The Viral Garden

Social Media Mavens - An Interview with PepsiCo's Bonin Bough

2009-07-15T07:04:00.005-05:00

Welcome to the second interview in the Social Media Mavens series, where I talk to some of the top minds in corporate social media, and learn how their companies are crafting their social media efforts. Today's edition features a recent chat I had with PepsiCo's Director of Global Social Media, Bonin Bough. The interview focuses on Tropicana's involvement with BlogHer in launching an online community site for women, The Juice. Read on to learn how this partnership came to be, why Tropicana went with a community site to reach their target audience, and how the company judges the effectiveness of this initiative:

MC - Walk me through the thinking that went into Tropicana wanting to sponsor an online community, and an online community on the BlogHer site? What advantages do you see to this approach versus spending the same amount of time and money on traditional marketing? What are the challenges?

BB - The Juice was launched in coordination with Trop50, Tropicana’s new orange juice beverage with 50% less calories and sugar. Because it is a unique product, we wanted to go out with it in a unique way – by starting an online community. Trop50 is all about getting "more of what you want and less of what you don't" - and we understood that this mentality really jived with women's day to day lives. Social networking and community message boards are a huge part of women’s online lives today. The Juice evolves the tradition of women gathering around the kitchen table to share stories and tips – and creates what we like to refer to as a “digital kitchen table” for ongoing conversation.

BlogHer was a natural choice for us because their audience maps so well to the market for Trop50 and Tropicana. It’s important to look at the breadth and reach that BlogHer has – almost reaching half of the women that are going online to experience the blogosphere read something from a BlogHer blog. However, I’d point out that sponsorship is a dated word. The last thing we’re doing is a sponsorship! What we’re doing is more of partnership – we collaborate closely with them on episode topics, scripts, and guests so what you see is a reflection of both Trop50 and BlogHer.

Overall I think we need to stop focusing on the “either/or” approach to traditional versus online social media marketing. At Tropicana and PepsiCo we have an integrated marketing mix strategy. The Juice is a specific tactic that brings a different and deeper level of engagement and provides a platform for an open conversation, so we can actually engage directly with our consumers. We are moving from impressions to connections, and campaigns to conversations. With The Juice it’s about enabling a conversation that’s important to our audience – helping them get more of what they want and less of what they don’t on a variety of topics they choose to discuss. And, this isn’t just about the BlogHer community – it’s about using that as a springboard to reach into Facebook, Twitter, iVillage, other BlogHer blogs, non-BlogHer blogs, and more.

MC - A lot of my readers are at a place where they 'get' social media, but are trying to get the 'buy-in' at their company from people that don't. Did you have to 'sell' the idea of sponsoring The Juice community internally, and if so, what were some of the objections you heard, and how did you move past them?

BB - I understand a lot of people are in that position – the first thing I’d say is PepsiCo is in a great position because senior management across the organization believes in social and digital as a game changer. They have driven us to be as innovative with our marketing as we are with our products - Trop50 which is an innovation in product and an innovation in the way we market.

Having said that, of course we needed to sell the idea of The Juice internally and one of the biggest questions we received was about understanding “reach” in the social media space. We believe there is an arc to the way messages should be delivered these days. The message starts when we engage our advocates (versus influencers) and begin a conversation – it expands when we carry that conversation elsewhere. Reach is gained over time through syndication, traditional message, integrating into paid, and other 360 efforts. The Juice is a marathon not a sprint. Overall – it starts with making sure you can articulate the value of a tactic, and not let it viewed in a narrow way.

MC - How do you judge the ultimate success of The Juice as a marketing initiative for Tropicana? Or are you even approaching it as being a marketing effort? What will need to happen from this partnership for PepsiCo to look at launching similar efforts in the future for its other brands?

BB - All our efforts in the social media space are totally focused on ROI, and demonstrating the value of engaging with consumers on social media platforms. Measuring a program against key metrics and relationships is really important as we scale up our social media work across brands. For Trop50 specifically we are working with Ogilvy and their Conversation Impact model which tracks key metrics that ladder up to Reach, Preference and Action. So yes, very focused on measurement - and to be honest that is a huge part of what will help sell communities across to other brands. We'll look to share this out as a case study across PepsiCo. This type of engagement won't be right for every brand, but we share best practices so other brands can help evaluate if a community model might work for them.

Again, the big thing is that we can’t get stuck on older metrics. It’s an emerging world, and we need to adapt to that.

Thanks again to Bonin for answering my questions and giving us some insight into how The Juice came to be. You can follow Bonin on Twitter by clicking here. And if your company would like to be considered for a future interview in the Social Media Mavens series, please email me. Look for the next interview in this series in two weeks!

The Viral Garden's Top 25 Marketing & Social Media Blogs - Week 142

2009-07-14T13:08:00.002-05:00

Here's the standings for Week 142:

1 - Duct Tape Marketing - 132,000 (No Change)(LW - 1)
2 - Church of the Customer - 121,000 (No Change)(LW - 2)
3 - CopyBlogger - 67,265 (+8,526)(LW - 3)
4 - Web Strategy by Jeremiah - 37,257 (+13,817)(LW - 4)
5 - Chris Brogan - 26,427 (+3,306)(LW - 5)
6 - Logic + Emotion - 18,335 (+4,439)(LW - 6)
7 - Search Engine Guide - 14,160 (+568)(LW - 7)
8 - Daily Fix - 11,499(+1,617)(LW - 8)
9 - Influential Marketing - 10,323 (+853)(LW - 9)
10 - Social Media Explorer - 7,833 (+3,187)(LW - 13)
11 - Conversation Agent - 7,589 (+2,491)(LW - 11)
12 - Drew's Marketing Minute - 7,312 (+317)(LW - 10)
13 - Techipedia - 6,125 (+3,013)(LW - 19)
14 - Being Peter Kim - 5,979 (+1,882)(LW - 15)
15 - The Viral Garden - 5,567 (+1,310)(LW - 14)
16 - Debbie Weil's Blog - 4,756 (+912)(LW - 17)
17 - Jaffe Juice - 4,662 (-54)(LW - 12)
18 - Converstations - 4,565 (+892)(LW - 18)
19 - What's Next - 4,387 (+291)(LW - 16)
20 - Greg Verdino's Marketing Blog - 3,791 (+1,524)(LW - 23)
21 - Brand and Market - 3,429 (+500)(LW - 20)
22 - Techno Marketer - 3,415 (+1,083)(LW - 22)
23 - Emergence Marketing - 3,135 (+928)(LW - 24)
24 - The Social Media Marketing Blog - 3,115 (+338)(LW - 21)
25 - The Social Customer Manifesto - 2,083 (+160)(LW - 25)

The Top 25 Marketing & Social Media Blogs are ranked by the number of subscribers, according to FeedBurner. The number you see after the blog name is how many subscribers accessed the blog's feed, according to FeedBurner. FeedBurner (and I had to look it up to make sure) tracks the number of times your blog's feed is accessed, and matches it against the IP address of the computer making the request, to approximate the number of subscribers that access your feed, and report this as the number used in the Top 25. After that number is a positive or negative number, and this represents how many readers the blog gained or lost from last week's Top 25. The final stat tells you what position the blog held in the Top 25 Last Week (LW). If you see this; (LW - UR), it means the blog wasn't ranked last week.

Welcome to this month's edition of the Top 25 Marketing and Social Media blogs. This is the first Top 25 since Feedburner started incorporating FriendFeed subscribers into their sub #s. So if you saw a sudden spike in your numbers a few weeks ago, this might be why. Personally I think it makes FB's #s more inaccurate since it replicates some subscribers (and some FF members arent subscribing to you for your blog posts), but anyway. Many blogs saw big moves, with the flashiest being a huge jump by Jeremiah to distance himself from Chris Brogan's blog. Conversation Agent, Social Media Explorer, Techipedia and several others saw big gains as well.

Remember if you want to have your blog be considered for inclusion in the Top 25, make sure you add the Feedburner feed count chicklet to your blog. And if you redesign your blog, make sure to keep the FB chicklet on there, or I can't track you for the Top 25.

Next update is next month.

My Social South session is set!

2009-07-13T09:11:00.004-05:00

And the winnah is...What Rockstars Can Teach You About Kicking Ass With Social Media!

Yeah! Thanks to everyone that voted, as there was strong response for 3 of the 5 topics I selected, which is good. And actually, many of the points I would have raised in the 'How Social Media Can Transform Your Marketing and Your Business' session (which finished 2nd in voting), will also be covered in the Rockstar session.

So what WILL be covered?

How rockstars build community and embrace their fans, and how you can apply these same techniques to your social media and community-building efforts
How rockstars go beyond simply 'losing' control of their branding/content and actively seek out ways to transfer ownership to their fans
Why rockstars don't have 'customers', they have fans. Hint: They are fans themselves.

Of course this session will be heavy on case studies as always, and plenty of 'lessons learned', with examples of companies that are utilizing social media as a way to connect with their customers and even reach them as fans.

And if you haven't yet registered for Social South, you're in luck as the cost is a low $149 as the 'early bird' rate is in effect for the next couple of weeks! That's for a TWO day event and is an insanely low price, and you can see that some of the top social media minds in the South will be there. Hope to see you there, and BTW if you have any examples of rockstars that are successfully reaching their fans via smart marketing, or better via smart SOCIAL MEDIA marketing, add a comment here and I'll see if I can get your example added to my session!

Companies, ignore social media early-adopters

2009-07-08T09:46:00.002-05:00

Recently, Steve Rubel decided that blogging was dying, and that he was moving away from it. Whether you agree or disagree with Steve (and honestly I disagree with him often, especially on this issue), the fact remains that he's a very influential voice in the social media space. Companies read what he and other social media early adopters write, and they take it to heart.

But on the backdrop to the latest resurrection of the 'blogging is dead' meme, there's this; Google just announced that they will be jumping into the operating system business, launching an OS for computers based on their Chrome browser.

And how did Google alert the world to what Andy Sernovitz calls the biggest tech news of the year? Via a blog post.

Why did Google go with a supposedly 'dying' medium to make argubly their biggest announcement of the year?

Because what's 'dying' to the bleeding edge isn't what's 'dying' to companies. Oh and BTW, some people on the bleeding edge like to say things like 'blogs are dying' cause they know that everyone will link to them when they do. Shocking, but yeah, it sometimes happens.

But the bottom line is this; early adopters most likely use social media in a completely different way that your company, or your customers will. So if you are looking at how the 'influential' people in this space use social media as a potential blueprint for your own efforts, you are missing the boat. Look at how your CUSTOMERS use social media. They are the ones you need to be focusing on. It's great that GaryVee spends 18 hours a day on social media sites. He does this because that's how HE stays in contact with HIS customers. But if you do the same thing, and your customers are NOT on those same social media sites, how many hours a day are you wasting?

Whenever I talk to companies about their using social media, they always ask 'well how much time do YOU spend with social media each day?' And I have to point out that that's like asking me how much time I spend with my business each day. I am an outlier, my usage is NOT the norm, and it's not what you should be trying to emulate.

Companies, take your social media cues from your customers, not your favorite blogger/Twitterer.

Find your dancers, and give them the stage

2009-07-07T09:38:00.005-05:00

Thanks to Matt for linking to this video from the 2009 Sasquatch Music Festival, which I am about the last person on the interwebs to see, I think.

Thoughts I had as I watched this video and how it could apply to your community-building efforts:

1 - The guy dancing by himself would have danced all day by himself, if he had to. He was just having fun, and probably enjoyed the idea that everyone was staring at him.

2 - The SECOND guy is what starts the movement toward everyone dancing. Without the first guy standing up and dancing by himself, the second guy probably never moves.

3 - When the third guy joins in, suddenly everyone else realizes that everything has changed. A minute ago, it was 'who is that idiot dancing by himself?' Now that the third person has joined in, suddenly everyone is wanting to join in. Either because they want to be a part of this group that's being created before their eyes, or because they realize that if they DON'T join in, they are going to become 'that idiot that's sitting down by himself while everyone else dances'.

4 - Reality changed in a matter of seconds. It went from being 'cool' to sit down and enjoy the show, to being 'cool' to stand up and dance with strangers.

5 - Passion is infectious.

So what does this mean for your community-building efforts?

1 - Give the stage to that first guy. It could be the guy that wants to dance by himself, or it could be the guy that wants to spend 4 hours a night answering questions on your forum and solving customer issues. But make sure that first guy has room to dance, because that's what he wants to do.

2 - Once the first person is taking the action you want, as quickly as possible, find a way to encourage the second and third guy/gal to join in. This is key as it gets everyone else's attention, and it makes it much easier for everyone else to feel comfortable participating.

3 - Let your members/users/readers understand that they are creating a shared experience. Notice this video went from 3 guys dancing to 100 in a matter of seconds. Everyone knew that something special was happening, and that they had a chance to be a part of it. That they had a chance to be a part of something bigger than themselves. That's very rare and powerfully enticing to people. So you want to make it as easy as possible for the people sitting down to want to get up and start contributing to your community, to start dancing.

BTW one last thought; by the end of the video was the 'event' still the concert itself for the audience, or how they were dancing together?

What did you see when you watched this?

PS: Verdino has already tried to hijack the comments with shameless self-promotion, so I figured I'd make it easier for everyone to see his kick-ass post on this same video.

PPS: And literally while I was editing the post to include a link to Verdino's post, Spike leaves a comment with a link to HIS post on the video. Anyone else? ;)

Which social media conferences should you attend?

2009-07-06T09:30:00.003-05:00

Stuart DMed me wanting to know which social media conferences I recommended he should attend. Since I get asked this on a fairly regular basis, I thought it would be a good idea to write up my thoughts, since we are about to hit the 'busy' season for conferences in a few weeks. And BTW, these points are relevant for conference organizers, as well.

First, consider the sessions, and what you want from them. Are you wanting Social Media/Blogging 101, or have you gotten started and you're looking for more advanced tactics? Make sure the structure of the event is consistent with what you need. And when the sessions end, will the speaker be leaving you with a plan of action and an explanation of the next steps you should be taking? They should be, otherwise you can just read their blog posts.

Second, consider how much networking time is available. THIS is where the great conferences excel. Let's be honest, for most major conferences, you can eventually find at least audio (and sometimes video) for the top sessions, online. So why should you pay $1,000 for a ticket to an event when the sessions will be archived for free a few weeks later? Because paying that $1,000.00 gives you access to the speakers and the attendees. It's one thing to hear Chris Brogan's session on launching a social media strategy, but quite another to get 15 mins of his time in the hallway where he tells YOU how YOUR business should launch a social media strategy. At the last event I spoke at, Amy Africa spent over TWO hours helping me with my MackCollier.com site. That alone made the trip to Boston more than worth my time. The sessions are great, but the connections you make in the hallways are what makes the event worth your time.

Third, know why you are attending the event. Is it for business, or pleasure? South By Southwest is a wonderful event, but it's not for everyone. If you want to attend to reconnect with friends in the social media space and meet some of your favorite bloggers/Twitterers, then SXSW is where you want to be. But if you are attending SXSW looking for excellent sessions and business opportunities, your money might be better spent elsewhere.

The bottom line is that both the attendees and the conference organizers need to understand that in most cases, the attendee is going to have to convince their boss to fork over their attendance fee and all the associated travel. So this means the attendee needs to have a plan in place for how that expense will be justified, and the conference organizer needs to help the attendees make their case to their boss.

Pic of SXSW panel via Flickr user Jeremiah

Social Media Mavens - An Interview with Graco's Lindsay Lebresco

2009-07-01T08:00:00.008-05:00

Originally, I had planned on relaunching The Viral Garden today, but the migration to Wordpress/Thesis has been slowed a bit by my consulting work. There's several changes I will be making when the relaunch does happen, and I'm going to go ahead today and give you a sneak peek at one of the biggest changes you'll be seeing.

Starting today, and every two weeks hereafter, I'll be sharing an interview I've done with some of the top social media minds in the corporate world. These are people that have executed and overseen successful blogging, community-building, and social networking efforts. I want this series to be a resource for YOU, as you'll be learning from some of the top companies in the world on how to create, launch, and maintain successful social media efforts.

And I could think of no better company and person to launch this series than Graco's Social Media Manager, Lindsay Lebresco. Besides being a good friend, Lindsay is one of the top social media managers on the planet, and she and her team have created one of the most successful corporate blogs anywhere, Graco's Heart to Heart Blog. Lindsay was kind enough to answer some questions for me, and walk us through how Graco crafted their blogging strategy, how they measure their efforts, and how they craft their blog content (Graco absolutely nails 'the bigger idea' behind their blog).

MC - So many companies/organizations decide one day to start blogging, and just launch a blog and learn as they go. Is this what Graco did?

LL - Definitely not. It actually took us nearly 9 months (we tend to work in trimesters over here) to really get started in the space. We did a lot of listening to understand what kind of conversations our consumers (expectant parents and parents of young children) were having in the social web. We then matched up what we heard with our company’s goals and brand’s vision and thus our social media strategy, lead by our “corporate” blog, was born. Of course the blog is only one of the social platforms we’re engaging our consumers with but it was definitely started with the most insight and has the strongest strategy behind it. I think there’s certainly room for experimentation in social media and there’s something to be said for brands willing to take a risk to get a reward, but in my opinion, and I think most social media strategists and practitioners would agree, corporate blogging is not the place for dabbling or experimentation.

MC - So basically, Graco listened to its customers and crafted its blog content based on what you thought they would find valuable, and you and your team made sure that Graco's social media goals aligned with your company's larger business goals?

LL - That’s really it! You make it sound so easy there Mack - that actually took quite a lot of planning & time but it was the absolute right foundation to get us started. I’m so glad we took our time and got totally aligned before we jumped in- it’s proven to be at the heart of our success.

MC - As you know, I am a huge fan of what Graco has done with its blogging strategy, and as Graco's Social Media Manager, you've been a big part of that. What's your daily routine as it pertains to Graco's blog?

LL - And wouldn’t it be lovely if after 18 months I had a routine! Since the blog is published 5 days a week, it can be a challenge to create and gather content from all the folks in the organization that are a part of the blog. As you know, we have a multiple-contributor blog platform where we’ve tried to establish different voices that we feel best represent who we are as a company- which is basically a collection of passionate, talented and caring individuals who, a lot of them, are parents themselves. I work with these people to create quality content that we hopes connects with our readers and helps underscore the fact that the people behind the products at Graco are on the same journey our consumers are on or are headed on. So in that regard, I manage a team of contributors.

I also work with product teams who want to talk about new products, I work with HR who likes to showcase a little of the spirit behind Graco by posting company happenings, I work with our channel marketing teams to support our retail partners and programs, and I also personally create content that people tell me they want to hear about.

From a time breakout standpoint, I could spend an hour or more every day pulling together content, editing it, optimizing it and getting it in a format to publish- that usually happens around 5:30 in the afternoon when I realize I’ve forgotten to do it and have just promised my husband that I will be home on time for dinner.

MC - One of the areas that companies struggle with before, and even after launching a blog, is how to measure its effectiveness. What does Graco look at to decide how effective its blogging strategy is?

LL - We use a variety of methods, some of them fairly standard (how many comments, how many links, how many visitors, how many clicked through to Gracobaby.com, etc) and we also look at the engagement of our readers. Are readers coming back over time?, how often are they commenting?, is the relationship with our blog readers extending to other SM platforms of ours?, etc) SEO is certainly another measure we look at.

For instance, one of the blog posts that continually performs well in search engines and delivers a large amount of keyword traffic is a blog post written by Kim Lefko who is our Global Vice President of Brand Marketing. Her post is entitled “Top 10 Ways to announce your pregnancy” which she wrote when she was expecting her 2nd child. If an expectant mom is looking for creative ways to tell her friends and family she is pregnant, usually right around the start of her 2nd trimester, and she comes to the Graco blog by way of search, what a perfect time (when FTEs start registering for baby gear) and personal introduction we’re able to make with that consumer.

MC - Finally, what's next for Lindsay?

LL - Now this is the million dollar question! As many of our regular readers and online friends know, Graco Children's Products is relocating its headquarters to Atlanta, GA next month to be with our other sister companies and part of our corporation Newell Rubbermaid. Unfortunately I am not making the move because my roots and family are here in southeastern PA. After nearly 7 years of working at Graco, a company and brand that I passionately believe in, it was a very difficult decision to make (especially since my husband is a stay-at-home dad!). I’m exploring several avenues but my desire is to stay here in Pennsylvania practicing social media. So if your readers know of anything…

Thank you, Lindsay! And let me say that if your company is looking for someone to head up your social media efforts (especially if you are located in the Philadelphia area), then you would be damn hard-pressed to find someone more suitable to this role than Lindsay. Seriously, the results literally speak for themselves, here's some of the stunning success Graco has had in social media. In 2007 before the company launched its blog, 68% of online mentions were positive. In 2008, that number was up to 83%, and the company found that almost ALL of the additional online mentions after the company launched its blog, were positive. That's a testament to the success of Graco's blogging strategy, and please email Lindsay if you think you have an opportunity for her!

BTW you can (and should!) follow Lindsay on Twitter by clicking here. And if your company would like to be considered for a future interview in the Social Media Mavens series, please email me. Look for the next interview in this series in two weeks!

Sweet Home Alabama! Social South is ON!

2009-06-29T09:39:00.006-05:00

It's taken well over a year of planning, but the Deep South is finally going to have a social media conference. In August, the city of Birmingham will host the first Social South, a conference devoted to social media with a decidedly Southern flair. The speaker list is still being assembled, but already includes some of the brightest minds in social media:

Toby Bloomberg - Atlanta's own Diva, Toby is well-respected as one of the foremost experts in corporate social media use, and her Diva Marketing Blog has been online since 2004. She's also spoken at some of the top social media events in the country, and SoSo is damned lucky to have her.

Paul Chaney - Everyone's favorite Social Media Handyman, Paul is the pride of Lafayette, Louisiana, and Director of Marketing for Bizzuka. Like Toby, he also writes for Marketing Profs Daily Fix blog.

Jason Falls - Jason is the Director of Social Media for Doe-Anderson, one of the country's oldest advertising agencies. He blogs at Social Media Explorer and has spoken at literally every major social media conference in the nation. And to keep the Southern-ties thingie goin', he lives in Kentucky and in a previous life was a native of Birmingham.

Ike Pigott - A Birmingham native, Ike is a social media and communications expert, and one of the most respected PR voices in the blogosphere. He's also been one of the driving forces behind Social South becoming reality.

Scott Schablow - Scott is the Chief Strategic Officer for Provenance Digital Media and like Ike, is a Birmingham native and has played a huge role in getting Social South off the ground.

This is the initial speaker list, and others will be added shortly. Social South will be on August the 21st and 22nd at the Innovation Depot in Birmingham. The website for Social South is currently having the finishing touches put on it, and should be ready to go in a day or two.

Now if you're wondering if I'll be speaking at Social South, you're damned skippy I will be! And the best part is YOU decide what I will speak on! I told Scott I wanted to speak on something a bit 'edgier' than most of the conferences I speak on, but at the same time, edgy can be a total hit, or a complete bust. So I wanted to throw out several possible topics, and let you guys vote on your favorites. Voting will run through July 10th, and here's the choices:

Six Reasons Why No One Likes You Online - Building a Better Community Site

This presentation is based on this post, and six pitfalls to avoid in creating a successful community site. We'll also cover examples of companies that are doing this the 'right way'.

What Rockstars Can Teach You About Kicking Ass With Social Media

Based loosely on this post, this presentation looks at what music artists do successfully (they don't think in terms of 'customers', they think in terms of fans), and how you can use social media as a set of tools to not just connect with your customers, but excite them. This one is probably the presentation I am most excited about giving.

Five Reasons Why Your Company Blog Sucks

Based on this post, this presentation will look at five common mistakes that most companies make with their blogging efforts, and how to correct them. We'll also look at examples of companies that are creating successful blogging efforts.

This Changes Everything - How Social Media Can Transform Your Marketing and Your Business

This presentation will look at how a business and the way it communicates with its customers (and internally with itself) can be changed and improved by using social media. A bit heavier on theory (with real-world examples mixed in), we'll examine how social media can improve your marketing, and how you connect with, and understand, your customers.

Ten Steps to Helping Your Business Kick Ass on Twitter

Twitter is the hot social media site right now, and businesses are scrambling to figure out how to use Twitter to grow their business. This presentation is based on this post, and will walk you through ten steps you can use to successfully launch a presence on Twitter.

And you can vote using the poll below:

Online Surveys & Market Research

So please cast your vote, and also if there's certain points you want covered/addressed in a particular presentation, please add those in a comment or email me. Can't tell you how excited I am about this presentation, and this event. Hope to see you in two months in Birmingham!

Pic of me and Jason Falls via Beth Harte

A lil (blue) birdie told me Marketing Profs has a new Community Manager!

2009-06-24T08:44:00.000-05:00

And it's none other than Beth Harte! I'm not who deserves to be congratulated first, Beth for getting the gig, or Marketing Profs for getting Beth! So I'll congratulate both Beth and Ann Handley and the gang at Marketing Profs.

Oh and if you want to know how absolutely perfect Beth is for this position, note that The Harte of Marketing just celebrated it's FIRST blogging birthday! Yes that's right, she's only been blogging there for a year, but look at the incredibly vibrant community she has on her blog! And of course she's always been a big evangelist for Marketing Profs, so this really is the definition of a win-win situation for everyone! Here is Beth's post on what the move means to her, and why she made it.

So go congratulate Beth on her blog, and on Twitter!

Is Social Media just one big clique?

2009-06-18T09:17:00.004-05:00

I recently had a conversation with Amy Africa, and she mentioned that after she presented at the Marketing Profs B2B Forum last week, that several attendees came up and asked her if she did social media consulting. She explained that:

I think part of the thing is that you guys are so cliquey that you are often difficult to approach. Yes, even you. So people approach people like me (who know jack about social media) because well, we’re approachable.

I can't really disagree with her, and I have been thinking about this for a long time. From my personal perspective, the problem for me is that:

1 - I am an introvert offline, and an extrovert (or at least more extroverted) online

2 - When I am at an event, I assume that most people have no idea who I am, and thusly don't want to approach me

Now my fear is that my naturally being introverted and assuming most people don't know who I am, is giving the impression that I don't want to meet you. And another problem is, I am following almost 3,000 people on Twitter. I always have someone come up and introduce themselves and give me their real name and say they are on Twitter. I normally don't recognize them from their real name, and if we haven't interacted on Twitter, I probably won't recognize them at all. This is a downside of following so many people on Twitter, that I can't always have meaningful connections with everyone.

And I've talked to other people that are 'known' in social media, and I have also been around others at events when someone approaches them and compliments them on their blog, etc. I can tell you that I am always slightly embarrassed when this happens, and I have been around some of the so-called 'superstars' in social media when someone gushes about their blog, and I've seen them turn beet-red with embarrassment as well.

That's because at the end of the day, I'm just a guy with a blog. And I know that YOU guys as a group, are smarter than I will ever be. So when someone comes up to me and says "I just wanted to let you know that I love The Viral Garden!", I am so thankful, but it's also a bit embarrassing because it's like you are thanking me, when as a reader of this blog, I should be thanking you!

And honestly, this post is difficult for me to even write because it involves talking about myself. I don't like doing that, but I think this is an important topic to discuss. I do agree with Amy that some people may see several of their favorite bloggers/social media people together in a group, and feel like they can't walk over and introduce themselves. I am the same way, at SXSW this year, I literally forced myself to go up and introduce myself to Kathy Sierra after her talk. I made a complete fool out of myself blubbering about how amazing I think she is, but it was important to let her know how much I appreciate her smartitude.

So while I can't speak for anyone else, I can tell you this. If you see me at an event and want to introduce yourself PLEASE feel free to do so as I absolutely love meeting you guys. I've said this before, but the best meeting I had last year was at a conf where a reader walked up to me and said they loved The Viral Garden. It was completely unexpected, and I was so appreciative. For my part, I am going to try to make myself more accessible and approachable during events from now on.

And I don't usually do this, but if you would be more comfortable emailing me instead of commenting on this post, please do so. I want to make sure that when I am at an event, I have a chance to meet as many of you as possible. If you have any ideas on how I can make that happen, please let me know!

Pic via Flickr user David Alston

Are you registered for Inbound Marketing University?

2009-06-13T16:27:00.006-05:00

It may be summertime, but marketing/social media class is about to be in session! Next week, Inbound Marketing University will bring together a dozen of the top names in social media and inbound marketing to provide you with a FREE series of 10 classes next week (2 per day), and a final exam on Monday the 22nd. The webinars are designed to give marketing training to existing marketers as well as those inbetween jobs. You can see the class schedule here, and register for the free series here.

The list of 'professors' for the IMU is pretty robust, featuring experts such as David Merriman Scott, Chris Brogan, Lee Odden, Rand Fishkin and many more. Ann Handley and I will kick off the week-long event on Monday with our Blogging for Business session. There will also be a Q&A period for the classes. And all the classes will be archived, so don't fret if you miss one or two.

If you have any questions about our session, feel free to email me, or check out my Blogging 101 section over at MackCollier.com. See you next week!

Five reasons why your business/social media conference sucks

2009-06-11T16:03:00.008-05:00

Longtime readers of The Viral Garden know that when I speak at a major business/social media conference, I try to recap my experience to help not only conference-goers, but conference organizers as well, to help them better structure their events. With that in mind, here are five areas that the Marketing Profs Business 2 Business Forum nailed, and these are areas you should pay close attention to as you plan a similar event:

1 - You have boring, cookie-cutter sessions. Every session is a speaker standing behind a podium addressing an audience. That's a lecture, not an optimized learning experience. Now granted, some speakers can speak well from behind a podium, and this will happen often, but the point is, if every session is like this, it tends to blend together and become fairly boring.

At the B2B Forum, the MP staff was smart enough to shake it up a bit. There were interactive sessions where the audience was encouraged to participate from the start. There were hot-seat labs, where again, audience members were put on the 'hot seat'. And of course, Amy Africa closed out the event by having a Family Feud themed presentation on conversion and website design. All of this worked to spice things up, and it helped spark attention and learning.

2 - After the sessions end, so does your event. One thing Marketing Profs did that was brilliant was they had a tweetup at the end of the first day, and got 451 Marketing to sponsor it. Why was this important? Because it let a bunch of people in the Boston area that couldn't attend the event, to show up and meet everyone. This was one of my favorite parts of the conference, as I got to meet Julie Ann, Doug Haslam, Michelle Wolverton, Christine Perkett, and even Chris Brogan showed up. This also gave people that didn't attend a chance to get a taste of the experience at the conference, and I'm sure this helped sell these people on attending future Marketing Profs' events.

3 - You have boring meals. One theme that ran through the B2B Forum was expanding the event beyond just the sessions. This was evident with the Tweetup on day one, and then afterward there was a dinner which featured a wonderful group of magicians going through the crowd amazing us. Then the following morning during breakfast, the tables were organized by topic, and you picked the conversation you wanted to be a part of, and joined in. This was a great way to get everyone's brain moving before the general sessions started on day two.

4 - Your speakers leave the stage, and leave the event. This is a BIG pet peeve of mine. At many events, the speakers fly in, collect a check, and leave. If you aren't lucky enough to catch them as they are walking off the stage with your question, then you are SOL. At the B2B Forum, the attendees could not only schedule one-on-one time with many of the speakers about several different topics (blogging, Twitter, email, usability, etc), but the speakers themselves were great about spending time with attendees and answering questions. I missed lunch on the first day of the forum and so did Amy Africa. That's because she spent two freakin' hours with me helping me with the organization of MackCollier.com. I don't even want to know how much that time would have cost me otherwise.

5 - You aren't a friend of Lucky the Lobster. Ok this one has nothing to do with the conference, but my two days in Boston were capped by a dinner that featured Ann setting Lucky the Lobster free into the Boston Hahbah. Here's a pic, and here's the video Justin Cresswell shot.

But the bottom line is that when you are planning your business/marketing/social media conference, think about what Marketing Profs' did right with the B2B Forum, and try to better the structure of your event. The staff found a way to make the event more fun and enjoyable, but at the same time, this increased the learning and sent everyone home from the event satisfied. This was honestly the best business/social media conference I have been to yet, and has me even more pumped for the Digital Marketing Mixer in October.

Some pics via Flickr user Robert Collins and SWoodruff

The idea that 'content is king' in blogging is total bullshit

2009-06-04T09:38:00.002-05:00

This is one area of social media and especially blogging that has always irked me. The belief that if you create great content, you are set. That your blog will be inundated with thousands of visitors just dying to get the chance to glimpse your verbal greatness.

Give me a break.

Every day I read hundreds of blog posts. And every day, I see dozens of truly GREAT posts that get no comments. Every day I see dozens of pretty good posts that get dozens of comments and have vibrant conversations.

The difference? Most of the bloggers that write those pretty good posts are also pretty good about leaving their blog and interacting with people on OTHER sites. They comment on their reader's blogs. They tweet their links on Twitter. They are ACTIVELY social with social media.

The ones that write those great posts that get no comments are the ones that I never see on Twitter. I never see them leaving blog comments, in fact if I ever want to see them, I have to go to their blog to find them.

Many bloggers view their blog as their stage. Nothing wrong with that. But it doesn't make sense to walk behind a podium, start talking, and expect the room to fill with an attentive audience. Chris Brogan had a great post on this today (and read @KathySierra's comment), and the point he kept making is that the difference between an audience and a community is the direction that the chairs are facing. Many bloggers act as if they are addressing an audience, when they want an interactive and passionate community. This is a disconnect that the idea of 'content being king' feeds into.

Great content is NOT the king in blogging. Being social is. Remember last week when I talked about how bad many of my first posts were here? Even those posts were getting comments, and a big reason why was because the comments were coming from people that noticed my commenting on their blogs.

I know what you're thinking. 'But Mack, good content is still VERY important, and if you have good content, sooner or later people WILL find out about it'.

I agree, but here's the thing; being active in the blogosphere and on social sites IMPROVES the quality of the content you create on your blog! It gives you a better idea of what your readers are looking for, AND it exposes you to other viewpoints, which helps you solidify and strengthen your own thoughts. And as this is happening, you are also exposing your blog to other people, by interacting with them in their space.

The best way to grow your blog is to leave it. That's how you build a great blog.

Pic via Flickr user JacobEnos

First impressions: Thesis

2009-06-03T11:52:00.005-05:00

Earlier this week I announced that I had launched MackCollier.com, and I did so on Wordpress using Thesis as the template. I know a lot of you are thinking about launching or relaunching your blog, and may be considering Thesis, so I wanted to share my initial thoughts on the template.

Pros: Insane amount of customization is possible, and most of the major changes can be made with a few mouse clicks, instead of changing/editing code.

Cons: NOT for the beginner. If looking at template code scares you, you'll never get the full affect from using Thesis. Plus, it costs $87.

Bottom line: If you are comfortable tweaking your blog's code, or willing to learn, Thesis holds incredible potential for your blog as its template.

I've been wanting to relaunch The Viral Garden, and launch MackCollier.com for a while now, and I knew I wanted to have both be on WordPress when I did. Initially, I was thinking that I would wait till later in the year when I had time and hire someone to design a super snazzy template for me. But when I heard about Thesis, I really became intrigued because it apparently simplified much of the coding process, and since I knew a bit from tinkering with the template here (and wanted to learn more), I decided to go with Thesis.

And let me say up front that I think this is where the first misconception about Thesis (at least for me) comes into play. I think Thesis is viewed by many as the template that makes the process of designing your blog MUCH easier. I think it would be more accurate to say that it flattens the TOP of the learning curve when it comes to tinkering with your blog's template. But if you are a complete newbie when it comes to changing/editing a blog template, Thesis will still seem like you are dealing with Egyptian hieroglyphics at first. I remember reading the forums about getting Thesis set up on my blog (can't remember the snag I was hitting), and I saw a reply from someone that had just bought Thesis and they said 'I bought Thesis thinking it was supposed to make everything easier. It shouldn't be this hard'. I completely knew what he meant.

But if you want to quickly and easily set up a very basic blog layout, Thesis is a gem. Look at this screenshot:

It might be a bit hard to see, but that's the Thesis Design dashboard, and with a few clicks, you can change not only the size of each of your blog's columns, but even change the NUMBER and ORDER of your columns! Want 2 columns with the content column on the right? No problem. What about three columns with the content column in the middle with a width of 500 pixels with the sidebars having a width of 250 pixels? Piece of cake. This is probably the biggest area that most people want to customize when it comes to their blog's layout, and Thesis gives you the ability to change and define this in literally seconds. This alone probably makes Thesis worth the $87.

Another area that many people want to change is adding widgets to their blog. We all want to stick our Twitter and Friendfeed and MyBlogLog, etc widgets on the sides, right? Thankfully, Thesis also makes this painfully easy.

Thesis has several 'pre-loaded' widgets available for you to choose from, such as Archives, Recent Comments, Tag Cloud, etc. It also gives you the ability to add your own by adding a Text widget, then putting in the HTML code you get from Twitter or MyBlogLog or whatever site you want to add the widget for. Just pop that code in the text widget box, click Done, click Save Changes and there you go! You can also choose which sidebar you want to put the widget on, and in which order you want to have the widgets. Again, this is painfully simple.

The other area of MackCollier.com that I wanted to change was to add a header image, and this is where the trouble started. Unfortunately, this process was far more demanding than changing the layout and adding widgets. I went to the forums for some answers, and struggled to find a decent solution. And in reading the forums it becomes obvious that Thesis is geared toward the more advanced blogger. I guess that's assumed since you have to pay $87 to get the thing. But I think it can be a bit intimidating for the beginner. Here's an example of what I am talking about. I was scanning the archives for a problem I was having on getting Thesis set up, and found this solution from a member:

"Hey this is an easy problem to fix! All you have to do is edit your custom.css file, add in this code, save it and re-upload it, and you're good to go!"

Now this response makes several assumptions:

1 - That I know what my custom.css file is and where to find it
2 - That I know HOW to edit my custom.css file
3 - That I know how to add the code and re-upload it

By now, I know all of these steps, but at first I was totally clueless and had to do some serious studying. But if you are used to using Thesis, solutions like this will make total sense, but will confuse the hell outta you if you are new to tinkering with your blog's template, and Thesis. But on the whole, the forum has been very helpful to me, and all the members seem very nice and willing to help out. Even if some of them make the mistake of assuming that I'm not an idiot when it comes to some of this stuff ;)

BTW I finally figured out my header issue, this site has the answer I needed, just find out the EXACT URL for your header pic on your server, and put it in parantheses where it says YOUR_ABSOLUTE_PATH, and add the code to your custom.css file. Yeah, it sounds like French now, but if you get Thesis and start tinkering with it, you'll get it!

And this comes back to the ultimate question: Should you buy Thesis? It really depends on:

1 - How comfortable you are with editing and changing your blog's template and files associated with your blog's template, and

2 - If you are willing to learn how to do this tinkering, if you don't already know how.

I am more in the camp of I don't know that much about HOW to tinker, but I want to learn. For myself personally to improve the look and functionality of MackCollier.com and this blog, but also professionally, so I can help blog consulting clients with their blog's design.

If you want a no-frills blog template that looks decent that you never want to mess with, you can probably get what you need from a free template and be completely happy. But if you like to customize your blog's design and keep the functionality up to date with what your readers want, Thesis is perfect for you. And I haven't even gotten into Thesis Hooks, which hold incredible customization potential by allowing you to add in functional elements at different locations on your blog. Here's an example of a gorgeous blog/site that's running on Thesis. That's definitely over my head, but it shows the potential that Thesis offers, and that's a big reason why I wanted to get the template and learn how to tap into its potential.

My advice is to get Thesis. Sure it costs $87 and you'll also have to pay the associated hosting fees, but in the end it's worth it IMO to be able to customize your blog to the level that Thesis allows. And you also get updates for free as each new version of Thesis comes out. I'll likely be updating this entry later on as I become more comfortable with Thesis, but I wanted to give you my initial impressions as someone that's only been using Thesis for a week or two.

If you're using Thesis on your blog, what do you think about it, and what would you tell someone that's considering getting it?

Is social media creating one helluva mess for your company?

2009-06-02T11:55:00.004-05:00

Ms Single Mama recently left a post that got me thinking, and that should get the attention of every major company. She took her child to use the bathroom at her local Kroger, and was horrified at the condition she found it in. She took out her cellphone, snapped some quick photographic evidence, and then issued this challenge to her readers:

I have a challenge for you - because I have a bit of a rebellious spirit, if you hadn’t noticed, take a picture of your local grocery store bathroom and post it on your own blog or to your Twitter account (use your cell phone to take pictures).

This got me to thinking about what could happen next for Kroger (or any company that finds itself in a similar situation).

Bad scenario: MSM's idea goes viral on Twitter, and everyone starts posting Twitpics of horrible bathroom conditions at Kroger's around the country. #nastykrogerbathrooms becomes the top trending topic on Twitter, and Kroger finds out about this when the NYTimes calls for a comment.

Good scenario: Kroger posts in every bathroom their Twitter name, asking customers to contact them if they don't like the condition of the bathroom. Kroger then continues to monitor feedback on Twitter, and continues to improve.

The point is, your customers now have the tools to create content about you. Many have cellphones that can take pictures with them at all times. Some even can record video and stream that video INSTANTLY to the internet.

And thanks to social sites/networks like Twitter, they can mobilize and share information almost instantly. Paul created quite a stir with his Hurricane Kohls post from almost THREE years ago. That was back when most of you had never heard of Twitter. Imagine what could happen if that post had been left/tweeted today?

The bottom line is that thanks to social media, your customers can move and mobilize faster than your company can. Welcome to 2009.

Changes

2009-06-01T16:15:00.002-05:00

Hopefully you've noticed, but posts have been a bit lax here at The Viral Garden for the last couple of weeks. The reason why is because I've been working on getting my new site, MackCollier.com set up.

I've been wanting to launch this site for a while now for two reasons:

1 - I needed a better way to promote my blogging, social media consulting and speaking services. And I have never felt completely comfortable having that information here, yet at the same time, I am constantly being contacted by people that want to know IF I do consulting. So I needed a better way to let everyone know what I do, and launching a new site with this information seemed like a great way to kill two birds with one stone. Feel free to check out my prices and services for blogging and social media consulting.

2 - Over the last 4 years I have literally written well over 1,000 posts and articles about social media. I wanted a place to aggregate much of that content, instead of having it spread out over The Viral Garden, Daily Fix, Marketing Profs, and Search Engine Guide. So I've collected some of my best posts and articles and collected them in a Social Media Library on MackCollier.com.

So please check out MackCollier.com if you have a minute. It's not perfect now and there's some issues that I'll still be tinkering with in the next couple of weeks. But it's officially open for business! Please let me know what you think!

Now that brings us to The Viral Garden. As much as I have wanted to launch MackCollier.com for a while, I've also been wanting to move The Viral Garden to Wordpress, and I'll be doing that soon. But this move also got me thinking about the focus of this blog moving forward. I have always viewed the content here as being co-created between you and I. I write the posts, you leave the great comments, and the end result is content that we both created together.

So when I relaunch The Viral Garden, I am going to approach it not so much as a blog anymore, but as a community site. Because that's what I think of it as being. So with the move to Wordpress, I'll be able to add some elements/plugins (Comment Luv!!!) that will give you more of a say here, and will better promote your contributions. And I have some other ideas that will highlight readers and commenters on a regular basis. I also have some ideas for new features that will be here that will hopefully increase this site's value and keep you on the cutting edge of what's happening in the blogging and social media space.

So moving forward, MackCollier.com will be more about me, The Viral Garden will be about us. I'll be removing the tabs/pages about my consulting/speaking that are here when I switch over the Wordpress, and will be replacing that with other materials.

And BTW it can never be said enough, but I really do appreciate each and every one of you that read The Viral Garden, whether you've been reading since the first post in 2006, or if you just found the blog today, thank you. I will try my best to never take your attention for granted.

You will fail at social media

2009-05-27T08:53:00.000-05:00

I did something that made me a bit comfortable this morning. I spent about an hour or so going through the archives of this blog. I read some (many) of the posts from 2006 and early 2007, and I cringed. They were terrible. I was in complete 'this is about me' mode.

But I noticed that toward the end of 2007, the tone of the posts began to change. There were more 'here is what I have learned' and 'what do you think?' posts. When I started blogging, this was a place for me to share my voice. I blogged about what was interesting to me.

Yet as time went by, I found my blogging voice. I connected with my readers, and wanted to change how I created and presented content here. I stopped focusing on 'let me share what's important to me', and started trying to create valuable content for my readers.

But the now wouldn't have come without that first year or so. It took time for me to connect with my readers, and realize what type of content they want to read. And I am still learning and tinkering with the content and experience that I co-create with each of you. Every day I try to improve.

The point is, you will have that same period of 'failure' that I did with your social media efforts. Embrace that as your growing pains that will allow you to improve the way that you use these tools. I recently saw a TED talk from Sir Ken Robinson on children and creativity, and I've embedded it below. He made a wonderful point that children don't fear being wrong. They will 'make a go of it' even if they aren't sure what the 'right way' is. But he suggested that as we grow older, that we become fearful of being wrong, and I think he's mostly right.

When you start blogging, or you start using Twitter, you will 'fail'. You will make mistakes, and these mistakes will be incredible LEARNING experiences for you that will help you move forward.

Embrace your failures with social media. They are the key to your future successes.

Time is running out to register for the Marketing Profs B2B Forum!

2009-05-21T15:14:00.003-05:00

Next month I'll be back on the road, conducting special one-on-one blogging sessions at the Marketing Profs B2B Forum in Boston. We first did this at the Digital Marketing Mixer that Marketing Profs had in Scottsdale last October, and they were very popular, so I'm happy that Marketing Profs has asked me to do them again next month.

Since this is Marketing Profs event, the program is top-notch, with speakers from top companies such as IBM, Cisco and Forrester, along with top stars in the social media space, such as Valeria Maltoni, Greg Verdino, Beth Harte, Ann Handley, Peter Kim, KD Paine, Chris Penn and Jay Baer.

And for those of you that still need to register, you can get a special $200 discount off registration by clicking the picture above (Disclosure - That's an affiliate link). Marketing Profs' conferences are very well-run and always receive rave reviews from attendees. I'm hoping you'll get to attend, and if you want to reserve a session so I can discuss your company's current or potential blogging strategy, please do that when you sign-in at the event.

Finally, I apologize to everyone for the lack of posts in the last week or so. I've been very busy with client work and a couple of projects that I'm very excited about, and will hopefully be able to update everyone next week on what I've been doing.

The Viral Garden's Top 25 Marketing & Social Media Blogs - Week 141

2009-05-13T10:40:00.003-05:00

Here's the standings for Week 141:

1 - Duct Tape Marketing - 132,000 (+1,000)(LW - 1)
2 - Church of the Customer - 121,000 (+1,000)(LW - 2)
3 - CopyBlogger - 58,739 (+2,551)(LW - 3)
4 - Web Strategy by Jeremiah - 23,440 (+2,264)(LW - 5)
5 - Chris Brogan - 23,121 (+715)(LW - 4)
6 - Logic + Emotion - 13,896 (+487)(LW - 6)
7 - Search Engine Guide - 13,592 (+679)(LW - 7)
8 - Daily Fix - 9,882(+424)(LW - 8)
9 - Influential Marketing - 9,470 (+610)(LW - 9)
10 - Drew's Marketing Minute - 6,995 (-238)(LW - 10)
11 - Conversation Agent - 5,098 (+316)(LW - 11)
12 - Jaffe Juice - 4,716 (-53)(LW - 12)
13 - Social Media Explorer - 4,646 (+400)(LW - 14)
14 - The Viral Garden - 4,257 (+183)(LW - 13)
15 - Being Peter Kim - 4,097 (+156)(LW - 16)
16 - What's Next - 4,096 (+89)(LW - 15)
17 - Debbie Weil's Blog - 3,844 (+126)(LW - 17)
18 - Converstations - 3,673 (+207)(LW - 18)
19 - Techipedia - 3,112 (+35)(LW - 19)
20 - Brand and Market - 2,929 (+283)(LW - 20)
21 - The Social Media Marketing Blog - 2,777 (+104)(LW - 21)
22 - Techno Marketer - 2,332 (+62)(LW - 22)
23 - Greg Verdino's Marketing Blog - 2,267 (+36)(LW - 23)
24 - Emergence Marketing - 2,207 (+17)(LW - 24)
25 - The Social Customer Manifesto - 1,913 (+40)(LW - 25)

The Top 25 Marketing & Social Media Blogs are ranked by the number of subscribers, according to FeedBurner. The number you see after the blog name is how many subscribers accessed the blog's feed, according to FeedBurner. FeedBurner (and I had to look it up to make sure) tracks the number of times your blog's feed is accessed, and matches it against the IP address of the computer making the request, to approximate the number of subscribers that access your feed, and report this as the number used in the Top 25. After that number is a positive or negative number, and this represents how many readers the blog gained or lost from last week's Top 25. The final stat tells you what position the blog held in the Top 25 Last Week (LW). If you see this; (LW - UR), it means the blog wasn't ranked last week.

Welcome to this month's edition of the Top 25 Marketing and Social Media blogs. One advantage of doing the list once a month is that we can more easily spot trends. Such as, 23 of the 25 blogs gained subscribers in the last month. This is a good sign that blog readership, at least among the more 'popular' marketing and social media blogs, continues to expand.

As far as moves, Jeremiah leapfrogged back in front of Chris Brogan to reclaim the #4 spot, and I thought that SEG had a big month. Past the Top 10, Conversation Agent and Social Media Explorer continued their hot streaks.

Remember if you want to have your blog be considered for inclusion in the Top 25, make sure you add the Feedburner feed count chicklet to your blog. And if you redesign your blog, make sure to keep the FB chicklet on there, or I can't track you for the Top 25.

Next update is next month.

How to write great blog comments

2009-05-11T11:06:00.005-05:00

One of the best ways to grow your blog, is to leave it. What I mean by this is leaving comments on other blogs is a great way to create value for others, and ultimately grow awareness for your own blogging efforts.

But not all blog comments are created equal, and here's some of the tips I've learned over the years for writing great blog comments:

1 - Add something to the conversation. Often I will read a post and think 'wow, great post!' But go past that, highlight issues that the blogger addressed, and add your own take. You don't have to agree completely, and you don't have to stick with their point. If one example they mentioned reminds you of another instance from your own experiences, mention that. But try to avoid simply repeating what others have said. And this is easier to do when you...

2 - Comment early. Sure it's nice to let a few people comment first, so then you can build off what they say, as well as the blogger's post. But what if you wait too long and everyone has addressed the points you wanted to raise? And for well-trafficked blogs like Chris Brogan's or Liz Strauss', each post can get dozens of comments, and not everyone will read down if your comment is #37 of 54.

3 - Don't over-promote yourself. @garyvee says that the only link you are ever allowed to share in a comment is the link you get in your name that's hyperlinked back to your blog/site. I tend to agree with this stance, because the fastest way to honk off a blogger, is to leave a comment on their blog, that's really just a commercial for you. You've seen them, the comments that say 'This is a great post, thanks for sharing', then proceed to add 5 lines of bio/site links. Don't be 'that guy', remember that you aren't leaving the comment to promote yourself, you are trying to create value for the blog by adding to the conversation. If you've done your job, you'll get promotion as an indirect result of your efforts.

4 - You can disagree, without being disagreeable. I might be a bit different from some in how I approach disagreements in the comments section, but I love it when readers disagree with my posts, and challenge my points. The biggest reason why, is because when you bring in alternative points, that extends the conversation and gives more people a chance to jump and leave their point of view.

However, always remember that it's ok to 'attack' the ideas, but not the people presenting the ideas. Challenging stances and ideas are fine, but personal attacks add nothing to the conversation, and make you look like a jackass. Not what you want. Feel free to disagree, but don't be disagreeable.

5 - Ask questions. What if you find a post and agree with the post, and everything the commenters have said. Now what? Why not ask a question or bring up a point that no one has raised yet? One thing that often happens, especially on blogs where the writer is very popular, is that the readers may all agree with the writer. Why not offer a contrarian view and bring up the other side of the issue? Again, this helps extend the conversation, and you might find that others will then chime in saying that they agree with your point of view.

6 - Know why you are commenting. Are you leaving a comment to draw attention to yourself, or to add to the conversation? As with most everything else in social media, blog comments work best as a way to INdirectly promote yourself. Write a comment that others find value in, and that encourages others to check out your blog, follow you on Twitter, etc. Write a comment that was clearly intended to promote your blog, and you will likely gain nothing, and hurt your reputation.

These are some tips I have learned from my own experience in writing blog comments. What did I miss that works for you?

Pic via Flickr user Bohman

Case Study: Citi uses Social Media to promote Citi-Forward Webcast

2009-05-07T12:33:00.002-05:00

I’m often asked about how I work and what type of projects I like to be involved in. I recently had the opportunity to participate in a campaign with TMG Brand Communications, and it’s a great example of how a thoughtful social media strategy can get executed well. Tami McCarthy got in touch with me about one of the social media projects she was working on, in this case for Citi. She told me that the plan was to kick off the campaign with a pre-launch webcast for media-only (which she invited me to), and that once the program officially launched a week later, other key components of the communications plan were a Twitter page, YouTube Channel and marketing program with MySpace. It was exciting to see that Tami and her team were creating a comprehensive social media strategy for Citi Forward, and I was happy to be involved. I was also pleased that her team had actually done some research and had picked specific social media sites/tools that they thought would help Citi best communicate with their target audience, instead of just 'doing everything' as many companies will do when they launch a social media strategy.

Tami and I discussed who would be ideal participants in the webcast, and I’d like to share the background on how this unfolded, particularly the use of Twitter, as I think it could help many of you with similar efforts. I think the strategy to first target “influential” people to be involved in the webcast, as well as those that were targeted to help promote it on Twitter is a good case study worth mentioning.

The webcast was going to be a way to educate the 'media' and viewers about the structure of a new credit card program that Citi was about to launch, the Citi Forward program. The program itself has some pretty unique features (such as lowering APR for consecutive on-time payments), so Citi wanted to give everyone a way to learn more about the program, prior to its launch, which would come the week after the webcast.

The webcast would include Terry O'Neil, the Executive V.P of Citi Cards, a moderator, and 3-4 panelists. The structure of the program is such that it is geared to appeal to young adults, ranging from Gen Yers and college students to those with young families, so it was important to include panelists that were familiar with these audiences, as well as people that understood the value of sound financial planning, which is a core focus of the Citi Forward program. The webcast wasn't going to simply be a commercial for the program. Sure, Citi wanted to explain the structure of the Citi Forward card, but they also wanted to create educational value for the webcase audience, by having them submit financial planning questions to Terry and the panelists.

I've blogged about this before, but I think many companies target the wrong 'influencers'. Traffic and subscribers are great, but you need to be very mindful of reaching out to people that are actively engaged with their readers, and those that seem to have developed an affinity with the people that read their blogs and followed them on Twitter. In short, for the Citi Forward webcast, Tami wasn’t looking necessarily for the 'biggest' or those with the highest number of subscribers to their blog, but for the people that were the most connected to and respected by others. That denotes true 'influence' to me.

The chosen Citi Forward webcast moderator was Chris Penn. Chris was absolutely perfect for this role, as he works for the Student Loan Network, and co-produces the Financial Aid Podcast. In addition, he's one of the most influential people in the social media space, and co-founder of Podcamp. Another consideration for choosing Chris was that since he's constantly speaking/being interviewed, that he would be completely comfortable handling a live webcast, and he was.

The panelists (who would be joining the webcast via conference call), were myself, Ramit Sethi, The Silicon Valley Blogger, and Rebecca Thorman. Each of other three panelists are well-respected in social media circles, have vibrant and active blogs, and are well versed in the financial wants and needs of Gen Yers and even early thirtysomethings. This group is in touch with the exact group that Citi wanted to connect with for their Citi Forward program.

Tami and her team at TMG also had a steady stream of dialogue with financial bloggers to alert them about the webcast, but a small group of people on Twitter were also targeted to help get the word out about the webcast.

One of the biggest mistakes that companies make is in making bad pitches. Often times, the first time I hear from someone that pitches me, is when they pitch me. That almost ensures that I won't promote whatever it is you're pitching.

For my part, I only contacted seven people on Twitter to ask if they would help me promote Citi's webcast. These were all people that I consider to be close friends, and it should also be noted that I almost never ask people to RT something for me on Twitter. I emailed each person a PERSONAL email sent ONLY to them. Sending a form letter is another fast way to kill your pitch.

Of the seven people I contacted, 5 agreed to help me promote the webcast on Twitter. My friend Lisa even RTed the link to the webcast three times, and both she and Shannon asked her followers to please RT it! So five out of seven people agreed to promote the webcast on Twitter for me (and one of the people that didn't later told me that they were flying when I emailed, and they didn't see the request until hours later). That's a 70% or so response rate, which is probably a tad higher than most agencies get for their pitch requests. But again, this worked because I had developed relationships with the people I reached out to, and I rarely ask for help like this. In fact everyone that helped me even answered my email and told me they were happy to help. And it should be pointed out that these five people had between 4,000-15,000 followers each at the time of the webcast. So they are connected to and respected by a lot of people.

The morning of the webcast, I also live-tweeted the lead-up to the event, and we encouraged people to send questions for the panelists via Citi_Forward's Twitter account. I gotta admit that it was pretty cool hearing Chris read a question to Terry about program that had come from Twitter.

So once all this is boiled down, what were the results? The end result is that the webcast exceeded its goal for media registrants by 100%. If you want, you can still view the webcast here.

What if everyone you know was on Twitter?

2009-05-06T12:19:00.002-05:00

Think about that for a moment. What if you had a way to quickly and easily contact EVERYONE you know, in a centralized location. And it doesn't have to be Twitter, the point is, we could be heading toward a near future where we can get near instant access to most people.

How would that change your life? I've been thinking a lot about this recently, especially when I consider that in many ways, my community is on Twitter. Many people could say the same thing, or maybe theirs is on Friendfeed, or Facebook, or another site.

But what if everyone in our towns were using social media? Right now, my Twitter community is spread out over the country, even the world. Yet I'm thinking if 'everyone' was on the same social site that I was, that my community would migrate toward being more localized. That it would be easier to have tweetups locally, and make more local connections.

And as I'm thinking about this, I'm thinking of the implications for businesses, especially small businesses who thrive on local customers. Right now they might look at social media and really not be excited about the potential, because their customers ARE local. But as we move forward, and as more people start using social media, it could be a great way for most small businesses to reach local customers. People like Jason Falls and Shannon Paul are already talking about how the definition of social media could and perhaps should be broadened to include communication tools like the telephone. Think about how the world change when most everyone was given telephone access in their homes.

How would it change again if most everyone could use social media to connect with each other? That day may never come, but I think we will be closer to that point as we move forward.

Anyway these were some thoughts I had swirling around in my head that were really more than 140 characters. I'd really like to get your thoughts. What would the world look like if the majority of people were actively using social media, and could easily connect with each other? Or is that a future we even want to see? What do you think?

Selling Social Media to 'The Man'; #blogchat recap

2009-05-04T10:41:00.003-05:00

Last night was another great #blogchat conversation, this week we discussed how you can convince your boss/company to start using social media. So many of you had great suggestions that I wanted to capture them here and share your ideas:

1 -Mattceni: buy-in comes from confidence. you need to build confidence. small wins is how we did it

2 - _djh: For us it was small steps also. Printed quartery newsletter -> on-line newsletter -> blog -> other SM

3 - tamera: do your research. provide alignment with basic business needs and prove how the value can be extended into social channels.

4 - thebrandbuilder: 1. Show them that SM can have measurable impact on the organization's success. Demonstrate that there is real ROI.

5 - thebrandbuilder: 2. Help them understand specifically what the risks associated with SM are, and address them.

6 - DavidSpinks: First figure out what the company's goals are, then show how social media can help them reach those goals...

7 - deirdrereid: It doesn't hurt to show what yr competition is doing and what you may lose by now participating. Risk of Ignoring

8 - Tojosan: getting your boss involved in social media? #blogchat -> I'd say give him a crash course, inside the walls, perhaps Yammer?

9 - MackCollier: I agree I think the easiest way to get your company blogging/using social media is list poss objections & counter

10 - matthewray: Education on how to social media tools and who can use them; need to know good and bad case studies

11 - stevecunningham: How about this: find somebody they admire/respect who is also using it for their company. Get them to talk.

12 - jonnew: Also it is important to give them examples of other similar companies and the success those companies are having.

13 - justincresswell: many think it is play time, time waster, don't see the ROI since they're seeing it with old eyes. they need allegories.

14 - TamarahLand: identify the company's target audience and show them how that audience uses social media to find and buy products/services

15 - andrewmueller: Expain that you will use SM show your customers that you care, and give examples of how you would do so

16 - Teeg: What do they want? Show how sm can help meet their wants whether it's getting the word out to group or communicating one on one.

17 - mattceni: one way to show value of sm is bring up Twitter Search (summize) and just let them see the tweets about your brand. eye opening.

18 - amymengel: It's easier to convince a co. to jump in with SM if its customers are using it; if they're not, it's a much harder sell

19 - katebuckjr: RT @thebrandbuilder Understanding the client's immediate needs is crucial. You don't want to "sell" SM. You want to integrate it.

20 - glecharles: Social media emphasizes tools over results; establish a clear goal, then show how tools can help achieve it. No magic bullets.

I'll stop there, since there were literally over 800 tweets during last night's #blogchat. Another great conversation, and if your company has successfully integrated social media into your communication efforts, how did you get your boss to commit? For those of you that have run into resistance, what objections to social media are your bosses offering?

And remember, #blogchat is every Sunday at 8pm CST on Twitter, anyone and everyone is welcome!

Five reasons why your company blog sucks

2009-04-30T09:53:00.002-05:00

You've been blogging for your company for a while now, but the effort is going nowhere. You have little traffic, and other than the time you replied to your own post, you've never gotten a single comment. You feel betrayed for buying into all the hype about blogging and social media and are convinced that it's all a buncha overblown crap.

Of course there's another option, that you simply have a crappy blog. Here's five signs that your company blog sucks:

1 - You use your blog as a billboard. Billboards are pretty and everyone loves them...in Times Square. Your blog isn't in Times Square, so don't treat it as an 'in your face' promotional tool. Don't use your blog as a tool to promote yourself, use it as a tool to create value for your readers. Tap into the 'bigger idea' behind why your customers buy your products and want to interact with your company. Patagonia does a good job of this by having The Cleanest Line focus on environmental issues and activism, instead of their products.

And the payoff? If you position your blog properly as a tool to create value for your readers, then they will promote your blog to others. So your blog ultimately DOES become a promotional tool for your company, but not if you attempt to promote it directly. Go the indirect route.

2 - Your don't answer or encourage comments. Who needs comments when you have the right keywords targeted in your posts, right? Groan. The great thing about a blog is that it gives companies the ability to get feedback from their customers. Why wouldn't you do everything possible to encourage and promote this feedback from your customers? This is a great way to get insights into what your customers want from you and your products/services.

Encouraging and acting on comments from your blog's readers is also a great way to positively promote yourself among bloggers. This helps raise positive awareness of your blogging efforts, and that ultimately reflects well on your company. If you are having trouble deciding how your company should handle comments, the Air Force has created a wonderful flowchart that simplifies this process.

3 - You rarely have new posts up. What's your posting pattern? If it's 'whenever I get a chance', then you're in trouble. You have to 'train' your readers to let them know when you will have new content up on your blog. Write a set number of posts each week, and publish them on the same days. If you can only do 2 posts a week, try to run them on the same days, such as Tuesday and Thursday. That way, your readers will know that they should check your blog a couple of times a week to see your new posts. And yes, if someone subscribes to your blog this isn't an issue, but you can't assume that they will.

Get your posting on a pattern, and stick with it. If you can only post once a month, then make it the same day every month(and please try to post more than once a month).

4 - Your blog has little or no pictures, and is visually boring. We are visual creatures. We want to see bright and pretty pictures. And, believe it or not, we want to see what the people writing your blog look like. Trust me here, if we can see your picture, that makes it easier for your readers to connect with you, and ultimately trust you.

Look at HomeGoods' OpenHouse blog. Pictures everywhere. Of the bloggers, from customers, of the company's products. Visually, this is a gorgeous blog.

5 - Your blog creates little to no value for your readers. This usually ties back into point #1. Most blogs spend too much time promoting themselves, and not enough time creating valuable and relevant content for their readers. Always look at your blog and ask the question 'why would anyone give a damn about reading this?' If you can't immediately answer that question, then you have problems. Kodak doesn't blog about their cameras, they blog about helping you become a better photographer. Graco doesn't blog about their products for parents, they blog about parenthood. Think about the type of content people would want from your blog, think about what the 'bigger idea' is behind your products and services.

So there's some suggestions for making your company blog less sucky. If you want to see how the very best blogging companies are doing it, check out my list of the Top 10 Company Blogs.

Pic via Flickr user mynameispaul

What are your three biggest Twitter moments?

2009-04-29T08:00:00.002-05:00

I love speaking/teaching about social media at events where the attendees are relatively new to this space. And that's because they have 'fresh eyes' and a fresh perspective on these tools and always ask the most amazing questions. Yesterday at Social Media Club Birmingham's workshop, Daniel Rehner asked me 'What are the three biggest things you've seen on Twitter?'. I had to think about it for a minute, but here's the three biggest 'Twitter moments' I gave him:

1 - Twitter users reporting live during the Mumbai terrorist attacks last November. Twitter members that lived in Mumbai were able to give the world unfiltered and uncensored accounts of what was happening, as it happened. I remember @conniereece was helping put everyone in contact with Twitter users that were local to the attack sites, and I believe she shared that someone had created a way to show only tweets from Twitter members that lived within a 5-mile radius of the attacks.

2 - Twitter scoops mainstream media on San Francisco earthquake. Another case where Twitter broke a live news event first. Last month, a relatively mild 4.3 earthquake struck San Francisco, and almost instantly, Twitter users were tweeting it. And then it became a sort of game to track the time of the first tweet about the earthquake, and then see how long it would take a mainstream news source to report it. I think it took about 10 mins, which isn't bad at all.

3 - David Armano raising $16,000 to help Daniela. This was a classic example of the potential of social media to mobilize many people to help the few. David reached out to his network on Twitter to help them raise some much needed funds to help Daniela and her family, who were living with David's family at the time. The goal was to raise $5,000 in a month, and I believe almost $17,000 was donated by 545 people in a little over 24 hours (David if you read this and that's wrong, please correct me).

Those were the three I thought of when Daniel asked me, but what are the three biggest Twitter moments for you?