A couple months back, I was trying to decide what I should pitch to the  Northern Voice organizing committee for a workshop this year. I’ve been a presenter at NV since 2010 (note the orange “Bloggable” shirt from that year), and it’s always fun to try to come up with new ideas that will appeal to our local, grass-roots, blogging community.

I was in the middle of teaching a module on analytics, so I sent an email to Kazia (who is super smart about analytics) and asked her if we should pitch that as our workshop.

We did, and were accepted, and yesterday, we presented!

I love presenting at NV. It’s such a warm, home-town crowd, and I always love hanging out with the local Tweeps.

Jetpack is great for everyday analytics, but Google Analytics gets you deeper.--@kaziamullin
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Here’s our presentation:

I just came back from teaching a social media bootcamp in Powell River last weekend to a bunch of what were primarily visual artists.

I love introducing new tools to people. I know Instagram has been around for a couple of years already, but this group was pretty new to it, so it’s always exciting to see people light up when you give them new, creative tools.

For me, I use Instagram as a way to share a “slice of life.” Many people say to me (about social media in general), “who wants to follow me? I have a boring life. I have nothing interesting to share.” But the truth is, people are interested in your life. We are fascinated by what goes on behind the scenes. Especially artists–for much of the rest of the world, our creative process is a bit of a mystery.

So, Instagram is a wonderful way to share what’s happening (via visuals) in your life–I call them “random moments in my travels”–a moment of beauty or inspiration or irony or silliness. On any given day on my feed, you’ll see photos of where I am, food I’m eating, or people I’m with.

One quick note on best practices: when it comes to Instagram, don’t post 4 or 5 photos in a row (it’s called “bleeding the feed”). Make sure your posts are spread out over the day, with time in between, and they shouldn’t all be similar images.

Now get out there and take some photos!

I was away teaching a social media bootcamp all weekend, so I have a guest post for you today.

I was never a fan of the cocktail party-variety networking scene. I will never be one to dart around a room shoving business cards into people’s hands. I prefer meaningful conversations with people, getting to know them and vice versa.

ashraful kadir via Compfight

But social media networking? That’s something different altogether. Done right, it’s never a hit-and-run. Rather, it consists of building relationships over months and even years by sharing information – both professional and personal – through posts, comments and responding to questions in various online communities.

What’s the return on investment, the ROI, for putting that kind of time into social media? Actually, it’s called the RON – the “return on networking.”

And for me, it’s huge.

I’ve been on Facebook for five years; I also have Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn accounts, among others. All totaled, I’m now approaching 100,000 friends, followers and connections. Those followers expose my name and message to their audiences every time they “like” one of my posts or share one of my links. Recently, someone re-tweeted something I’d shared on Twitter – he had 130,000 followers! That’s a potential audience of 130,000 people I likely would have never reached otherwise.

Talk about exposure!

Who knows how many of those people may someday become my clients? Who cares? I’ll still consider the exposure a good return on networking. Here’s why.

The RON of social media isn’t always tangible, not immediately, anyway. By establishing a continued presence online through regularly sharing content of use to my followers, I’m building my platform and my reputation as an expert. That grows in surprising ways – and it lives in surprising places.

A recent case in point: Late last year, I got a call from a prominent New York City hair stylist, the director of a salon in one of that city’s premier department stores. He wanted to talk about some publicity needs and what my company could do to help him.

When I asked how he got my name, he explained he’d written some books over the years with a co-author, and she’d heard me at a speaking engagement.

Well, that made sense. Speaking at conferences is still a great way to get your name out while also building credibility.

But the next thing he said came as a complete surprise.

“So, then I contacted the corporate office (of the department store chain) and asked what PR agency they would recommend.” And they recommended me and my company!

I don’t know a soul in the corporate offices of that high-end retail chain. I can only guess they learned of me through social media.

Just being on Twitter or Google+ isn’t enough, of course. You have to make a diligent effort to regularly post content that people find valuable, including links to informative articles, tips relevant to your topic, and/or informed insights on topics in the news.

You also have to “be a human,” as our lead social media strategist, Jeni Hinojosa, likes to say. She and our other social media producers encourage clients to send photos when they go on vacation, celebrate milestones or engage in hobbies. Posting those photos with a comment adds a personal touch that allows followers to connect on a more emotional level.

Our social media producers also make sure clients’ personalities shine in their posts, showing their sense of humor and letting followers in on the other things they care about, whether it’s victims of a natural disaster or a favorite charity.

Interaction is equally important. Strive to respond to every comment or question posted on your networking sites. Interacting is engaging, and people who are engaged tend to be happy followers. The more you take part in conversations via comments and responses, the more lively and visible your presence becomes.

The RON includes increased traffic to your website; increased trust in your brand and what you’re selling; and greater word of mouth than you could ever hope for by attending a cocktail party or even a speaking engagement.

 Marsha Friedman is a 23-year veteran of the public relations industry. She is the CEO of EMSI Public Relations (www.emsincorporated.com), a national firm that provides PR strategy and publicity services to corporations, entertainers, authors and professional firms. Marsha is the author of Celebritize Yourself and she can also be heard weekly on her Blog Talk Radio Show, EMSI’s PR Insider every Thursday at 3:00 PM EST. Follow her on Twitter: @marshafriedman.

I went to this cool productivity conference a couple of weeks ago, hosted by Steve Dotto. Lots of good speakers and information.

Productivity is a big issue for most of us. We don’t have enough time in the day to get done what we need to get done, so how do we make the most of our time to get things done??

My business runs on email. That might surprise you, knowing that a great deal of my business is about social media. And it’s true–I spend a lot of time on Facebook and Twitter, and writing blog posts. But when it comes to rubber-hits-the-road paid work? It’s happening on my email.

When you’re self-employed, and you don’t have a boss breathing down your neck and saying “did you get that thing done I needed you to get done??” there’s an extra layer of responsibly.  If something doesn’t get done, I only have myself to blame. So, I have systems in place to make sure I don’t miss anything.

Stéfan via Compfight

Here’s how I manage my inbox:

I go through and sort every single email in my inbox about every 24 hours. This is a system I put in place about 3 years ago after reading David Allan’s Getting Things Done. I wrote about the system I have here and very little has changed in the last three years! The main difference is that now I use gmail instead of Apple mail. I made the transition after getting an iPhone. I didn’t want to have to deal with syncing, etc., and because gmail is a web-based email program, I always have access to it, and it’s always up-to-date. It just works better for me than a desktop program.

I only use my phone for “email triage.” I love my iPhone. But I’m not a fan of returning emails on it. It’s small, it’s hard to type on… I don’t have easy access to my files. So I use my iPhone to check my email, but I only respond to emails that are urgent and require an immediate response. Otherwise, I wait until I’m back at my computer.

Boomerang stuff that you need to deal with later. Every day, I have to set priorities -what tasks am I going to focus on finishing today? I’m the kind of person that works better under a deadline, so often if a project is deadline-driven, it’s going to move up the priority ladder. If the deadline is next week, I use a tool called Boomerang to re-send me that email closer to the day.

Disconnect from your social networking and turn off your chat. For me to really get things done, I need to focus and minimize distractions. Dissertations like… oh, the latest cute cat video, or getting engaged in a conversation with a friend online. It’s really easy to do–it happens to me all the time. Think of Facebook as a reward for getting your work done.

For more great info an tips on managing your time and being more productive, check out Mike Vardy’s The Productivityist.

What’s your favorite “email, you will not defeat me today!” tip?  

Last monday night, I joined a big crowd of fellow WordPress enthusiasts at The Elephant and Castle in downtown Vancouver to celebrate WordPress’ 10th Anniversary. It was the local chapter of an international celebration.

Photo by @robertdall

I’ve been using WordPress for almost 6 years, and it’s irreplaceable to me. This blog/website is a self-hosted WP site, designed for me by Janet Baxter. I also have a WP-hosted site for my personal blog.

I love how easy it is to use, and I love how they are constantly tweaking and improving the UI, and adding new features. Even people who aren’t that technically adept can build professional-looking sites without too much grief.

So, I’m very happy for the role WordPress has played in my business and life!

In keeping with the theme, I have an infographic for you today of the top 30 WP Plugins. Plugins, for me, are the thing that really makes WordPress stand out above all the other blogging software out there. Because it’s open source, third party apps are constantly being developed and improved, and that rocks.

Which ones are your favorites? (note: these are for Self-Hoste WP only)

Share your favorite WordPress Plugin (on this list or not) in the comments section below.

“ This infographic is courtesy of WP Template and Designed by graphs.net

I have a quick but fun tip for you today: how to create a Facebook Cover from your Instagram photos.

If you’re like me, you’re probably pretty obsessed with Instagram. As a marketing tool, I feel like it’s a great one to use to present a “slice of life” experience to your fans–what kinds of events make up a day in your life? You can get a snapshot into my life by following me at instagram.com/rebeccacoleman.

There’s a cool little tool that allows you to take your last 50 Instagram photos and to create a perfectly-sized Facebook Cover image out of them. Here’s how:

1. Go to Statigram.
2. Log in using your Instagram credentials.
3. In the main navigation menu, click “Promote.”

4. Scroll down the page until you get to the option “Profile Cover.”

5. Click the big blue button that says “Create Your Cover.” Let the program do its work.
6. Once your image has been generated, right-click on it to save it to your desktop.
7. Log into Facebook.
8. Go to your profile. When you hover over your Cover image, you’ll see a box that says “change cover.” Click it.

9. Select “Upload Photo.”
10. Choose your newly-generated FB Cover image from wherever you’ve saved it to, and click “Save Changes” once it’s uploaded. You’re done!

Statigram, by the way, is a really cool little free program that also allows you to:

• see a rundown of your Instagram stats
• create an Instagram tab for your business page
• create a photo gallery widget for your WordPress (or other) blog
• create “follow me” buttons
• …and much more.

Let’s go old-school for a bit. Despite the 1 billion people on Facebook, and the half a billion on Twitter, and the 4 billion hits that YouTube gets every day, the #1 form of social communication in the world is still email.

So, if you’re like me, you probably send and receive hundreds of emails a day. Every email that you send, a fresh, new one, or a reply, is an opportunity to have the receiver connect with you via social media. If they know how to find you on social media.

It’s a form of lead capture–let’s say someone emails you to inquire about your products or services. You email them back. At the bottom of your email is a spiffy email signature that lists all of your social networks. They think “oh, hey! I’m on LinkedIn, I’ll connect with them on LinkedIn,” or they’ll “like” your Facebook page. You’ve now increased your ability to communicate and win this person over as a customer or client by two-fold (that’s assuming that you are keeping your social networks active and interesting).

Everyone should have an email signature. No matter what email program you’re using, be it a computer-based, desktop program, or a web-based program, all of them support signatures. 

Here are a few of my favorite ways to create a professional-looking email signature:

Build your own: you need to know/understand a little html for this method, but it’s really not that hard. Check out this video:

WiseStamp: is an add-on for your browser that works well with web-based email.

They allow you to create really elegant email signatures. One of my favorite things about WiseStamp is that they give you the ability to stream RSS feeds–so you can include in your signature, your last blog post or YouTube video. My pal Steve Dotto explains more about the  tool and how to use it.

V-Cards: Although V-Cards are Microsoft-based (meaning they work best if you are using Outlook or one of MS’s deskstop email programs), they are very cool, and quite useful. They are probably the closest thing to an electronic business card you can find. You can attach them automatically to each email you send, and then people can add you automatically to their contacts with one click. You can also send them to other people, if you want to share contacts. V-Cards are built into any MS desktop email program, or check out V-Card Maker.

Vizify: This is a cool little web-based program that allows you to create interactive online infographics. You can create a little signature to attach to your emails, that, when people click on it, it takes them to your page. Here’s mine: www.vizify.com/rebecca-coleman. And here’s what the email signature looks like:

Here’s one last bonus tool for you.

Rapportive: is, again, like Wise Stamp, a browser add-on. It works a bit like a reverse lookup of an address or a phone number. When you get an email from someone, it displays, in the right-hand margin, all of their social networking. Here’s what Steve Dotto’s looks like when I get an email from him:

Cool, right?? You can actually connect with the person and follow them or send them a friend request right in the margin of your email.

Do you have a favorite email signature tool? Share it in the comments section below.

A couple weeks ago, I got an email from Amber over at Vancouver Mom, letting me know that someone (Susan??) had nominated me as one of the top mom bloggers in Vancouver.

I thought there might be some confusion, because I don’t really consider myself a mom blogger. Yes, I’m a mom. And yes, I’m a blogger, but I don’t often blog about being a mom. The contest is open to anyone who is a mom and blogs, no matter what the topic! More than 60 bloggers were nominated, and out of those, 30 were chosen to compete in the final contest. And I’m one!

I love what I do. I love being a blogger, and I love supplying you guys with social media and marketing tips and tricks twice a week here on The Art of the Business. I love sharing my culinary adventures with you on Cooking by Laptop. I don’t need to win a prize. But it is really nice to be nominated, and to be included in the ranks of some really great bloggers.

Do I use a ghostwriter?? I’ll never tell!

Thanks to Vancouver Mom for recognizing me. And if you do want to vote for me (I’m so not the type to bug you every three minutes via all of my social networks to vote, so you’ll likely only hear this from me once or twice before the voting closes on June 10), you can do so here.

You can vote for up to three bloggers per week, during the two weeks that the voting is open.

Thanks for the love! I’ll be back tomorrow with our “regularly scheduled programming.”

I have a cool infographic for you today on what are the best and worst times to post to your social media channels.

This, of course, has to come with a caveat: each business is different, and you have to figure out what time is the best time for your business. You do this by experimenting. Create an excel spreadsheet where you lay out your posts for the week, and make sure you schedule them at different times on different days of the week. Then have a look at your analytics and see how each post did. You also have to bear in mind that different kinds of posts are probably going to perform better than others–like photos perform better than plain text status updates on Facebook.

It also depends on what kind of business you run. Many B2B businesses, for example, find that posting during the week, and during office hours can be quite positive, while many B2C businesses don’t post on the weekends, but could get a spike in traffic if they did so.

A second tip: in order to take advantage of high-traffic posting times, there are tons of options out there that allow you to pre-schedule your tweets or posts. You can use Facebook’s scheduling option, or a dashboard program like Hootsuite.  I often take advantage of Hootsuite’s “Autoscheduling” feature (I like Buffer for this, as well), but if you want complete control over when your tweets go out, you can schedule them for specific times. Just remember, auto-scheduling is for information-sharing only. You can’t load up a week’s worth of tweets and then log out. You still need to check your @mentions and reply to your tweets.

As of this moment, there are no built-in scheduling features for LinkedIn (although you can connect LinkedIn to your Hootsuite dashboard) or G+, but there is a cool little app called Pingraphy that allows you to schedule pins.

Now, off you go. Time to get nerdy with a spreadsheet.

In one of my other (many) lives, I’m a food blogger, and I was recently assigned to write a piece on restaurants with great patios. I reached out to several of these restaurants via Twitter, and was surprised at the amount of time it took for them to respond, or the entire lack of response from a few of them.

Facebook, but Twitter especially, are becoming excellent customer service tools–I would argue, even more so than the phone (but this is coming from a girl who uses her phone only to text, tweet, and check her email).

Many businesses I work with are still somewhat reluctant to jump onto the Twitter train, especially. They are afraid folks will say something bad about them, or they’re afraid they’ll need to be connected to their device 24/7 just to answer people’s questions. The truth is, people are going to talk about you. I think it’s better to know if it’s negative, so that you get the opportunity to turn it around. And when it comes to customer service, quite simply, above everything else, people just want to be heard. Acknowledging them often solves 80% of the problem.

Today, I do an interview with Chuck Wall, author of Customer CEO: How to Profit from The Power of Your Customers (Bibliomotion, April 2013). You can download a free chapter here, and I’ll be giving away a copy of the book at the end of this post.

RC: How has the social media revolution affected how businesses dealt with negative feedback in the past?

 CW: In the good old days (before social media), if a customer had a bad experience they were at the mercy of someone, anyone, at the company that might take the time to listen and do something about their complaint.  This is why proactive companies like Nordstrom and Ritz-Carlton stand out; so few others made “high touch” customer service a competitive advantage.  Many companies have just figured “why bother? There are plenty of new customers to take the place of the complainers.”  But now, in this mobile social era, the customer has the immense power to tell many others about their experience in real time.  Companies that don’t take the time to really understand this shift in power are simply kidding themselves.  Today’s customers have many choices and they will be gone in a flash unless quickly helped.     

 RC: Many businesses I work with are terrified of social media for this exact reason. “What if someone says something bad about me?? ” How would you respond to that?

 CW: You are so right. I have heard this many times over the last few years from all types and sizes of companies.  In fact, in the book, I list the eight main reasons leaders have told me they want to avoid social media at all costs.  They are:

• It’s a fad.
• There’s no ROI.
• It will only damage our brand’s reputation.
• We lack the time and/ore resources to do it right.
• We can’t control the message.
• We’re afraid of making mistakes.
• Our staff lacks experience.
• We don’t really care about what they are saying.

 Of course, we know this is short-sighted and counter productive.  The dam has burst and many companies are underwater now.  The longer they wait to catch up, the harder it will be to swim back upstream.  Meanwhile, competitors that understand the importance of social commerce, will gain a tremendous and decisive competitive advantage.

RC: 




How has social media changed the way that businesses are handling customer service?

 CW:  The smart brands have embraced new tools to allow them to listen 24/7 with “listening posts.”  For example, I think JetBlue is doing an exceptional job using Twitter to build rapport with their passengers on good flight days and bad flight days.  They use humor to connect and this helps build a reservoir of good will.  Others, like United, have been slower, and often seem somewhat detached from the conversation.  Interestingly, legacy brands like Hertz (who have not used social media proactively) have recently jumped in with both feet.  They are moving much of their real time customer service response to Twitter. They have finally figured out that it’s good for both parties in that it’s a fast and efficient way to solve customer problems…and build goodwill in the process.

 RC: Finally, do you think that people are starting to abuse this power? I tend to mostly post positive stuff. If someone really pisses me off, I’ll try to get some satisfaction, but for the most part, I like to use my “social media super powers” for good. Do you think people are getting too cocky with this “superpower?” or is it just a few bad apples?

 CW:  Yes, like everything, social media does have it’s bad apples.  I call them “customer vigilantes.” These folks are on some kind of search and destroy mission and I think brands would be smart to “fire” them.  Make them someone else’s problems.  No one likes a bully and that’s what is happening in some of these cases. However, my research shows that they vast majority of people are too busy; they just want a resolution to their problem as quickly as possible.  

RC: Thanks, Chuck! Follow Chuck on Twitter @customerceo.

To be entered into a draw for Chuck’s book, Customer CEO: How to Profit from The Power of Your Customers, tell me, in the comments section below, either:

• an example of someone you know who has used social media as an effective customer service tool

Or

• how your business is utilizing social media as a customer service tool

I’ll do a random draw from all the comments in a week, on May 22.