Small Business and Blogging Should be Linked Together

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Build a Better Blog

I've been preaching this message for the past 2 years to individual consultants, advisers, speakers, and business owners. There is no better vehicle by which to drive your social media activities than your blog.  Denise Wakeman, one of my favorite blogging experts at Build a Better Blog, summed it up in one of her blog posts, where she said:

 

If you’re a small business owner here’s good news: social media has helped to level the playing field. In the past, smaller companies couldn’t compete with big companies and their megabuck advertising budgets to reach customers and prospects.

Now you can by going directly to your target audience with a blog as the centerpiece of your social media strategy. Think of your blog as your home base. It’s important to get runners on first, second and third base but they need to cross home plate for you to win.

From your home base, you can feed important information directly to Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and many other social media sites where your customers are forming communities. Push the “publish” button and your article is immediately distributed to sites of your choice with a link back to your blog – think runners crossing home plate when visitors come to your site.

 

Are you publishing a blog yet? With the technology available today, nothing could be more simple. What's the fear or technological hurdle holding you back. Blogging - creating a platform for engaging with your network - is one of the 4 major topic areas we're covering in the current Chair Coaching Program to Leverage Social Media. Are you participating in this FREE one-on-one personalized coaching program? To learn more about the coaching program, check it out on the LinkedIn Discussion Group. Click here to go to the Discussion Group where hundreds of chairs are taking the best tips, hints, practices and applying them to find and nurture relationships with potential CEOs for their groups.

 

To read the full article  by Denise Wakeman, click the link below:

Why Every Small Business Owner Should Have a Blog

Barry Deutsch

Can You Build Trust Through Social Media

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Personal Branding Blog

Kyle Lacy, one of my favorite blog authors, wrote a guest post on the Personal Branding Blog about how to build trust through social media/digital marketing. He gave 40 examples of how to do it. I focus on a few of these in my Chair Coaching Program on how to leverage social media to find new members. Kyle does a great job presenting a "holistic" approach to using social media. Even if you pick up one or two interesting ideas from this article, it's probably worth reading.

Here is his number one recommendation and the one thing I can attest to that has lead to my success in using social media. I can't emphasize enough the importance of having a content-driven marketing approach to social media.

In the new economy there is one major truth that stands above the rest. Trust equals revenue. If you are a small to mid-sized business or organization, it is the amount of trust you can build between people that strengthens your brand. Whether we are talking about donors or customers,  it is about building trust that filters into an integrated marketing system with digital and traditional tools. THAT is where the true success is found within the marketing world.

With trust comes happy people, and with happy people come referrals, or what we call advocacy at MindFrame. Trust is a fundamental block of building your brand. Marketing is built under the assumption that stories can create an emotional bond between a consumer and a brand… a client and a service. Can you tell a story… create a service and/or an experience that builds trust?

1. Content

Content is the number one way you can build trust with potential clients. By creating meaningful and thought provoking content you are building a bridge to later sell that person on your services.

 

Do you have a content marketing plan to generate leads with CEOs for your group and nurture those leads to convert them from prospects to members? Are you building a bridge for future interactions, or a cliff where if your prospects don't immediately sign up, they fall out of your sight?

To read the full article, click the link below:

40 Ways to Build Trust in Your Personal Brand on Social Media

Barry Deutsch

Are You Nurturing Your Prospects?

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HubSpot Inbound Marketing Blog

Not everyone signs up after the first telling session or after a visit to your group. Do you effectively "nurture" your leads to convert them into prospects when they are resistant initially to becoming a member? If not, you might be leaving a tremendous number of prospects "on the table".

The subject of lead generation and lead nurturing has become a focal point for me - especially in our executive search practice and in attracting top talent for open positions.

Ellie Mirman, writing on the HubSpot Blog identified a series of reasons for creating a lead nurturing program to convert leads (prospects) into customers (members).  She identified 9 different items, but two that caught my eye were:

 

Build Thought Leadership - People do business with businesses they know and trust. The first time someone converts on your website, the likelihood that they really know who you are or understand why they should do business with you is pretty slim. Lead nurturing is an opportunity to show that you are an expert in your field.

Identify Interest or Pain - Lead nurturing emails are a great way to learn more about your leads - what challenges are they facing? What features or products are they interested in? By presenting different questions or types of content and seeing who responds to what, you can qualify your leads and set yourself up for warmer sales conversations.

 

What's your lead nurturing program look like - what type of messages do you send - either through email or social media to continue to communicate, engage, excite, and nurture?

Is any of this communication automated OR do you create each individual message to each individual person on your list?

If you looked back over the past 2 years, how many potential members initially said NO, that you subsequently signed up as a member?

Is it time to start exploring the basic elements of putting an effective nurturing program together. This is the stuff I remember Jim Cecil talking about back in the early 90s in my TEC Group - at that time he called he drip nurturing. Today you can automate this nurturing and come at your prospects from both traditional email and social media.

If you would like to read the full article, click the link below:

The 9 Benefits of Lead Nurturing

Barry Deutsch

 

Are You Turning Off Your Network From Referring You?

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Andy Lopata Networking Blog

Do you "un-inspire" your network to refer you?

When was the last time you kept a referral source updated on the progress of their referral? When you did you thank them for the referral? Did you ask for their assistance in building the relationship with the person they referred?

Most referrers want to be intimately involved in the process of helping you with the referral - why do most people resist this and try to go it alone?

If you looked at all your referrals right now - let's pretend it's 20 referrals you're currently working on - when was the last time you touched based with the person who referred them? How often do you stay in touch with the person who referred them?

I've made numerous referrals to chairs over the years through my network and I am stunned at the number of times I don't get a call for months - if at all - on the referral status. Getting thank yous, being asked to help with the initial introduction, and being kept constantly alerted to the status of the referral are so basic to networking and referrals that I'm shocked most people don't do it. Why does that happen?

The problem is that if you screw this up with your referral source - they'll stop making referrals - you'll wonder why that well dried up. They'll never tell you. They'll just start giving referrals to your competitors.

What's your track record of communicating with your referral sources?

Here's what one of my favorite blog authors, Andy Lopato, on networking and referrals, had to say about this issue:

 

I was out with friends last week. I knew that they had referred some very good business to a mutual contact of ours, and he had gone on to win the contract. I mentioned that I had spoken to our mutual contact the week before and helped him with some introductions which would help him deliver to his new client.

My friends were disappointed when I told them this. They had helped him by referring the business, why had he not approached them for help with the connections? In fact, as the initial referral was their client, they would have expected him to keep them involved throughout. 

Not only had he not kept them informed and involved. He hadn't even thanked them properly.

 

How often do you think these conversations occur behind your back about you?

To read Andy's full article, click the link below:

How To Lose Referrals With Ease

Barry Deutsch

Are You Creating a False Sense of Networking?

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Will Kintish, author of the Being Kintished Blog, wrote an article that reminded me of the false sense of security you might have regarding networking.

Many professionals are falling into the trap of thinking that networking (with the ultimate purpose of gaining referrals) is being on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

Like Will, I love social media, and think it can play a very valuable role in the networking process - But it's NOT the heart of networking.

Here's the quote from Will's blog article that reminded me to step occasionally away from my computer and meet members of my network:

 

Networking is building relationships:  know-like–trust are the 3 key steps to achieving this. How can you get others to like and trust you simply through the computer. I do believe you can start a relationship online and even reinvigorate and reinforce but no-one will ever convince me you can build a sustainable relationship with anyone.without the face-to-face meeting.

 

Of the time you invest in networking (5%-10% of your total workweek), how much time really goes into face-to-face meetings for the purpose of building stronger networking relationships? Don't include pitches, presentations, and meeting prospects. I'm talking about face-to-face meetings to foster stronger relationships to gain referrals to CEOs who could become part of your group. Everybody complains about not getting enough referrals. I'll contend that the number one mistake of seeking referrals is not having a strong enough relationship with the referral source along the three dimensions that Will talks about: KNOW-LIKE-TRUST.

What's your plan for building relationships with your best referral sources to get them to like you and trust you (by meeting with them personally and frequently) in the coming year?

To read the article on Will's blog, click the link below:

Network? Sure, I network. I’m on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook all the time.

Barry Deutsch

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