Business owners can be the best PR managers. Using social media and the Internet as a distribution platform you can match the results of even the best PR agency. However, the amateur marketer can need a little help learning the short-cuts to early success.
Here are some easy steps to get these social media tools returning real PR and branding results:
1. Set-up your PR and Branding Platform. Start small and focused. This platform is going to be where you drive people to learn more about your business, products, and services. Pointing back to this central focal point with all of your PR and branding campaigns with assist lead generation.
If you are technically inclined a simple blog is a great place to start. However, it is not necessary--you can chose to make Facebook, MySpace, or LinkedIn your personal brand platform. Make sure a visitor is engaged with your strategy when they arrive.
2. Listen First. Once you have a good platform, a base station, you need to start listening to your market. Consumers are all over the Internet and making it easier and easier to survey their needs.
A great place to start listening is on Twitter--the premiere social networking and conversation tool. Search for key words associated with your market in the Twitter search engine, then sit back and see what they expect.
3. Participate. Listening is important, but participation builds trust, relationships, and targeted audiences. Ultimately, and online PR and branding strategy online is community building.
Community building means conversations and conversations build audiences. Audiences that will trust your recommendations, marketing, and services. Participation in your community will create sales leads for your business, if done appropriately.
4. Give Value First. Consumers are naturally skeptical, especially online. Nothing brings a sale faster than "giving first" and breaking that natural skepticism. Online publishing tools and platforms have made is a snap to leverage the Internet for big-time audience generation and distribution.
Creating valuable content targeted at solving problems for your ideal customer can make a big impact. This can be as simple as a blog post, eBook, or amateur video. This little effort and value given freely and distributed widely will bring enormous return.
5. Build Relationships. You have to care! Consumers and customers see this in a heartbeat--and they react. Quickly returning emails, phone calls, and even tweets show a passion for your business and the customers you serve.
Customers greeted with a sense of urgency can be the biggest advocates and promoters of your products and services.
6. Be Helpful. Consumers are using the Internet more and more to find information and solutions to their problems. Being helpful is one the most powerful marketing tactics. The psychological principle of reciprocity can produce incredible returns on a simple helpful tip, pointer, or referral.
If you know the answer to a question--help someone. There are lots of ways to help online and build your brand. Check out LinkedIn Answers or Yahoo!Answers.
7. Promote Others. Having a successful PR and branding strategy is not all about you. Promoting others builds your audience and reputation. This technique has two benefits: Getting the reciprocity of helping someone else with a campaign. Second, you get the attention and trust of those who follow your advice and gain value.
Promoting others is like doubling your product base and increasing your marketing reach.
7.5 Engage PR and Marketing Professionals. With so many social media tools available and free advice on the Internet it is easy to rush in without a plan. Doing PR and branding without clear objectives and concise messages can be an obvious train wreck to consumers--a lasting bad impression.
Professional advice and guidance from PR and marketing professionals can help you set firm footing and foundation under your idea. Then you can make do-it-yourself have real impact.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/1912105
Showing posts with label blogger. Show all posts
Showing posts with label blogger. Show all posts
Monday, 5 August 2013
Friday, 2 August 2013
7 Social Media Tips From Top Industry Experts
Tip #1: Host Live Facebook Events
To add great value and give your fans a different way of interacting with you, every now and then offer live chat sessions, teleseminars and webinars. Mari Smith and her friend Chris Treadaway conducted what they called a "flash chat" as a way of crowdsourcing content for a book.
They used the webinar platform Linqto which enabled people to interact with them as the presenters used a webcam to take turns being on the floor. Participant interaction took place via chat.
If you don't have that type of technical know how you can keep it simple by doing a simple Q&A session on the wall of your Facebook Page.
Tip #2: Be Willing to Help the Less Than Famous
The best way to build your personal brand is to involve other people in the process. Do your best to help others and give others credit for the awesome work they do. Though it may seem like a lot of work, in the long run it pays off. On top of that, as Erik Qualman says in his book Socialnomics: How Social Media Transforms the Way We Live and Do Business, "It's the right thing to do."
Easy ways to help other people include tweeting their work and leaving great comments on their blogs.
Don't just target your help toward top name people; they get a lot of love and attention. You'll really stand out if you help out those who have great potential but are not yet well known.
Tip #3: Don't Overemphasize Marketing
Remember, social media marketing is... social. Heading right into marketing without investing the proper amount of time in the social part of social media marketing is detrimental. There are certain expectations within social media, with one of the major expectations being community. "Very often these expectations do not include having marketing messages jammed down their throats," writes Hollis Thomases in Twitter Marketing: An Hour a Day.
Tip #4: Find Out What Your Customers Want
Brian Solis, in Engage: The Complete Guide to Building, Cultivating and Measuring Success in the Social Web writes, "... my best advice to you is to go figure out what your opportunity is first." He suggests using the tool Research.ly to learn more about your prospects.
Tip #5: Meet People Offline
It's a natural tendency to go online for information and even for friendship and networking. While the Internet is a great place for these things, nothing replaces time spent face-to-face with other people.
Steve Garfield, writes in Get Seen: Online Video Secrets to Building Your Business about the importance of mingling with others in a setting where everyone is welcome.
Tip #6: Share the Knowledge of Experts With Your Readers
Find the experts in your industry and the offer to interview them about their newest product. Ask them a lot of questions that you know your audience will want to know the answers to. According to Michael Stelzner, the founder of Social Media Examiner, this is a great way to not only build a solid relationship with the expert, but to also provide content of tremendous value to your audience.
Tip #7: Be Controversial
Dean Hunt writes, "... here's a strategy I created to ensure that your content WILL get noticed....In fact, people will do a double-take when they see your content title and will not be able to resist reading it. I call it the 'negative slant.' It's very simple to do and works best with informational or how-to content."
As an example he gives the title of a blog post he recently wrote, "How to Work Really Hard and Make No Money." The negative spin on the title created shock value and contributed to it being a great success.
BONUS TIP:
When it comes to Facebook, you need a tailored strategy that works for your business. As time goes by, Facebook proves to be more important. You're starting to see a widening gap of those who get it and those who don't.
If you are looking to increase your leads, drive more traffic to your website and turn fans and followers into customers, FBinfluence is your step-by-step solution for making Facebook Marketing work for your business.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/6504933
To add great value and give your fans a different way of interacting with you, every now and then offer live chat sessions, teleseminars and webinars. Mari Smith and her friend Chris Treadaway conducted what they called a "flash chat" as a way of crowdsourcing content for a book.
They used the webinar platform Linqto which enabled people to interact with them as the presenters used a webcam to take turns being on the floor. Participant interaction took place via chat.
If you don't have that type of technical know how you can keep it simple by doing a simple Q&A session on the wall of your Facebook Page.
Tip #2: Be Willing to Help the Less Than Famous
The best way to build your personal brand is to involve other people in the process. Do your best to help others and give others credit for the awesome work they do. Though it may seem like a lot of work, in the long run it pays off. On top of that, as Erik Qualman says in his book Socialnomics: How Social Media Transforms the Way We Live and Do Business, "It's the right thing to do."
Easy ways to help other people include tweeting their work and leaving great comments on their blogs.
Don't just target your help toward top name people; they get a lot of love and attention. You'll really stand out if you help out those who have great potential but are not yet well known.
Tip #3: Don't Overemphasize Marketing
Remember, social media marketing is... social. Heading right into marketing without investing the proper amount of time in the social part of social media marketing is detrimental. There are certain expectations within social media, with one of the major expectations being community. "Very often these expectations do not include having marketing messages jammed down their throats," writes Hollis Thomases in Twitter Marketing: An Hour a Day.
Tip #4: Find Out What Your Customers Want
Brian Solis, in Engage: The Complete Guide to Building, Cultivating and Measuring Success in the Social Web writes, "... my best advice to you is to go figure out what your opportunity is first." He suggests using the tool Research.ly to learn more about your prospects.
Tip #5: Meet People Offline
It's a natural tendency to go online for information and even for friendship and networking. While the Internet is a great place for these things, nothing replaces time spent face-to-face with other people.
Steve Garfield, writes in Get Seen: Online Video Secrets to Building Your Business about the importance of mingling with others in a setting where everyone is welcome.
Tip #6: Share the Knowledge of Experts With Your Readers
Find the experts in your industry and the offer to interview them about their newest product. Ask them a lot of questions that you know your audience will want to know the answers to. According to Michael Stelzner, the founder of Social Media Examiner, this is a great way to not only build a solid relationship with the expert, but to also provide content of tremendous value to your audience.
Tip #7: Be Controversial
Dean Hunt writes, "... here's a strategy I created to ensure that your content WILL get noticed....In fact, people will do a double-take when they see your content title and will not be able to resist reading it. I call it the 'negative slant.' It's very simple to do and works best with informational or how-to content."
As an example he gives the title of a blog post he recently wrote, "How to Work Really Hard and Make No Money." The negative spin on the title created shock value and contributed to it being a great success.
BONUS TIP:
When it comes to Facebook, you need a tailored strategy that works for your business. As time goes by, Facebook proves to be more important. You're starting to see a widening gap of those who get it and those who don't.
If you are looking to increase your leads, drive more traffic to your website and turn fans and followers into customers, FBinfluence is your step-by-step solution for making Facebook Marketing work for your business.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/6504933
Wednesday, 31 July 2013
DO's & DON'Ts for bloggers
We got the lowdown on all things blogging from some of the top industry experts in the blogosphere. If you’re wondering what you should and shouldn’t be doing when you’re blogging – check out our expert panel’s top tips.
Here’s what you SHOULD be doing:
"DO be tenacious - don't give up, regular and disciplined posting pays off eventually." Dominic Smales – Gleam Digital.
"DO think about brands and how you can work with them." Vicki Fogwill – Social Media Manager for Next.
"DO make real world connections as well as online ones - the contacts you can make at events and seminars will be invaluable." Dominic Smales – Gleam Digital.
"DO value your work and your own worth." Kat Williams – Rocknrollbride.com.
"DO become friends with other bloggers. Rival blogs in London have become my best friends – it becomes a family. You should see bloggers as friends rather than enemies. Networking is huge!" Emily Johnston – Fashionfoiegras.com.
"DO look for stories and be proactive." Pat McNulty – Wed Editor at Cosmopolitan.co.uk.
"DO collaborate. Invite other bloggers onto your blog or channel then do the same with them. Post or publish together, linking to each other’s posts - your traffic should benefit." Dominic Smales – Gleam Digital.
Now take a read on what you SHOULDN’T be doing:
"DON’T blog/vlog thinking it’s a fast track to riches or even freebies. The audience and potential clients can tell and will run a mile. The pure passion and enthusiasm of your blog is what will make it successful." Dominic Smales – Gleam Digital.
"DON’T just email asking for free stuff and invites to events." Vicki Fogwill – Social Media Manager for Next.
"DON’T write things and assume everyone is interested. You may not have an audience." Andreas Pouros – Greenlight Digital.
"DON’T be controversial for the sake of it." Kat Williams – Rocknrollbride.com.
"DON’T get frustrated. Stick with it – it’s not always a quick fix." Emily Johnston – Fashionfoiegras.com.
"DON’T make enemies of other bloggers or brands. If you have a non-constructive, negative opinion of someone or something, keep it to yourself or tell your Mum, just don't tweet or post about it." Dominic Smales - Gleam Digital.
"DON’T give away your rights or content. Your audience is valuable - so don't be afraid to constantly question, 'What's in it for me?'" Dominic Smales – Gleam Digital.
Read more: http://www.cosmopolitan.co.uk/blogs/cosmo-blog-awards-2013/Do's-and-don'ts-for-bloggers#ixzz2acJQTJRo
Here’s what you SHOULD be doing:
"DO be tenacious - don't give up, regular and disciplined posting pays off eventually." Dominic Smales – Gleam Digital.
"DO think about brands and how you can work with them." Vicki Fogwill – Social Media Manager for Next.
"DO make real world connections as well as online ones - the contacts you can make at events and seminars will be invaluable." Dominic Smales – Gleam Digital.
"DO value your work and your own worth." Kat Williams – Rocknrollbride.com.
"DO become friends with other bloggers. Rival blogs in London have become my best friends – it becomes a family. You should see bloggers as friends rather than enemies. Networking is huge!" Emily Johnston – Fashionfoiegras.com.
"DO look for stories and be proactive." Pat McNulty – Wed Editor at Cosmopolitan.co.uk.
"DO collaborate. Invite other bloggers onto your blog or channel then do the same with them. Post or publish together, linking to each other’s posts - your traffic should benefit." Dominic Smales – Gleam Digital.
Now take a read on what you SHOULDN’T be doing:
"DON’T blog/vlog thinking it’s a fast track to riches or even freebies. The audience and potential clients can tell and will run a mile. The pure passion and enthusiasm of your blog is what will make it successful." Dominic Smales – Gleam Digital.
"DON’T just email asking for free stuff and invites to events." Vicki Fogwill – Social Media Manager for Next.
"DON’T write things and assume everyone is interested. You may not have an audience." Andreas Pouros – Greenlight Digital.
"DON’T be controversial for the sake of it." Kat Williams – Rocknrollbride.com.
"DON’T get frustrated. Stick with it – it’s not always a quick fix." Emily Johnston – Fashionfoiegras.com.
"DON’T make enemies of other bloggers or brands. If you have a non-constructive, negative opinion of someone or something, keep it to yourself or tell your Mum, just don't tweet or post about it." Dominic Smales - Gleam Digital.
"DON’T give away your rights or content. Your audience is valuable - so don't be afraid to constantly question, 'What's in it for me?'" Dominic Smales – Gleam Digital.
Read more: http://www.cosmopolitan.co.uk/blogs/cosmo-blog-awards-2013/Do's-and-don'ts-for-bloggers#ixzz2acJQTJRo
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