Social Networking: A Worthwhile Investment

Here’s the conundrum - you want more business, but you are already working your buns off handling client projects, fulfilling orders, dealing with infrastructure, employee and independent contractor issues, delivering presentations, rushing to meetings, hopping planes, attending empowerment and organizational workshops, and chatting with new contacts at all kinds of networking functions.

In between all this, you’re connected, to your phone, PC or laptop, feverishly checking your emails and responding via some kind of enabled device every 12 seconds. So when in the world do you have time to supersize your connectivity via online social networks?? How can MySpace, facebook, LinkedIn or YouTube have any relevance for your business?? Isn’t that stuff just for teens, wannabe rock bands and geeks who don’t have a life?

The simple answer is: NO. Although there are silly people doing outrageous things (some making complete asses of themselves for sure), there is real business done through these portals and others, tons of of it.

Pick up WIRED magazine, check out any number of online marketing or advertising resources (MarketingProfs, AdAge) and you will see the buzz is not about IF social online networking platforms are working, but HOW they are working, and why it’s more than time to jump onboard.

The digital landscape is constantly evolving, and industry insiders have lots of valuable info and insight, so I trekked to NYC yesterday to attend AWNY’s Social Networking breakfast.  Execs from LinkedIn, Hulu.com, Dove and several top creative agencies discussed how the platforms can be used to target specific market segments as well as provide real data on consumer needs, preferences and developing habits.

Specific success stories highlighted the facts:millions of people are actively using these interaction portals for a full spectrum of meaningful lifestyle-enhancing and buying activity: whether it’s finding work, catching up with old college buddies, or landing lucrative new business deals. The best part about all this for the small business owner, is that these particular opportunities to build brand awareness, reach new prospects and make more money, are FREE!!

So, yours truly has recently stopped complaining about how much time I don’t have to be involved with this stuff. Like Dove and Geiko and a slew of the major brands, I’m testing the waters. Each week I’m joining new groups, strategically creating profiles, inviting colleagues and following national experts. All this action has already created exciting new client opps and peer engagement. I’ve already found several great people to friend in Boston, London and California - and I’m getting invites all over the place.  I must confess after one week I am happily “tweeting” as much as I can! (Check out my posts at Twitter.com, at marcomwhiz.)

I’ll let you know what develops as far as real business and how much these tools actualy cost me in terms of time taken away from other important tasks. In the interim, I challenge you to get moving.  Start slowly and with a specific business objective. Post to a relevant blog, create your own, connect with new leads through common friends, or join a new social networking platform. Do something within this terrific digital sales and marketing platfom and see what happens!

Avoiding Advertising Mistakes

According to Jay Conrad Levinson, author of Guerrilla Marketing, there are 25 things that people do that result in disastrous or weak returns when it comes to advertising.

These tips are INVALUABLE — so I pass them onto you as is, so you can avoid these very costly advertising mistakes. (Please see my Top Ten Success Tips underneath.)

1. Premature abandonment
2. Silly positioning
3. Failure to follow through
4. Starting without a plan
5. Wrong media for the right audience
6. Right media for the wrong audience
7. Unclear to prospects
8. Not understanding clients
9. Not understanding self
10. Exaggerating that undermines truth
11. Not keeping up with change
12. Unrealistic expectations
13. Over- or under-spending
14. Saving money in the wrong places
15. Inattention to tiny but nuclear details
16. Missing the point about profitability
17. Thinking it can be done without hard work
18. Unimpressive first impressions
19. Too many committees or layers of management
20. Not using media to support efforts
21. Not supporting advertising with other marketing
22. Starting out in the wrong direction
23. Allowing success to begat lethargy
24. Judging future by the past
25. Boring advertising

Pattie’s Top Ten Tips for Winning Ad Campaigns

I’ll start with this freebie: Your mother, friends and assorted acquaintances’ opinions don’t count. If you follow through on the other ten, you will reap much better returns!

1. Get a professional graphic designer to create a winning brand.
2. Use the same graphic designer to produce all your ads & collateral materials, reflecting your strong (& very unique) brand.
3. Work with a professional marketing copywriter, who can create polished, perfect prose to engage the specific market(s) you are seeking to reach.
4. MAKE AN OFFER – ads with offers work. I don’t care what the demographic market is – everyone loves a deal.
5. Have a deadline. 60 Days works best — it’s been tested and proven a gagillion times, so don’t question this, just do it.
6. Test, test and test again! Great campaigns evolve as a result of research, risk-taking & tweaking. Till someone comes up with a crystal ball – this is part and parcel of nailing big wins.
7. Get advice from a media placement specialist – deals are out there on traditional print and radio that you might not be aware of.
8. BE DARINGLY DIFFERENT. Lots of really creative ideas get shot down everyday. Dare to be advised by your creative team.
9. Guard your brand and style guidelines with all your might. ‘Nuff said.
10. Diversifying is not just for stock portfolios. Winning ad campaigns get the word out in various mediums, including PR, train station platform advertising (one of my personal favorites), direct mail and various web-based platforms, including regular e/mail, branded e-newsletters, e-ads, crosslinking, blogging, YouTube, podcasting, etc.

Speaking

For sassy motivational, educational and training speakers — check out WomenCentric™! Our talented roster of women experts deliver top-notch seminars, keynotes, opening addresses, webinars, teleseminars, and podcasts for corporate, entrepreneurial and academic audiences. WomenCentric™ custom-tailored programs seek to spark inventive vision, celebrate self, encourage harmonious interaction, stimulate leadership and pave new success paths.

passion • purpose • connectivity • performance

Corporate Training Programs include:

• Team Building
• Diversity Awareness l Appreciation
• Motivation l Celebration
• Women-focused
• Communications l Public Speaking l Media Training

Entrepreneurial l Trade Association presentations include:

• New Age Marketing: Everything You Need to Know about Twittering, Blogging, Podcasting, YouTube, and Other Online Sales Tools
• Branding like the Big Boys for Small Business Success
• Penny Pinching Marketing Secrets: Get your Guerilla Going!
• Jump-Starting Your Business: Getting to the Next Level
• How to Produce Winning Websites (and LOTS More Sales!)
• The Amazing Entrepreneurial Life

Academic Programs include:

• Communications for Grads — Navigating the Real World
• Networking for Career Success
• Blueprint to Personal & Business Success
• Creating & Leveraging your Personal Success Toolkit

A little background history…

WomenCentric™ was originally “birthed” as a spunky women’s speaking group. Five women (virtual strangers to one another) gathered together at a diner to discuss how to showcase our collective and individual talents. We had distinctive areas of expertise in peak performance, communications, image, life and divorce coaching, and resume writing and business career coaching. Despite diverse backgrounds and experiences, we had many things in common. One bond: we were all seeking new business opportunities. More importantly, our little group had big dreams and open minds: we believed we could grow as professional business women as a result of sharing our respective capabilities.

Today WomenCentric™ is getting a makeover! Our spanking new website will go live in the fall, and will feature a one-stop shop for some of the most dynamic women speakers and trainers in the country.

Find out more about booking a terrific expert speaker!

Discover how you can become one of our expert speakers!

Business CopyWriting

Kickin’ Web & Print CopyWriting & Press Release Writing Services

Want imaginative marketing communications or editorial copywriting that sings? Rely on Write-Communications. We craft polished prose that engages, educates, entertains, motivates or sells.

It’s no secret, great communications requires a careful blend of art and science. Successful print or web advertising or educational vehicles connect all the dots — sporting a real insight into your company, your target market(s), and your overall strategy and objectives.

For a professional, unbiased assessment of your current materials, smart copy polishing services, innovative editorial coverage for an annual report or Press Kit, or SEO-friendly text that will help improve your website’s ranking organically, you can rely on one resource — Write-Communications!

Contact Write-Communications today for expert wordsmithing for your communications projects, including:

• Advertorials
• Blogging
• Brochures
• Corporate Bios
• Direct Mail
• Editorials
• Feature writing
• Ghost Writing (e-books, books, articles)
• Mission Statements
• Narratives
• Press Kit materials
• Press Releases
• Print Ads
• Product Packaging Copy (CD’s, food products, etc.)
• Radio Commercials
• Speeches
• White Papers

Old Habits Die Hard

Greetings!

As you can see it’s been awhile since I’ve added some thoughts here. Blogging was supposed to be a new activity that I would post to on a fairly regular basis … Yeah. Well, I had good intentions … which brings me to my topic.

The fact is, we are creatures of habit and changing a pattern of behavior is much easier said than done. We do lots of stuff by rote, without stopping for a second to think about anything. Take your morning routine, the place you stop in to get your coffee (or tea), and (for the ladies) how you apply your makeup. Putting on makeup, what’s the big deal, you say?? Trust me on this, it was ridiculous how long it took me to reverse my morning regimen once I got a new prescription . . .

My point - changing a rote pattern takes determination and concentration, and moments when we have to literally stop what we are doing and think about what the next step is before we make it. The process of implementing even the most simplest change (like the order of stuff that needs to be done when putting on makeup) is mildly annoying at the least and downright exasperating to the point of chucking the “better” way of doing things …

So - is it any wonder that we balk at changing systems, vendors, operations,or employees that are not cutting the mustard etc., in our businesses??

What a headache, right??

Fact is, change is necessary and for the most part lots of new thought processes, systems, vendors - whatever - can help our businesses run better and make our lives less stressful in the long term.

Once you make a plan of action, cut yourself a break in the implementation process. I intend on posting at least 3 times a week from now on, but that means I have to break my pattern of frittering away time (under the guise of doing research, keeping up-to-date with trends and resources; which I am, in fact, doing for very good reasons.) Realistically though it’s gonna take me about 3 weeks to go from the stop- and-start of breaking old habits, to creating new ones.

Bottom line: In order to accommodate the various new initiatives I’ve put on my 2006 to-do list (like blogging, writing my book, and podcasting) there are going to be a some bumps and glitches along the way, for about 21 days, before things start to go smoothly. If I don’t start now another month will go by and … Well, you get the picture. I’ll still be doing what I always did!

Wishing you the best of luck of on your re-patterning challenges!
Pattie