Should you be Business Blogging?

November 13, 2011 by · Leave a Comment

Daily Blog Tips

Sometimes I stumble across an interesting article that works for Vistage and TEC Chairs, Speakers, Trusted Advisers, and Members. This might be one of those articles. Is Blogging for everyone? Could your business, consulting, speaking, services, and products benefit from launching a blog?

This a little bit of a “devil’s advocate” post. Everyone is jumping on the blogging bandwagon. Should you join in the parade? Should you wait? Is Blogging NOT an effective strategy for your business? This article on Daily Blog Tips summarized many of the key points related to determining if your company should be blogging or whether it might turn into an exercise in futility?

I liked the way the author laid out a set of criteria or a checklist to determine if you should launch a business blog? There are obviously many benefits from having a business blog – one of the major questions is whether you have the time, patience, and resources to devote to launching a business blog.

There’s a common opinion that your businesses should blog. And that’s true – a lot of them should, but that doesn’t mean you should blog just to blog. Many businesses do the blog thing wrong, and apply it for the wrong reasons. This can create productivity gaps and areas where resources are allocated improperly. Blogging shouldn’t be done just to blog – there should be a clear focus, goals, and actionable metrics applied to it. It shouldn’t be done just because people do it – for the same reasons that Facebook and Twitter accounts shouldn’t be created because you heard “social media’s good”.

To read the full article on Daily Blog Tips, click the link below:

Why Your Business Should – And Shouldn’t – Have A Blog

Barry Deutsch

Filed Under: blog information, social media · Tagged: , ,

Is Fear Holding You Back From Business Blogging?

August 30, 2011 by · Leave a Comment

Compendium Blog

Have you launched a corporate blog yet?

What’s holding you back?

We have a saying in our basketball program based on one of the most popular quotes ever issued by a coach: “You’ll miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.”

How many shots (opportunities) are you missing because you’re afraid to shoot (start blogging)?

I’m sure by now you’ve listened to, read, and seen numerous “experts” talk about social media. In all that information, I’ll bet every one of the experts has called on you to start a blog.

I read recently on the Compedium Blog an interesting statistic:

According to a recent study by Experian-Hitwise, an Internet measurement data application provider, searchers’ use of eight-word keyword phrases grew 22% in just one year. In addition, 56% of all keyword queries are now three word phrases or more. So what does this mean for corporate bloggers? The longer the phrase, the more specific the searcher intent. Long tail searchers are hand raisers and know exactly what they’re looking for. It’s up to you to show up and solve their problems. How do you do this? By blogging.

There is no doubt among marketing gurus that blogging is the most effective method to drive search engine queries about your products/services, provide differentiation through thought-leadership, and engage with your community of potential buyers,  prospects, and raving fans that are interested in your products and services.

So, we’ve now established that beyond a shadow of a doubt, blogging is a great low-cost and effective marketing strategy – especially one that can drive sales leads.

What are you waiting for?

What is holding you back from taking the step of establishing a blog targeted at your customer base of individuals who make decisions on whether to purchase your products and services?

Are you waiting for your competitors to take the lead and then you’ll follow – or would you rather be the leader among your competitors?

Common fear factors in setting up a blog include:

  • The fear of running out of blogging ideas
  • The fear of looking/sounding stupid
  • The fear of wasting time with no immediate results
  • The fear of employees/blog writers releasing confidential information
  • The fear of not knowing where to start
  • The fear of the unknown: “I don’t know what to expect”

Are you letting your fears about blogging consume you? Are you over-analyzing whether it makes sense to start a blog? You could have a blog up and running within a few hours. Yes – you will make initial mistakes, errors, and you’ll have a few regrets. What’s new? Doesn’t this sound like every other idea you’ve tried for the first time?

I sometimes have to remind the girls on my basketball team to shoot the ball. Take a risk. Do something different for once. I ask them what’s the worst thing that could happen? Of course, they tell me they might miss. So do all your teammates, but they don’t let that fear of doing something – like shooting – stop them. Remember the old adage: You’ll miss a 100% of the shots you don’t take.

By not trying to blog and testing the social media waters, are you missing the opportunity to engage more fully your customer base, are you leaving sales leads on the table, and are you providing a window for your competitors to dominate your market?

Barry Deutsch

Filed Under: blog information · Tagged: , ,

Is the Issue of Delayed Gratification Important in Success vs. Failure?

August 13, 2011 by · Leave a Comment

Vistage Chair Mark Taylor, put forth the interesting idea that perhaps success or failure is determined by delayed gratification.

Here are a few of the comments Mark made in his blog post:

 

In this six minute TED talk, Joachim de Posada, author of Don’t Eat The Marshmallow Yet!: The Secret to Sweet Success in Work and Life, shares a telling experiment on delayed gratification — and how it can predict future success. This must see video of kids trying their hardest not to eat the marshmallow is very funny and teaches an important lesson for leaders, the key difference between success and failure is not merely hard work or superior intelligence, but the ability to delay gratification.

 

Mark took this idea to another level by linking emotional intelligence to delayed gratification.

Would you agree delayed gratification is important to measure? Is it a important behavior trait among your top performers.

Is measuring this possible in an interview?

Are you someone who delays gratification?

My experience of having interviewed with my partner over 250,000 candidates over 25 years and having conducted over 1000 search assignments – is that most top performers in the corporate world want immediate gratification. They have a need to see a project or task completed and want feedback on how the did immediately. They are intensely goal/target focused and have an ability to plow through obstacles, problems, roadblocks to complete projects. Can you be someone who delays gratification, yet be someone who is also execution oriented?

It’s an interesting idea to consider – although I’m not yet convinced this is the core issue of success vs. failure. In roles requiring a high degree of urgency in completion, would this potentially be a negative?

If you’re interested in reading the full article Mark posted, click the link below:

Here is the key difference between success and failure

Barry Deutsch

PS: Mark did a great job of illustrating how you can manage content for your target audience and use it as a tool to engage, promote discussion, brand yourself, and establish your thought leadership. If you’re a speaker, consultant, or sales professional, do you do this with your network on a frequent basis by leveraging social media, such as LinkedIn and Blogging? The additional lesson is that I find this interesting article that Mark wrote, quoted him, linked to his material, gave him full credit, and put my own thoughts around his blog post. This technique of sharing information with your network is called content curation – are you doing this with your most important connections?

Filed Under: culture, employee peformance, hiring top talent · Tagged: , , ,

Can Social Media Help You Improve Relationship Marketing?

May 15, 2011 by · Leave a Comment

Blogging Tips Blog

Patti Stafford writing on the Blogging Tips website talked about how social media can improve relationship marketing. However, she made an important observation that you have to connect personally with your audience. Sending “form” emails and broadcasting where you had lunch on Twitter is NOT relationship marketing. Social Media can provide a great platform to improve relationship marketing and interactions on a large scale if done properly. Social Media provides leverage in marketing to many vs. the traditional “call – meeting – follow-up process” which is more direct sales than marketing and touches very few prospects. Relationship Marketing through Social Media is a blend of traditional direct selling and marketing/branding/pr/awareness building – all layered on top of tools that give you the opportunity for continuous conversations from the comfort of your computer chair. with very little time investment.

Obviously, you’ve got to eventually meet in person your best prospects to close them;  however, imagine how much more successful you and your sales team could be by engaging hundreds of perfect prospects every week as compared to just a handful.

Here’s one of the key points Patti made from the blog article:

One key point to remember and the reason for relationship marketing is that people buy from people they like and trust. If you aren’t taking care of people and getting them to like you, they will never buy your product or a product you recommend. It’s that simple. You may get a few initial sales but if you don’t get up close and personal with your audience they won’t spread the word about you, sales and traffic will drop off and your business will die.

To read the full article on relationship marketing, click the link below:

What is Relationship Marketing?

  • Here’s a few questions to get the conversation started:
  • Do you have a specific strategy for executing on a plan for relationship marketing with your key prospects?
  • Where do you stand on leveraging Social Media as part of your relationship marketing plan?
  • Is your sales team still stuck in sales engagement, prospecting, and networking that is stuck in a 1970s sales model?
  • What research, tools, and consultants/coaches have you sought out to begin moving down this path of relationship marketing that leads to more effective lead generation and nurturing?

Barry Deutsch

Filed Under: social media · Tagged: , ,

How Do You Stand Out in a Crowded Field?

April 1, 2010 by · Leave a Comment

How Can You Stand Out in a Crowded Field?

How can you stand out in a crowded sea of other leadership or experts in your field?

How can you establish your brand as unique?

How do you differentiate yourself to the point where CEOs and executives look forward to your postings since they are so different from all the other generic stuff that everyone else posts in their blogs?

Darren Rowse, writing on his blog, Problogger, recently posted an article titled “11 Ways to Add to the Blogosphere and Stand Out From the Crowd“. Actually, it’s a video and Darren once again nails it with actionable tactics you could implement tomorrow to start differentiating yourself as the “go-to” leadership guru/expert in your local community.

Take a look and let me know what you think?

Are you doing any of the 11 things that Darren discusses in his video?

If you’re NOT yet blogging – is it time to start? Should you have a platform on which to establish your credibility, expertise, knowledge, and personal branding? There is no better solution that blogging about what you already know!

Barry Deutsch

Are you a member of one of our LinkedIn Discussion Groups for Chairs, Members, or Speakers/Trusted Advisors? See the footer below this post for the links to join these groups and join the discussions of how to build your business – especially through social media and social networking.

http://www.problogger.net/archives/2010/04/02/11-ways-to-add-to-the-conversation-of-the-blogosphere-and-stand-out-from-the-crowd/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ProbloggerHelpingBloggersEarnMoney+%28ProBlogger%3A+Helping+Bloggers+Earn+Money%29
Filed Under: leadership best practices, social media · Tagged: , ,

What are those little buttons at the bottom of each Post?

April 1, 2010 by · Leave a Comment
Social Media Buttons to Share Outstanding Information

Social Media Buttons for Sharing Information

At the bottom of each blog post are a series of little icons that enable you to share various blog posts that you’ve found particularly useful. Brad, our expert guest bloggers, and I all appreciate your sharing our content with other folks in the Vistage Community when you read something you thought worthy of sharing.

At a fundamental level – that’s the way blogging and social media works. Someone writes a blog post or shares something interesting they found on the Web that has a few good take-away points, you like it, and share it with your friends, associates, acquaintances, the Members of your Group, other Vistage Chairs, your favorite Speakers and Trusted Advisors.

So, what are these buttons?

Delicious: Delicious is a popular on-line bookmarking site. You can store all your bookmarks here and you can share all your bookmarks with those looking for similar content. Posting your bookmarks on subject matter expert areas is one of the strategies to personally brand YOU. See my list of bookmarks on Delicious as an example. You have be logged into your Delicious Account to post bookmarks.

Facebook: You can share a valuable blog post with your contacts on Facebook. Once you click the button, you’ll have an opportunity to enter the post into your news feed on Facebook. Obviously, you have to be logged into your Facebook account for this to work.

Digg: Digg is similar to Delicious as one of the most popular bookmark sharing sites on the Internet. The content that Digg and Delicious have accumulated is exceptional. One of the key places I do my research now in addition to Google is to go to Digg and Delicious to see how others have voted on various websites and blog postings.

Email: This button will allow you to forward the link of a blog article you found interesting to someone in your email address book. The system picks up whatever email program is your default – such as Outlook.

Google Bookmarks: This allows you to save interesting articles you find so that you can refer back to them at a later point. For example, if you read the blog postings of one of the feeds on this portal site, you might want to bookmark a particularly interesting blog post.

Twitter: Twitter is all the rage on the Internet. It is a micro-blogging platform where you can send 140 character mini-messages to those following you. For example, I have almost 7,000 people following me on Twitter around two different categories – executive job search and hiring talent. Many of those individuals join our LinkedIn Discussion Group, download our free materials, and purchase our products/services. Approximately 10% of our web site traffic comes from Twitter.

It’s a viral environment where people who like what you have to say repost to their network. It’s another form of personal branding and differentiation. You should have a Twitter Account. You can look at my profile and see one of my lists of  Vistage Community Members using Twitter.

The primary way Twitter gets used is to make a statement/ask a question, repost the tweet someone else wrote (called retweeting), and post a link to something you found useful.

LinkedIn: This button will allow you to repost the blog article to any of the LinkedIn Groups you participate in. It automatically creates an entry in the news feed of the group. You can select the specific group you would like to post the news item (blog post) into to share with other members of the various LinkedIn Discussion Groups.

Barry Deutsch

Graphic courtesy of DavidZimm

Filed Under: blog information · Tagged: , ,

Vistage vs. TEC Language

April 1, 2010 by · Leave a Comment

TEC Logo Vistage Logo

How should we refer to the worldwide community of Chairs, Members, Speakers, Staff, and Trusted Advisors?

I recognize that many of the readers of our blogs, members of our LinkedIn Discussion Groups, and followers on Facebook and Twitter are from the worldwide community, ranging from Hong Kong to Vancouver. In most of the US, we call it Vistage (there are some exceptions), and outside of the US, we call it TEC.

For ease of communication, please accept our use of the name Vistage even though you may be part of a TEC community. We mean no disrespect, but rather use this naming convention as means to avoid tripping over ourselves in referring to the worldwide community of Vistage and TEC Members.

I realize that I probably don’t have to publish this blog post on this subject; however, I thought it might be useful to explain why we were only using the Vistage label.

We would like to embrace the entire worldwide Vistage/TEC community that is interested in learning and growing. Please accept our use of the Vistage Label when referring to the entire worldwide community.

Thank you.

Barry Deutsch

Filed Under: blog information · Tagged: ,

Are You A Vistage Blogger

March 30, 2010 by · 6 Comments

Calling All Vistage Bloggers

Calling All Vistage Bloggers

Calling all Vistage Bloggers

Are you a Vistage Blogger that would like to be featured in our Vistage Leadership Community Portal.

We have assembled a listing of all the known Vistage Bloggers (Chairs, Members, Speakers, and Trusted Advisors). We’ve tried our best through Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn to identify all those in the Vistage Community who are actively blogging. (We define active blogging as writing at least one blog post every week).

We may have missed a few folks in this process. If so, we apologize – no oversight intended.

Would you like to be featured in our directory on this site. We’ll show the last 5 blog postings in your feed to the visitors on this site.

Our combined monthly volume of visitors to our various Web content properties is now in excess of 25,000 visitors. We cross-promote between these various blogs and all of our content is promoted and reinforced through guest blogging, ezine articles, and our weekly Internet Radio Show Broadcast, not to mention exposure to over 100,000 CEOs and Presidents on LinkedIn on a daily basis.

Not only are we seeking Vistage Community Members who might like to have their blog featured on this consolidated portal site for the Vistage Community, but we are also seeking guest bloggers who might like to write an occassional article aimed at one of the subject areas on this portal – including hiring, retention, culture, employee engagement, leadership, sales management, and social media. We are seeking those who have the ability to provide best practices aimed at the entrepreneurial-middle market company.

If you’re interested in having your blog featured and/or would like to be a guest blogger, please send us a note using the contact form on this website OR you can find me in the Vistage Directory.

Barry Deutsch

Filed Under: blog information · Tagged: , , , ,

Welcome to the Vistage Leadership Community Blog for Best Practices

March 28, 2010 by · Leave a Comment
Welcome to the Vistage Leadership Community Portal

Welcome to the Vistage Leadership Community Portal


Welcome to the Vistage Leadership Community Portal

Welcome to our first blog post for the Vistage Leadership Community Blog on how to LEVERAGE the success of your people to build an exceptional organization. We’ll explore subjects including leadership, management, hiring and retaining top talent, sales management, culture and employee satisfaction/engagement.

In addition, we’ll also take the hottest area right now – social media and social networking – and share best practices in how to build and expand your business, including networking, customer satisfaction, marketing, sales, business development, engaging employees, and recruiting. This is an area of great confusion and frustration for many Vistage Chairs, Members, Speakers, and Trusted Advisors.

Leadership Portal

This leadership portal represents an extension of the work of Barry Deutsch and Brad Remillard’s decade plus interaction with Vistage Members, Chairs, Speakers and TAs. In that journey, we’ve collected a wealth of information and best practices we would like to share with the Vistage Community.

  • We’ll review some of the very best articles from exceptional bloggers on the Internet you should be aware of as you go forward in developing and building your business.
  • We’ll feature some of the very best Vistage Resources as guest bloggers, especially other speakers, chairs, members, and Trusted Advisors who have volunteered to share their expert knowledge on leadership topics focused on Vistage Community.
  • We’ll share information on this portal from our other Internet Properties, including our Blogs and LinkedIn Discussion Groups.
  • Finally, we’ll provide the feed for ALL the Vistage Community Bloggers (assuming you’ve told me you’re blogging).

We hope you find the information in this blog valuable and practical as you develop and build your groups.

Feel free to post a comment, offer a suggestion, raise a question for our experts.

Barry Deutsch

P.S.: Here are the LinkedIn Discussion Groups you might be interested in joining to participate in a more in-depth discussion:

Hire and Retain Top Talent

Leadership and Management Best Practices

Executive and Managerial Job Search

Vistage Chair ONLY Discussion Group for Leveraging Social Media and Networking

Vistage Member ONLY Discussion Group for Leveraging Social Media and Networking

Vistage Speaker/TA ONLY Discussion Group for Leveraging Social Media and Networking

While you’re here, grab the feed on the sidebar so that you can stay on top of new posts, tools, and ideas when they appear on this blog – either through a feed reader such as Google Reader or Bloglines – or by email. By subscribing to the feed, you don’t have to remember to keep coming back to the blog to stay current. We’ll also feed new postings on this portal into our LinkedIn Discussion Groups for Leadership Best Practices, Vistage Members on Leveraging Social Media, and Vistage Speakers/Trusted Advisors on Leveraging Social Media.

Filed Under: blog information · Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , ,