Imagine Your Reality

One of the key realizations I’ve had about marketing is that it’s very important to track what works and doesn’t work with your marketing. I track which marketing activities help me get business and which ones don’t do anything and on the basis of that tracking I determine what I should continue doing and what I should let go.

For example, some time back I gave up using lead referral networking groups because I wasn’t getting much business from them…certainly not enough to justify the amount of money I spent on those groups. Since then I’ve joined three chambers of commerce and I was quickly able to determine that being involved in the chamber was much better for my business, because of what I tracked. What was very interesting to realize is that by not only changing the type of networking group, but also the activity associated with such a group I was able to figure out what worked best for me when it came to getting business.

The importance of that last statement is that its also important to track the specific activities that work or don’t work. By learning which activities work you can continue to focus on those activities, while also testing other activities to see if they also fit or don’t fit.

What I’ve also realized is that just because some activity works for one business doesn’t mean it will work for every business. Additionally each person has their strengths and weaknesses and so its important to learn what your strengths are and how you can use them to help market your business and put you in touch with your clientele.

Book Review: How to be a Fierce Competitor by Jeffrey Fox

This is a very relevant book to read in a time of economic recession, but its also a book I would recommend reading even during a time of economic boom. The author spells out in clear cut terms what activities and behaviors work to make a business a fierce competitor and more importantly a successful business. I like the use of stories, but I also like the author’s bluntness. The book is easy to read and to the point, but you will learn a lot in each chapter you read.

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Typically, what I read and see in regards to social media is how it can be used for marketing, how it can be used to get in the door and catch the eyes of people. But I think social media is a lot more than just marketing or even networking. Social media needs to be examined in terms of how it can or can’t be applied to all areas of a person’s business.

Christopher Koch brought up a point recently about lessons companies can learn from people such as Steven Slater and Mark Hurd. That point is that people are making it easier and easier to find out what they have to say and what they are doing all the time. And the question for business is simple: Are you listening and responding to what people have to say?

When you don’t listen to what’s being said it creates problems that could’ve been contained if people had just made the effort to find out what the problems actually are. But businesses tend to react to situations, instead of putting some thought into how they can actually get on top of a situation meaningfully. In many ways businesses don’t even care what people are saying or make a lame effort to show they care, when they don’t. While that may sound harsh, it’s worth saying especially when businesses don’t seem to make an effort to address problems conclusively or with respect to the employees or customers that have problems.

A business is only as good as the level of service it provides customers and employees. Businesses that make efforts to listen to employees and to customers will definitely benefit in the long run, especially if we consider that a happy person is much more productive than an unhappy person. Monitoring what people say and making the effort to respond can pay off in the long run, especially if the business makes inroads with the community overall in their communication.

One of the prevailing attitudes about customer service is that its just about damage control: Dealing with customer complaints. But customer service shouldn’t just be about damage control, and while social media is a wonderful medium for tracking what customers are saying or aren’t saying about your business, it also offers the opportunity to simply get into conversations with clients.

It seems to me that one part of customer service that’s ignored is customer retention. So while customer service will handle customer complaints, they won’t necessarily be proactive and actually talk with customers to establish a relationship with them based on trust as opposed to distrust. With social media, it’s easy to actually get involved in the conversation with a customer.

Here’s a tactic I use with my clients, that could also be used by other businesses, (even large ones) provided they are willing to assign customer service reps to specific clients. In Twitter create a specific list called clients and put all of your clients on there. On Facebook become a fan of their fan pages (if they are a business) and make it a point to visit those pages once a day. For each social media site there is a way to check up on clients, and engage them in conversation, provided you are willing to invest the time in doing so. Start conversations with your clients, or make a response to something they say that has nothing to do with your business. In short, show support for what matters to them, instead of waiting for them to contact you when they have a problem. By doing this you’ll be showing them that your interested in having a relationship with them, regardless of whether or not you’re doing business with them at the time.

Customer service should be about relationships first and damage control second. No business has an excuse for not investing in customer relationships, because each business is ultimately successful because of the customers. The product or service offered is only useful if someone wants to buy it, use it, and tell people about it. So ask yourself this: Is your customer service about damage control or actually getting to know your clients?

As social media policies are developed, one factor that needs to be considered is relationships. Since social media is ideally about creating and cultivating relationships with other people, a social media policy needs to consider those relationships and respect them while also making it clear to employees that they also have a relationship with the company.

In fact, a social media policy should, right from the beginning, make it clear that there is a relationship between the company and the employee. That kind of understanding can help policy makers frame their policy in terms of showing employees how that relationship is impacted by their actions on social media. At the same time, policy makers do want to consider that employees are using social media to be social, to answer questions, share ideas, and otherwise cultivate relationships with other people for a variety of reasons.

In developing a policy that employees will need to follow, a special section should be devoted to the company’s stance on respecting the personal lives of the employees as well as the relationships employees cultivate and maintain on social media. Employees need to know that their privacy will be respected and that their choices for who they contact won’t be held against them, as long as it doesn’t endanger the company. That last point is essential for employees to understand, so that likewise they respect the relationship they have with the business. Sharing proprietary information would endanger the company, or speaking badly of a fellow employee or client on a social media forum would also endanger the company. Employees need to consider the relationship they have with the company they work for, so that when they communicate online, they do so and still protect company secrets and represent the company respectfully.

While an employee might only work eight hours a day, s/he still nonetheless represents the company 24/7 by virtue of being employed there. This doesn’t mean the company owns the employee, but it does mean that the employee needs to recognize that s/he always has a relationship with the company and that relationship will effect other relationships, insomuch as what the employee says about work to the people s/he interacts with. By addressing social media relationships in a policy, companies can help employees understand the importance of respecting the relationship they have with their company, while also cultivating new relationships with people they meet online.

As more and more employees get involved on social media sites, its important to know how to explain social media to them, as well as encourage their use of social media in a way that also considers proprietary information, and speaking positively about the company. At the same time, it’s also important to respect that each employee has his/her own voice and that s/he will be talking about every day life, including work, on social media. So what can you do to help your employees with social media?

1. Don’t tell them to talk about the company all the time, unless they happen to be your social media manager. Do ask them to be positive about the company, fellow employees, and clients of the company, or refrain from saying anything.

2. Don’t micro-manage everything they do on social media. Not only is it weird to have a boss looking over your shoulder, but chances are they’re mainly using social media to stay up on what’s happening with friends and family. Respect their privacy, as you would hope they would yours.

3. Make sure employees know what they can’t do on social media, but also encourage them to be active participants. For example, you may not want an employee to set-up a company social media account without checking in and explaining how it’ll be used, but it is good for that employee to actively comment and participate on forums as him/herself.

Remember that your employees do represent your business. Trust them to represent it, but also provide guidelines that them. You could include suggestions for how they can use different social media sites successfully, or tips for how to blog better…but most importantly encourage them to be active and be themselves instead of trying to repress their voices.

What do you do to help your employees with social media?

Biznik, Facebook, and Linkedin have a features called Groups. Linkedin and Biznik also have a Q and A forum. These features are very useful for becoming more visible in your social media communities and even leading to business, but there is one thing you need to do: participate.

Participation doesn’t have to take up a lot of time, provided you are focused about it. I usually will check out the Q and A forums first and skim a couple pages of them and see if there are questions I want to answer. I usually at least answer two questions. I do this every couple of days for the different sites I visit, which usually suffices for keeping me visible and engaged with the people I’m having an online discussion with.

I also check up on groups every couple days, unless I’m posting something to the group, at which point I’ll check when I post my discussion and determine if I want to contribute a comment to a discussion on the group. Again, I’m doing this to say visible and engaged in the group.

Can this activity lead to business? Sometimes it can. As people get to know you and also as they read what you’ve written, it can provide an opportunity for you to make online connections that can turn into offline conversations. Again, it’s ultimately up to you to follow-up with people you interact with online, but I’ve found that by choosing to follow-up with people has opened up opportunities I would otherwise miss out on. And participating in forums and groups has connected me to those people, so I think its worth investing a bit of time into the online groups and forums you join.

What about you? what has your experience with Q and A forums and groups been like and how has it helped your business?

In my recent post on advertising too much, I was asked if I was referring to people trying really hard to get a job or just people advertising goods and services. The answer actually applies to both cases, or if you will to anyone who is spending too much time trying to convince you to buy and not enough time on actually providing good content that will justify interest in finding out what someone has to offer.

So how do you balance advertising of any kind with good content? I hear suggested ratios of 4 to 1, where you give four pieces of information away and then make an offer. And I think if that works, its useful to do. I’ll admit that I tend to just give away a lot of information and occasionally make an offer. I don’t have a specific ratio down, but I know I’m offering more than 4 pieces of information. However, my focus is more on interaction and specifically on trying to start conversations and then take those conversations into a direction where possible business can result. So my focus is really about providing content and from that content creating discussion which may or may not lead to business. As I continue to develop my product line, this may change some, but overall I prefer to focus more on content and socializing as a way of creating relationships.

I think, if you are going to advertise, that you do need to keep in mind that ultimately you are creating relationships and as such you need to ask: How do I want people to perceive my interactions with them? The example I used last week of the person who mentions his book in every post shows me someone who hasn’t really thought through the kind of impression he can make on someone who visits his website for the first time.

Successful marketing, networking, sales, and advertising has to include some awareness of the perception you want people to have about your activities and the actions you want people to take. You also need to know what perceptions and actions you don’t want people to take. Once you know what you want people to do or not do, then you need to determine if your activities are encouraging your preferred action. This can be determined by surveying people (irritating to fill out) or by simply observing how people respond to what you are doing.

For example, on Linkedin groups I regularly post excerpts of my blog and a link back to it. I do this to offer content and get some discussion to occur. Sometimes I’ll be contacted by people who want to connect and I use that invitation as an opportunity to not just connect via Linkedin but also offline, if possible. Only once have I been contacted by someone who complained about the posting I do, and once he understood I was primarily focused on offering content to start up conversations, he saw the value of my activity. Is there some advertising of some kind in my activity? Just a bit, because I am using my postings as an opportunity to establish reputation, but overall the focus is on providing to the community, instead of trying to get something from it.

What do you think? How would you balance content and advertising?

Employees are using social media. How should businesses handle that? They can take a hard approach or trust their employees, but which choice is best? Watch my video below to learn more.

The other day at one of my chamber meetings, a fellow member remarked on my hat and noted that even if people didn’t remember my name, they’d always remember my hat. I think he’s right, because it’s a fairly distinctive hat. In fact, that’s one reason (though not the only) that I wear it. I know people will remember me by my hat and that if they ask someone else about me, chances are that person will also remember if the hat is alluded to. Of course, I also dress up and I make it a point to have a memorable tag line, because I realize that sometimes it will be some of that information that helps someone find me.

Still appearance alone isn’t enough and neither is a clever tag line. What will really make you stand out is showing people you can walk that talk you give out. So be able to back up what you do and you’ll be pleased with the credibility that also gets associated with the image.

What do you do to stand out to the people you know? Each day, I meet lots of different people. Some of them are new, most of them I’ve already met a couple times. What makes someone stand out to me is going to half involve appearance, and half involve what they actually say. Afterwords I’ll research them and find out more, and see if my initial impression is confirmed or disproved. Depending on what I find a conversation may follow or it might not. That’s what I do to check up on people who stand out to me.

There’s also a social media component to this and I’ll cover that in the next post.

Book Review Social Media 101 by Chris Brogan

Social Media 101 is chalk full of useful tips and suggestions for how to leverage social media for your business. Best of all the writing is not only approachable, but its to read a couple of chapters, put it down, and then come back to it later. I’ve found numerous useful tips that I’ve tried out, from the book, and I’d recommend it to anyone who is wanting to learn more about how to use social media for business. Then check out Chris’s blog, which will have more useful information for you.

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