Day: June 18, 2010

Maybe it isn’t too late to reverse the slide?

I first saw this video a month or so ago during a web presentation on UstreamTV and asked the presenter via Twitter DM where he got it with unfortunately no reply.

Pleased to say I’ve come across it again and this time was able to score the embed code below to share it with you in case you haven’t seen it yet.

Sad to say it appears we’re from the Lost Generation but with thoughts and deeds like this video one can only hope the next generation with our attention and support can reverse the slide!

Jeff Ashcroft
@TheSocialCMO

How to “win” with social media

Wherever I go to speak, entrepreneurs and corporate marketing professionals come up to me afterward and ask, “But what do we DO with social media?”

So, forget all the fancy plans; forget the ever-unsatisfying pursuit of ROI. Please just let this video sink in. Let this one thought permeate all that you do on social media. If you will, I guarantee you that you will discover exactly what you should DO on social media.

Here’s the foundational principle at work on social media:

  • everyone wants to be heard
  • everyone wants to be understood
  • everyone wants to know his or her life matters.

You START that process by paying attention. On Twitter that starts by following the people who are following you. Period. It is just that simple. The next step is making social media about them, not you. And that starts by acknowledging their presence.

[Whenever I say something like this, someone with 250 followers will try to tell me they follow only people who add value to their own social media experience. I won’t tackle the challenges with that argument in this post, but I would encourage you to seriously think through the value system that would produce such a conclusion.]

Please watch T.J. Thyne’s famous video and then notice the people around you: acknowledge & affirm—it’s how to win with social media and in real life, too.

Trey Pennington

PS. You are AWESOME!

Refuse to Live in a Box!

Live outside the box! Let’s say it again. Live outside the box and dare to no longer be defined by the “confines of a box.”

Why is it that so many people today are defined by the proverbial “box” and quite frankly seem to like to stay in the comfortable confines of a box?

Think about it.



Most people sleep on a “bed/box” talk on a “phone/box”, email from a “blackberry/box”, type on a “laptop/box”, eat from a “drive thru/box lunch”, drive to work in a “car/box”, and then set their AM wake up call to be made from a “alarm clock.box” etc. No wonder people are so comfortable with box type thinking.

Organizations are no different than people– as organizations are made up of people.

I challenge everyone who seeks to be a leader to “live outside the box.” Furthermore, look at 2010 as it is, and see our organizational problems for what they are… etc instead of looking at them as worse than they are.

Lets focus on seeing things that others do not see and being a leader who is not adverse to trying new ways of doing things. Let’s work to find a better way to do things… and then work to make these things a reality.

Living outside the box, is uncomfortable to many who love their simple, black and white (no gray), four walls up… and “box oriented” world.
However, to compete now and the years ahead– the box has to go away and the four walls must come down to allow free energy, creativity, and unbridled ideas to occur.

What box do you face? Do you like the confines of your box?

Ryan Sauers

What is the true value of a Facebook to a Marketer/Brand

I believe many are looking at this in too narrow a fashion. Everyone is trying to assign a dollar value to a Facebook fan or Twitter follower instead of addressing the fact that it is the engagement and interaction that takes place in these mediums that is incredibly important to a brand.

Building a relationship with existing and future customers is the true value and strength of social media/marketing. ROI is certainly incredibly important whenever investing, but companies have to start looking at ROR, Return on Relationship, when planning, strategizing and most importantly evaluating social marketing.

A new study shows that those who are fans or followers of a brand on Facebook or Twitter, respectively, are significantly more likely to buy products and services or recommend the brand to a friend.

Specifically, the study by Chadwick Martin Bailey and iModerate Research Technologies found that consumers are 67% more likely to buy from the brands they follow on Twitter, and 51% more likely to buy from a brand they follow on Facebook. Moreover, they’re 79% more likely to recommend their Twitter follows to a friend, and 60% more likely to do the same on Facebook.

Welcome to the “Age of Influence,” where anyone can build an audience and effect change, advocate brands, build relationships and make a difference.

Ted Rubin