Many sports analysts are dissecting Super Bowl 44 and offering their thoughts on how the New Orleans Saints pulled off an upset victory over the Indianapolis Colts. I personally think this game was decided by the mental state of the two teams and came down to the question of “desire”. The difference in “desire” meant the Colts played to not-lose and the Saints played to win. This sounds like the same thing but it isn’t. In business and in sports you play to win. If you don’t have a desire to win but only to “not lose”, then you’re not going to win. If you’re playing not to lose then you’ll make mistakes that will cost you the game. (I’m not blaming Manning for the loss. I’m only pointing out that the game would have been different if the Colts had approached it with a greater desire to win.)

I’m not going to delve into the details of the game but I believe the game turned into the Saints favor towards the end of the second half. Facing fourth and one at the one yard line, the Saints went for it, instead of kicking an easy field goal. This demonstrated that they were willing to give everything they had to win this game. Unfortunately they were stuffed and at the time looked to be a terrible gamble, one that could cost them the game. However, what the Colts did next revealed that the Saints were going to win this game in the end.

After stuffing the Saints, the Colts got the ball back with almost two minutes left. Plus they were up 10-3. The Colts now had an opportunity to send a clear message to the other side and take complete control of the game. I don’t know about you but I was expecting the Colts to go into their two minute offense. I was expecting them to march down the field and score. I was expecting them to enter half-time with a 17-3 lead. Such a lead would have changed everything.

Instead the Colts played ultra-conservative and called lack-luster plays going three and out. They punted the ball back to the Saints, who then advanced the ball sufficiently and kicked a field goal. The Saints went into half-time behind 10-6 instead of 17-3. Energized, they came back with an on-side kick to open the second half. They recovered and subsequently scored a touchdown. The rest as they say is history.

Here are three things I learned in from these moments:

1. If you have an opportunity to greatly advance your business, do it. Go for it. Don’t hesitate. Don’t sit back.  When opportunity knocks be ready to take advantage of it completely. No “ifs”, “ands” or “buts”!

2. Sometimes the only way to get ahead with your business is by taking a huge gamble. Time your risks well and boldly execute them.

3. Ask yourself if you really truly have the desire to win. The level of your success is directly tied to the intensity of your desire. Do you have that burning desire to succeed no matter what?

The 2009 New Orleans Saints have certainly given me inspiration for the coming year. Congratulations to the city of New Orleans on showing the world what it takes to be a champion!

photo credit: RMTip21

photo credit: ian_ransley

Yesterday I attended the Get Motivated business seminar. I was really looking forward to the event and enjoyed many of the speakers.  There were some big names speaking and it was my first time seeing them live.  While I would rate the overall experience as “so-so”, I loved hearing from Kurt Warner, Krish Dhanam, Phil Town, Steve Forbes,  James Smith and the legendary Zig Ziglar. It was sad to see that Zig was  having a difficult time after his fall, but it was inspiring nonetheless to hear from him. Zig in my mind is a legend of all legends when it comes to motivational speakers!

Here is a brief takeaway from each of the speakers I enjoyed:

Kurt Warner -  Do not settle for “good enough”, seek perfection. Be the best at what you do. Life is defined by how we respond when we have setbacks.

Krish Dhanam – Offer praise to your inner circle (family).  Develop an attitude of gratitude. Dream with eyes open. IQ + EQ + SQ = the real you! Don’t forget the spiritual element to your success.

Phil Town – Only 3% of fund managers (who make $5 million a year) have beat the S&P 500 since 1985. Take control of your investments. Buy and hold is one of the biggest investment myths.

Steve Forbes – Figure out ways to make ordinary things extra-ordinary. Starbucks makes billions selling coffee and McDonalds sells hamburgers.

James Smith - It’s the little things you do today and not the big things that determine your destiny. One degree change in the velocity vector can land you in a different solar system in ten years!

Zig Ziglar - Attitude is everything.

I enjoyed the other speakers but could have done without Rudy Giuliani. I can’t believe this man stood up in front of 20,000 people and told them its important to connect to the Internet. It’s’ 2010 Rudy! Half the people in the audience tuned out after he said this and were on their mobile phones catching up on their emails. Plus, it seemed that after this main point, all he said was Ronald Reagan.. yada yada yada… 9/11…. yada yada … Ronald Reagan … yada yada … 9/11!

I definitely felt it was worthwhile to attend but I can’t say I was motivated afterward. I rarely attend these types of events and in some ways I now remember why I don’t. But at the same time it was good to get away, listen to some inspiring words and meet new people. Even though I can’t say I was completely motivated, I do look forward to learning more from these speakers through their books!

Continuing in my series of conversations with social media practitioners, today I share with you an interview I conducted with Justin McHood. I’ve known Justin for a few years and we’ve enjoyed a professional relationship due to our shared background in the mortgage industry and our interest in SEO, affiliate marketing and other Internet Marketing tools.

Justin has worked as a loan officer for the last seven years. In those seven years he has been responsible for at least a thousand funded loans and by my estimation at least a thousand and one happy clients. He started blogging in May of 2008 at ArizonaMortgageTeam.com and now contributes to several different mortgage and Real Estate related blogs. Justin is a talented fellow with an MBA from Brigham Young University but he somehow never managed to let school get in the way of his education. He lives in Chandler, Arizona and when he is not trying to solve seemingly un-solvable underwriting conditions or get docs out on a loan “yesterday” he enjoys golf and tinkering around with Twitter.

So, all this humor aside here are my questions and Justin’s answers:

1. Why did you choose social media (blogs, twitter) as an integral part of your business development strategy?

JM: Working in the mortgage business, for many years the company I was with at the time only did direct mail, nothing on the web. As the market started shifting and equity values started falling, it became clear that we needed to make a shift and so in 2008 I started my first blog.

After the first blog launched, it became clear that there were many more things that I could be doing to promote “mortgage experts” on the web – such as Twitter, Facebook etc – and I was fortunate that there were very few loan officers at the time doing it.

2. What is the most amazing thing you did in 2009 when it comes to social media? Perhaps there was a blog post or a Twitter connection?
Amazing… I don’t know about “amazing” but the most positive feedback I remember getting was my “Dear President Obama” post and my “Is Your Landlord a Lemon?” posts – both on Zillow. The Lemon Landlord post actually was featured on the Zillow homepage – which was the first time that Zillow featured anything that a loan officer wrote like that – or at least to my knowledge it was. My personal favorite was the “We Suck Less?” post on The Phoenix Real Estate Guy, it just really hit home for me. Sometimes you can’t make that stuff up.

I also thought it was fun to teach Beverly Kidd the Keyword Game when she came to #EVFN (East Valley Friday Nights) – where we would pick a keyword for her to say on air over Twitter and she would sneak it into the evening news. Go ahead, give it a try – just get on Twitter, @BeverlyKidd a keyword and see if you can get her to say it on the air. You might be surprised at how savvy she is at slipping them in without missing a beat.

3. As a mortgage professional is it possible to successfully use social media without being passionate about mortgage? What role does passion play in making your social media usage successful?

Don’t let this surprise you, but I am not passionate about mortgages. To me, they are just another “widget” that people buy when they need to. So yes, I would say that it is possible to be successful in all kinds of social media if you aren’t particularly passionate about what you are doing at the time.

This is just a hunch, but many people who I have met through social media actually know that I don’t like mortgages – but know that because I am transparent and will tell them “the truth” about mortgages – they say that it is refreshing to get an “inside” view of what really goes on in the mortgage business.

4. How do you answer those that say social media takes too much time and is a waste of time?

I 100% agree that social media takes time and I 100% agree that it can be a complete waste of time. If you don’t do it “right” – it is probably going to end up being a waste of time.

There are many different ways to do it “right” – but if you don’t take the time to learn about what is and isn’t acceptable in social media, you are probably going to end up putting in a little bit of time, get nothing out of it and then declare that it was a waste of time.

Social media is… social. It is always fun to watch new people come into the social media circle and just try to “fit in” – and what kinds of strange things they do to try to fit in.

Although I offer none of my time to be a “social media consultant”, if I had a successful business and wanted to test the waters of social media, I would absolutely spend the money to hire the right social media consultant – they can make all the difference between doing it right and doing it wrong.

5.. How do you measure the success of your social media strategy? What role did social media play in making 2009 successful for you?

Social media is pretty much all I do for marketing – and I made it through the mortgage business in 2009, so I consider it to be a success. I also think that I probably have a base to build on going forward, which is key in my opinion.

6. How has the use of social media directly affected your business since you actively began using it?

Well, I think that since I use no more direct mail, I can say that I have transferred from a completely offline business into a completely online business.

7. How has the use of social media affected you personally?

I know a lot more great people than I used to. I used to be kind of isolated in my day to day world – but I have made quite a few “good” friends and even a few “great” friends through social media. In a lot of ways, I guess it is kind of a “digital country club” only there really isn’t a membership fee – you just need to be Authentic to be let in.

I also like to use social media references when talking to people about what I do for a living – it is fun to watch their faces as I describe it. For example, one of my daughter’s friends mom asked me what I did for a living and I told her that I played a loan officer on Twitter. She didn’t exactly know what to say.
Lastly, I finally have a group of friends that I can hang out with (almost) every Friday night at #EVFN. @evo_terra, @sheila_dee, @raillife, @deanouellette, @phxreguy, @dpatricklewis, @spellwight, @paulvalach, @shanehollenback, @cwaterhouse, and plenty of other great people show up a different location each Friday night to have a great time. If you live in the East Valley, it is worth going to these at least every once in a while – especially the ones at Whole Foods.

8. What are your hopes for 2010 when it comes to social media?

I know this sounds crazy, but I don’t really have any hopes or plans. I just kind of do what I do, adapt as new technology comes along and try to keep up with the smart people in the space. I think it is safe to say that I am probably not going to do anything that sets the world on fire in 2010 or if I do, it was a complete accident.

But I do tinker around with matches and dynamite a lot, so I suppose anything is possible.

photo credit: ncburton

photo credit: stefanopa

photo credit: Nick Bastian Tempe, AZ

If you run a pay-per-click (PPC) campaign then you need to constantly optimize it’s performance. You’re paying for clicks so you can’t afford to begin a campaign and let it run without keeping a very close eye on its performance. Just being satisfied with the traffic is not going to deliver the ROI that you can gain from an effective PPC campaign. Don’t get me wrong, traffic can be a good measure, but targeted, relevant traffic that converts into sales and delivers a strong ROI should be your ultimate goal.

When it comes to PPC there are seven critical elements you need to pay close attention to in order to deliver high ROI. In this post I will focus on three of the seven: geo-targeting, the search query report and effective day-parting. I will cover placement bidding, landing page targeting by keyword and managing the content network in a subsequent post. Finally, in my last post I will discuss effective keyword discovery, research and utilization.

Geo-targeting -  Whether you have an established business or one that is just coming up, you need to first evaluate where your most profitable customers are located. Do not make any assumptions and take a peek at your sales history, product performance to determine the major markets for your products.  Rank your geographic markets and set your PPC geo-target to the most profitable locations.

Google’s AdWords allows you to set multiple geo-targets. In my experience it is best to set one geo-target per campaign. This means you can closely monitor the performance of each market and turn off campaigns by markets. Effective geo-targeting requires testing so keep testing markets until you have a strong mix. As you monitor performance do not rely only on the metrics provided on the AdWords screen. It is very important to run a geographic report for each campaign every two weeks. When you do this you will discover additional performance metrics that will help improve performance. For example, if your geo-traget is regional in nature (entire Phoenix Metro area for example), then this report will break down campaign performance by  city (Scottsdale, Chandler, Tempe etc.) This breakdown allows you to further break down your market and focus on the more profitable areas.

Search Query Report – In my experience I have found the search query report to be one of the most useful performance reports. The reason for this is because this report provides the exact search term visitors uses to arrive at your website. Even though the keyword report tells you which phrase or keyword converted, you still do not know the exact phrase that was the source of your conversion. For example, they keyword report might indicate that the phrase “phoenix hotel” was the converting phrase, but the search query report might show that “pet friend phoenix hotel” was in fact the phrase the visitor typed to arrive at your website.

This additional information helps you understand that not only was the visitor looking for a phoenix hotel but they were specifically looking for a pet friendly hotel.  This additional information can help you improve the ad text you use, the offers you include in promotions and also expand your keyword mix.

Effective Day Parting -  Google AdWords allows you to turn your campaign on and off during different times of the day. One of the easiest ways to optimize performance is to keep your campaigns active only during the most profitable times of day. If you are just starting with your PPC campaign then I recommend taking a look at the traffic patterns on your website (via your web analytics) to set an initial day parting schedule. However, finding the most profitable times requires constant testing.

While testing your day parting times, one thing to keep in mind is, even though you have set it up so the daily budget is evenly distributed through out the day, this is never the case. I recommend running an hourly (regardless of date) campaign report to determine how your money is being spent on any given day.  I generally look at the time at which 80% of the budget is spent and compare this against the conversions during this time.  This analysis helps to determine whether or not to split the day parting even further.

Next I will discuss placement bidding, landing page targeting by keyword and managing the content network.

Here is a word cloud of President Obama’s State of the Union last night:

Here is a word cloud of the Republican response:

I’ve gotten to know Nipa Shah over the past year and have greatly enjoyed our growing relationship. Even though its only been through Twitter, I’ve learned a lot from her expertise as a social media practitioner and online marketing expert. Not only is she an Internet Marketing expert but she is also the founder of Jenesys Group, LLC. I am a big fan of her work as a marketer and also her work within the Indian American community in Detroit, Michigan.

She networks via Twitter, she educates through her blog(s) and she engages via social networks. She is a true social media practitioner who has had a direct impact on her clients and her own business.  I wanted readers to benefit from her expertise and experience so I asked for an interview. Between working on her business and managing a score of other things on her list, she was kind enough to send me her response to some questions I sent her.  Enjoy:

1. It seems like many traditional marketing agencies are now offering social media services as a “me too” strategy. You’re different in that you’re an early adopter. What advice would you give agencies that are seeking to move into the brave new world of social media?

NS: Thanks for recognizing me as an early adopter. What advice can I give the newcomers? First, they should create a robust offering that is all-encompassing rather than just focused on one aspect of social marketing. Our advantage is that we implement Social marketing with Search engine marketing. Traditional agencies may not have the capability. They should partner with companies (like ours) to integrate that component for their customers. Second, they need to balance quality with quantity. Customers aren’t going to be happy if they only focus on quality messaging and the number of followers (Twitter), fans (Facebook) or contacts (Linkedin) remain low. How to build a network to influence while also posting quality messages is key. And finally, showing ROI is always difficult in marketing but it is important to establish criteria to measure campaign success and provide robust reports to demonstrate performance.

2. Can social media be out-sourced? Meaning can you blog or tweet on behalf of clients?

NS: Sure it can be outsourced. We have a team of bloggers, twitter experts, facebook experts, and people who are trained in social media marketing to help our clients. We write weekly blogs for them, we tweet on their behalf, we create and manage their facebook profiles, etc. etc. What makes this work is making sure that the resources are trained in doing this function. A key necessity for the success of outsourcing is ensuring that the resources are good at written communication.

3. How do you answer those that say social media takes too much time and is a waste of time?

NS: Marketing is a necessary ingredient to promoting a company and it’s products or services. Yes, marketing does take a lot of time. And its ROI is sometimes difficult to compute. But if you don’t conduct any marketing, how do you ensure that your company’s products or services get visibility. The same companies that say it takes too much time or social networking is a waste of time may also be the ones who spend thousands on getting their site listed on a directory portal, paid marketing campaigns, and networking events. What I say to them is that not marketing online via the Facebooks and the Twitters is no longer an option. That’s because if your company isn’t there but your competitor is, guess who gets the benefit from regular interaction?

4. How do you measure the success of your social media strategy?

NS: Traffic from social networks to the main website, number of connections, contacts, or followers, AND inquiries about my company’s products and services that is generated through the social networks. And believe me, it works.

5. How has the use of social media directly affected your business?

NS: It has led to additional visibility and traffic to the website. Social Networking has also allowed my company to get real-time insight into what customers are looking for in terms of the classes we host, feedback on the launch of a new website, input on something that we may be evaluating, etc.

6. How has the use of social media affected you personally?

NS: Personally, I enjoy Tweeting and Facebooking for fun and awareness. Through my tweets and FB messaging I am considered an “influencer”. People tell me how much they enjoy my comments and have even learned things about me that they would never have known before. I never discuss personal stuff online. But I do make comments about kids, work, and my opinion on things that are happening around the world. Since my personality comes through in my very opinionated comments, people tell me that my comments totally reflect my face-to-face personality. And finally, I have made a lot of new contacts and friends through the social media sites. Including you –

7. The nature of social media makes it difficult to separate your personal brand with your company brand. How are you dealing with this?

NS: Well, Nipa Shah’s brand is much different than Jenesys Group’s brand. Jenesys Group provides online marketing and web solutions. Nipa Shah on the other hand is a mother, wife, community leader, founder of the MIICC.com, etc. etc. So you see, I don’t see the brand conflict at all. For small companies, the brand may be associated with the person who founded it but by unique messaging, separating the corporate profile from the personal profile, etc. etc. are some ways to differentiate between the two. I see how that can happen to others, but I personally don’t have that situation. At least I don’t think so. Do you?

8. What inspires you?

NS: Selflessness inspires me. Mother Teresa (giving up everything to help others), Nelson Mandela (can you imagine spending 20 years in prison and coming out on top?), Dalai Lama and everyday great people like the New York Fire Department folks who knew the risk and still climbed the Twin towers to save people. That’s just a source of inspiration to me to become a better person. And that’s for my personal inspiration.

Inspiration for my professional life comes from an inner drive to do more and better every waking day. Why is that I’m not sure, it’s just my personality. I quit a perfectly cushy job at General Motors to run my company full-time, 4 years after I started it.

Thank you Nipa for taking the time to share your expertise with us. If you want to stay in touch with her I highly recommend you subscribe to her marketing blog.

photo credit: ilamont.com

photo credit: dougbelshaw

photo credit: Peta-de-Aztlan

Recently I asked myself what I learned about social media in 2009. It’s an important question because the media is grown a lot in the last few years. Many have adopted the tools and some have left it behind while others continue to stay away. Still others have made millions.So, here are the top five things I learned about social media in 2009:

1. Social media is not rocket science - With the widespread adoption of social media tools and technologies, platforms such as Facebook and Twitter are no longer confusing to people. Everyone from company CEO and  HR managers to vendors and suppliers are using one of these social media tools. Additionally, once you get on these tools you realize it’s really not that hard to figure out. If you can hold a half way decent conversation with a stranger in an elevator you can pretty much use Twitter. There is nothing to it.

Consolidation ot technology is another factor that has taken away the mystique associated with social media. As an example, there used to be a number of competing microblogging websites but now Twitter is the king of the hill.  Plus most people understand that sites now occupy distinct spaces. For instance, MySpace is the domain of artists and musicians, LinkedIn is for business connection and Facebook is the general purpose platform for social networking.

So, combine the ease of use factor with the consolidation factor and you pretty much have a situation where anyone can use social media. It’s not rocket science and anyone that tries to make it look like it is complicated and hard to use is not telling you the full story.

2. Big difference between social media “experts” and social media “practitioners” – Kind of piggy backing on my first point, in 2009 I learned that the people you really need to listen to are not so much “experts”, but “practitioners”. Social media is so darn simple, I really don’t think there is a need for experts. I know I’m going to get a lot of flack for saying this but what expertise do you need to use Twitter? Create account, find followers, start connection. Seriously, what does an expert do to help you make Twitter more effective?

That is why I learned that the people you should pay attention to are not the experts that churn out blog post after blog post on using social media, but those that are using social media to sell a product or service. These are the folks in the trenches that are having an impact. They’re obviously using the tool effectively and making things happen. So, listen to them. In fact I’m going to be running an interview series on this blog talking to social media practitioners.

3. Focus on overall marketing goals not social media tools – Going back to my example above about Twitter. In 2009 I leanred that what makes your Twitter or Facebook experience relevant and effective is the goals you have set for these tools. You need to clearly define the goal you wish to achieve as you consider social tools. This will help you know exactly how you’re going to use these social media tools and you can set your creativity loose. For instance, if you’re going to use Twitter to drive traffic to your blog, then, you’ll have to figure out how to use Twitter to achieve this goal. If you’re going to sell products from your blog post, then, you’ll need to create blog content in such a manner as to achieve this goal.

Goals driving your tools is actually the most important concept I learned in 2009. Clarify your goals and then use the tools to achieve these goals. The tools in and of themselves should not be the focus. This is where listening to "practitioners" vs. "experts" comes in.

4. The connections made via social media are real – When it comes to social media its easy to think that because you’re spending so much time in front of the computer connections are not being made. At the end of the day, you do business with people not computers. That is why connection with people is so important. For me one of the most satisfying aspects of using Twitter has been the connections I’ve made with professionals in the local community. It has opened doors for me on more than one occasion. From connecting with a video expert to the director of a non-profit helping refugees, my world has expanded exponentially through the connections made via social media.

So in 2009 I finally understood that the connections are real. The people are real. Business is real. Social media is not the domain of computer geeks and nerds talking php and html.

5. Social media can give you the confidence to take on giants – From a personal perspective my experience on social media this past year has given me the confidence to start my new venture. I have finally come to appreciate the power of this new media to make thing happen. As my world expanded and my contacts grew, I realized that I had the ability via social media to make my new venture extremely successful.  If a business selling worms in the UK can use social media to develop a sustainable global business, I too can use social media to deliver a product to a niche market.  It is with this confidence that I have launched Sabdamala.com, an online video teaching business geared to the Nepali community.

What’s ahead in 2010?

The learning and growing process never ends and 2010 will be no different in this regard. As I move forward with this blog, I will be interviewing social media practitioners. The objective is to share our experience, and learn from one another.  I will also be posting about my use of social media as Sabdamala grows and expands. The possibilities are endless and the field is wide open. Onwards and upwards my friends.

The New Year is here and it’s going to be a year to celebrate. Unlike other years, 2010 has a nice ring to it. There is symmetry to the digits and for a former math geek like me that’s a very cool thing. Also, 2010 is almost like a religious number of sorts, perhaps carrying a secret of some kind.  Well, anyways, enough with the diversions!

If you’re a long time reader, you’ll notice that with the New Year I’ve changed the name of this blog and updated the look. If you’re reading this in your feed, you have no idea what I’m talking about. You’ll have to visit the site to know.

First let’s talk about the name change. This was done a few weeks ago. The reason for the change is that the old name “Social Media Wiz” just didn’t convey what this blog is all about. At the end of the day this blog is not about any “wiz”, but rather about sharing knowledge and thoughts regarding social media. Plus I came up with that name on a whim and never felt a connection to it. So, in its stead I have renamed the blog “Social Reflections” with the objective remaining the same. To put it in one sentence the goal here is to observe, comment and bring to light social media success stories, strategies and personalities.

With the name change, it was natural to change the theme as well. I like this new theme. It’s professional and fits in with the goals of this blog. Again if you’re still reading this in a reader you have no idea what I’m talking about.

With all this change I’m going to kick off the New Year by interviewing social media practitioners (not experts). These are individuals that have used social media to achieve predefined objectives and goals. In one way, shape or form these are people who are either using social media to increase sales, improve brand image or increase awareness of their organizations. In other words, true practitioners on the front lines slugging it out and having an impact.  And I look forward to your participation as well.

Stay tuned.

photo credit: Alesist

Looks like this face recognition video camera wasn’t tested on dark skinned people. Watch:

What do you think? Are HP camera’s racist?

H/T Ad Age

The Simpsons intro – middle age version: