninterested.”

Did this help?

The difference between sharing and pushing information in the world of Social Media really gets to the crux of what we’ve been talking about this week – getting your information out, being nice about it, and giving as much feedback as you want to receive.

Do you see it differently? Any questions? Give a holler in the comments and let’s talk about it!

Image by Alan Rainbow. http://www.sxc.hu/profile/Wia-Tirol

For better or for worse, it seems like I am stepping into the very modest wardrobe of Ms. Emily Post when it comes to the world of Social Media. I’ve been getting a lot of questions lately regarding proper etiquette or how I approach certain situations whilst avoiding hurting anyone’s feelings.

Really, what it comes down to are some pretty basic rules. I thought I would outline some here, and then you fill in any that I miss.

1. If you don’t G2G, then you’ve G2G: In other words, if you don’t give to get, you’ve got to go. I don’t mean that you have to pay it forward in a cheesy movie kind of way, but, for example:

• If someone retweets your post, go to their blog and leave a nice comment or tweet out a post for them

• If you ask someone for a favor, try to do them a favor around the same time frame

• If someone refers a person to you and names you as a good resource – be a good resource

Can this seem mechanical sometimes? Maybe. Can you get away with not giving to get? Probably. But giving to get also has the added benefit of helping you feel helpful and squishy, which is almost always nice.

2. Hold the Ham: Everyone wants to be the star of their own Social Media reality, and let’s face it, when all of these sites are asking, “What are you doing,” “What’s on your mind,” and “What’s new” it’s easy to think that everyone cares an awful lot about us. However, sometimes it’s a good idea to step back a bit and let someone else take the starring role. This can mean:

• Promoting someone else’s project, even if you have a project in progress

• Inviting someone to guest post on your site

• Contributing a guest post to someone’s site

• Retweeting someone else’s post or tweet

3. Remember that time is the ultimate gift: One thing people really appreciate is getting an acknowledgment that they have a lot on their plate. This can be done in any number of ways. For example:

• Don’t throw a tantrum if someone doesn’t read your post Right-A-Way!!!!!

• If you ask someone for a favor and they say no, don’t ask 27 more times

• If you ask someone for a little time and they do give that gift to you, be appreciative.

Bear in mind, whenever you write a blog post and tweet it out or post it to Facebook, you are asking people for time, and when people comment or share your post, they are giving you that time. Show appreciation via comments or tweets.

4. Extrapolate how you feel on to others: Even though so many of us experience Social Media in different ways, we often encounter experiences that create the same kind of sentiments. Try to keep your eyes and ears open for situations where you can sympathize with or applaud a person. This means:

• If a person announces that they have just started blogging, give them a round of virtual applause. You know what a big step that is and how hard it is to get going

• If someone is new to Twitter, reach out, lend a hand, and introduce them to some of your friends

• If someone posts really good news, retweet it and congratulate them, because you know you’d love the same thing

5. Be a hunter, not a gatherer. In other words, don’t search out information so that you can store it in a bin (like your brain, for example). Hunt down information, chats, useful people, and good resources and share the bounty with your community. It’s not about controlling information, it’s about spreading information.

Here’s a bonus one, and it’s the one I am always surprised people miss. Are you ready?

Say thank you. Say thank you when someone says something nice about you. Say thank you when someone tweets out your post. Say thank you when someone comments, either by literally saying thank you or by replying to their comment in kind. Or if you think saying “thank you” would get old, act out your thankfulness. Be human. It’s not just about voice, it’s about being civilized.

What are your “be nice” tips?

How do you define Social Media good manners? What rules do you use to guide your online behavior? Do you have your own list of five? Let’s talk in the comments about how to be nice in Social Media through words and/or actions. It’s the right time of year for being nice anyway, right?

About a month ago, I wrote a post about how to be a blog promoter. I said at the time that my methodology was to post a link to my blog once in Twitter, *maybe* twice, and then that would be it.

I’m going to write three words now that you don’t see very often in the Social Media world.

I was wrong.

I’m prepared to eat some crow, too.

What I’ve learned in the last month

I often say that time in Social Media moves quickly and slowly at the same time. We can communicate instantly, so we can get a lot of thoughts out there, but we’re also building a knowledge base and relationships, which can take time. I’m not sure if a month in this world is a long time or a short time, but I’ve learned quite a lot since I wrote that post. Namely:

• In Social Media, you have to be proactive. You can’t depend upon people to spread your tweets around or to build up your blog following. If you want people to read your stuff, you have to ask them. Nicely.

• Silence does not get rewarded. A month ago, I was noting that I didn’t promote my blog posts a lot because I’m not after blog traffic or a certain number of comments. That’s still true. However, there are reasons to send your work out there that extend beyond Klout or your “social influence number.” I am proud of some of the posts I write (I try to only hit publish when the post meets my own standards) and I think that what I am sharing could be of use to people whom I wish to help (at least that’s my hope). These reasons are enough to motivate me to spread the word a bit more about what I have going on here.

• People are around at different times. Around the time that I wrote the post, I had debated with Dan Perez (@danperezfilms) during a blogchat about the promotion issue. He said he tries to post links to his blog as often as possible. When Dawn Westerberg commented on the post, she noted that she also will tweet a post more than once. As I’ve gotten even a bit more familiar with Twitter (the learning never stops) I’ve come to realize that it’s really true – you start to see what times are good for posting links and what times are dead as door nails. And guess what? It varies day by day. There is no set, fast rule.

A symptom of not owning it

I am a pretty darned humble person when it comes right down to it. Maybe it’s my Midwestern sensibility. I feel awkward when someone’s opening a nice present I’ve given them. I don’t like to make a big deal out of good things that I’ve done or that happen to me. If you are like that, let me tell you that while you don’t need to be an egomaniacal jerk in Social Media, you have to come to a half-way point where you can at least invite people to judge your work for themselves.

I was not doing this.

I was meekly going over to Twitter and saying, “Um, if you happen to be around *right now* it would be kind of okay if you went and read my, well, I wrote something, and *shuffle shuffle*, er…uh..”

This was symptomatic of me not owning my mission. This was symptomatic of me thinking that maybe what I was saying was really just…not that important in the end.

You have to at least believe that your work – on your blog, in your business, in your Twitter stream – is worth talking about. Not bragging about. But talking about.

An even balance

That being said, there are still a lot of things I said a month ago that I stand by. I don’t schedule tweets that blast out 3-4 blog posts throughout the day. I want to converse with people and engage. Blasting out a broadcast isn’t the way to get there. I don’t tweet out my post every 7 seconds. Depending on when I write a post, I’ll probably not tweet it more than 4 times before I write my new post. That’s still not a lot. There are still a lot of people who won’t see it. But I’m careful about when I time things and I have certain goals to shoot for now in terms of blog performance (rather than feeling inexplicably happy or frustrated with each post I write).

I’m also trying to do a better job of promoting people who take the time to comment on my posts. I’m inviting people not just to talk with me, but also to talk with the people who are in the conversation. Talking to 1 person can get boring. Talking to lots of new people about lots of different topics seems a little better.

Don’t be shy

If you are investing time and effort into blogging and working and tweeting, make sure people see it. Own it. Show that you believe in what you are doing. If people smell that you are hesitant about promoting your own work, what will drive them to help you build your community? Nobody wants to help build a village in the bog of eternal stench, right? You can promote yourself without being a jerk about it. You can drive traffic to a blog post without being a braggart. It is not a black and white choice. It is not a this or that scenario. That was the mistake I made a month ago.

Does this help you?

Where do you stand on promoting your work? Do you find it hard, as I was finding it hard a month ago, to get out there and talk about what you are doing? Talk to me in the comments about how we can help you find your blog promotion balance.