Marketing Talk

I’ve gotten a lot of very kind comments lately from people saying that they agree with some of my views or that something I have said has been helpful. This, of course, is an easy way to make my day (if you mean it).

I have to take this opportunity to point something out, however.

The way that I do things is merely my interpretation of what I have learned from people like Chris Brogan, Jay Baer, Ann Handley,  Beth Harte and many more people that I am fortunate to have connected with on Twitter and elsewhere in the Social Media world.

Sometimes, people get frustrated that they don’t get responses from people who have pull in Social Media. Sometimes it seems easy to get attention by writing a blog post saying that that the views of the “influencers,” “thought leaders,” “cool kids,” whatever term you want to use, are wrong, uneducated, whatever.

If you like the way that I am using Social Media, I would ask you to take a moment to realize that these people, under the radar often times, are doing everything I am doing except that they offer at  least a decade of experience behind everything they do, with 10-20-100 times more followers, and with expanded ways to reach out to you, like webinars, presentations, and more.

The parts of what I do that have gotten the best responses are all the result of me doing the best I can to learn from these thought leaders. My Social Media world, and what I do, is the size of  a crumb compared to the full multi-level cake  of people that these industry leaders are assisting every day.

Before you get frustrated, before you decide to try to pick a fight to get some attention, remember that the “cool” kids are people like you and me. They are perpetually doing something they don’t have to do, which is to help us get better at what we do. I am trying to pay back all of that time and free information by living it out and passing it along. Will you join me and do the same?

Image by Chris Greene. http://www.sxc.hu/profile/christgr

I was asked today if I have checked my Klout score. I have seen a lot about Klout…it’s essentially a way to measure your influence (there’s that word again). Klout defines its metrics this way:

We believe that influence is the ability to drive people to action — “action” might be defined as a reply, a retweet or clicking on a link.

So, if you have a lot of people clicking on links and retweeting you, your Klout score goes up. Naturally, attaining a high Klout score will be easier, statistically, for someone with 50,000 followers than a person with 100 followers. 1% of 50,000 will always be bigger than 1% of 100, I don’t care what kind of fuzzy math you’re doing.

That’s not why I have no interest in my Klout score, however.

Put simply, I haven’t checked my Klout ranking for 2 reasons.

1. I don’t need to

2. I don’t care

Let’s explore both of these in a bit of detail.

I don’t need to know what my Klout score is

So, first of all, I have my own ways of measuring clicks. I know how many people are coming to my blog. I know how many people (roughly) are clicking on my bit.ly links. I know how many people are retweeting me. Even if I cared deeply about my Klout score, the plain and simple numbers that I look at to measure what I’m doing tell me that in terms of clicks and Retweets, I am not “influential.” Boo hoo. Don’t cry too hard for me. I’ll survive somehow.

Here’s the thing. For me, clout (spelled correctly and without a .com after it) in Social Media translates to people you’ve helped somehow. Do you know how you measure that? People kindly tell you that you helped them. Yep. Communication on Social Media sites. Wacky, right? Klout doesn’t really measure “influence” in this way, but I think all measures of influence should be based on “thank you” and any and all translations. A lot of the people who have high Klout scores would also probably rank pretty highly on the “thank you” scale. Others would fall off pretty darned quickly, though. For example, the people who spend a lot of time saying, “Please RT” or “OMG CLICK!”. They might have a great Klout score, but not a lot of the kind of clout that I admire.

I don’t care about my Klout score

Numbers in Social Media, for me, have just become moments of pause. I marked when I finally got my 100th follower. I noted progress when I grew my community to 500 followers. I paused again when I reached 1,000 followers. But I have not changed a gull darn thing about how I am blogging or how I am Tweeting. At this point, my game in Social Media is about continuing to learn all I can and then when I’m not doing that, bringing other folks up to speed who might be struggling in the same way I was six months ago. That’s it. I don’t get retweeted a whole lot because generally, I don’t talk in sound bytes. I talk in words that I string together into 140-character mini sentences. Normally, those are written in response to something someone has said to me. I just talk to people. There isn’t anything innately retweetable about “Hey, are you feeling better?” I don’t care. I just don’t. I like talking to the people I talk to. I learn from them, and hopefully they learn from me while also having a little fun (sometimes at my expense).

Point a finger and you have three pointing back at you

I’m not saying that you are a TERRIBLE person if you use Klout. I’m just saying that I wouldn’t get too bogged down in it. Ultimately, if you care about that kind of thing, you could just make your game a Klout tally score. You could trick people into clicking links. You could get a bunch of your friends to retweet everything you say. Your Klout score would probably skyrocket in just a couple of days. But how does that really help you in the end? Ultimately, people will realize that that game is all you’re about. Hungry Hungry Hippo is really fun for about the first hour, and then people want to move on to Trivial Pursuit or Scrabble, right? Well, it’s the same kind of thing. I think people who use Twitter to communicate person-to-person find it much more rewarding, in all of the ways that Klout.com doesn’t measure. Just my opinion, but I’m sticking to it.

1st Image by sebile akcan. http://www.sxc.hu/profile/sebileakc

2nd image Credit: http://www.sxc.hu/profile/rubenshito

I was conversing with someone this week about blogging. They were really having a tough time with it. “Am I using my voice? Am I going to let down the Twitter community I have built if my blog isn’t what they’re interested in?” I’ve had a lot of similar conversations. I’ve witnessed others. People who tweak their posts. People who go back and delete older posts.

It reminded me of the days when I was first learning to crochet.

For me, the phase of learning how to crochet (and knit…and cross stitch…) was a lot like learning how to blog. In other words, I thought I should be able to jump right in and do it. Perfectly. This didn’t seem unreasonable in either scenario. In the craft world, I was seemingly surrounded by people who could whip up an afghan in five seconds flat, and it would be BEAUTIFUL! When I was learning how to blog a little better, it seemed like fifth graders were blogging more and better than me (nothing against fifth graders, of course).

Just like with other crafts that you learn, blogging is based on some basic tools that everyone uses. You need a blogging site. A computer is an awesome help. Things to write about. Ways to promote. A person learning to crochet needs a hook and some yarn. A knitter needs two needles and…some yarn. That’s it. Pretty basic stuff.

When you set out to blog, just like with any craft, you think it’s going to be easy. You know all of the pieces and parts. You’ve seen other people do it. You’ve even gotten lots of helpful tips. Where crafters have patterns, bloggers have tons of informational resources. Then you sit down to blog, and it’s like your brain just starts leaking out of your ears on to your keyboard. When I was learning to crochet, I could not for the life of me figure out how to make the slip knot that you need to make before you even start to do the actual crocheting. This did not bode well, I thought at the time. Learning how to knit, which requires, really, two and a half hands, is also extremely awkward, whereas when a long-time knitter is knitting, it looks effortless and even kind of hypnotic.

Inevitably, with blogging, you come to a point of distress or mild irritation, depending on your personality. “Why am I not getting any comments?” You yell at your personable computer. “I mean, I mean, look at this post! This post is about ORANGES and it got 57 comments. This is stupid.” Now, I am not proud to say this, but when I was learning to crochet, I actually threw a project off the deck of a place my family was staying in for vacation. Every time I sat down to make something, it ended up looking like a DNA molecule, all twisty and uneven. Very un-blankety. In a fit of rage, I just threw the whole mess away. I went to pick it up later, by the way.

So what do you do after you hit this point of despair? Do you just give up your blog and say, “I don’t know. I must just not be meant to blog.” No. The temptation might be there, but blogging, like any craft, is ultimately, in the end, a test of patience. You start to realize that the less you stress about it, the easier and better it gets. My first completed crocheted project, although not a masterpiece, happened when I sat down and said, “Aw heck, I like doing this and I’m just going to do it for fun.” My stitches relaxed. I relaxed. Everything got better.

As you get more into a craft, you realize that what once looked like everyone using the same tools is actually people using the same tools in their own particular way. In blogging, some people use very personal anecdotes. Some people like to come across as teachers. Others like to be kind of biting and funny. Sometimes a blogger will drift from post to post *cough* In crafting, it’s the same thing. Some knitters will swear by bamboo needles while others lust for aluminum. Some knitters refuse to knit with anything but natural yarn, while others are okay with whatever *cough*

I would say my blogging is about where my crocheting and knitting are. I can create some passable stuff. Some of it turns out pretty well. Sometimes I sit down to write a blog and I end up staring into space for 20 minutes. Sometimes I sit down to knit a hat and end up with something that is three feet in circumference. In both cases, I’ve learned to calmly back away, take a few deep breaths, and believe that one day I will be a blogging master and a crafty master. And you know what, no matter what kind of blog posts you write, no matter what “craft” you might be learning right now, you’ll become a master too. It just takes a little time, and heck, I’ll go ahead and quote Guns ‘n Roses. It’ll take a little patience.

As I go through and look at people who are following me, I analyze carefully who I follow back and who I decide to just keep my eye on. I’ve come to notice over the last couple of months that there are things I look for in my fellow tweeters, so I thought I would share my top ten (or tep ton as I just typed) ideas for how to get rolling on Twitter. Let me know if these ideas help!

1. The whole 12:1 Ratio Concept: I was still having a really hard time getting going on Twitter when I saw a remark from Chris Brogan that he makes a point of promoting 12 people for every comment he makes. This changed my entire approach to Twitter. It’s easy to think that Twitter is like Facebook, where you update YOUR status. Twitter is more like a news stream, however, and that means people don’t just want to hear about you, they want to network with you to reach other people and other information. I started making sure that there was plenty of space between me tweeting out posts, and that is when things started to go better for me.

2. Do not become a parrot: It’s easy to think that “Promoting 12 people for every comment you make” means retweeting a lot. I made mistake, too. I would click on “Retweet” like it was an easy button. Retweeting isn’t bad, but if you do retweet, try to add a couple of words introducing what you are saying to show that you really found it interesting. Even more fun is to indicate disagreement so that you can start some conversation.

3. Don’t follow 5 million people right out of the gate: One thing that I look for now is people who are followed by more people than they are following. Don’t despair if you’re just getting started. I’m not saying that if you have 57 followers and you’re following 127 people you’re doing a bad job. Where I start to get a little suspicious is when people have 57 followers but they are following 9,742 people. That tells me they are trying to get numbers rather than a quality community.

4. Don’t measure your success based on the big names: I know that a lot of people base their measure of success on Twitter by how many replies they get from some of the big thinkers. To get RTd by such a person is like gold. To have the beginnings of a conversation is cause for giddiness. I know how that is, but things started working better for me when I said, “Heck, they are following more people than I can even imagine. How are they going to see anything I say?” I started talking to people who were just breaking into Twitter like I was. More chance for conversation, more chance to build community, more value.

5. Attend Twitter Chats: I’ll say it till you beg me to stop. Twitter opened up for me when I went to #blogchat for the very first time. Get out there and share ideas with people who are interested in the same things you are. Here is a list of the Twitter chats in existence right now. You can find me at #Blogchat, #TechChat, #CustServ, #IMCChat, sometimes #B2BChat, and #TweetDiner (which I co-founded with Stan from Pushingsocial).

6. Read as much as you can: This may not seem like a straight line, but in order to pass on informed and credible information, you have to gather it first. Read blogs, comment on them, build u a rapport with bloggers, mention great things you read – that is how you build community.

7. Aim to make friends: I told someone this the other night and I think they thought I was kidding, but honestly, if you worry about things like the “quality” of your followers or the number of retweets you’re getting, Twitter won’t work for you. It’s like falling in love, right? You work on just getting to know people, share content, and then by accident you find yourself as part of a great community. Seriously.

8. Be Yourself: Just because you’re on Twitter for business reasons doesn’t mean you have to only talk about business. A bot can do that. Let people get to know you a little. That’s not to say that you should bleed all over the page, but engage with people.

9. The Avatar: If I see the little Twitter birdy instead of a customized avatar, I’m honestly going to have some doubts about whether you are a human being. This is not meant to be judgmental, but a lot of spam bot accounts are absent a picture, so it raises flags for me. Show me who you are or who you are on Twitter for, barring a personal picture. It doesn’t have to be a glamor shot – in fact those make me suspicious too. Just a nice little portraits works well.

10. A little bio: Take a bit of time to fill out the bio. You don’t have room to tell your life story, so you don’t have to worry about getting too personal. However, having a few keywords there or a brief synopsis is a good idea. It helps people find you, and if Im hedging about whether to follow someone, having a bio, which means a little effort was taken, can be a difference maker.

Image by Billy Alexander. http://www.sxc.hu/profile/ba1969

Phew. What a week, and it’s not over yet! I’m really excited about something regarding this project – people are recommending OTHER peoples’ blogs more than their own. These are the kinds of things that give me faith in both humanity and Social Media – in that order. I hope you enjoy these posts. Don’t forget to congratulate the authors, and don’t forget – as soon as you see this post, it’s time to send me new ones for next week!

1. Great post on proofreading by Bob James (The Mighty Copywriter). The graphic he uses is hilarious!

2. @DWesterberg notes that good marketing is memorable, valuable, and frequent! Recommended by @kseniacoffman

3. My friend @jeffthesensei warns that the “man behind the curtain”may not necessarily be a wiz

4. New publisher Sterling Hope finds that the Clinton Global Initiative’s goal of expanding impact resonates (from @AmberCleveland, authored by @KayWhitaker)

5. A truly beautiful post by my new friend @cristianisdaman – about the day his own Superman gave him a call

6. My stunning friend Lisa @ellisvalincom) explains why she is a marketing stylist

7. @Michael_Evanko recommended this smart article about Empowerment from the Harvard Business Review

8. My friend @FutureJennD recommended this post about an atypical day at the fair, by @framericandream. Be ready to hold your breath!

9. @FutureJennD also wrote a post her own self! A great post about the complexities of a blended family.

10. My friend @KnowledgeBishop took his blogging skills on the road. He waxes poetical on the Subtleties of Success at the Get Your Leadership Big On Blog

11. @Tommyismyname warns you that your profile information can be used against you. Watch out!

12. I loved this post by @LisaPetrilli. Maybe sometimes the best leaders are those willing to be vulnerable. Brilliant.

13. There’s a lot of buzz about how awesome @LaurenKGray is. One of the reasons is that she is always out there helping people, like in this post about her favorite chats

14. My friend @fredMcClimans has important observations about bit.ly and other link tracking through Twitter. Privacy concern post #2 on this week’s list!

15. Whenever @IanMRountree attends a #blogchat, he writes up some of the best “meeting notes” out there. I wanted to give you an example of one of Ian’s Blogchat round-ups

16. My friend Stan @PushingSocial tackled the question “How often should I post?” a little while ago. It’s a great argument. What do you think?

17. @MissusP (Christine Perkett) is one sharp thinker. I loved her post on how Social Media is affecting PR firms. Check it out!

18. @SueYoungMedia offers a fun quiz for PR Pros. Pretty fun, funny, and thought provoking!

19. The brilliant @SuzanneVara ponders if school bus advertising is going too far

20. @Salamicat ponders food, glorious food. Don’t read if you’re already hungry!

21. The first post to make me tear up. @naomidunford’s guest post on problogger about not giving up is sad, inspiring, and beautiful. Read it!

22. Your weekly @JayBaer dose – Jay looked at the 25 most popular blog posts on his blog. Then he blogged about how that exercise can help you blog better.

23. Another mind-bending post from @julien. Happiness, what to do, what not to do...you might be surprised at what you learn.

24. I loved this post by the super awesome @MayaREGuru. Why do you use Twitter? Not as existential as you might think 🙂

25. @BillBoorman always is offering advice, whether during #blogchat or many other chats in which he partakes. On this day, Bill spoke with images instead – The 2 things you need for Social Media. Well “said,” Bill! And the right order, too 🙂

26. @pprothe is one of my favorite co-IMCChatters on Wednesday nights. I really enjoyed his post on how to connect with 8-year-old girls if you’re not Justin Bieber. Plus there’s a really good lesson to learn! 🙂

27. Read this post by @AmberCadabra if only because she uses the word kerfuffle! A post about opinions, the freedom of, and PriceChopper.

28. My brilliant friend Debra Ellis (@wilsonellis) wrote a great post on the 8 people your company will meet on Social Media sites. Invest your time wisely.

29. This is a really interesting post regarding what kind of language to use in your blog – and why. By @ctmarcom

30. I’ve already put this wisdom to use this week, so I guess I’ll round things off with my favorite Chris Brogan post of the week…are you asking the right questions? You just might be surprised at how a subtle change can alter your outlook.

Being an agency person in the world of Social Media can be an interesting journey. On the one hand, I am out here learning so that I can offer the best advice possible to our clients. But then recommendations come through my Twitter stream that are geared towards the “do it yourself” mentality. This places me in an untenable situation. I can try to argue that something that works decently and is super duper cheap is not really good for you, or I can say, “Hey, try this out everybody!” And talk our agency out of potential projects.

The problem with this dichotomy is that it makes it seem like agencies are job shops. We are all about making stuff, right? We make ads, we make websites, we make business cards. If you can find a way to do those things, you don’t need an agency. Right?

The problem is that the word “agency,” like so many other words in this rapidly evolving age, is no longer the same thing that it was even five years ago. There are still agencies out there that really do just focus on project work, but that is not the whole story. Agencies, as I have said before, are really in the service industry. We are like the folks who own your favorite restaurant. Yes, we make the food you eat. But we also can tell you what wine will go best with that meal. We can tell you how to warm it up so it tastes just as good tomorrow. We can tell you what dessert will be the perfect follow-up. Yes, we also enjoy getting paid for doing that stuff. Just like your favorite restaurant.

I’ve only ever worked for one agency – my family’s agency. So I can only speak to what we do and how we do it. There are some things we can do that you might not be thinking about at all. And that last part – that’s why the “do it yourself” mentality keeps me up at night. It’s not about the fact companies can now do a lot of things themselves. It’s about the fact that those projects are not the whole story. There’s a whole world beyond just creating a sell sheet. Here’s a small sample of what we do. How many of these things are on your radar?

1. Analyze publications with a fine-toothed comb, including examining the folio, looking at the BPA statements, and talking to publishers and sales reps about potential concerns

2. Take calls from publications who either want you to advertise or maybe who want to include you in editorial

3. Handle invoicing tied to your advertising campaign

4. Make sure you are protected against vendor mistakes, like a magazine running your ad by mistake and then trying to charge you

5. Copywriting – for anything

6. Product Research, including assisting in creating focus groups, industry research, etc

7. Connect with vendors that will benefit you, from people who sell premiums to printers to videographers and voice specialists

8. Consult with you on whether a company or product should be purchased

9. Offer constructive criticism on a project

10. Offer ideas on how to improve customer satisfaction

11. Offer ideas on how to improve employee satisfaction

12. Create materials for your sales meetings

13. Consult on the development of your e-newsletter

14. Execute your e-newsletter

15. Conduct research to see if Social Media is right for you

16. Help you implement  your Social Media Plan

17. Recommend trade shows to attend

18. Recommend trade show promotional concepts

19. Orchestrate corporate outings

20. Create promotional materials tied to corporate outings

21. Keep you updated on what is happening in the industry and with your competition

22. Alert you when you encounter good or bad buzz

23. Plan marketing campaigns for and with you

24. Implement marketing campaigns for and with you

25. Research how your competition is using their websites

26. Develop websites that will make sense to your customers and that will outshine your competition

27. Consult on Search Engine Optimization strategies

28. Consult on web hosting

29. Consult on e-commerce stores, including issues like taxation and how to calculate shipping

30. Keep you updated on the newest goings-on in the world of technology and marketing

31. Offer product concepts

32. Assist with budgeting

33. Consult on international marketing

34. Media placement

35. Ad Development

36. Recommend campaign measurement strategies

37. Implement/monitor campaign measurement strategies

38. Recommend appropriate paper stock and printing methodologies

40. Represent your company via meetings with publication representatives and other personnel tied to your industry

41. Recommend topics for news releases

42. Develop and send news releases

43. Create/recommend opportunities for article inclusion in key publications

44. Make sure your marketing is remaining cohesive and coherent

45. Monitor new industries that might be relevant to you

46. Develop campaign and corporate tag lines

47. Help your company build towards a bigger future through research and planning

48. Organize your content in a sensible, easy to navigate way

49. Proofread everything tied to your company

50. Assist you in anything else you might need to make your company grow