This article was written for PINK Magazine, published today. How do you grow when consumers and clients are spending less? Maintain or increase marketing your business spending to get ahead of competitors who don’t, adjust your product portfolio, support your distributors, adjust pricing – all risky and challenging when cash flow is down.
Thanks to Web 2.0 and social media, your customers are giving you a perfect opportunity to put minimal dollars to find out what they’re saying about your company. And if they’re not, ask them…..
Need a weekend project? How about organizing your personal brand on the web?
We’ve been dealing a bit with “online personal branding” with the executives of some of our portfolio companies, and one of the biggest things we’ve noticed is the feeling of being out of control of “where you are” online. People don’t realize how many places they are or how many profiles they’ve set up.
The first step to creating an effective Web2.0 personal brand is organizing the existing presence you’ve got. From there, you have focused content in a controlled number of places and can move forward in a clear direction. Below are a few things you can do on a slow afternoon to get the process started.
Create lists and purge. Do a full centralization process on what platforms you have profiles on, what your user names and passwords are, and what the function of each list is. Record everything in one place so it’s easier to do work. Then, get rid of anything that’s not useful or not moving toward your end goals (they can professional or personal). That Friendster profile from 5 years ago? Sorry Friendster, but you’re just not working for me any more.
Consistency is key. Make sure that your avatars are consistent (you don’t have to have just one profile photo, but keep it to 2-3, especially if you’re talking about using these services for primarily professional purposes). Use the same or similar bios or about paragraphs. Update them all at the same time.
Do a search on yourself. Yeah, everyone does this. But analyze it, record any notable mentions, or worrisome mentions. You might find something worth showcasing on a profile. You also might find a profile you forgot about or didn’t even know existed. You want to know what’s out there, so do the search. Try out a few different search engines too. Yes, people do still use MSN search and yes those results can vary from Google.
Connect and aggregate whenever you can. If you can update on one tool and have that update hit several others, that means efficiency and streamlining. Use RSS feeds, Twitter feeds, Friendfeed etc. This makes life a lot easier. If it helps you, you can also record what’s connected where (I use a pretty simple excel to keep track of it all).
Pull together all of your content and work for people. If you’re anything like me, you have a lot of content out there that people would only be able to find if they searched your name and felt like sifting through pages of results. Make it easier for people to see your body of work by giving them one access point. I contribute to several blogs, write articles for various publications, and have a bunch of one-off “things” out there that I want to make sure people see. I’ve set up my own website used (for now) as one place to go to see most of what I’ve done. I also plan on flushing out my personal Portfolio [Please note: Interfolio IS a client of ours].
Do you have any other advice on organizing your Web 2.0 Personal Branding? Do you have any favorite tools to accomplish this?
Back in April, we posted up a case study on the use of social media in ACCION USA as part of a panel discussion that I was moderating for TiE Boston on using social media for your social enterprise.
Well, we have an update on their social media program, which seems to be moving along swimmingly. Great! Julie Soforenko writes:
At the time of the TiE-SE event I was just starting to learn the concepts and tools of Web 2.0, and ACCION USA had yet to make a dent in the online space. Fast forward two months and the picture looks different. After copious amounts of reading, researching and diving into some of the tools, such as Twitter, the landscape looks different.
Our blog launched a little over a month ago and we’ve had at least two posts a week by rotating staff members of the organization. The blog focuses on domestic microfinance and small business topics and gives a person-to-person tone to the topics. It is currently in the top 15 most viewed pages on our website. Following the blog launch I jumped into the Twitterverse and started growing our following to its present number of 658. Twitter is now one of the top 15 ways to click-through to our website, and steadily growing. Additionally, I’m tracking the analytics from a handful of analytics sources so that we can learn understand the ROI and learn where improvements can be made.
ACCION USA also established an organizational Social Media policy to give the staff guidelines and a framework for how they can participate in the online space as representatives of AUSA. I then presented to the company an introduction to social media. This included how it benefits the organizations, explanations of how to use certain tools like RSS Readers and Google Alerts, and tips on contributing to the blog, Facebook, etc. Everybody is getting excited about these new ways to increase the number of people AUSA is able to serve.
Although things have been going well, we are still in the nascent stages of social media. Through more reading, listening, and experimenting we will continue to find spaces online where our services, both in lending and financial education, resonate.
“Getting attention for your brand (personal or company) is easier than ever thanks to the ole’ interweb but doing it with “zing” is still key to building a following. Learn and ask question from the people who have built brands and careers by doing it with “zing”.”
Colt: Building your brand is that much easier now. People will learn more about you than they will from your resume. Chapman: People are scared about web 2.0, that you can talk about anything across all channels.
[Pause for horsing around by panelists]
Question: How do you balance? Loic: Personal aspect if very important, it shows you as you really are. I want to see there faces Delaney: Like in Twitter, it’s really hard to BS in 140 or less. You can get an idea of what people are about pretty quickly, it’s hard to BS. Colt: I’ve decided what my brand is, and it’s genuine with my personality. I’m the world’s smartest marketer with a little bit of creepy. If I’m using this tool to find clients or work, these people will jave to work with me, so why not show them who I am.
Question: How did you guys start your brand?
Chapman: I started out blogging. I just started reading and treated it as my own personal journal. Whatever you’re passionate about, just go with it. Delaney: Twitter is a great way to build a brand and interact with your audience. Loic: Answer every single piece of feedback, especially when it’s negative. Delaney: I won’t answer all feedback about our products. Colt: I’m of the belief that you should answer everything, except when it’s super super negative, you can never get rid of all the negativity, and at some point you need to figure out when you should just opt out of a conversation. Chapman: If you’re on Twitter, you need to be a brand that is ready to talk about yourself, and handle the negativity. Some brand are just plain not ready for that.
Question: How far do you do in helping companies figure out their plan? Do you Tweet for them?
Brogan: Hell no. Chapman: Kick the person out of the nest, they have to learn to do it on their own. Teach them, and then hold their hand at first. Delaney: Don’t drive the car.
Question: Where do you focus your energies if you’re supposed to handle all the social media “stuff” for a brand?
Colt: figure out what one is the most successful, and spend 80% of your time on that platform.
Question: Would you launch generally or go in stealth mode? When you go with a name, should you go with the Double “O”…. Google, Yahoo….?
Loic: Launch as soon as you can, and be open, build it and share it in public.
Question: What do you think about the fact that social media might not be for everyone?
Colt: Social media is a tool. Brogan: Do you have to use social media all the time? Hell no. Where’s your customer, and where’s the needle moving? Does something happen when you do it?
Question: What about using social media to brand locally?
Delaney: Getting everyone together around a small event is a good way of solidifying a social media strategy. Brogan: It’s cheap and free, you just need sweat equity. BrightKite is great for location-based. If in your area, there aren’t enough people online, it might not be the right thing for you. But there are a lot of opportunities, you can do a lot of the smaller cafe-style conversations, just a few people. Chapman: Facebook allows you to do targetted ads by location. Get people aware of you, and it’s true word-of-mouth. Delaney: You could set up a search on Twitter or whatever for your town. When people mention it, just say something back to them.
Question: What about rebranding?
Colt: You still have to worry about your product. You’re empowering people to tell everyone they know about your product, so if it’s bad, it spreads three times quicker than if it’s great. Be careful then with things like WOM. Brogan: It’s a question you have to ask internally: how much do you want it to suck? And how much do you want people to know that it sucks? Colt: There’s something to be said about a brand that says that they know it stinks and that they’re working on it. People really like that. Loic: Lack of transparency is very passe. Audience: Have the lawyers reference the case of Tylenol, the effects of addressing it or you’re not addressing it. Loic: I make a point of never saying that my competitors suck.
Question: A lot of brands don’t disclose who’s Tweeting on behalf of them. Is there a best practice there?
Colt: I think it’s really important. People want to be dealing with people, not brands. Chapman: What happens when someone leaves though? That’s a hard thing to do. Colt: You can have several people though. Chapman: How do you handle when those personalities leave?
I can’t decide yet if I’m excited for the Superbowl ads so much as insanely curious what people are going to do with limited resources.
Miller High Life preps us with some applicable sentiments. I’ve loved MHL commercials of late, and will be looking for the 1 Second Ads (definitely check out the site, it’s got some fun goodies).
Aside from the general excitement and emotion surrounding Tuesday inauguration, there are a lot of cool things happening online.
Firstly, my colleague Patrick pointed me towards a neat initiative put together by a friend of his, Andrew Turner, called the Inauguration Report 2009. A collaboration between NPR, CBS News, American University and volunteers, it lists and maps reports from around the world, and you can participate by using various mobile applications, SMS messaging or using Twitter tag #inaug09 or #dctrips09.
Current announced it teamed up with Twitter by “adding your real-time Twitter messages (“tweets”) over our live broadcast of Barack Obama’s Inauguration.”
CNN and Facebookare providing live streaming, along with status updates and friend status feeds.
Hulu is (and has been) spotlighting a variety of streaming opportunities here.
I wanted to quickly point to a great essay by Peter Daou concerning the internet and politics in 2008. It discusses the distinction between a campaign that is remarkably technologically innovative versus one that simply developed a solid integration strategy and leveraged many existing technologies.
“The truth is that the Obama campaign was a triumph of integration more than technological innovation. It was the wildly successful marriage of time-tested political strategies and tactics, executed with acumen and discipline, seamlessly combined with cutting-edge technology and tied together with an empowering grassroots message. With a brilliant candidate at the helm. That, in itself, was innovative.”
Keynote: The New Media Rollercoaster, Cynthia Gordon, VP of New Media Marketing from Universal Orlando Resort
The internet has completely revolutionized and transformed people’s lives.
It’s like a giant collective brain, and we’re sending messages back and forth to each other.
The consumer is in control. Blogging has become mainstream. The past couple of years has shown me that I need to pay attention that. I also needed to find new and innovative ways to get in front of the audience.
CNN is an adaptable channel, they partnered with YouTube to bring the debates to the masses. They figured out the concept of citizen journalism.
John Stewart and CNN iReporting video.
We went from 3 channels to over 100 channels doing multiple shows a year. It’s must more difficult to be a marketer at these companies.
Ultimately, TV is still people’s preferred medium of watching shows, and that will drive online viewing.
You can’t stop technology, you have to make it easier for people to get your content.
Brought up efforts for Harry Potter theme park opening.
Both of these did happen some time before a Press Release was put out.
To promote the opening of a new Simpson’s Theme Park, Universal leveraged the millions of avatars that were made in the wake of the Simpson’s movie and made an online world for them to play in.
Panel: Social Media Marketing in Tough Times – Who Should Do What & What Should They Do?, Todd Defren, Principal at SHIFT Communications
We have two choices: We stick our head in the sand, cut budgets, or we can get tougher, smarter and louder.
Why would you cut budget for your brand in a way that gets it louder and more visible at a time when it’s most important for you to get the word out?
From Doug Leone, Sequoia Capital: Pound your competitor’s shortcomings, nail your sales & marketing, and an aggressive marketing and PR strategy is key right now.
You don’t need to reach everyone, you need to reach people who are going to find your stuff. How are they going to find you?
You can simultaneously stir up the Google Juices.
“Findability” is cheap. What’s expensive is the time.
Focus on the basics. What you should cut: SEM (PPC), Advertising (in a downturn), Layers (internal staff), and Events (visibility comes from speeches).
Where do you double-down? Listening (responsiveness scores points and identifies red flags early on), Content creation (thought leadership and findability), SEO, PR (thought leadership and promotion).
You get to know your audience through social media, you can then tailor content to them.
People don’t want to go on your website to find you, they want to find you in places where you hang out.
Fresh Content + Smart Brains = Google Juice
PR is crucial. Provides third-party validation (mainstream media is influential).
Do: Listen, blog, hire a PR firm, focus on SEO, distribute content that’s relevant.
Christopher S Penn: Study Something Old to Learn Something New
When you’re trying to get dialogs from your company, think about old medium that it can be compared to (a blog is the same as a newspaper editorial!)
How can you update the information you already have in your organization?
There’s nothing magic or esoteric about this stuff. You can all do this, you just need to learn a little about it!
Take all the info in your organization that you want to communicate: Things to Watch, Things to Read, Things to Hear, then figure out the format.
Think about where your customers are. If you don’t know, go to your database.
New media is not a new shiny object. Don’t treat them as new, treat them as tools in the toolbox.
They won’t save you if you don’t have a functional business model. Get your business in shape first before you start new media.
Someone saying that they’re an expert in a particular medium is crap [we like Christopher!]
Think about old companies, and what made them successful when there was no internet. What can you extract from their success to make your own business model successful?
CC Chapman: I Don’t Have Time to Play With Everything! Ten quick tips of things you can do
Google your brand, see what people are saying, comment on those site, keep the PR people away, let people talk.
Set up Google Alerts. It’s free. Put in your name. Put in your company name. Put in your competitor name. Put in key words.
Twitter is useful. You don’t have to follow a ton of people, it’s not a game. Use it in a way that’s most useful to you.
Join a social network. If you’re just starting, use LinkedIn and Facebook.
Use newsletters: Marketing Vox, WOMMA and MarketingProfs are three great ones.
Flickr is great. It’s not just about photos, it’s about commenting and seeing what people are doing.
This article was written for PINK Magazine, published today.![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_c.png?x-id=6f398676-8c62-4975-bf11-041ccec2859d)
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At the time of the TiE-SE event I was just starting to learn the concepts and tools of Web 2.0, and ![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_c.png?x-id=62f12356-0d26-4fa0-afbb-72f0b7eb3384)
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Aside from the general excitement and emotion surrounding Tuesday inauguration, there are a lot of cool things happening online.![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_c.png?x-id=22a4aa70-cab8-4d9f-93f0-fe18c861fdbf)
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