As we progress closer to the post-scarcity world, it seems that nearly everyone is developing unique skillsets. Copywriters, mobile application developers, HTML5 experts, local business specialists, video optimizers… and those are just people I met yesterday. Mix in the countless jobs and specializations that have been around for years and you’ll see that entrepreneurs and business owners now have a nearly endless talent pool.

If, that is, they can find them.

That’s where the connector comes into play. Connectors know people. They know the skills that people offer and have a general understanding of how that skill fits into the marketplace. Connectors understand the rules of the new economy and are keen at spotting trends. As the economy improves, the need for well-positioned connectors will grow. Do you know one yet?

Building your connecting skills

Being a connector takes certain skills. And any skill can be honed. Here are some tips on doing just that, and a call for help at the end.

• Build a network.
  There isn’t an end-goal to a connector’s network. We don’t have a certain number of friends or followers in mind. We don’t select a handful of social networks and ignore the rest. More important, we build out network outside the online world.

• Stay informed.
  Connectors have become masters at drinking from the firehose. Yes, it’s an ungodly amount of information. But along the way we’ve developed techniques and adopted tools that help intelligently filter out much of the noise so we can focus on the signal. Still, it’s not easy.

• Be visible.
  It’s all for naught if the people looking for a connector don’t know you exist. Offer to speak at conferences. Teach at events. Lead panel discussions. Create SlideCast presentations and share them with the world. Blog! Get used to creating copious amounts of material. Think like a publisher, and share everything — and everyone — you know.

• Cultivate your list.
  Here’s that cry for help: I’m lousy at this part. While I’m pretty good at recalling information and figuring out who’s the best person when I’m asked to make a connection, my network has grown to the point where it’s no longer efficient. I tend to keep going back to the same wells. Or I see the same person multiple times and fail to remember what unique skill set they offer.

How do you cultivate and care for your list of connections?

While there are plenty of contact management systems out there, they tend to be aimed at casual relationships or sales leads. The former seems more what I need than the latter, but the latter tend to be much more robust than the former. But too robust leads to clunky, and I don’t have the time to spend on that.

I want an Evernote-simple tool that I can both dump info into and quickly pull info out of. I want to know who does what, and I want to know who’s doing what new thing right now. I want magic, I know that. But Evernote proved that magic in the form of advanced technology does or will exist. I’m just waiting for the application in this space. Unless it already exists and I missed it? Help a brother out!

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Conventional wisdom tells us that time, money and energy need to be spent on promotion. Whether you work for a business, are in business for yourself or maybe you are the business of yourself, you’ll feel the pressure to promote. And you’ll find countless examples of others who spend lots of time, energy and money on promotion. Promote, promote PROMOTE!

But what if you took all that time you spent promoting your business, your venture, your product, yourself… and spent that time instead being truly remarkable?

How much time would you need to spend promoting if you were truly doing remarkable things?

The fact is that most things that are promoted aren’t remarkable. They aren’t that much different than other similar things, of which there may be dozens, hundreds or thousands. In effect, they are terribly average — even if they are quite good. So someone has to promote these average things to take away mind-share from other interchangeable average things. If these things were instead remarkable, people would make remarks about them. In turn, other people would make remarks, and others… And the cycle perpetuates. Sans promotion, perhaps?

Of course, you can’t be remarkable in a vacuum. Someone has to have knowledge of “the thing” before they can make remarks about “the thing”. And to do that, someone needs to put “the thing” in front of the audience most likely to make those remarks. But is that promoting? Or is that just smart marketing? Or is it something else entirely?

So given the choice of spending time, money and energy on either promoting or being truly remarkable… which will you choose?

It’s no secret I’m a fan of numbers. Facts and figure are just… cool. Especially when they are presented in a way that makes them interesting to everyone.

A recent “State of the Internet” video showcases some of these numbers. The word staggering comes to mind.

JESS3 / The State of The Internet from JESS3 on Vimeo.

Still think this whole social media thing is just a fad? I’ve got news for you: this is the internet today. Get used to it.

“Blogging is easy. Every business should have one.”

That’s often the only argument you’ll hear consultants give when advising clients on the merits of blogging. After that, they wax poetically on a litany of benefits you’ll get from blogging. Increase search traffic & better engagement with customers usually top the list. And while I agree with the last two, you lost me at “… is easy”.

Relative ease does not a business case make.

A business case for blogging? You must be mad. It’s easy!

Didn’t we just cover that? And just so we’re clear, strategic blogging for a business is certainly not easy. The mechanics alone are daunting to a the vast majority of people who don’t let words spew forth from their keyboards naturally. It’s a tactic that takes time and understanding to develop the necessary skills. And that’s just to learn how to write. Now do it frequently. Against a schedule. On plan. And fit it in with the dozens of other things a business owner has to do every day to keep their business a going concern.

OK, Ok… ok. It’s not easy. But a business case?

Yes, a business case. Listen: anytime you invest time or money in something for your business, you need to understand what you’re getting yourself into. Don’t get me wrong; I’m a sucker for spontaneity. Some of my best ideas were crazy “gee, I wonder if…” ideas that were launched shortly after the concept germinated. But the ones that are still going all — without exception — had at least a rudimentary business plan. I’m not talking about a 60-page document that needs to be ratified by the Board. The last business case I put together for a client was a simple spreadsheet.

But to my initial point, “it’s easy!” isn’t a business case.

Here are 3 questions you need answers to before you jump on the blogging train:

• Do we have the content? If you’re a retailer that relies mostly on your vendors to supply you with information about the products you sell, this may be a problem area. By and large, you can’t repurpose collateral and have that be blog-worthy content. You need original material, written from your company’s point of view and in your company’s voice.

• Do we have the time? If you’re working your employees at close to maximum, they won’t have a lot of bandwidth to dedicated to blogging. And the time it takes you to read a blog post has nothing to do with how long it took someone to write it. 2 – 3 hours per post isn’t an unrealistic numbers. How will you balance that time against other productive work time from your employees?
• Do we have the dedication? Every new blog starts out with the same number of readers: zero. Almost every blog grows at about the same rate: incredibly slow. Even with gangbuster content right out of the gate, you shouldn’t expect any sizable audience for 6 – 12 months. Maybe 18. Are you committed to generating exceptional content on a schedule that entire time and accept slow and steady progress?

And for fun, here are 3 questions you should never ask yourself about blogging for your business, for the answers are abundantly clear:

• Should we outsource our blog to someone else? Oh hell no. Yes, there are professional writers out there who perform copywriting services on a consulting basis. I’m one of them. But you do not want to outsource your blog content. There are many ways in which you can use these services to help your blog be better, but don’t ever think you can hand the reigns over to someone else. The best business blogging comes from within. Hire, train or allow for personal development. Don’t outsource.

• Is our business interesting enough for a blog? Oh hell yes. You obviously think it’s interesting or you wouldn’t be doing it. And if the whole thing isn’t all that interesting, there are some parts that are. Focus on those. If you can convey the interesting parts of your business in a blog, you’ve just made inroads with potential customers when they discover it. And isn’t that what your sales people try and do anyhow?
• Is there an audience who cares? This goes hand-in-hand with the last point. Don’t assume your business blog has to appeal to tens of thousands of people. It doesn’t! Interesting content will attract the right audience to it, and that will expose people to your business. Key words include interesting and content. No one cares about a blog full of posts about products. Blah.

So… ready to blog now? It may not be for you. Yet. Don’t feel pressured. But don’t ignore the question. Keep asking it. Some day, you may be ready.

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Is your marketing campaign too complex? Maybe you think it needs to be. Maybe you’re right. But sometimes all it takes is one new player in the market to change the game, and all that complexity falls away.

Take the consumer electronics and personal camcorders, for instance. My uncle’s super 8 video camera from the 70s was pretty simple, yet looked rather intimidating. All I know is that I wasn’t allowed to touch it. The first camcorder I purchased around 1990 had more buttons and dials than I could possibly master. And it seems that every year that passes requires at least one more bell or whistle to be added.

Enter the Flip, playing the role of game-changer to the market. Small, inexpensive and a built-in compulsion field. Hold the thing in your hand and you can’t not start taking video. Yeah, it’s that cool.

But not as cool as how it came to be. Business Week ran a story called Lessons in Simplicity from the Flip a few days ago. It’s pertinent to anyone in business, and covers quite a few of the key points I like to harp on. Like the power of a simple, elegant presentation. Simon Fleming-Wood was responsible for convincing retailers to stock this new camera. A new camera that eschewed the standards of what modern video cameras should look like and what they should do. He states that…

… he spent 50% of his pitch on one very simple slide. He asked [retailers] to “reimagine” the category. The slide contains photos of two camcorders—a traditional video camera and the Flip. Under the traditional camcorder are the words: “Use this for special occasions.” Under the Flip are the words: “Use this for everything else.”

It’s no secret I’m a fan of simple things. Hence, the name of this blog. I’ve been a reluctant marketer for over a decade and been in more battles with complexity than I care to imagine. Sometimes, things need to be complex. But much of the time, they don’t. I’m reminded of that each time I pull out my Flip.

And while this story is ostensibly about a game changing product, it’s more about a game changing approach. It takes guts to hinge your success on a single slide. It takes foresight to resist the temptation of shoving in more and more data to your presentations. Above all, it takes confidence in yourself, your knowledge, and your ability to convey your message in a way that will resonate with your audience.

Oh, and practice.

Your turn: How do you fight complexity in your presentations?

Doing a talk in Ignite or PechaKucha style will help. But not everyone can do that. Pass along your tips in the comments.

This is a SlideCast version of a talk I gave last week prior to Social Media Club Phoenix. Each week I lead a session called Social Media 101. It’s a safe place for newbies to learn one aspect of social media and to get their questions — on any topic — answered in a friendly environment.

“My account got hacked!” How many times have you heard someone say this, usually after they’ve sent you 5 “here’s how you can make a gazillion dollars by blowing your nose!” tweets? Of course, they didn’t send that to you. Some nefarious hacker gained access to their account, sending out spam messages to everyone — including you.

But they have their facts wrong. They didn’t get “hacked”. They willingly gave up their password to some website. That’s not hacking. That’s phishing. Or maybe the site they gave their password to got hacked. Or maybe they left their computer unlocked, and all sorts of bad things happened.

Being smart about selecting and securing passwords is about as 101 as you can get. And we — I’m lumping me in here, too — do it wrong/bad/without enough forethought all the time. This Slidecast presentation will walk you though the basics of setting up and securing passwords in today’s social world. While it was aimed at the social media beginners, more than one seasoned maven picked up an idea or two when I gave the talk last week.

You’ll notice also I’m starting to rebrand some of my talks. This one uses the new naming: A Simpler Way to be Safe and Secure Online. Hope you enjoy it!

I’ve just spent 8 hours of my life — wasted, some may say — investigating the efficacy of social bookmarking for large etailers. Social bookmarking sites — Digg, reddit, StumbleUpon and literally hundreds of others — have a variety of uses. I’ll even grant you that they may have some value in increasing traffic and helping search rankings. But here’s the punchline: the amount of bullshit artists touting bullshit advice on how to use social media bookmarking is of astronomical proportions.

Yes, I know. Bad advice on the internet. Go figure.

[sigh]

So is social media bookmarking worthless?

No, not at all. Millions of people use sites like those listed above to not only save interesting sites and web content, but also to discover and share new and interesting content. It’s the social part of the name that’s important. And often forgotten about in a rush to gain the oh-so-powerful backlink.

So let’s start there: Social media bookmarking is a complete and utter waste of time without compelling content.

If you’re an etailer selling the same stuff available at any number of other online — or offline — retailers, even if you’re selling it for a lower price than anyone else, understand this: the fact that you sell something does not constitute compelling content. To be blunt, we don’t care.

Ok, smartass. So is social media bookmarking worthless for online retailers?

Maybe not. But it does require a strategy to develop the content worthy of sharing. Compelling content. Remarkable content. And if you’re not willing to do that, then you might as well stop reading. You won’t like the rest of this.

Here are a few tips on building compelling content as an etailer that may be worthy of sharing:

• Interesting packages – Just because you don’t make something doesn’t mean you can’t pair that — or triad that — up with something else to make it interesting. Smoking deals are always relevant. And it’s often times better to discount a group of items with a mix of profit points than to slash everything by 25%. Create pages that feature deals that your customers want and your competitors can’t touch. And for the love of peat (I like scotch), hire a copywriter to convey the awesomeness of the deal without sounding like a used car salesman!

• Copy from Groupon – This rapidly growing site features city-specific, super-discounted deals that only kick in when a certain number of people sign up. To get the deal, interested parties share the deal with their network, and it’s not uncommon to see Groupon deals all over the various social media bookmarking sites. Offer up the same idea, but base it on the number of times your site’s offer page is Dugg, for example. Or even easier: put a coupon code on the offer page and add in “share this” type links loudly to encourage sharing.
• Data mine and publish quirky behaviors – We’ve all seen the funny “those who bought this also bought…” suggestions Amazon often makes. Chances are, you have some real gems in your database, too. Or maybe you see a spike in orders of one type of product during the year that seems a little odd. Mine your data looking for patterns people might find interesting or funny, then build content around those patterns. If it’s compelling, share it!
• Go ahead and list your “special” pages – You should submit more than just your home page. Just make sure the pages are good entry points and have good content. No one wants to see your “here’s all the brands we sell” page. But someone may want to see the special storefront you made for Doodiddly Diodes. Be smart about using this, and always ask yourself if the new page you’ve created is worthy — in the social bookmark users’ eyes — of being included on those sites. If the answer is “I’m not sure”, then it isn’t. Move along.

That’ll get you started. Once you’ve figured that out and created the content, you’ve got the lion’s share of the work done.

But what about that “share this” button I’ve placed on every page of my website?

It’s probably a waste of time. Even worse: it may be impacting your conversion rate. Ouch! You won’t know until you test, but anything not directed to get someone to buy on a purchase page is diverting attention. A better approach might be to send that “share this” button along to the customer a few days after the sale with a “if you loved it, share it!” message.

Your turn now. Did I go too far?

I’m certain that a fair number of “seo experts” will jump in with stories of how they’ve managed to boost rankings, build boatloads of traffic and generally refute my initial arguments. If that’s you, can I ask one question? Please provide specific examples related to the business of etailers. I’m trying to be specific with my lambasting. I hope you will be, too.

Now for that worthless “share this button”. No, wait. I’m not an etailer. Different rules apply, see?

Weeks ago I gave a presentation at SMAZ — Social Media for Business in Arizona — that was all about measuring ROI for social media. This is a topic that gets bandied about quite a bit. It’s also something that gets made up, brushed under the table or completely ignored. And that’s a shame. Because, yes, there are ways to measure ROI — real ROI — for social media efforts. It’s not easy. It’s not glamorous. But it’s growing more necessary all the time.

Special thanks to Olivier Blanchard for helping shape much of my thinking about ROI and social media. Even more special thanks to all those in attendance at my talk for the outstanding questions. I love that so many of you realize the need to understand this piece of the puzzle. Thanks for the great ideas you gave me and the audience during the talk.

For those new to me, no… I usually don’t dive this deep. But this is a growing trend, and even CFOs need a simpler way of thinking about things, right?

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The Social Media for Business in Arizona — SMAZ for short — has concluded. Once again, it was a great event. And yes, my presentation on measuring the ROI of social media will be up on Slideshare soon.

As the day was winding down yesterday, I was asking various attendees — many of which I had met for the first time at the event — their opinions on the day. Their answers were universally positive, even though each person took away something different. In an interesting twist, I was asked by one of those people what I learned that day.

That was an interesting question. While many new to the social and digital marketing scene walked away with their brains overflowing with information… this isn’t my first rodeo. I speak at a variety of events, including this one. I knew many of the speakers and am intimately familiar with the topics on which they presented. I’ve been doing social media marketing for more than a few years, so was there anything I could learn?

Duh. That’s an obvious and great big yes!

What did I learn? The same thing I almost always learn from events like this: that there are plenty of things I’m not doing as well as I could be. Things that I advise clients and compatriots on all the time, but neglect to do myself. There are a lot of moving parts to figuring out the right digital business strategy for a client. All too often, I neglect to fully implement the tactics that support those strategies for myself.

So for me, events like SMAZ provide me plenty of notes with “You know this, dumbass” in parenthesis behind them. And that’s why I’ll keep going to events like this: I sure could use that constant reminder to keep toiling away and to keep doing better.

Your turn…

What is your takeaway on this idea? Do you got to events as “the expert”, or do you find ways to learn something along the way?

On Monday, I’ll be presenting at the Social Media AZ conference in Tempe. I’ve attended a fair share of social media conferences — this one is a bit different. It focuses on the business side of social media.

That’s an important distinction. While many of us “get it” right away, lots of people — not just business owners, but people — still don’t get the point of social media. I know a few of these people, and their hesitation always comes down to the cost/benefit equation. They’re looking for the upside of spending all that time being… social. You can answer that question — where’s the upside? — a few different ways. With SMAZ II, those answers will be focused in on the business case.

I’m leading a Social Media 101 talk simultaneous with registration. Hopefully the newbies will show up early, get registered fast and drop by to ask their questions in a safe environment. If the last SMAZ is any indication, there will be lots of people new to or confused by social media in attendance. I like helping them take their first steps. This is similar to what I do before each Social Media Club Phoenix meeting.

Then I finish off the day by talking about the ROI of social media. That’s real ROI. Not some new made-up term that your CFO scoffs at while looking for your replacement. That should be fun.

While the advanced tickets are gone, they will be live streaming the event for those who can’t attend. The access fee is a simple donation, and all proceeds go to charity. Sign up to watch live here.

And for those going, I’ll see you there!

You’ve all heard the phrase “tilting at windmills”. It refers to the tale of Don Quixote, a fictional knight that — among other things — confused ordinary windmills for ferocious giants. The resulting “battle” with such a creature is rather one-sided and of little consequence to the windmill. When we say someone is tilting at windmills, we mean to say that they are wasting their time on a pointless battle that can’t be won.

In reality, most of us wouldn’t go charging into battle against a ferocious giant armed with nothing but a sword and trusty steed. Most of us would seek to avoid drawing the beast’s attention. That’s a much safer path than drawing the ire of the beast. Nor would we fight against a windmill. What would be the point, right? Slam on the shingles all day with your sharp iron stick, and that sucker isn’t going to budge.

But what if that perception isn’t reality? What if the windmill you see isn’t real? What if that seemingly insurmountable challenge is a trick of your imagination?

This happens in business all the time. It’s happening in my business today more than I care to think. Hence this blog post. I need a term to describe these people who see obstacles where none are. For those who assume that the effort to fix what is obviously broken is greater than the reward… when a much simpler solution exists.

Enter my friend Encaffeinated ONE. He proffered this gem:

fauxcrastination: \ˈfō-ˈkras-tə-ˈnā-shən\ noun
: putting up false roadblocks
: imagining challenges where none exist^*

I love it. Now where did I put that sword… and my horse!

^{* – Late addition courtesy of Matt Selznick}

In the great rush to take advantage of all the new possibilities the web offers, we often fail to reach beyond the familiar. Our “strategic thinking” looks more replicative than revolutionary. Consider how many of these failed technologies you’ve seen:

• A “virtual counter person” greeting visitors of a retail site.
  Web visitors do not want the same experience as they have in store. At least, not in that way. That helpful avatar either isn’t or is dipping into the uncanny valley. And it’s not that “the technology just isn’t there yet”. It’s that people don’t want to interact with your site that way.

• Online magazine forces you to “turn pages” just like an offline magazine.
  Do you know why we turn pages of physical magazines? Because we have to. Not because we want to. You’d be better off putting a screen and a keyboard on a magazine. Oh wait.

• Business card-shaped CDs.
  Granted, it’s been almost a decade since I’ve seen these. Maybe they’re all dead now. The concept was silly, but they sold like hotcakes. Now if we can just kill off physical business cards all together.

The best inventions are transformative. They make use of new technological advances to advance something, often times convenience. There’s that pesky arrow again.

There are good reasons why:

• printers aren’t powered by armies of miniaturized scribes hyped-up on coffee,

• planes don’t flap their wings,
• submarines don’t swim like whales, and
• robots WON’T (trust me on this) walk like humans in the future.

But sometimes silly is good. The current implementation of virtual worlds are pretty terrible. They’ll stay terrible as long as avatars are controlled by mouse and keyboard strokes. But some good stuff can — and does — come out. But for now, silly.

Augmented reality is also rather whimsical. Putting virtual furniture around your living room is a lark. It’s also a far cry from how your room will really look when pixels are replaced by upholstery. But the exploration of the technology will certainly lead to some breakthroughs. It’s just got to get out of my webcam and into my life.

But I’m not giving up on these new ideas. You shouldn’t either. Nor should you be afraid to play with emerging technologies. But be skeptical of those gizmos that promise to make the digital space “just like the real world”. To steal a line from a squirrel, that trick never works.

Emarketer is talking about what works and what doesn’t work for marketers using Facebook & Twitter. The article is based on a survey of marketers, and we all know how much I loathe survey data. This one is no exception.

Let’s look at these so-called “tactics” listed and find out if they truly are successful. Success implies meeting or exceeding a goal that somehow benefits the company. Do these all? Nope. And I’ll tell you why. Let’s look at the reported tactics on Facebook first.

Worth-less Facebook marketing tactics

• Created a survey of fans
  Think of your Facebook fans as your most loyal customers. Will someone who hates or is lukewarm about your brand going to become your fan? Then consider those who’ll take the time to fill out your survey even more fanatical. Whatever you are asking, it has suddenly become “tell us how much you love us”. What are you, six? There’s almost zero value in that information.

• Friending recent customers with corporate Facebook profile.
  That’s against Facebook’s terms of service. People can be come friends of other people. Companies and entities can’t become friends of a person. Granted, many companies break these terms of service all the time. But until the ToS are modified, this tactic has to be considered inappropriate behavior.

• Creating a Facebook application around a brand
  Creation without usage is worthless. Usage without purpose is even more worthless. There are great opportunities to leverage apps, but only if they drive some business goal. “Getting people to use my app” is rarely a valid goal.

• Driving traffic to corporate materials with status updates
  If your corporate materials are boring, who cares? And is are they really worth leaving the Facebook ecosystem to see? Stop trying to get everyone to click through to your site. Start re-purposing — re-crafting as necessary — those materials so they are consumable in situ. Engagement doesn’t mean “steal them away”.

Worthwhile Facebook marketing tactics

• Used Facebook user data to profile your customers demos or interests
  Smart, but limited as pointed out in the survey comment. And only useful if the data you mine helps to inform your real tactics to drive a business goal.

• Buy targeted CPC ads on Facebook
  I’ve gone from cold to lukewarm on this one. Facebook offers some amazingly deep targeting info. Yet the goal of all the campaigns I’ve seen has been to either get a click or get a fan. That’s missing the point, and campaigns with those success metrics will — and do — fail.

Before you get too caught up on the two I think are worthwhile, remember the caveats. Now, how do the reported success stories on Twitter fare?

Worth-less Twitter marketing tactics

• Create in-person event using only Twitter invites
  I fail to see how a false sense of elitism helps your business. There may be short-term gains here, but companies who expand to other tools — and even beyond the social sphere — will do better. Anything else smacks of a gimmick.

• Driving traffic by linking to marketing web pages
  Most marketing web pages suck. You’re smart enough to be on Twitter. Be smart enough to realize that we don’t want your same worthless drivel when we hit your website. See the next item for ideas on how to stop making terrible marketing web pages.

• Provocative text to drive link clicks
  On the surface, this is a good idea. The 140-character restriction of Twitter causes marketers to carefully chose their words, dropping much of the superfluous bullshit. I’ve lumped it here because you should be doing this everywhere! Stop being boring. Hire a fantastic copywriter. Or empower your people to be witty and creative. Burn all your whitepapers! Then re-write them in a style that doesn’t make people’s eyes bleed, turn them landscape and start spreading them around.

• Invite Twitter users by positive brand tweets to do…?
  Granted, I don’t know what they were suggesting in the survey, as the info was truncated in the eMarketer slide. But be careful trying to thank everyone who tweets a positive experience. You should strive to provide a positive experience for every customer and hope that they all share that. Instead, showcase the fantastic reviews and shares. And do more than just follow the people that made them on Twitter, OK? That’s valuable stuff you should be sharing through many different channels.

• Increased Twitter followers by traditional media mention
  This isn’t a tactic. It’s a positive side effect. And one that is becoming assumed. If you get mentioned in the media, some of those readers will turn to Twitter (and Facebook and other digital media sites) for info. So be there. But I’m skeptical of the need to try and get traditional media to reference your Twitter account.

Worthwhile Twitter marketing tactics

• Monitor Twitter for PR problems
  This remains one of the top reasons companies should use Twitter as an incredibly smart tactic. it’s not always easy to do, and knowing what to do after is even more difficult. If you’re not doing it; start.

• Contacting Twitter users tweeting negatively about the brand
  And contact them publicly, right back on Twitter. It shows you care and that you are paying attention. I’m assuming you’re contacting them to try and put things right. Remember, sometimes you can’t. Acknowledge that when it happens and move on

• Timing tweets to maximize views
  Twitter — and other social sites — shouldn’t be an afterthought. Don’t just dump all the updates you want when you finally get around to it. Figure out when your audience is likely to be ready to receive your message and send it then. There are tweet scheduling tools to help with this.

• Driving sales by linking to promotional web pages
  I almost put this in the worthless pile. But good deals transcend crappy marketing-speak, so it stays in the good pile. A healthy percentage of people on Twitter follow brands precisely so they can be alerted to deals, offers and promotions. Don’t only tweet about these, but they can certainly help your bottom line — if worthwhile and done correctly.

It’s good to share what is working and what isn’t working. This is brand new stuff for most of us, and guides are good to have. But without knowing the measurement of that success, you’re still spinning your wheels.

“If you don’t participate and take an interest, you’ll always be outcompeted by those who do.”

I stole that line from Cory Doctorow’s Makers. Great book. You should get it.

It may not seem that there is much insight in that phrase. After all… it seems pretty obvious. But if you’ll reflect on it a moment, I think you’ll find many areas that you have consciously chosen to ignore. The older we get — OK, the older I get — the more likely we are to fall into the trap.

When is the last time you paid attention to your Facebook account? You probably missed that the “News Feed” on your home page doesn’t include all of your friends. Nope. It only includes the most active ones. The same goes for everyone else’s profiles. Are you active enough to show up to them?

Google’s been dropping relevant and real-time results from the social sphere in their search results pages. I’ve said before that social will become one of those things that business simply can’t afford to ignore. Google made it a reality faster than even I thought.

It’s a wake-up call to you experts, too. Sure, you’ve got plenty of business supporting your outdated language or platform. But for how long? Switching costs are dropping. Data will only get more portable. Are you going the way of the cobbler?

And being outcompeted isn’t necessarily about real competition. It’s about being informed, having experiences and not worrying that you’ll wake up one day and find the world around you has changed. I’m OK with getting old. I just don’t want to be outdated.

If your company gets involved in social media this year, will you make money from it? If not… don’t bother.

Yes, I realize that your customers want you to get involved with social media. Many of them would also like you to give away free beer, but you probably don’t do that.

Yes, it’s true that your customers are having conversations about you that you aren’t aware of. But do you think that didn’t happen before social media? Please.

Yes, your competition may have hundreds of people engaging with them in the social sphere. But are they doing anything truly remarkable, or are they just chatting? More importantly, are those people buying more stuff because of those conversations?

You won’t succeed at social media on accident. And success probably isn’t measured by mentions and followers. Success for your business is measured in dollars, not sentiment. In sales, not conversations.

Social media playtime is over. Business just getting involved today don’t have the luxury of figuring it out as you go along. It’s time to stand on the shoulders of those who’ve come before. Time to learn from the mistakes of others. And to extend on the wins many have made.

Three questions to think of:

1. Is your social media crew up to the challenge? The right crew will have a blend of business acumen and real-world social media skills. Balance is important.

2. Does your agency talk in the language of your business? The only metrics that matter are the ones you care about.
3. Are you demanding return and payoff from your digital marketing efforts? If it costs money, it should return more money. Period.

Your answer to all of those should be an emphatic yes. If not, put those responsible on notice.

I learned today that I’ve been listed as one of Roost’s 50 RE people you should follow on Twitter. No, I’m not a real estate agent. Yet I’m on the list, and it’s not on accident, I’ve been assured.

My involvement with the real estate industry is two fold. First, I’ve been fortunate enough to have been asked to speak twice now at the National Association of Realtors® national convention. The topics I speak about to their members are the same topics I cover here — doing business in the digital world. My first talk from 2008 — New Media Business Strategies for Real Estate Professionals — is up at SlideShare. It’s my goal to create a slide case out of this year’s talk — Digitally Expose Yourself: Building Your Web Presence — but I haven’t made it that far. It’s on the list!

My second connection comes from the friends I’ve made here in the Phoenix area who are involved in real estate. Phoenix has been blessed – or plagued — with some of the most prolific social media-aware RE folks in the country, and I’m proud to count many of them as my friends. They’ve even been so kind as to keep inviting me to talk at RE BarCamp Phoenix, which I’m happy and excited to do.

There’s a lesson here. There are communities everywhere you look. If you can add value to that community with your knowledge, presence and involvement, do it. The RE community is rather tight-nit. I’ve received so many referrals — and not just from my friends — to do work that I’ve had to turn many away. That’s a good problem to have.

So if you’re lightly involved with a community, consider shoring up that relationship. No, don’t show up at meetings passing around business cards and stories of what a great expert you are and how much they need you. Show up at meetings, make friends, join conversations, add value and get involved. Then you’ll be showing them what a great expert you are, and they’ll quickly realize how much they need you.

The future is here. You no longer have time to adopt a “wait and see” attitude. Trying new things should still be high on your list, but only if you are ready to examine the results and react quickly. And by quickly, I mean within days; not months.

This goes against the “let it soak” approach business has taken toward the online space. Well… we were wrong. Or rather, there exists better approaches today. Adopting the Fail Fast methodology requires more effort up front. More planning. More analysis. More understanding of what you’re doing. And what you expect to get in return.

It doesn’t mean start small. But it also doesn’t mean you have to go all-in. Size is only important if your upfront analysis indicates it might be. Yes, you can learn as you go, but you have to adapt as you go. Data puke gets in your way. Get rid of it. Focus on the goals and objectives you set forth at the start. Ignore everything else. You don’t have time to spend chasing down interesting blips. Not yet, at least. First, you have to fail fast — or hopefully succeed.

The era of learning and not doing is at and end. Welcome to 2010.

I’m a rather verbose person by nature. As a kid, I never worried much about having a 500 word report prepared by the end of the week. I usually had it done by the end of the period.

When I wrote Podcasting For Dummies, I had to learn to curtail much of that. That’s a very different writing style. But I’ve adopted it. And I think it makes my writing more effective. I also give props to Patrick McLean for being an inspiration. Seriously, if you want to know how to write clearly, concisely and effectively, you couldn’t ask for a better writing coach than Patrick.

Which brings me to the discussion of the 4322 four thousand, three hundred twenty-two (4,322) word blog post by Jonathan Rosenberg, Senior Vice President of Product Management for Google. The title was The meaning of open, a topic of some import with me. So I read it. All of it. Whew. Now I’m tired. I’m glad I read it. But chances are, you won’t take the time. It’s simply too long. He’s approaching the halfway mark of a novella.

Luckily, the advent of the web — speaking of open — has provided a visualization tool that helps. Wordle is a free service that lets you paste in text and create an on-the-fly word cloud. The more a word is used, the larger it appears in the loud. There are other factors involved as well. Here’s the word cloud of Mr. Rosenberg’s blog post:

Word cloud for really long Google blog post

While it’s a poor substitute for actually reading the work, it can provide valuable insight. Insight that helps you decide if you should read the whole thing or not. Conversely, this could be a helpful self-check measure. Create your own word cloud out of something you are writing. Does the cloud match your intent? It should. If it doesn’t, you didn’t use the right words.

It’s hard to become the biggest at something. For companies, it often means understanding market opportunities, what the masses want and beating the hell out of the competition in price. It’s not a field in which individuals can play without being a part of — or leading — an organization.

It’s hard to become the best at something. Becoming the best often means relentless dedication to excellence, innovation and detail. Here companies and individuals are on more of an even field.

But becoming the biggest and the best at something? It seems those two things are at odds with one another. And if you take stock of the companies that purport to be one or the other — or both — you’ll see how rare it is.

The brand of beer that outsells all the rest by orders of magnitude? That doesn’t make it the best. I’d argue all the ones in my refrigerators (Yes, I have more than one. I like beer.) could vie for the best, but they are a proverbial drop in the bucket when sales volume is examined.

The author making the rounds on the talk-circuit with a book that’s burning up the charts? Neither are the best. But any that hard-core book fans would agree is the best is likely unapproachable by the masses.

Though it’s argued often, biggest is a quantitative measurement that leaves little to interpretation. I understand that best is subjective, but it’s a demonstrable qualitative characteristic. So while companies often say “we’re the biggest and the best”, they aren’t. They may be one or the other, but it’s difficult to be both.

Or is it? Here are a few examples of where I think the biggest is also the best. I’d love to get your opinion on these as well as some other examples.

• MP3 players – The iPod reigns king in sales and in usability.
• Ketchup – Not that I use it, but I have it on good authority that Heinz is pretty tasty.
• Blizzard Entertainment – I’m no gamer and I understand there is a wide-range of opinion on this, but WoW seems to be one of those waves that didn’t quit. And when Diablo 3 hits the stands, it’ll do it again.
• Search engines — Google. No further discussion required, though I’m sure some of you are Quixotic enough to try.

There have to be others. Please discuss in the comments.

Sometimes you have a good idea. Then the your goals change. And that first good idea isn’t important.

Or is it?

Maybe the kernel of the idea was good. Like… the name?

And here we are. More in a moment.

What if you threw a revolution and no one came?

Contenture is shutting down. No, you probably never heard of them and probably won’t miss them. And since I didn’t even know of the company until I saw notice of their demise, I won’t presume to offer cogent reasons why their business model never got off the ground. But here’s the key reason they gave on their blog:

[W]e were unable to get any big publishers to use the service, which was going to be the key to our success. Without any large publishers, the economics just don’t work.

I bring this news up here as a cautionary tale in two parts:

Labels are important.
Contenture billed their service as “The Micropayment Revolution”. That phrase was part of their logo on their blog. That revolution lasted exactly 192 days from launch-date to shut-down announcement. And as they say above, the revolution wasn’t adopted by key entities. Revolution is a pretty serious word. It brings up serious connotations.

Lesson: Be sure the words you use match the reality of your intent.

Don’t ignore the Convenience Arrow
After reading the links above that describe the business model, it seems to go backwards. Sure, blocking ads would be nice, but it does little to enhance convenience. And it’s certainly not worth paying for. At least not to me. And obviously, not a lot of other people either.

Lesson: There exists a difference between annoying and intruding. One I’ll pay you to get rid of. The other I’m really good at ignoring.

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This post inspired by a nice soak in the steam room, my little reward for breaking my 1+ year sabbatical from working out.

None of us have it figured out. No one has achieved perfection. Supreme enlightenment is at best unattainable and at worst a scam.

There always remains a stone unturned. A nook unprodded. A path unexplored. For all of us. Even for those who always seem to be first, there was a time when they didn’t know about it either.

We all fall short of our goals. We take missteps and often time make mistakes. Occasionally we screw up royally and get embarrassed by our own ineptitude.

So when you figure something out, celebrate. When you discover something new, have fun with it. And when you crawl back on the wagon horse, ride on.

Go ahead and reward yourself. But keep the scale of your accomplishment in mind. Somethings are worth shouting about. Most that I’ve mentioned above are not. Yes, they are important. Yes, they can lead to bigger things. Yes, you should feel good about what you’ve done. But little changes deserve little rewards.

When you’re done, go work toward something truly big. You can scream about that.

The future is almost here. No, really. In a few days it will be 2010. That’s the future.

As of late, I’ve been writing a lot about business. Specifically, how the digital world changes what it means to be “in business”. A catch phrase I’ve been using over the last year is this: Doing business online means more than just having a first-class website. And while I believe that is true, I wonder if the statement goes far enough? I wonder if, instead, I believe this:

It is possible to do business online without having your own website.

Heretical? Not really. And not all that ground-breaking. I first heard about eBay from a neighbor almost a decade ago. A significant portion of his income came from trading baseball cards on the site. He didn’t have his own website until the last few years. I’ve ran a digital media consulting practice for the last two years without a site for said practice, though I’ll concede that this site helps and that I used prior connections to secure clients.

The web of today provides smart businesses many chances to make connections without having a dedicated website. So yes, it’s possible to do business without one. I’m not advocating you abandon your website. But I do challenge you to consider the role your site plays today. Think of where your customers or prospects are and be there. Spend at least as much time building and maintaining your presence out there as you do on your own site.

Maybe more?

Given the choice, I think every business would choose to be remarkable. Certainly no one in business wants to provide a bad business experience. But I’m more troubled by those in business satisfied to deliver a staple experience.

Staples are things you have to have, or need on a regular basis. The “general store” of old comes to mind. Competition really didn’t come into play, as they tended to be the only game in town. It may not have been pretty to shop in, but they had what you needed. And if they didn’t, you probably didn’t know you needed it.

Today, businesses in the staple-market compete on one thing and one thing only — price. Margins are razor-thin. Service and selection are commoditized. Success is measured by volume. Customers are lured in by items offered below cost in the hope that an impulse decision may result in a slightly higher profit item being sold. Some companies have made loads of money this way. Some entire industries operate under this principle. There is a success path here, if that is your true intent.

There exists a direct relationship between choice and staple-ness.

It’s hard to offer a multitude of choices and succeed at all of them. It’s difficult to try and meet every conceivable need and almost impossible to exceed them all. If you’re lucky, you do one or two things really well. The rest? Filler. And those things you don’t knock out of the park may be doing harm to your business or your brand.

Consider the restaurant that offers dozens of entrées. Do you go there because the all the food is fantastic? What about any of the food? Chances are, you eat there because it’s fast (relatively speaking), decent (relatively speaking), cheap (relatively speaking) and predictable.

Alternately, consider the establishment that is really known for one or two things. Chances are, they offer a more limited — more exclusive, if you will — list of items that they kick-ass on. Every. Time. Because of the limited selection, they can also be fast enough and (relatively) affordable. But these places offer a product that is far above decent. Predictable? Only to those who are regulars, and they often drag their friends along just to see the look on their faces when they taste something truly remarkable.

Those same rules apply to almost any small business or entrepreneur. Focus on that which you do better than anyone else. While it’s hard — if not stupid — to turn away business, understand the possible risk if you fail to not just meet, but exceed your customers’ expectations.

I’m not a very patient man. My sense of time has always been a few clicks faster than those around me. This helped me in academics as a kid — but to a point. Impatience breeds boredom. And that leads to a host of issues with less-than-desirable outcomes.

But impatience can be — over time — channeled into a power for good. While everyone else will happily continue to drive over the speed bumps, we impatient find a way around them. Eventually, those around us notice and start following. And without any planning or process meetings, a new and generally accepted path is formed.

Businesses can be impatient, too. I see that as a Good Thing. Impatient companies recognize a need and fill it — now. While there’s nothing wrong with analyzing conditions to see if the timing is right, sometimes that just takes too long. Or sometimes the signs are so obvious that further study simply isn’t needed.

How do you adopt impatience? I don’t think you can. I think you are, or you aren’t. But your business can learn to be. You may have to bring in talent from the outside. You may have to look through your list of “troublemakers” and see if they truly are worthless (then fire them) or if they just want things to move faster. Don’t give them the reigns, but do give them some rope. You may be surprised what they can create, and what you might learn.

Don’t underestimate the value of connections. While we (and by we I mean I) sometimes get caught up looking for ROI and hard, measurable facts, some things are more esoteric. Yet just as valuable.

When Google bought YouTube, they thought the asset was the impressions the videos would deliver. What they found more valuable was the connections and conversations people were having around and because of those videos.

Today, you can’t have a network without the connections. Some connections between you and others are incredibly strong. When you start noticing the same people at events and see the same names on email, comments or other outreach, that’s an indication of a strong connection.

But strong connections aren’t conducive to growth, either personal or the growth of the network itself. And while it can happen, strong connections make it difficult for others to join in the connection. So instead, we tend to keep increasing the strength of our own connections, since that’s easier than breaking in. I think that approach misses the mark.

Spend less time strengthening strong connections.

If your connection with another person is truly strong, it will survive a bit of neglect on your part. I know that people will tell you that relationships take work. I’ve found that not to be the case. At least, not a significant amount of work. And if it does, then it’s probably a relationship I’m probably not going to miss.

Rather, spend your time shoring up tenuous connections. Reach out to those you’re loosely connected to, and make those connections stronger. You’ll quickly find yourself exposed to new ideas, new people and new opportunities. And those other strong connections? Still rock solid. Now you have even more.

Which tenuous connection will you work on strengthening first?

Changes to FTC (Federal Trade Commission) guidelines on endorsements and testimonials were made active on December 1. And seven days later, I’m happy to report that I, a blogger, have not been sued. Neither, chance are, have you.

There was a huge stink about these proposed changes a few months back. Mob mentality won over common sense, and the assumption was that bloggers were going to be fined $11,000 if they failed to mention the book they just reviewed was purchased from Barnes & Nobel with a 15% coupon.

Wrong.

What do the new guidelines mean for bloggers?

Probably nothing. The overview by the FTC on this page is pretty good, but I think this short PDF of the revised guidelines is even better. And if you want the whole story, check this 81 page PDF. It’s overkill, but for the complete-ists out there; have at it. But back to “probably nothing”.

The new guidelines — the first change to the endorsements & testimonials section since 1980 — require marketers to be honest, forthright and clear when using endorsements and testimonials. What a crazy concept. If you’re the endorser or provider of the testimonal — bloggers, for the purpose of this discussion — then you have an obligation to do the same and disclose if you were compensated for your endorsement.

Chances are, you already do that. And if you don’t; start. It requires you do nothing more than say “Ford let me drive this new car for a week, and here’s what I think”. Again, you probably do this already.

Marketers are responsible for what compensated endorsers say.

That’s the biggest change. If Snapple sends out free samples of a new beverage to specific bloggers as part of an outreach campaign, they have an obligation to make sure the endorsements are real and true. That’s an oversimplification, but it’s close enough. If one of those bloggers posts about how the drink cured them of lung cancer, the marketer is on the hook. The blogger is on the hook as well, and probably by more than just the FTC.

My advice to bloggers is simple:

1. Don’t lie. If your really didn’t think it was the best ever, don’t say it was. Don’t shill.
2. Disclose received compensation. Getting it for free for the purpose of blogging or tweeting about it is compensation. Getting a free sandwich because you bought nine others is not.

My advice to marketer is even more simple:

1. Don’t try and deceive. “Results not typical” will be a thing of the past. Finally.

And yes, the fine for infractions can be up to $11,000 per occurrence. Will you get caught if you break the new laws? I sincerely hope so.

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There are only two types of “visitors” to your website, blog, profile, or account page¹: Those who’ve never seen any of your stuff before, and everyone else. Converting the new visitor to a repeat visitor is a key goal for anyone in business. The definition of conversion varies, and we’ll get deeper into that in the coming posts. But a high-level goal should be moving that new person into the “everyone else” column.

First impressions mean everything to this group. They will be making snap decisions about you based on your most recent post on your blog, update to Facebook, image on Flickr, tweet via Twitter, video on YouTube, episode of your podcast, or whatever action you do on whatever platform you’re doing it from.

Your most recent update should always be your best.

It should also be indicative of the kinds of things you want to be known for on that platform. That makes it hard to post anything other than that which you want to be known for. And that makes for a boring, monolithic platform.

The fix is easy. Though it’s easier on some platforms than others. In fact, I’ve done it with this blog post. It’s not the most recent post I’ve made, though new folks would never known it.² I back-dated the post I wanted to make so that it showed up below this post and deeper in the RSS feed. The “everyone else” I mentioned before are probably getting this via RSS or email, so they won’t miss it. Those that are more casual checkers may miss it, but so what? It’s not like the post was all that critical. This one is the important one.

Not all platforms will let you do that. So that last tweet is what people who hit your Twitter page will see. You can’t back-date on Facebook or Flickr either. So it’s a good idea to hold some gems in reserve. Then you can post that whimsical update followed quickly by something of more value to the new person.

Or… you could recognize that personal branding is pretty fractured, and you don’t have to be the same thing in all places. You never want to stop being a human, and if cutting up in public is part of who you are — it’s sure as heck who I am — then do it and don’t worry about it. I do it just about everywhere else but here (as of late).

But even still, I think I could do a better job of putting my best foot forward on platforms other than this. Now to determine if I care or not. Do you?

^{1 – This assumes they come in through your front door, as if someone told them to check you out online. Searchers are a totally different breed, as Google cares little for taking people to your home page and instead wants to take them straight to the content they want. More on this in the future.}

^{2 – Well, they wouldn’t have known if I didn’t spill the beans with this post!}

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Perhaps it is my lineage of Oklahoma settlers, but I’m not a big fan of wagons. My mom had a station wagon when I was a wee lad, and I don’t remember liking that, either.

But the wagons I am speaking of are of a different sort. The first is the wagon. What used to be a metaphor for sobriety has been hijacked to mean any sort of routine. Workouts, a commitment to daily blog posts, vegetarianism, eliminating “nazi” from your lexicon… you name it. But my ire isn’t with the bastardization of the term. Culture does that, and I’m OK with it.

Falling off is akin to falling down.

Don’t just lie there — do something about it! Don’t flounder around for support and sympathy — do something about it! You created the wagon. You decided to crawl upon it. No one pushed you up there. If it’s a place you want to be, then be there. If you find yourself constantly slipping off, maybe it’s the wrong wagon for you.

And then there are bandwagons. Snaked from the tarnished world of politics, bandwagons have become legion. In fact, they’ve come to represent any specific wagon referenced above that is shared by multiple individuals. But people don’t fall from bandwagons.

If you don’t like the direction it’s going, get off.

Unless you’ve got the reigns, you can’t steer a bandwagon. The moment it heads someplace you’re uncomfortable with, get off. Find another. Or make your own. Or just start walking. All too often, those wagons are filled with sheep. Or maybe that’s just how they look to us wolves.

Remember when you hung out your very own “expert” shingle? Oh, there’s no doubt that you deserved it. You knew as much — if not more — on the subject than anyone around you. And when the topic of your expertise came up, people immediately thought of you.

You received payment for the work you did for clients. And you did amazing things for clients. They referred other clients to you, and your expertise was further recognized and validated. You made ends meet and created a successful — if not profitable — business venture. Well done.

Or maybe you took a job with a company. They hired you as The Expert or An Expert, and you worked diligently on projects and ideas for your clients. Those clients loved the work you did for them, and your company received great referral business, solidifying you and them as true experts in the field. The company made money, you drew a steady paycheck, and life was good.

But that was last year, when you were the expert.

While you were busy being an expert, your expertise expired.

Unless your expertise is in something like Great Opera Singers of the 12th Century — and maybe not even then — the game is changing constantly. The milieu isn’t today what it was 12 months ago. And if you’re in an emerging or highly volatile field, that could be 12 weeks.

While you were busying being an expert, your skills lapsed. While you were busy being an expert, the platform moved. While you were busy being an expert, outside changes impacted your field. You didn’t notice. And now you’re an expert at outdated concepts.

Stay fresh.

If you’re spending 100% of your time on billable work, you have no time to keep abreast of the changes in your field. If the company you work for has you cranking out paying work 40+ hours a week, then they are letting your expertise lapse, and you’re becoming a limited time offer.

Cut back on the work and make time for what many professional organizations call continuing education. Attend and speak at conferences. Read publications. Try new things. Connect with other experts in your field. Connect with experts in related fields. Become part of the community.

If that means you have to raise your billable hourly rate to make up for the lost income — do it. If that means you have to demand your employer reduce your doing-work to give you room for learning-work — do it.

The consequences of not doing it? You cease to become the expert, and your value effectively drops to zero. And who wants to put “I used to be an expert” on a resume?