social media – Page 3

Basics on Blogging

Made the following presentation to the 3×2 Networking Group this morning on the basics of blogging.

Many customers, friends and family ask me all the time for advice on how to get started in blogging. While I could go on and on about everything one could do to successfully blog, it could prove to be overwhelming. So to make it easy, I will start out with some basic information and add to it from time to time.

Decide what you’re going to blog about. Keep in mind that there are literally 100s of millions of bloggers worldwide. If you’re going to attract the right readers you best know what you’re talking about and be passionate about it.
To host or not to host – You need to decide if you’re going to sign for a freebie blogging site such as blogspot or blogger.com or if you want to set up an independent blog on a web server where you pay for the hosting services. I pay to have this blog hosted. It cost around $6-$7/year. With a freebie site you have to be prepared for two things: one, you don’t own your domain name. Your domain becomes something like this “blogtitle.blogger.com”. Should you decide at some point you want to strike out on your own, you will lose all the content you spent perhaps years building up. And you have to let your audience know where you went. Second, you have to put up with their ads. Frre doesn’t really mean free.
Host your own – Offers more flexibility because you “own” the turf. You can monetize the site (topic for another time), your content is your own and your audience stays with you (so long as your good). It costs money, but its money well spent.

The best software when hosting your own blog is WordPress in my humble opinion. The hosting company I use set up my site with the software already installed. When inside the admin part of the site I can set my theme and a variety of other configurations. I will discuss these at a future blog post.

Watch for more tips and tricks to help you get started. Mike and I also conduct seminars through the Illinois Small Business Development Center at McHenry County College.

Yellowbird Marketing Solutions

Reasons Why A Blog Doesn’t Work

I was setting down to begin writing a new topic for this blog site and was pondering why it doesn’t work as well as I would like for it to work. I know I’m not the greatest writer in the world, but I’m certain I’m not the worst either.

Then I started to wonder if I’m the only blog writer out there wondering why their blog isn’t working. Not likely: after all, I’m not the only person in the world who likes spaghetti.

So I thought about it for awhile and I came up with the following reasons and hopefully you will find these insightful enough to help you. Also, I’m sure I’m not the only one to come up with these same reasons:

It’s not all about me – I have come to the realization that most readers of a blog could care less about the person writing the blog. Face it people, the most important person to the reader of your blog is…the reader. He couldn’t care less about you. Is what you’re writing going to solve his problem a fill his needs? That is what is important.
Quit trying to sell something to your readers – I’m certainly guilty of that one. From now on I’m cutting back on the ad space.
You don’t cite other sources – When it comes to an article where you did a good deal of research and the ideas belong to someone else (are there any original thoughts anymore?), give credit where credit is do. I read a lot of different sources for my material, but the thoughts on what they wrote are my own.
Your writing is BORING – You need to spice it up, make it interesting and make it relevant. Come on, I know you have something to say. Spit it out and quit trying to be fancy. Be you cuz there ain’t no one like you and everyone wants to see that person, not some fool you’re pretending to be.
You’re not making it easy to share– Put an RSS feed on your site. Add a Follow me on Twitter button, Post to Facebook button, a Like button. Anything you can think of to let folks share easily. I know with WordPress there are plugins that allow your readers to share your content. I use WP-Social-Bookmarking which adds on links to all the major Social Media sites.
You’re not letting others talk – You need to engage people in a conversation. That may mean having to go where they’re at since they are coming here. Go to other similar blogs and comment on what they wrote. This allows folks to get to know you and what you’re all about. It may make them stop by for a visit now and then.
As number 6 said: Give them a reason to return. And they will if you’re not boring, you engage your readers, make it easy to share you and you’re providing useful information.

Hopeful this proves to be somewhat helpful. If anyone out there has some other thoughts please share them with us so that others may learn too.

Yellowbird Marketing Solutions

On-Line Video

Advertiser are shifting funding from standard banners and rich media to online video because it’s bringing major benefits to their companies. But they’re still advertising on television making online video a compliment to TV rather than an alternative to it.

A study by Brightroll is showing that at least 85% of the ad agencies said spending was moving from other types of advertising to online video. Moving funds from television, though, wasn’t happening as one might expect, with less than 65% of all agencies doing so. Companies that were pulling funds from TV were doing so in much smaller increments.

Many companies in the survey agreed (91%) that targeting capabilities are an important consideration when buying online video. Behavioral targeting is clearly viewed as beneficial, even though still not a wide spread practice. Only 40% of those responding indicated they would use the practice when leveraging their advertising.

I found it interesting that 96% of those ad agencies responding in Brightroll’s survey saw research as something of value their clients, yet only 35% actually conduct research for them. When asked which area of online video advertising one would to see an increase in research done 29% said performance vs television advertising, followed by 28% saying they would like to see increased research in the “Change in purchase intent or brand lift”. Audience profiling research cam in last with only 4% wanting to see increased research done. Research provides invaluable insight into how well a campaign performs and allows for improved optimization of future campaigns.

Media buyers are predicting that this year online video will see the largest increase in spending with mobile video following closely behind and social media coming in closely in third place this year. Display, search and tv advertising followed with dismal expectations of any kind of increase.

Overall, I think online video is becoming a clear winner in the advertising expenditure race this year and will likely surge further ahead for the foreseeable future. There are many services out there offering top notch technical product and knowledge, so it should be relatively easy to either DIY or have find a qualified professional to help you.

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It’s about traffic

Ok, the big question I get from my customers is how can I get more of the right kind of traffic to my website. A very good question. I certainly don’t get someone asking me to lessen the amount of traffic to their website.

Here’s what I do to attract more customers: I consistently try to put engaging content on my blogs, on my website and on my Social media sites that relates to what I do and to who I am as a person. I figure that I love what I do and so I know I’m going to be very passionate when writing about it. I also enjoy a number of others things in my life and I like to write about those subjects, too.

I have a great girlfriend whom I live with. We love taking care of each other.

I enjoy hiking in the local county forest preserves in the area. I love to take long bicycle rides. I like reading, watching a good movie on the TV. We’ll go out to the movies only to watch a flick where it has to be viewed on the big screen…like Avatar for instance. I enjoy BBQ on warm summer days sipping on a long tall cool imported or micro brewed beer with friends and neighbors.

I am very passionate about politics. You will likely see a few posts here where I wax poetically about the issues of the day. I think it’s important that we all are involved. After all, you may have the answer to solving this mess we’re in.

I love to garden. You can see how my garden progresses each year by viewing my Facebook page. I’ll talk more about this subject in the very near future.

Anyway, to get more traffic I know I need to add other things to the mix along with the good content. You see, everyone is saying you have to have good engaging content.

Really? Hmmm, imagine that.

But good and engaging content to one person falls flat to another. For example, my girlfriend hates computers. She uses them, but when I try to explain something technical to her she gets all glassy eyed and tries to change the subject to something else. I do the same to her when she tries to talk about a subject I have no real interest in.

So my subject matter has to be pointed at the right kind of traffic. Someone who is interested in what it is I do.

Getting attention can be easy. Charlie Sheen has been getting tons of attention. But as you can see from his traveling show, some audiences love him and some just think he’s stupid.

In my case, or at least I hope so, I want to attract attention that builds my business. I have to address those interested in what I do by showing them I know what I’m talking about. I have show why I’m the subject matter expert in my chosen field. And do this in a way that provides value and is entertaining. If my writing is boring then people will not read it.

All this means that I have to know who my “A” customer is. My “A” customer is the one I really enjoy doing business with. And it’s not the guy from across town who just wants to pick my brain all the time. Him I need to drop him like a hot rock.

Your “A” customer is the person/company that can afford your product, who will benefit from it, that is eager to buy from you. Those customers make being in business a pleasure.

So, write to your “A” customer.

7 ways to handle negative responses

I recently had a former customer call me up on the phone. He was asking me to help him with removing a negative comment that was posted on his listing in Google local directories. He thought it would go away if we took his website down.

It should become apparent as to why we no longer do business with this guy.

See, rather than deal with the complaint on its merits, he wants to ignore it. He claims the complainer is being unreasonable. The complainer felt he was being taken for a ride by my former customer. I wasn’t really disagreeing with the complainer (by the way, I’m not the complainer), which is why we no longer have this guy as a customer.

So I thought I would discuss the 7 ways we recommend to our good customers how you should look at handling complaints:

1. Never fear the complainer – Complaints are an opportunity for you to show your community how you handle adversity. Avoiding it says as much about you as does confronting it.

2. Be totally honest – admit fault, within reason, even if it isn’t your fault. If one of my customers complains I didn’t perform as they expected, even though what they’re complaining about isn’t in the scope of the project, as long as it’s reasonable I will take responsibility for the misunderstanding and work to correct the problem. I will not bury my head in the sand and hope it goes away.

3. Respond back in the medium where the complaint originated – If the complaint is from Twitter, don’t respond back in LinkedIn. Keep it within the medium received. Responding back in a different medium makes it look like your avoiding the issue.

4. Use the complaint as feedback from your customers – If your widget has a problem you will usually receive that information in the form of a complaint. Use it to fix the problem and show the world how you did it.

5. Listen – Many times when a customer is complaining all they want is to be heard. It’s as simple as that.

I had a customer of a customer many years ago who called complaining that a battery pack her son used in his hobby race car had exploded while being recharged. Back in those days it usually took twelve hours to recharge a battery pack. The kids would buy 2-3 battery packs so that they could race for hours. They also used to try to recharge the packs very quickly, literally zapping the daylights out of them. The problem was that NiCad batteries are a notoriuosly greedy substance. The battery doesn’t know when to quit taking a charge like SLA batteries do. There is a lot of heat created while charging which builds pressure inside the battery. So, once in a while a battery being charged too fast will build enough pressure to pop its top.

Scares the hell out of you.

It scared this Mom’s kid, which of course upset her. The sales person who took the call was having trouble getting her to be reasonable and so I took over. I asked her what the problem was and she proceeded to yell and scream about what had happened. When she appeared to be running out of steam, I asked her if there was anything else that concerned her and she proceeded on for another 10 minutes. I asked her one more time if there was anything else she wanted to tell me and she went on again, but only for a minute.

I then apologized to her for the incident. I asked her a few questions and I discovered that her son, when zapping the daylights out of the battery, didn’t use dry ice to keep the battery from overheating. He couldn’t afford dry ice so he tried the not so good alternative, ice cubes. She wasn’t too happy with her son when he admitted to what he was doing. You can’t really fault him since many of the other boys were recharging the batteries and he just wanted to do the same. The charging instructions that come with the batteries are usually tossed aside rendering them useless. So, I told this mom I would send her 3 battery packs for free along with a detailed set of instructions on how to properly charge them.

Total cost to us was $75.00. But we gained a customer for life because I took the time to listen.

6. Follow up – Never assume the problem is totally resolved, always follow-up. This will reinforce in the customers mind that you really are listening.

7. Make sure you share these experience with your audience – Don’t be afraid to share the real you. Your audience will love you for it.

Confusing Internet

Many small to medium size companies find the Internet to be a very confusing place.

My friend Tom was recently lamenting:

How come I’m not getting traffic to my web site?
What is this Social Media thing all about?
Will it last? I’m told I should have a website.
I’m told I should be on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube…aahhh.
Too much to decide on, too much time involved figuring it all out.
How is it that some people seem to be all over the Internet and I can’t even get off square one?

Like anything out there worth doing, the Internet takes a lot of hard work, which means a lot of time. And time is something many of us have very little of to start with. So to put more time into something that has a really steep learning curve and doesn’t seem to produce results makes absolutely no sense whatsoever, right?

Tom continued to think out loud:

But gee whiz, look at Charlie, the Butcher across the street. I’ve never seen him so filled up with customers. The wife said she saw a coupon he had put onto this thing called Facebook. All of her girlfriends are raving about it. She used that new smart phone I got her last Christmas to scan something called a QR code, whatever that is.

But I just had the website redone last year and it cost me a bundle. I’m still not getting any leads from it.

Come to think about it, that damn phone book ad isn’t producing butkus. And it costs hundreds per quarter for it, tried to cancel it months ago but I couldn’t figure out how to do it.

Sure wish there was someone out there who understood business and could help me develop a marketing strategy that would make sense, remove the confusion and make it productive.

Well there is, Tom. Call me at Yellowbird Marketing Solutions and I’ll help you figure it all. We can help you develop a package that will fit your budget and produce results. I’ll even show you how to cancel that phone book ad that does nothing but frustrate you.

You can find me at:

Privacy when on-line

Have there been violations of the privacy trust as stated by Facebook. Yep, most likely. While I don’t like it, it’s better I’m aware of the possibility. So, as in many cases, it’s buyer beware. If you don’t want others to know than use these tools wisely. Think before you click.

I found the new bill before Congress, “Do not track act” introduced in the House of Representatives on Friday by California Democrat Jackie Speier, to be an interesting exercise in government interference . While I firmly believe the government should be setting the rules in many areas, Wall Street comes to mind, I think it is unnecessary on the Internet (except to keep it free and open from the big wigs).

The intent of the bill is to create a system similar to the do not call lists. The do-not-call lists for telephones were needed due to the abuse generated by the telesales companies calling people at all hours, especially during dinner. Products were being developed, like caller ID, to deal with these unwanted calls. But these products had limited success.

But I think the difference when it comes to the Internet is pretty obvious.

I don’t have to look at the ads in the right hand column when I Google for information.

I can ignore the ads that appear in Facebook. I can tell Facebook not to share personal information such as name, numbers, address, etc.

Or better yet, just simply leave them out all together.

As a business I run PPC ads in Google and Facebook upon occasion. I pay for “Keywords” used by those doing the searching or who are using Facebook. My goal is to have my ad appear when someone uses the keywords I bid on. The user, by using the keywords of choice, is expressing an interest in the subject. And since there is no cost to the user to use Google or Facebook, ads is what you get in order to support this free service. Very much like TV used to be…Yes Virginia, TV used to be free.

I don’t get to, nor do I want to, know who you are. Nothing personal, I just want my ad to appear on the right side column when you express an interest in the subject. I just want my services to appear before those interested. Nothing more, nothing less.