Facebook has been getting a heck of a lot of buzz lately as the social networking site continues to add value for brands and small business owners. Late last week they improved local ad opportunities for SMBs and just yesterday they announced a partnership with Eventbrite to help business owners monetize events advertised on the site. The combination helps to make Facebook an even more attractive marketing channel for SMBs to utilize. If you didn’t catch yesterday’s announcement, Facebook has partnered with Eventbrite (instead of competing with it) to allow small business owners to sell tickets and/or register to events directly through their Facebook Event page. Previously, attendees were directed offsite in order to do so. Allowing the registration process to happen on Facebook itself should be a welcome improvement to both businesses and users. Yesterday a page went up on facebook.eventbrite.com to announce the new feature. [The page has since been removed.] Collect money for your event with Eventbrite Eventbrite is partnering with Facebook to enable you to collect money for your event. Your attendees pay with credit card and Eventbrite collects the money on your behalf and sends you a check when your event is over. We charge a small service fee for every ticket sold. 5.5% + $.99c, which attendees pay, costing you nothing. Eventbrite has helped event organizers around the world sell over 10 million tickets. We’re excited to help you sell your and put some delightful cash in your pocket. The announcement offers SMB owners a great way to market new events and create visibility. To date, many small business owners have been utilizing the Facebook Events feature to spread word of mouth regarding physical events they were holding, product release dates, giveaways/contest, new promotions, etc. But there wasn’t a way to capture that attention directly on the site or to provide a compelling call to action to get people to register and hook them. Now that they can register directly from the site, even when money is exchanging hands, there is. I really like the news of the integration because I think it helps to strengthen the Facebook marketing platform for SMBs by allowing them to tie in everything else they’re doing on the site. For example, with the new roll out SMBs can easily: Create a Facebook Event to market something upcoming Use Facebook’s highly targeted advertising platform to promote the Event to the right people. Use the new Eventbrite partnership to close the conversion immediately Facebook’s allowing SMBs owners to create a perfect storm of marketing where everything is done more powerfully and in one centralized location. Facebook advertising converts exceptionally well because of how targeted and personal the ads can be. Taking that power and combining it with increased functionality is a win for everyone. If you’re interested in getting more acquainted with Facebook as a marketing channel, I was at SMX West last week and covered a great session about Free Ways To Market On Facebook . The speakers presented some pretty great information on how to use Facebook Groups/Fan pages, what makes stories pop in your News Feed and some of the best ways to market on the site. It may be worth a read. From Small Business Trends Facebook Helps SMB Owners Make Events More Useful

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Facebook Helps SMB Owners Make Events More Useful

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Learn more about what’s important to your small business today. Here is our latest roundup of the news articles and blogswe’re reading and what’s important, from Small Business Trends . Policy Is health care reform already hurting small business? Learning from Massachusetts. Small business owners decry health costs. SouthCoastToday.com Is insurance regulation helping or hurting small business? A perspective from Hawaii. HMSA seeks 7.8% hike in small-business rate. HonoluluAdvertiser.com Why FICA-tax breaks for hiring the unemployed won’t encourage new hires. Fifteen Billion Dollars but Not a Lot of Sense. The article notes that the Senate proposal “encourages companies to violate the most basic tenet of good business, which is to hire the most qualified people.” NYTimes.com Congress will not be acting on credit card interchange reform this year — and less government interference is probably a good thing. No Interchange reform legislation in 2010. If your small business accepts credit cards, this article gives tips for how to shop around for the lowest interchange rates. Vantage Viewpoint Credit Small business borrowing is up…but so are delinquencies. Exclusive: Small business lending up third straight month. Reuters Small businesses need more sales, not more loans. Economists Argue Small-Business Concerns over lending overblown. WSJ Blogs No credit? No problem. Start your business with a 401k. But we here at Small Business Trends would add, “be very very careful – not everyone can afford to risk their retirement.” SmallBusinessFinancing.com Marketing Women make most small-business B2B purchasing decisions. National Association for Female Executives (NAFE) Honors Office Depot. MarketWatch.com Be sure to weigh your return on investment in the new online marketing world. Services Combine Social Media, Marketing. WSJ Small Business Michael Katz explains why your small business needs deadlines. I Walk the Line – Newsletter Marketing Tips. Charlie Cook’s Marketing For Success Blog Don’t leave word-of-mouth marketing to chance. Use Case Studies to Increase Word-of-Mouth Marketing. HubSpot.com Unlike the post office, the e-mail is going strong! Email Marketing For Small Business Slowing Down? Understanding Marketing Operations Ever wonder how your state ranks on energy costs? The “Energy Cost Index 2010″ ranks the 50 states and District of Columbia, as they affect small businesses, individuals and families.  The lowest cost states for energy costs are Wyoming, Kentucky and Missouri, in that order. Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council Some great advice from venture capitalist Fred Wilson on the real nature of entrepreneurism. Rolling Up Your Sleeves and Getting Your Hands Dirty. A VC Blog If these things really bug customers, why do businesses keep doing them? Are you listening to what customers are saying?  Watch this video to see what they are.  AllBusiness.com Startups Emma Jones says “Move over, Rupert Murdoch!” Become a media magnate from the kitchen table. Create a publishing empire from your home. Microsoft Small Business Blog A surpising message to startups from local government leaders: Be adaptable and self-sufficient. Small businesses advised to think big. Recordnet.com Jim Kukral talks about the importance of focusing on who you are. “I’m Not As Smart As Chris Brogan,” says Jim.  Then he explains why you should be you and quit worrying about trying to be someone else. JimKukral.com Entrepreneur Johns Wu talks about finding the niche online marketing brass ring. Johns Wu – Founder, Developer, Sole Employee, and eventual Seller of Bankaholic.com.  This is a real-life story of a young Internet entrepreneur who became a millionaire before age 23, and retired. MO.com From Small Business Trends Small Business News for March 2, 2010

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Small Business News for March 2, 2010

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A couple of weeks back I raved about Google Alerts and all the different ways that I used them . I mentioned that I use them to track keywords, identify content theft and even to track links coming into a site. I look at Google Alerts as a great multi-purpose tool that can help you track lots of different things. However, when you’re serious about finding a tool to monitor your social media presence, Trackur is where Google Alerts go to grow up and one that SMB owners should really be aware of. You may remember that I interviewed search expert Andy Beal about Trackur back in September and he chatted about the importance of protecting your brand as a SMB owner, what to track and how his tool Trackur could help. Well, last week Trackur released a free tool for SMB owners that I thought was worth mentioning sharing. The new tool is called Trackur Free and the functionality is the same as you’d find in a paid Trackur subscription. With it, you can set up a search and Trackur will look for mentions in traditional and social media, scouring through mainstream sources, blogs, tweets, images, videos, etc and deliver you the results via the Trackur dashboard, RSS, email or CSV export. What separates Trackur Free from the paid product is that you can only track one keyword . That said, if you’re a small business owner who’s already using Google Alerts for the “other stuff”, it may be worth using Trackur to keep an eye on that one money term that you’re really focused on. Where Trackur Free trumps a simple Google Alert is that it runs every 30 minutes and graphs mentions over time so that you can easily see if buzz is growing and how sentiment is changing. As I mentioned, it’s a bit more mature than a simple Google Alert. Personally, I like the idea of using Trackur as your “specialty” tool and Google Alerts to pick up the easier to find stuff or terms you’re just casually monitoring. I use Google Alerts like a fire house to give me lots of different information in different areas, Trackur is considerably more refined. Worth noting is that Andy has chosen to make the tool retroactive. So if you read our interview back in September and signed up for a free trial, your account has already been moved over and you can start using it. If not, you can sign up for a free trial to give it a look. If you’ve resisted because of the associated price tag, now’s your chance to look under the hood. The importance of knowing what people are saying about your brand is going to diminish anytime soon. In fact, it’s only getting stronger. From Small Business Trends Trackur Gives SMBs A Free Social Media Tool

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Trackur Gives SMBs A Free Social Media Tool

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by Mike Brown I watched the @ThatKevinSmith and @SouthwestAir brouhaha erupt live on Twitter but didn’t write about it last week. Bunches of tweeters and bloggers hashing out who was right and wrong based on second, third, or five hundredth-hand information simply wasn’t interesting enough to warrant adding to the noise. Getting ready for a social media presentation this week though, I’ve been thinking about service defects and service recovery in the world of social networking . I sought an analogy to help think strategically about how a company prepares for an angry customer who wants to be heard and starts tweeting incessantly: handling a hostage situation is very comparable . Rather than a person though, it’s a brand’s reputation being taken hostage by a customer threatening irreparable harm unless demands are met. With the one-to-many communication capabilities of social media, this type of threat has never been more credible. Here are five hostage negotiation principles and related implications for preparing to handle when your brand’s good name is being held hostage : Have a negotiating team ready – This means more than a single person monitoring Twitter and handling responses. In hostage negotiations, the primary negotiator, who is ideally the sole contact with the hostage taker, is joined by a coach/commander in charge of the situation and personnel along with a secondary negotiator to help monitor, listen, and offer input. Strategic Questions – Does your company have a pre-identified team and protocols for how it will work together in a social media-based service recovery effort? And how would you incorporate front-line employees when you’re trying to recover from a service failure playing out both at one of your company’s locations and online? Gather as much solid information as possible right away – Beyond having standard questions to run through, there’s added complexity in a social media-based service recovery effort. Suppose the customer issue IS taking place in-person. With social media monitoring removed from the scene, it may not even be possible from a customer’s messages to determine where the issue is occurring. This creates an interesting implication for enacting rapid service recovery. Strategic Questions – If it’s clear the issue is taking place in the presence of front line employees, what steps will you take to identify the location and establish communication with them immediately? Since multi-person communication with the angry customer is almost a given, how will you ensure your multiple contacts are speaking with one message? Connect on a personal level – Social media throws a whole new wrinkle into this, especially when you want to move interaction with the customer to a private messaging stream. If it’s even available, the company may have outdated phone information on the customer, making direct contact challenging to establish. A corporate tweeter may have to try to get a brand kidnapper to ‘follow’ the company so direct messaging can take place. And typically, the corporate tweeter is communicating under a corporate account without a personal avatar. It makes establishing a personal tone of, “I’m here to try and fix the situation,” difficult when the customer is receiving tweets with the corporate logo. Strategic Questions – Are you following your customers on social media? Do you have multiple ways to reach out to customers? Do your company social media people have work-related, personal accounts they can use to reach out specifically in these cases? Communicate openly and actively listen – When you have face-to-face contact, listening, and the silence that goes along with it, is easy to convey. It’s a little tougher via phone. But in a medium geared toward short, back-and-forth messages, a pause associated with listening or contemplation comes across as being distracted or ignoring the other person. Strategic Question – Beyond having plans for migrating service recovery conversations to private channels, are you actively training your social media response team in dealing with the dynamics of these new service recovery situations? Show empathy – One way hostage negotiators demonstrate empathy is by delivering on aspects of the demands that have been made. Granting small, detailed requests is done in real-life hostage situations to slow and drag them out, which is desirable. In a service recovery situation (especially one playing out in public), the last thing you want to do is extend it. Strategic Questions – Who is on your social media service response team? Have you included your best customer service people – the ones with strong understanding of what you can do to solve customer problems and are best at understanding issues from a customer’s point of view? No matter what your company is doing in social media, you have to address this reality. Even if your company doesn’t want a proactive social media presence, there’s a greater chance every day your customers will be talking about your brand via social media. When they do, and the discussion gets negative and brand threatening, you better have thought about your strategy, with a plan for what you’ll do. Enjoy this post? Subscribe to our RSS feed and join our Continuous Innovation group! Mike Brown is an award-winning innovator in strategy, communications, and experience marketing. He authors the Brainzooming TM blog , and serves as the company’s chief Catalyst. He wrote the ebook “Taking the NO Out of InNOvation” and is a frequent keynote presenter.

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5 Ways to Prepare for a Social Media Disaster

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We’ve all seen the power of having strong evangelists and how they can help build a brand. But just because the Web is getting increasingly social with more sites sprouting up new communities doesn’t mean that you need a community on your site. The problem with following the community craze is that too many are launched without any clear purpose. And you know it when you see it. It’s the blog that’s quickly thrown on the site even though there’s no one to write content or manage comments. It’s the social voting site you tack on but have no idea what you want to do with. It’s the community that was started with high hopes…but now just holds cobwebs. Before you make the decision to add community elements to your site, know why they’re there and how you plan to use them. Because it’s often a greater disservice to your brand to have a blog you ignore than to not have one at all. Below are a few questions you should ask yourself before you invest the resources in adding community elements to your site. Why are you creating the community? If the answer to this is “because [competitor name] has one”, then you need to rethink your efforts. Part of your community planning process should be to determine your goals and to lay down measurable objectives. When you create a community with no plan in motion, it shows. Your community members can feel when you’re just “winging” it and everyone feels a little lost. Know what you want and the reason behind it before you build it, otherwise the people won’t come. This is the Internet. Not Fields of Dreams. People need to feel safe in the home you’re establishing. Part of making them feel safe means creating an environment that “makes sense” and has a clear purpose. What’s your POD or why will people join your community? What do you have to offer your audience that other communities, or that just being your customer, can’t provide? Why will people invest time participating on your site and not just become silent lurkers? It could be that you provide great content, that you house important discussions, that you offer the opposing view, that you offer deals, etc. Whatever it is that will make you unique, you want to put that at the forefront and build it into everything that you’re doing. There are tons of communities on the Web. You need to generate a compelling point of difference that’s going to help you to stand out and assert yourself. Why would someone invest their time in you over an already-established community? Figure it out and then promote it. Do you have resources to support the community? You may want a community on your site, but are you ready to support one? Whether it’s a blog, a forum, a place for user generated content – someone is going to have to build and manage the community you want to host. If you can’t do it yourself, do you have the resources to outsource it to someone else? There’s a lot more that goes into supporting a community than simply getting someone to build it. Once it’s there, it needs to be staffed. Employees need to be trained on how to manage it and how to promote the brand while keeping the peace.  Time needs to be allocated to answering questions, responding to complaints and offering customers support when necessary.   When you’re deciding whether or not a blog or forum would produce a positive ROI, all of these other time and resource elements need to be taken into consideration. How will you promote the community? As unique and great as your new community may be, you’re still going to have to do some promoting to get the word out. Self promotion is often a hard thing for SMB owners to swallow, however, it really is vital.  The tactics you’ll want to use for promotion will depend on what you’re launching, but you should know what you’re getting into. For example, if you’re adding reviews to your site, you’ll have to find ways to contact people using certain products and maybe consider seeding reviews at first. If you’re adding a blog, you may want to form a partnership with other bloggers, write guests posts, seed comments, start commenting on other’s blogs, network with influential bloggers, etc. If you’re creating a voting site, you’ll want to look for cross promotional opportunities with other sites, advertise on related blogs, and get an active street team going to build buzz. In the early days, it’s up to you to be your community’s biggest promoter. Are you ready for it? How heavily will you moderate your community? This can get a little touchy. In a perfect world there would be free speech and we’d never have to step in to edit someone’s words or steer a conversation in a different direction. Unfortunately, this is the Internet where manners sometime get thrown out the window and where flame wars can have lasting consequences . Before you release your fledgling community to the world, you need to decide how much leeway you’re going to give people when talking to one another. What kinds of actions will you moderate? Will you just moderate the content or watch behavior that takes place offsite, as well? Your community is yours. Yes, it’s nothing without the people who choose to participate, but you’re the one responsible for being the adult in the room and keeping it productive. You can’t be afraid to moderate people when they’re out of line and threatening the spirit of the community you created. How will building the community support your other efforts? Essentially, does it make sense for you to add a community to your site? While it’s a noble effort to create a community so that your audience has a place to connect, ideally this community should be helping you with your other site goals. How will this new community take strain off customer service? Will it shorten your sales process by giving you more trust and brand awareness? How can you tie it into the rest of your marketing efforts? Nothing in the organization should be created in a vacuum. You want to carefully plan out how your new community will work with everything else you’re doing to give you the biggest benefit. There’s a definite Shiny ADD complex that often strikes the Web. We see that a competitor has created something and we jump to create an exact replica without knowing why we’re doing it. And that can often come back to bite us. Before you invest time and resources building a community on your site, know why you’re doing it, what you’re going to get from it, and how much time you’ll really spend managing it. That’s the only way you can determine its value. From Small Business Trends Ask Yourself: Do You Really Need That Community?

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Ask Yourself: Do You Really Need That Community?

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It doesn’t matter how many blogging ideas you’ve got stacked up. Sometimes you just get in a rut. You feel like you’re writing the same thing over and over again. You feel like you’re not providing any value and you’re so bored with what you’re writing that YOU don’t even want to read it, let alone anyone else. So what do you do? How do you get back in your blogging groove? You put some spice back into it by getting out of your comfort zone and incorporating different kinds of blog posts. You give readers something fresh and that they maybe weren’t expecting. Here are some different blog post varieties that you can count on to put some flavor back into your blogging. Lists : List posts have become something of a blogging cliché because everyone does them. But they do them because they work and readers respond to them. These posts are attractive to bloggers because they’re quick to write, have an easy structure and they allow for a bit of fun. Readers love them because they provide information in bite-sized, scannable chunks. If you’re looking to quick start some fun in your blog, write about the 10 things you can’t live without, the top 5 mentors who have inspired you or the 20 things you’d like to see happen in your industry this year. The possibilities for what you can write about in lists post are endless. And that’s why they’re great. Rants :  Rant posts allow you to let your hair down a little and talk openly and honestly about whatever is on your mind. If you’re worried about causing a stir, your rant doesn’t have to be overly controversial. Maybe, as a florist, you just want to rant about Valentine’s Day. Or perhaps you want to ‘rant’ about how much you love a certain type of flower. Rants give you the opportunity to get a little fired up and a whole lot passionate about whatever it is that’s on your mind. And when you get fired up, you give your audience license to do the same. They’re sure to jump start conversation. How-To Guides : Creating a How-To guide for your industry helps build authority, attracts links and extends your reach in the community. These posts are often instructional in nature and explain, in detail, how to do whatever it is you’re an expert at. How-To guides are different from regular posts in that they can usually stand the test of time, meaning that they become evergreen content pieces that your audience can bookmark and continually look back on. It gives you a chance to offer free information to your community, while also branding yourself as the go-to person for that topic. Conduct Interviews/ VIP Profiles : A fun way to add some life back to your blog is to introduce new voices to it by conducting interviews or profiles on people who provide value to your audience. When looking for people to interview or profile, don’t be afraid to step out of your immediate bubble. A person doesn’t have to do what you do in order to be relevant to your conversation. The more differing voices you can add, the better. Collaboration Posts : An offshoot of doing interviews with noted people in your industry is to ask a bunch of people a series of questions and post their responses as a collaboration post. The work involved in putting it together is fairly minimal (you just come up with the original questions) and in return you get a bunch of new voices for your blog and some added exposure through their communities. And if you’re worried that people won’t want to participate – don’t. The Internet loves talking about itself. Promise. Reviews : Even if they’re not related to your business, you use products every day to help make you more efficient. Well, your audience does too and sometimes they may need advice on which are the best ones to buy. Why not break up the monotony by writing reviews about your favorite ones? Doing so will increase your usefulness to your audience, and may also bring you new customers who are searching for [keywords + review]. Review-based searches are notorious for bringing in high search volumes. Personal Posts : If you’re in a rut and having a hard time feeling inspired, consider blogging about it. Or if not about that, blog about something else that’s personal to you. Opening up your blog and getting personal every now and then is a good way to recommit yourself to your audience and to let them feel closer to you. It helps spice things up after you’ve been nothing but business for the last month. After all, you’re supposed to be creating relationships, right? Video Posts : Some people find it a lot easier to talk to their audience than to write something out. And thanks to the rise of low cost video equipment, we’re seeing more and more bloggers adopt a multi-media approach to blogging. Just because you typically write your posts  doesn’t mean you can’t fire up the Flip camera and post a quick video hello to your gang. Actually, it means that you probably should. Changing mediums is a fun way to spice things up and lets your audience connect with you in a new way. Maybe a video tour of your audience is in the works for today. Or a quick chat with a new employee. The office dog, perhaps? Link Posts : I’m a sucker for a good link post. In fact, over at my other blog, Outspoken Media, we do link posts every Saturday morning to share content that our readers may have missed otherwise. A link post isn’t much more than a collection of links from around the Web. It could be stuff related to your industry, things they should be aware of, or even just a silly list of things to laugh about at the end of the week (that’s what we do on Saturday’s). I’m a big fan of Link posts because they can help expose your audience to content they may not have seen otherwise. The posts types listed above are the ones that I know I can always turn to when my blogging is feeling a little tired. Which ones work for you? Which can you not believe I missed and can’t wait to correct me on? From Small Business Trends Types of Posts To Incorporate On Your Blog

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Types of Posts To Incorporate On Your Blog

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by Hutch Carpenter Crowdsourcing is heating up in terms of corporate interest. Pepsi’s decision to skip the Super Bowl in favor of a crowdsourced ideas initiative – Pepsi Refresh – is an example of the interest in the market. Digital strategy, marketing and design firm Last Exit called crowdsourcing a top digital marketing trend for 2010 . Contests are a particular form of crowdsourcing that are proving to be beneficial in a number of areas. Contests allow people from around the world to compete with one another on a specific challenge put forth by an organization. Participation is motivated by incentives commensurate with the level of the challenge. The contest version of crowdsourcing has its own activities for gathering, filtering and selecting among the submissions of people. These activities are: Crowdsourcing starts with the contributions of people from around the globe. These submissions are aggregated into a common site. Submissions are provided in the format matching the contest objectives. People provide their feedback on the submissions of others. This feedback can be up-down votes, star ratings, comments and buying into ideas with virtual currency. This process can be collaborative, helping refine submissions. Organizations establish panels of experts who review the crowdsourced submissions, and select those best meeting their requirements. Experts possess distinct domain knowledge to make the final decision in the contest. The winners of the contest are determined by people’s votes and other measures. This selection process is a mix of overall crowd sentiment, weighted for higher reputed members, and the power of individuals to leverage word-of-mouth marketing. These components can be integrated in different ways to provide four different models for running crowdsourced contests. These four models are described below. Model #1: Crowd Sentiment, Expert Decision The Crowd Sentiment, Expert Decision model allows organizations to include the sentiment of the crowd as part of their decision-making process. This is valuable input for contests where the selected submissions will ultimately be put in front of the market. The crowdsourced feedback provides an early read on the potential market reaction. This model is also ideal for cases where a collaborative spirit can refine and improve submissions. Especially for more complex contests, feedback from interested collaborators is valuable for fully understanding the opportunity in the submission and its weaknesses. Two organizations are using our tools for this model of crowdsourcing contest. Cisco is seeking $1 billion ideas through its I-Prize contest . And the Enterprise 2.0 Conference is managing its competitive speaker proposal process with this model. Both are utilizing crowdsourced feedback as part of the decision-making process. Model #2: Crowd Decision The Crowd Decision model leverages the crowd for all parts of the contest. This model provides a great platform for organizations to better understand the meaning that is associated to their products and services. The submissions reflect the creativity of customers and interested parties. The feedback on a submission signals the intensity of feeling for someone’s particular interpretation of meaning. Winners are determined by how the community rates their submissions. This model is ideal for marketing purposes. It becomes a strategic engagement model, particularly where customers are talking about your organization in social media. It’s a fun way to increase company awareness. Model #3: Expert Decision The Expert Decision model engages the global community to find solutions to complex problems. Experts review the submissions, identifying those best addressing the objective of the contest. The sentiment of the crowd is not an element in these contests, as they typically address more technical challenges. This model also prevents theft by competitors of people’s ideas. The submissions are only visible to designated experts associated with the sponsoring organization. The closed nature of submissions is important for generating interest from people with the technical competence to address a challenge. Model #4: American Idol The American Idol model is so-named because it reflects the selection process of that show. The community ultimately selects the winners of the contest. But the candidates in the contest are first selected by experts. This model is good when the quality of submissions will fluctuate significantly. The experts act as a filter before the community votes. It’s also appropriate when the sponsoring organization has a specific direction it wants for the winning submission. The experts identify candidate submissions consistent with the direction desired. Four different models for running a competitive crowdsourcing initiative, each with its own characteristics and business objectives. The biggest takeaway for anyone considering such an initiative is the flexibility of approaches to accomplish different objectives. Enjoy this post? Subscribe to our RSS feed and join our Continuous Innovation group! Hutch Carpenter is the Vice President of Product at Spigit. Spigit integrates social collaboration tools into a SaaS enterprise idea management platform used by global Fortune 2000 firms to drive innovation.

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Four Models for Competitive Crowdsourcing

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by Mike Myatt Determining whether someone is a social media expert or a just another wannabe can be a difficult task for the typical consumer. There is a tremendous amount of noise out there being created by a plethora of “consultants” professing expertise in what I refer to as the new social sciences: personal branding, social networking, social media marketing, etc. I just did a Google search for the term social media expert and had more than 96 million returned search results… give me a break. So my question is this: what constitutes a “social media expert,” and how do you tell the posers from the players? Which of these professed miracle workers are true professionals, and which ones are simply attempting to gravy-train a rapidly growing market niche in pursuit of a quick buck? Let me begin by dispelling a popular myth oft espoused online – It seems to be fashionable of late to state that there is no such thing as a social media expert. The thinking (albeit flawed thinking) of those who hold this opinion is that social media is so new, and so rapidly evolving, that there simply could not be any real experts. My answer? Ridiculous… Every industry has experts regardless of maturity of life-cycle. In fact, many of the real innovators and experts are those early adopters doing the heavy lifting and the ground breaking. There are experts in every industry and at every stage of maturation. Some early experts mature as the industry grows, and others fall by the way side because they don’t keep pace giving way to new generations of innovators building on what the first generation of experts created. The issue is not whether experts exist, as they most certainly do. The issue is finding them among the hordes of pretenders and wannabes. I’m going to cut right to the chase and give you six things to beware of when attempting to discern the true professional advisers capable of delivering a certainty of execution, from the rogues and scoundrels simply looking to separate you from your money: Beware the Part-Time Expert: My father has an old saying that I’ve found to be very accurate over the years: “part-time efforts, yield part-time results.” If the person seeking your business has a day job that constitutes something other than the services he or she is pitching, run for the hills. If your potential advisor is moonlighting then they really have no business asking for your business. Beware the Shoemaker without Shoes: Your position should be one of “don’t tell me… show me.” If your would-be social media guru cannot be found online, doesn’t blog, tweet, or is invisible on the major social networking platforms you might want to rethink their qualifications. Important Caveat: the mere existence of a blog, YouTube channel, LinkedIn profile, Facebook account, or a Twitter page doesn’t guarantee competence… any idiot can amass thousands of followers on Twitter just by following everybody and their brother, so look for someone who has amassed a quality list of followers, who has more people following them than they follow, and who actively engages with their followers. Beware the Expert without Clients: No referenceable clients equals zero credibility. It’s one thing to show you their own work, but quite another to show you demonstrated success on behalf of paying and satisfied clients. Beware the Expert without Industry Recognition: If your so called expert isn’t published, doesn’t speak, lecture or teach, doesn’t have a column, hasn’t won any awards, etc., then they might not be a true expert. Beware the Expert too Aggressive in their Pursuit: There is a big difference between professional follow-up and desperation. Let me be blunt… most professionals at the top of their game haven’t made a cold call in years. In fact, even in this down economy they typically have more business than they know what to do with. If your world-beater of a consultant is chasing you down like a hungry dog after the meat wagon then you may want to take pause. Beware of Bargain Basement Expertise: In most cases the reality is that you get what you pay for… True expertise doesn’t come cheaply, but is well worth the investment. Few things in business will get you in as much trouble as not getting advice and counsel when needed, or worse yet, getting poor quality or incorrect advice. I would much rather pay an expert a larger fee for 30 minutes of their time and get what I need rather than pay someone $50 dollars an hour who is faking it until they can make it… Questionable advisors will take much longer to get from point A to point B (if they get there at all), and will likely cost you more money at the end of the day when contrasted with true professionals. If you need help in integrating social media into your business I would recommend the following individuals (some you may know and some you may not) as they all pass the litmus test mentioned above. Those listed below are in no particular order of preference and you can rest assured they are not “info-product” sales people masquerading as social media professionals, but they are in fact the true subject matter experts who can get the job done: Chris Brogan ( @chrisbrogan ) – Chris is smart, approachable, innovative, has a high degree of integrity, probably the hardest working man on the planet, and a heck of a nice guy. I’ve enjoyed every interaction I’ve had with Chris, and he has earned my trust and respect. Mack Collier ( @MackCollier ) – I don’t know Mack personally, but have enjoyed reading his candid and ever straight foward opinions online. Mack is well respected and his the loyalty of his followers more than speak to his capabilities. Lee Odden ( @LeeOdden ) – I’ve known Lee for several years (before he was rich and famous). In fact, in a prior life as a corporate executive Lee was the consultant I chose to place on retainer. He is smart, seasoned and delivers on his promises. Amy Martin ( @DigitalRoyalty ) – I guess the moniker Digital Royalty says it all… Amy represents some of the biggest names and fastest growning brands online. Nothing bodes as well for an agency as success, and Amy has plenty of pedigree in that department. Ashton Kutcher ( @aplusk ) – Ashton combines his celebrity status, a fascination with social media, and a disarming and ever inquistive intellect to head one of the fastest growing social media agencies on the web. Liz Strauss ( @lizstrauss ) – Liz is well known for her approachability, friendliness and candor. She also happens to be one of the savviest bloggers and social media consultants online. And if you’re slumming @mikemyatt – nuff said… Enjoy this post? Subscribe to our RSS feed and join our Continuous Innovation group! Mike Myatt, is a Top CEO Coach, author of ” Leadership Matters…The CEO Survival Manual “, and Managing Director of N2Growth .

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Social Media Expert or Wannabe?

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by Venessa Miemis Here are a few recurring themes that have been popping up on my radar. (click to enlarge) Enjoy this post? Subscribe to our RSS feed and join our Continuous Innovation group! Venessa Miemis is a Media Studies graduate student at the New School in NYC, exploring what happens at the intersection of technology, culture, and communication. Connect with her at www.emergentbydesign.com and on Twitter @venessamiemis .

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Picture – Trends for the 2010s

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by Matt Heinz I’m moderating a panel on the alignment of marketing & PR in a couple weeks at Dan Greenfield’s PR + Mktg Camp in Seattle. Should be a great day of discussion. Earlier this week Dan and I talked how marketing and PR teams have traditionally worked together (or not), and how those relationships are evolving now – especially with the maturation of social media as a cross-functional tool set. Excerpts from our conversation are below: Question: Are PR and marketing more aligned or less aligned because of social media? Matt: The idea of separating marketing teams and functions is a remnant of the “old way” of doing marketing. When most marketing was one-way (i.e. customers couldn’t react, respond and create messages of their own), it was more acceptable to separate PR from product marketing, and even lead generation activities. Now, especially because the customer has so much control and such a strong voice, it’s critical that brands act as one. That means PR, advertising, social media, lead generation – they all need to work from the same playbook in a coordinated fashion. Easier said than done, but that’s exactly what today’s most successful brands are doing. Social media has enabled the consumer to talk back in a powerful way, which is accelerating the need for this consolidation and integration of marketing strategy by products, services and brands today. Question: PR is generally about placement, reputation, messaging, impressions and storytelling. Marketing is generally about transactions, click throughs, key words and web applications. How is social media changing that, if at all? Matt: Everything is about getting the sale. It always has been, but now it’s easier to see and map the progression of a customer from awareness, consideration, intent, trial, purchase – then repeat, renewal, referral, etc. Social media is blurring the distinction between customer engagement stages. Ten years ago, it was easier to segment the functions – PR talks to the customer at the beginning, then product marketing takes over and offers demos, free trials, etc. Then once they’re a customer, your loyalty/retention team takes over. That approach doesn’t work anymore. The way we measure different marketing elements, by function, probably still works. But it has to be put into the context of a more immersive, cohesive customer engagement strategy that blends messages and tactics across stages of a customer relationship. Question: What disadvantages (inefficiencies, lost opportunities, customer confusion) and advantages (integration, cost savings) are these shared tools like Facebook and Twitter creating for PR and marketing? Matt: The sales cycle has always been far shorter than the customer’s buying cycle. Five years ago, the customer buying cycle was a black box for marketers. We had no visibility to what was happening, what prospective customers were thinking or asking, who they were even considering. Now, thanks to social media, we have insight into how customers are thinking well before they engage directly with brands. But this isn’t an opportunity for selling. It’s an opportunity to engage and become part of the community – add value, answer questions, provide valuable content. Earn trust, respect and credibility. Community engagement and social media are at the very top of the buying cycle, before the sales cycle, and it doesn’t really matter which part of the organization manages and executes there, as long as the approach is right. Question: Should social media ultimately be the responsibility of PR who manages reputation and conversations or marketing who is in charge of transactions and sales? Matt: It doesn’t really matter. Everyone in the organization needs to understand the customer, what they want, what they need, and how to address them – with or without a paid relationship current or pending. Every member of your organization should know how to address customers in a respectful, value-added way. Social media has accelerated the tearing down of walls between customer and provider. There’s more transparency, less formality. Brands need to be accessible, approachable and authentic to be accepted. The social media strategy doesn’t end when a customer enters a selling cycle. They aren’t going to stop talking to their friends, and using Facebook, or commenting on Twitter, just because they’re talking to a sales rep. Their interaction with and reflection of your brand continues across functional sales & marketing groups. That’s why ownership of the social media “voice” within one marketing function or another is problematic. Today, that strategy (and especially the execution) is a job everybody has. Enjoy this post? Subscribe to our RSS feed and join our Continuous Innovation group! Matt Heinz is principal at Heinz Marketing, a sales & marketing consulting firm helping businesses increase customers and revenue. Contact Matt at matt@heinzmarketing.com or visit www.heinzmarketing.com .

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Aligning Social Media, Marketing and PR

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