Testing the Social Media Marketing Waters

So last week I went on an allegorical dissertation of how to become a Social Media Marketing Master (say that three times fast!), but this week I’ll add some meaty chum to the water.  I won’t recap the discussion, as I’d rather you suffer through my words one post at a time, so I’ll just assume you’ve read it and swim on…

Step one is simply to get in the water of the internet.  That’s a simple task for most anybody under the age of 16, but those of us who can remember getting out of the chair to turn the TV channel (of which there were only *gasp* 13) might find it a little more painful and frightening.  I won’t waste anybody’s time on the basics of the internet, but I think its use for marketing is worth discussing at length. 

Are you ready?  Did you inflate your swim vest, don your arm bands, and pull down your goggles?  I sure hope so, because the water is cold and dark at first. 

Swimming the Social Media Marketplace (let’s call it the ‘SMM’ so I don’t get cramps and drown myself) is more than just listening to that old internet dial-up tone and surfing for naked pictures of mjHangge (please don’t because even I don’t want to see myself naked).  To become an SMM Jedi, you’ll need to learn where to advertise yourself, how to advertise you, and how to avoid those embarrassing SMM faux pas.  In her great book, 30-Minute Social Media Marketing, Susan Gunelius speaks of her ‘four Cs’ of social media participation.  Content creation, Content sharing, Connections, and Community building.  While you’re still teasing the SMM waters with scared toes, I would suggest that you start with building Connections and Community.  Creating content and sharing that content is your ultimate goal, but if you think twitter is the tremulous call of a bird then I would suggest you begin by merely observing content rather than creating it. 

Let’s start by talking about the WHEREs.  There are thousands, probably even millions, of online places to build community connections.  From social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter to forums on anything from the dietary rituals of earthworms to the sexiest Porsches, you can launch your SMM swim training by simply lurking around and seeing how people interact with each other. 

My suggestion is to begin by simply signing up for a personal Facebook page.  You are likely to invite only your friends into that personal FB page, which will allow you to swim in warm waters without fear of sharks.  Your friends will give you the leniency to make a few gaffes without letting you drown and may become your most strident swim coaches as you break out from the safety lines surrounding your swimming hole.  The beauty of beginning with FB is that you aren’t expected to bring any snacks to the picnic, your friends will interact with or without you.  My only caution is that you must be wary of what lessons you learn from your friends there—some things said in the ‘privacy’ of FB would be damaging or deadly in less ‘intimate’ areas of the internet.

This is also a good time to point out that ANYTHING YOU PUT ON THE INTERNET WILL BE THERE UNTIL LONG AFTER YOU ARE DEAD.  I hate to yell like that, but it’s something that people don’t seem to realize and is something you must learn early and often.  Don’t say anything online that you wouldn’t want your grandkids to read and, for God’s sake, don’t post pictures you wouldn’t want your mom to see…

Okay, rant complete, back to the swimming lessons.  I would suggest that you begin with Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, and Forums in your specific field.  I wouldn’t suggest doing much more than signing up for accounts and wading around a bit until you’ve spent some time learning the etiquette of each site.  Also, don’t sign up for too many at once, you’re simply trying to acclimate to the SMM not trying to master the butterfly stroke yet.  Simply spend the time watching others who are trying to sell themselves just as you are.  Write down what makes you want to read a certain author or follow a politician.  Don’t worry about how to sell yourself yet, your time will soon come.  Just watch and learn.  In the first few days of owning a Twitter account, you’ll see some great SMM role models to emulate like Kim Garst (@kimgarst), Jonathan Gunson (@JonathanGunson), or the amazing Guy Kawasaki (@GuyKawasaki) who has nearly 1.4 million followers.  Listen to them, watch what they do, learn how to sell like they do.  At the same time, watch for the mistakes.  There is a fellow author who I’ve read and enjoyed, but have chosen to unfollow because of his Twitter behavior.  His first (and most glaring) mistake is that he tweets a dozen times an hour about how great his books are—he quotes from them, posts reviews, lauds excessively upon his own work.  Don’t get me wrong, he is a talented writer and he does deserve praise for his accomplishments, but let others say how great they think he is or, at the minimum, don’t post about it constantly.  You want to build connections with people, not hear their ad nauseam thoughts on themselves.  I would love to hear more about his dogs and cars with a sprinkled sales pitch to get the uninitiated to take a quick nibble of his works.  From my limited online exposure to this writer, I can honestly say that I’d have never bought his books if I’d met him on Twitter instead of at the bookstore.  Think about that as you start to move into step two—if you don’t learn the basics of the SMM then you will be lost in it and you will miss one of the greatest sales opportunities ever.

See, step one was simple.  If you’re still floating above water (and I haven’t put you to sleep yet), then you’ve already learned the basics of social media marketing.  Take the time to struggle through each step as you reach them and soon you’ll be on the OSMMST (Olympic Social Media Marketplace Swim Team). 

Next week I’ll begin talking about how to use each of the most influential sites to your best advantage.  Until then, have fun surfing and watch out for the sharks.  MjH

Any other social media studs/studettes you can recommend?  Send me their names and I’ll add them to the list!  MjH

HOMEWORK

• Open a personal Facebook account
• Open a Twitter account
• Read and pay attention to others' tweets and posts
• Follow some SMM role-models such as @kimgarst, @JonathanGunson, @GuyKawasaki, and @Susangunelius
• Follow me @mjhangge_author and post how great you think I am.  (Okay, so maybe that's a stretch, but I'd sure love to hear from you.)

RESOURCES

• Learning to Swim in the Social Media Marketing Waters by mjHangge - next week's blog post on mjHangge.net
• 30-Minute Social Media Marketing by Susan Gunelius
• Social Marketology by Ric Dragon

DEFINITIONS

• Facebook defines itself as 'a social utility that connects people with friends and others who work, study and live around them'.
• Google+ 'aims to make sharing on the web more like sharing in real life.  Check out Circles, Events and Hangouts, just a few of the things we've [Google+] been working on.
• LinkedIn helps '(m)anage your professional identity.  Build and engage with your professional network.  Access knowledge insights and opportunities'.  
• SMM - Social Media Marketplace - Simply my acronym to keep you awake today
• Twitter is a '(s)ocial networking and micro blogging service utilizing instant messaging, SMS or a web interface'.  

Swimming the Dreaded Social Media Channel

Swimming the Dreaded Social Media Channel

I’m not sure if it’s because I’m too old (read ‘outdated’) to be a social media butterfly or if it’s my anti-social personality disorders, but the thought of a Social Media Blitz terrifies me.  So when my marketing consultant advised me to ‘develop a social media footprint’, my first thought was that she was trying to be funny.  She wasn’t. 

My next hope was that she’d do it for me.  She wouldn’t. 

I argued that I want to be an author not a socialite.  She said that I would make a very fine author, albeit a poor and unread one.  Then she sent me her bill.

I tried to ignore her advice—more out of obstinacy than disagreement.  She was right.  I knew she was, but that didn’t mean I wanted to follow her advice.  It took me a full week to pick up my feet and dial her up again.  She didn’t bother apologizing for me being wrong and I never rubbed it in that she was right.  She just told me that the social media marketplace is my penance for getting to use a high-tech laptop instead of my old Underwood typewriter and an hour later my legs were already quivering as I was sweating like Shaun T at the 24^th minute. 

At first, I’d thought it was the socializing aspect that scared me.  It wasn’t, though.  The thing about social media marketing that truly terrified me was how vast and mysterious it seemed.  I felt like Matthew Webb sitting on the Admiralty Pier, looking out across the English Channel and wondering if he would soon be eating Encornets farcis in Paris or if the cuttlefish would be nibbling at his drowning body halfway across.  It’s the pure enormity of the task that is so daunting, but if ol’ Cap’n Webb could brave the swim then I could face a few Tweeterers because, as Webb’s inscription reads, “Nothing Great is Easy”.

So how do you face that dreaded social media market if you’re scared of social media?  Same way you swim the English Channel if you don’t know how to float. 

Step 1.  Get in the water—They say the hardest stroke is the first.  Before you can swim 39 miles across rough water, you’ve got to be in the water.  Before you can sell 50,000 books online, you have to commit yourself to learning how to use social media.  You’ve got to set your fears aside and jump in.  There are so many terms and sites that it seems easier to risk the English Channel at first.  Flamers and trolls lurk everywhere.  Unwritten and often baffling social etiquettes change with the weather of the day.  At first glimpse, the social media marketplace can be just as daunting to a newcomer as the wide ocean to a non-swimmer.  Even to those pre-disposed to the strange world of social media, its use for marketing can still be scary.  But nobody goes from drowning to the Olympic Swim Team in one day and nobody should expect to become marketing savvy in only one weekend.  Take some time, read books, browse blogs, see what interests you, take small strokes, and keep your nose above the waterline. 

Step 2.  Learn to swim—You’re finally in the water, but you’re only wading in the shallow end right now.  Everybody knows the big money is in the deep end, but you can’t just pull up your knickers and dive deeper.  It takes time.  It takes a plan.  It takes coaching and lessons and practice and, most of all, patience.  Are there people who get on the net one day and get rich the next?  Sure, but there’s also people who buy one lottery ticket and hit the big jackpot.  Do you think you’ll be ‘that guy’?  Maybe you will be and, if you are, I commend you on your luck and wish you the best.  But, for the rest of us, we’ll have to put in the hours and learn how to make our name/money the old-fashioned way.  There is a step-by-step plan to swimming the English Channel (look it up if you need a new goal or a long nap) and so it should be with your marketing plan as well.  Write out your plan.  Get it on paper.  Start big—your goals.  Tighten it up a bit—how you’re going to get there.  Then focus right at the hands which will do the work and accomplish your goals—write out a description of you, your company, and your products.  Nobody knows you better than you.  Choose which social media platforms will work best for you and then begin learning how to use them first.

Step 3.  Implement your plan—Goals are just dreams unless you work to achieve them.  You already know what your dream is and you even know how to achieve it.  So all you have to do now is just do it.  Sound too simple?  Well, it is that simple.  There are thousands of books about how to achieve your goals and I can summarize them all right now: 

CHOOSE YOUR GOAL

LIST THE STEPS TO ACHIEVE YOUR GOAL

DO THE STEPS

Now you owe me $14.98 for saving you a trip to the bookstore to buy a book that says something you already know.  What those steps are and how to get through them is the more difficult part and each company/product is so different that there is no ONE singular solution.  Your goal or your vision of success is different than anybody else’s, even if they’re selling the same product.  The required steps to attain that success is similarly different.  So focus on you and your goals rather than how somebody else achieved theirs.

Step 4.  Monitor your success—No matter how hard you swim against some currents, you’ll never make the other coast.  You’ve got to see what is working and what isn’t.  If it’s working—improve it.  If it isn’t—change it until it does work.  Sometimes you’ve got to tack from starboard to port to get upwind and sometimes you’ve just got to come about.  Whether you change your tactics or simply abandon them, your efforts won’t be wasted as you continue to learn and improve your social media marketing presence.  With each failure, you will gain more understanding of how to succeed and, if you stay the course, you will eventually make land.

I’m far from an expert on social media marketing at this moment, but I soon will be.  I might succeed or I might fail.  I might be eating croissants or I might drown, but there is no ‘or’ in this statement—I WILL develop a social media footprint.  I’m hoping that it’s a Sasquatch print and not just a size 11W, but I’ll be happy just to be making imprints on the landscape. 

Next week’s blog assignment will be to give this week’s some bite.  Please tune in to read last night’s discussion when I asked my 17 y/o what the difference between a damned # and @ was.  Despite my ignorance, I’ve already achieved nearly ten percent of my SMM goals in a relatively short timeframe.  

Just imagine what I could do if I actually knew what I was doing…  MjH

As we progress through the weeks, what do you think I’m missing?  If you’ve got questions or concerns that I can help clarify, feel free to leave me a comment and I’ll do my best to help.  MjH

HOMEWORK

·         Decide whether you want to pay for advertisement or do it yourself.

·         Determine what you want to do with your company/product.

RESOURCES

·         Testing the Social Media Marketing Waters by mjHangge—next week’s blog post on mjHangge.net

·         30-Minute Social Media Marketing by Susan Gunelius