20 Great Social Media Professionals On Twitter via TweepleML February 4, 2010
Posted by derekshowerman in Random Schmoozing.Tags: Chris Brogan, jeremiah owyang, social media, social media widget, TWeepleML, Twitter
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http://tweepml.org/20-Great-Social-Media-Professionals-On-Twitter/
I posted this list of very intelligent Social Media folks awhile ago and will be adding to it in 2010. You can bulk follow these smart chaps and ladies through TweepleML.
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#1 In Google For “Social Media Widgets” = Content Is King! February 4, 2010
Posted by derekshowerman in Best Practices, Case Study, Social Networking Technology, Thought Leadership.Tags: content is king, social media
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Content is king in social media, especially when you share your content out!
Content is king in social media, especially when you share!I am proud to say I am number 1 in Google for “Social Media Widgets”. It might come across like I am trying to toot my own horn by posting this…quite the contrary. I am actually shining the spotlight on the need to do 3 things:
- Create unique content that has real value proposition
- Think about SEO and keywords with everything you do
- Share your unique content out in DoFollow Social Media & Niche channels
The result of these three commitments is #1 rankings in Google. For me it made sense to try to rank for “Social Media“. But instead of trying to topple “Social Media” out of the gate, I went after terms that include “Social Media” within. Thus “Social Media Widgets” was one of those terms I identified and alas- won!
In the end, the content I created was valuable enough to drive the #1 ranking- thus making content king! However, if content is king, then SEO is the King’s fuel and sharing in a DoFollow social channels makes for a smart and well nourished King.
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Social Media & SEO For The Newbies! February 3, 2010
Posted by derekshowerman in Random Schmoozing.Tags: explanation, newbies, seo, social media
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My roomate Craig asked me what I was doing when I was messing with hi5 the other night. I explained to him a little bit about Social Media, a little bit about SEO, and a bit aboutthe strategy in-between. I looked up and was met with a black stare and “yeah-whatever that means!” He then walked away confused and completely in the dark on what I do.
I am incessantly explaining SEO and Social Media to friends and family alike. Most of the time they look at me and utter under their breath “nerd”. But it was Craig’s response that got me thinking about how the average person is simply new to both Social Media, Social Networking, Social Bookmarking and SEO. So with that, here is a couple video’s and I am calling this post “for the newbies”. I hope this helps create cartoon light bulbs above your head…especially you Craig!
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Sales 2.0 Is Listening & The Death Of The 8 Step Sales Process January 28, 2010
Posted by derekshowerman in 1.Tags: 8 Step Sales Process, Barry Libert, Coke, Listening, Sales2.0, walmart, wikipedia
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The customer is always right? At least that is how it should be- or once was?
I have come across several instances lately where the “Sales Process” superseded the need of the customer- namely me! Maybe I am hyper sensitive to the sales process because of my sales background, or maybe it is something larger. Maybe the writing is on the wall? Is the sales process of old obsolete? Are we in fact entering a new age of sales- Sales2.0 if you will? Gone are the days of the 8 step sales process that bring is in an army of experts to sell you on one product?
I entered a meeting today with a vendor that is already working with our organization. The purpose of the meeting was to go over the capabilities we had already purchased. 20 minutes of up-selling and chest thumping- and we finally started the overview of the purchased product. When is it time to stop selling and start servicing? It is proven that when you service a customer to extreme satisfaction they will purchase again and new sales ops organically develop. Turn the page and service your customer and ye shall find organic sales ops!
Another example: I was on the second sales call with a prospectus vendor. The mission for them was to show us their product with our brand in mind. Our own data points, a test drive if you will! No using Coke and Walmart as examples of how powerful the product is. Instead I was met with the following:
- “It costs us money to use your data in a demo”
- “We don’t have a playground for you to try it out, but we do have screen shots”
- “Just follow along with the slide deck- it’ll answer most if not all of your questions.”
My thought was “Maybe car salespeople aren’t so stupid- they at least let you test it before you buy it!” Ultimately both situations were a supreme waste of time for me. Time is of the essence to many of us in business today, so losing time for the sake of a sales process is futile. Barry Libert once said “When you give your customers, peers, constituents and family what they want, when they want it, and how they want it- you win them over- over and over again!” That resonated with me!
According to wikipedia a sales process is a systematic approach to selling a product or service. Traditional sales process definition breaks a selling cycle into the following phases:
- Prospect
- Qualify
- Propose
- Negotiate
- Close
So what is Sales2.0? I would argue it is listening more than you sell. Ask questions to get to the fundamentals of selling which is “find the need and fill the need.” But to do that you must listen. To listen you need to abandon the traditional sales process dictated by your organization and let the prospect tell you what they want. In order to do this I suggest giving the prospect an information sheet ahead of your call/meeting. In the age of online shopping and testimonials it has become a greater practice to research before you buy. A trend that will continue to grow as technology infiltrates all facets of our lives.
In addition to listening, I suspect large ticket items are going to all move into a “try it before you buy it” approach to sales. If you have nothing to hide – then have at it. Have faith that your product to will perform to the prospectus customers expectations. In many instances this will actually speed up the process and remove unneeded steps.
Finally, think about selling activities that allow both sides of the fence to learn from each other about what they would like. This helps build trust, mutual understanding and a true feeling of partnership from the outset. This is finding the need and filling the need collaboratively and in a far more productive way.
Be sure to check out a swell site called Sales2.0: Next Generation Sales Tip & Sales Strategies and here is something to think about if you service your customer. If you stop selling and service them- you will open pandora’s box for new organic sales without the need of a sales process.
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VISUAL: Brand Overlap & Objectives When Engaging Social Media January 10, 2010
Posted by derekshowerman in Thought Leadership.Tags: brand affinity demographics, end user, fans, social media, sponsors
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Many businesses are engaging social media feeling as though they can engage and not think about overlap and the brand as a whole. The Social Media strategy is simply another arm of the brands whole. Please see the item I came across and tweaked below:
Moral of the story, when engaging socially think about:
- End user value (unique content and value proposition)
- Offers and content to keep the user engaged and tinking about your product
- Pricing and long term value of the product/service (how will your continue to engage your customer after the point of transaction)
- Constituents – How your brand engagement affects your business partners
There is more to being a social company then just engaging, there is a cause and effect with other facets of your business and business drivers. If I have left any blanks, please feel free to fill them in with comments.
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3 Phase Approach To Creating A “Social” Business Culture December 30, 2009
Posted by derekshowerman in Thought Leadership.Tags: 14 Ways A CEO Can Benefit From Social Media: A True Story, corporate portal, Culture, social media
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What is the best way for fledgling business cultures to adopt Social Media? It is no secret that the ROI of Social has been a hot topic within the confines of this blog, and in recent months I have come to a solid realization that SEO is one very clear (but not easy) way to recognize ROI within Social Media. But in order to achieve that success, the need exists for the business culture to embrace transparency to the external world.
A cultural shift for any business, no less a startup / younger business can be difficult. But then again, established businesses can be set in their ways like a crotchety old man too!
Jeff Bullas recently wrote 14 Ways A CEO Can Benefit From Social Media: A True Story, a great read and a fantastic blog by the way. But his point got me thinking to the point above, cultural shift and in this case, how a CEO can create a more social culture. Here is a 3 phase approach:
1) Evolve your corporate portal into a full internal community- Let your own company be the guinea pig. Create a private community for your staff. This will drive a culture of productivity and transparency. The end result is more bang for your buck from your work force, a birds-eye view of your business, knowledge retention (the baby boomers are retiring and with that their knowledge is disappearing-capture it now!), employee ideas (it is also advised to listen to your employees and innovate internal process to their voice). Listening and interacting builds employee loyalty not to mention empowerment to “get involved”. Don’t have a portal – skip it! They are so 2004. The business drivers of an internal community are:
- Transparency – Create more efficient and transparent information flow between corporate and the entire staff.
- Efficiency – Lower the overlap of work and quickly identify holes within processes. I have seen companies also organize and scale their business collaboratively through the use of a wiki.
- Innovation – Harvesting great ideas, flushing them out together and applying them builds
- A new level of scalable & repeatable business process
2) Create a partner/constituent community – Once you have successfully engaged your own staff, you can then turn to your business partners to:
- Derive Market Research- Listen to your business constituents – listen, learn, engage and stay relevant. Have the pulse of your industry in your back pocket to reference whenever you need to.
- Enable Partner Education- A knowledgeable partner is more likely to stay a business partner.
- Create A new generation of User Groups -Traditional user groups are evolving into social communities. Doing this helps fulfill multiple business objectives outlined in this list.
- Transparent Dashboard – The dashboard will create a clear and concise overview of the relationship between your business and theirs.
- Partner Insights – The interactions between partners can be invaluable insights. Especially when you have a birds-eye view of those conversations. It is also an add-on value for your partners to have these conversations that I have seen lead to serendipitous business opportunities for all parties involved. (Thanks to Jim Storer for that word)
3) Create a Customer driven community – I would be remiss if I did not suggest a ramp up phase where Twitter, Facebook and other demographically enlightened avenues are engaged as a pilot. Then create a social community for your customers. Some of the business drivers are:
- Product Innovation- When you listen to your partners & customers and innovate to their voice-you will win their business over and over again. Not to mention create better products in the long run. This is a proven case study of success.
- Business Intelligence & Competitive Analysis- Social Media allows you to open up channels to understand your business and competitors like never before. This intelligence has a value greater than any one sale or new lead.
- Peer‐Based Support, Education & Innovation- Let your peers and customers sell, educate and innovate for you. Collaboration drives all three and will let you shave your customer service, marketing and new product development costs.
- Thought leadership/Leads & Sales- Be the leader in your industry and you will develop serendipitous lead generation, new sales and new business opportunities that were not available before.
- Brand Awareness & Affinity- When you engage, adapt, innovate and are an accessible organization (culture) your customers will come back to you over and over. New folks will take notice over your competitor that have a closed door policy. Same with your employees and business partners.
I hope this helps get the conversation started about cultural change and gives you a roadmap to drive that change. Oh, and peep this graphic- invaluable! Thanks to the fine chaps at Nixon for this!
Ask, Listen & Implement – Don’t Be Afraid To Ask For What You Want! December 13, 2009
Posted by derekshowerman in 1.Tags: ask, happy holidays, implement, listen, product roadmap, vendor selection
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The big question this time of year is always – what do people want for Xmas? So riddle me this, why guess when you can ask?
In recent months I have observed the hesitancy from organizations to engage the Twitters of the world asking for the important answers they are looking for. Like it is a sign of weakness to ask your peers to offer their solicited guidance and opinion? Why?
I recently needed a date for a holiday party. So I Tweeted it out! The next thing I knew, my virtual friends created a #derekneedsadate hashtag and I ended up with a lovely date for the party. Ask and ye shall receive, much like asking what do people want for the holidays?
So with this information in mind, here are three business area’s an organization or brand can ask for advice- and no it is not exposing a chink in the armor- it is simply smart. Good practice because the many probably knows more then you. Proven fact!
- Vendor selection – If you are a business and need an external vendor, do your due diligence on the vendor. One step is to ask your peers their experience with the vendor. These are invaluable insights that can help you make an educated decision.
- Product Roadmap – What is amazing to me is that organizations don’t spend this time of the year asking their customers what the product roadmap should look like in the coming year. Your customers will be incredibly impressed if you ask, listen and implement. Make it so number one! Yes, I inserted a cheese Star Trek reference in there!
- 3. Competitive Intelligence – For those prospectus customers that are not currently using your service- ask them why. This can be simply done via the many Twitter tools and Facebook tactics (a post for another day) that will result in invaluable feedback. You can guess, but getting the answer from the horse’s mouth has never been easier. It never hurts to ask! But if you do, remember to ask, listen and implement
Happy holidays! Be sure to use this time of the year to simply breath, reflect and value the amazing people you have in your life. I started this post off talking about presents, but we all know that is not what this time of the year is about. So this is my plug to urge you to go bowling with Dad, watch a movie with Mom and enjoy the loved ones in your life.
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Why I Officially Work At Sokolove Law Doing Social Media & SEO November 29, 2009
Posted by derekshowerman in Random Schmoozing.Tags: Jim Storer, Sokolove Law, thank you
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Anyone who is paying attention to the Social Media world knows that the following 3 industries are slow to adopt SM into their marketing efforta:
- Law
- Finance
- Pharmaceutical
Say nothing about the culture associated with the companies within these industries. So why in the world would I go work at Sokolove Law? A number of colleagues thought I was crazy, while others praised me. My friend and colleague Jim Storer is fascinated by what I am doing. Jim I owe you a call and will be reaching out with some business ops soon!
Simply put, I took this position to crack the law nut. As you would imagine we have lofty goals that have a monetization attribute of our social presence. To me, this is the ultimate challenge in my career and I am really excited to get started. My focus will be SEO through the use of Social Media. While much of my job with still be creating a SM strategy (clarity- around SEO) that simply works. So not much has changed other than I have one focus instead of 9 or 10 companies at once. I also have resources to execute on our plan which is simply amazing!
Although I will not be able to share much of what we do, I will still be maintaining this blog from an analyst perspective. A birds-eye view of the social media space if you will! Because what we are doing is considered “trailblazer”, the IP we acquire will have to stay within the Sokolove walls. BUT- I will stay up to date on trends and share perspectives and best practices that I deem worthy to share from Sokolove. All in all, nothing will change in regards to this blog presence.
Thank you to everyone who is religious about reading my posts. Thank you to those who have helped me get to where I am today. These are people I mention within Twitter and on this blog religiously- y know who you are! Without you- I would not be in a position I am today to do something simply awesome. Thank you so much for having the bearing on my career that you have had!
Lastly, thank you to AJ and the Authority Domains staff for giving me the opportunity to help them grow their business while being able to look at SEO through different shades. It is that perspective that has afforded me the opportunity I am presented with today! I have heard that life is experiences that pile up as valuable building blocks. The Authority Domains experience was a leaps and bounds for me professionally and I will always make sure to pat their backs as I progress further in my career.
On a final note! If I can ever be a sounding board for ideas, a reference for your SM presence, or if you simply need strategic advice- please don’t hesitate to reach out to me. My new cell is 781-690-5998 and I can be emailed at dshowerman@gmail.com or dshowerman@sokolovelaw.com.
Happy holidays everyone! I wish you all the best! I will be following up soon with a post about not being afraid to ask.
3 Best Practices On How Your Brand Can NOT Be Intrusive November 16, 2009
Posted by derekshowerman in Best Practices.Tags: facebook, intrusive, Thread
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On Friday I was playing around with Thread. To put it bluntly- it is intrusive and not an application that I would suggest for clients to utilize. It is meant to be an application where you can meet friends of friends. I think I would find it to be rather annoying to have a friend of a friend hitting me up for a date or trying to contact me for a business opportunity. It just seems to cross that line in the sand…moving from being a helpful tool to a tool that is overbearing.
The last month I have been inundated with Twitter followers who include me in business offers in public Tweets. Instead of inspiring me to click on the link, it instead prompts me to go on a rampage of “offing them!” No, not putting on my Tony Soprano leather jacket- just unfollowing and blocking them!
So these two observations got me thinking about the importance of brands to be engaging but not intrusive! Three suggestions:
- Don’t use technologies like Thread that impose your will on people. It will do you no good- trust me! Make sure that you have unique nuggets of value within each channel. What does that mean? Read point 2.
- Don’t create a Facebook fanpage and just replicate blog and webinars from another location. Create unique content for that presence- otherwise you are simply creating another push channel. Give it value for your target audience!
- Ask questions of others & join the conversations important to your brand! This is for those organizations on Twitter that are well….completely obtrusive and turn my into digital Tony Soprano!
Lastly, be wary of new technologies moving forward. Be morally aware of how obtrusive or obnoxious they are before using them. It is ok to share value, but pushing your sales message is a no no! Some of new technologies make it easy to spam – you don’t want to be known for that! Err on the side of caution- if you feel like you are being intrusive and spammy- then you probably are. Have a gander at this…
Angels & Airwaves- Using Social Media To Monetize In An Innovative Way! November 10, 2009
Posted by derekshowerman in Case Study.add a comment
The music industry is in a state of flux. Let’s be honest, the way by which record labels were able to monetize via album sales has flown the coop. Enter Tom DeLonge of Blink 182 fame. He has said that Blink 182 was a band that had no voice whatsoever. But with his new band Angels & Airwaves he believes it carries a massive message about being optimistic in the future and plans to use that message as the vehicle to change the way music is marketed and delivered. An ambitious goal considering the music industry is ripe and in need of fresh ideas.
So how is Tom going about doing it? Well the first three albums of Angels & Airwaves are supplying the soundtrack to a movie called Love. Here is the 3rd album and movie teaser here:
Both the album and the movie are coming out on Valentines Day, 2010. Here is the movie trailer itself:
Pretty impressive right? To this point Tom has successfully created a huge buzz using:
- 1. Twitter (84,858 followers)
- 2. Facebook (91,373 fans)
- 3. Modlife (well over 100 podcasts)
- 4. Social Bookmarking (Stumbleupon, Digg, etc for link juice & exposure)
- 5. Traditional Mailing List
- 6. Youtube (1760 AvA videos), Hulu, Vimeo
- 7. Press Releases
A solid blend of traditional marketing with social Media! Tom has successfully built a massive buzz that he can market directly to. One problem, he isn’t following 1 person on Twitter! I am going to hedge my bets that this will be a success and an amazing case study when it is done. I can’t deny thinking though, how much more productive would the project be if Tom was a bit more open to suggestion?
One other observation! This is not a full-fledged Social Media project. If it were, there would be collaborative components. However it is using Social Media effectively to generate buzz and be viral. Look no further then the inspired fans creating videos of their own and chatting up the movie and 3rd album in virtually every social channel. How many man hours it has taken for it to get to this point? I wouldn’t care to know! Something to think about when your business engages- you need to go all in-resource allocation and all! Tom DeLonge understood that and burned many night hours of his own time to get here. Let’s see how his vision plays out!
