Strong writing is at the core of every strategic communicator’s skill set.
In this episode of “Over Lunch,” aiellejai’s Chief Content Architect Angie Jennings Sanders explains why she decided to launch the company as a content creation consultancy instead of a public relations firm. “That way, we can serve our clients directly or we work with PR firms to lighten their load,” she said.
Fast Company published “The Social Media Road Map” in their September 2012 issue—the one with The Office star Mindy Kaling {@mindykaling} on the cover looking like a sexy geek. I curled up in bed with a batch of homemade trail mix (dry roasted almonds and dried banana chips and cranberries) to see where this map would take me. So here are my key takeaways from these 19 interesting yet far from mind-blowing pages that paint the picture of social media’s current landscape:
Share with us: Did you read Fast Company’s “The Social Media Road Map”? Was this truly a road map for you? What new information did you learn from this piece?
This post is the first in a series of five posts discussing ideas presented in Fast Company’s “The Social Media Roadmap” section (September 2012 issue).
When I tell people about aiellejai and the services we provide, they’re often surprised to see me sitting in the audience at some social media panel discussion sessions. I like to attend these sessions to understand why people come, what they’re hoping to learn and to hear the questions asked. This helps us keep gauge the pulse of our market and develop products and services to best serve them.
I find that people who attend these sessions fall into three camps:
Do I need to set up a Facebook page?
These are the individuals or business owners who are new to social networking and how to use it to their advantages.
Why am I on Facebook or Twitter?
These are the people who are looking for strategy for participating in the social media space.
How do I measure success and how do I ensure results?
These are the people who are already maintaining social media presences in some sort of strategic way and are looking for ways to evaluate the success of their time and effort.
Most of the people I meet fall between camps two and three. But as they ask their questions and get good answers that still leave them scratching their heads, I suspect that these answers would be clearer to them if they had the following three elements in place:
A clear business model: Some of us business owners—especially those with service-based businesses—aren’t totally clear about the services we provide or the value of these services to our clients or customers. For example, aiellejai usually takes the standard, hourly-rate approach to our service offerings. We recently had to take an objective look at our business offerings, what services were most popular and how to create other products that will best serve the needs of our existing and future customers.
A laser-focused description of their ideal client or customer: When I ask potential clients who their ideal client or customer is, they often say things like, “small businesses,” or “nonprofits.” It’s especially tricky to identify specific demographic information about your ideal client or customer if you run a business-to-business company. However, when you’re marketing your services, most likely there’s one type of person or one point of contact who you’re trying to attract. Work on identifying who that person is, what they look like, what their challenges are and any other information you can think of that will help you see your clients as individual people instead of whole companies. Visualizing your potential clients/customers this way will help you market to them specifically.
An overarching communications/marketing strategy: Some business owners are having a hard time wrapping their brains around social networking because they aren’t clear on how to reach their audiences outside of the social media space. Once you establish clear communications and marketing strategies and goals you’ll then be able to understand how to use social media engagement—along with other tactics—to reach these goals.
Share with us: How does your company’s communications/marketing strategy influence your social media engagement? How do you define and measure success?
How many seminars or other related sessions with classroom-style seating do you attend in which you sit down, listen to the panelists and leave without meeting any of the other attendees in the room.
Perhaps after the session, you rush the front of the room like everyone else to meet the presenters and exchange cards, but do you mingle among the rest of the people who came to get the same information you did?
Classroom-style seating flips a switch in our brain that focuses us only on learning from and meeting the people talking at the front of the room. Although we leave with some valuable information, we may be leaving behind a great chance to network with others in the room who we can potentially work with and partner.
Last Wednesday, I attended the Community Business Partnership event, “Social Media Marketing Made Simple” session at Teqcorner. Like everyone else, I’d visited the refreshments table, grabbed my complementary sesame seed bagel and bottled water and took a seat between two other women.
After a few minutes, Juli Monroe {@1to1discovery} of 1 to 1 Discovery appeared at the front of the room to tell us to get off our butts, move around the room and meet each other. She encouraged us to introduce ourselves to at least two other people in the room and ask the question: “What can I do to help you achieve your goals before the end of the year?”
And what do you know? We all got up and did what Juli said. I just happened to be sitting between two smart business owners. Veronica owns a professional organizing business and wanted to know more about affiliate marketing and publishing an e-book. Elia is launching an online resource for people who are dealing with parents with dementia. She wanted resources for marketing her new business venture. Within a few minutes, I was able to point the women in the direction of information that could help them both. And of course these women are be ideal clients for me.
When the session began to start, Veronica said, “Oh, we didn’t get a chance to ask you how we could help you achieve your goals!” But just by talking to both women, I’d gotten clarity on a few products aiellejai is launching in the coming months.
The next time you attend a seminar and are sitting in a room filled with other smart and motivated people, take Juli’s advice and introduce yourself to at least two of them. Ask them how you can help them achieve their goals. You’ll probably be pleasantly surprised by the conversation’s outcome.
Twist, the novel I self-published in 2008, rattled around in my head for at least three years prior to me even putting pen to paper. The road to publishing became harder with each step but slowly, I took those steps that sometimes seemed impossible to me.
I wrote the first draft. Re-worked the draft, hired an editor to complete the final draft, secured print and design vendors and finally produced the finished piece.
I thought the hard part was over, but I had no idea that the real work was yet to come.
The biggest lesson I learned when I self-published is actually rule number one in product marketing: before introducing a new product, you should have a market that’s ready and willing to buy. By the time I learned that hard lesson, I’d done only a handful of book shows and had run out of marketing dollars.
Seth Godin suggests that we authors begin marketing our titles at least three years before the publication date. Yes. You read correctly. Three years. “Three years to build a reputation, build a permission asset, build a blog, build a following, build credibility and build the connections you’ll need later,” he wrote in his 2006 blog post.
This makes total sense. Your audience is constantly bombarded with messages. It’s your job to get your audience to know you as an author and/or thought-leader well in advance of your publication date. In other words, your audience should be paying attention to you long before you begin selling this final product.
The same principle not only applies to self-published authors, but also the authors with any kind of deal from a publishing house. You can’t depend on your publishing company to invest fully in your marketing—especially if you’re not a top-tier author. Once your book is published, the clock on its shelf life begins to tick. If you wait until then to market your book, then your book will be old news by the time you start to see an ounce of momentum.
It’s been four years since Twist became available for purchase. Did I sell millions of copies? No. Did I get discouraged? Yes. Did I learn a lot? Absolutely. I’ve just begun to tinker around with my second novel. But this time around, I’m definitely looking for ways to decrease publication costs—I’m considering an e-book over printing—and increase my marketing budget. And before I complete the rough draft, my audience will know that this novel is coming—in the next three years.
Share with us: Are you an author? How soon do you begin marketing your books? If you’re a first-time author, what are some key components to your marketing plan?
Shantel, my 16-year-old niece, asked me if I had a job. Why did she ask? Because she noticed that during her visits, I’m usually free to hang out with her on any given weekday.
First, I explained to her that with careful planning, I’m able to get my work done in advance so that I’m free to spend time with her. Then I explained to her that I don’t have a job. I run a company. I’m an entrepreneur. Her uncle—my husband—is too.
We pay life taxes to be able to hang out when family comes to visit, run errands during the middle of a weekday and not have to adhere strictly to the normal 9-5 hours. These life taxes include economic hills and valleys, unrelenting ambition and a willingness to work when everyone else is asleep.
In June, as part of their Startup Month, Forbes.com sponsored a questionnaire from Kauffman FastTrac to test entrepreneurial aptitude. Kauffman FastTrac helps aspiring and established entrepreneurs start and grow companies.
The test, which is by no means scientific, confirmed that I was an entrepreneur. I was pleased. Out of the 22 questions on the questionnaire, five stuck with me the most:
Q: I can prosper in an environment with many questions and few answers.
My Answer: Average
Even when I was a part of the 9-5 world, my career was filled with many questions and few answers. Being an entrepreneur is no different. Although I’m afforded more freedom to find answers to those questions my way, the stakes are a bit higher because I call the shots. I answered “average” because I sometimes get frustrated at first when I don’t have the answers. But I have to remember that it may take a while, but the answers are usually revealed in their own time.
Q: I can hang on in hard times and recover quickly.
My Answer: Needs improvement
This element is especially important, especially given the current economic climate. I answered “needs improvement” because I still work on managing my expectations and realizing what I have control over and what I don’t.
Q: I take responsibility for my own success.
My Answer: Strong
I come from a poor family and from a rural town. So whatever success was coming to me was going to be up to God and me. I’m a firm believer in “God helps those who help themselves,” and I try to do everything I can to help his plan for me along.
Q: I can do the tasks necessary to succeed, whether pleasant or unpleasant.
My Answer: Strong
While I was pregnant with my daughter, I embarked on a cold-calling campaign for aiellejai. I bought a list that didn’t have all the contact information I needed. I performed Google searches to update the entire list—more than 2,000 entries—and locate the communications and marketing staff I needed to reach.
Q: I provide for my own needs with little support from others.
My Answer: Strong
Although I answered this question with “strong,” aiellejai reaches out to outside content creators and other vendors as our client needs dictate. My answer pertains to the day-to-day operations and client-facing activities.
Take the test and let me know how you fare. Are you an entrepreneur?
Fox hit the airwaves in 1986 with only one show, The Late Show, hosted by Joan Rivers. The show tanked after only one year.
The network regrouped and attacked prime time with shows like Married with Children and The Tracey Ullman Show. They added one show each week for the next few weeks. Fox struggled along but now, after 16 years, it’s legitimate in the eyes of the viewing public. However, it’s still the butt of many jokes because of its gang of failed programs.
So why is it that we—myself included—expect Oprah to accomplish with OWN in just a few months what it took Rupert Murdoch years to do with Fox?
On March 28, I wrote a post about Oprah’s obvious problems with OWN, but after watching the first five minutes of Oprah Builds a Network part one, which aired on July 8 on OWN, the media mogul’s honesty and candidness set me straight.
“No one will ever understand what it took to do that last year… and while at the same time trying to build a network…” she explained. “I can honestly say that I wasn’t committed to the network because I was committed to [The Oprah Winfrey Show].”
Oprah’s name precedes her, and that often makes us forget that she’s human, just like us. One person making the leap from producing a one-hour television show to a 24-hour network is seemingly impossible effort. Her admissions during this show were the first we’d heard her utter about how tough this feat has been to pull off—even for her. “In this particular instance, being Oprah was a great asset and a detriment because it raised the bar and expectation for this little network beyond anything that I was capable of doing on my own,” she said.
She went on to say that she and her team were nowhere near ready to launch OWN, but media hype and public expectation propelled them forward. Oprah sounded as if she regretted launching with such a bang and not being able to build slowly and see her vision come to fruition.
“I wanted to move forward with the network in a way that would be progressive and that would be thoughtful and that would be innovative and that would be inspiring,” Oprah said. “That was my vision. None of that happened.”
At a dinner party, Lorne Michaels, writer and producer of Saturday Night Live, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon and 30 Rock fame, put things in perspective a bit for her.
“This thing you’ve taken on is huge. It’s big,” he said to her. “And nobody wants to see you sashay from the set of The Oprah Winfrey Show into this new business and everything go okay. You’re going to have to pay your dues. You’re going to have to learn the hard way. And you’re going to have to use the word mother*$ker a couple of times.”
Michaels also advised her to physically position herself on or somewhere very close to the network to ensure her vision is executed properly.
Here I am trying to run a little company and I’m judging Oprah for launching an entire television network. And for that, I’m sorry. She’s encountered programming hiccups and Twitter gaffes along the way, but what’s important to note about Oprah is that she keeps going. That gives me motivation to keep pushing along with my miniature endeavor in comparison.
Set your DVR to catch the replay of Oprah Builds a Network parts one and two on Sunday, July 22 from 6-8 p.m.
Five months before my 31st birthday in 2010, I launched operation 30 x 31, a personal mission to lose 30 pounds by my 31st birthday. I’d read that I should tell everyone about my decision to keep me accountable, but I work best when I keep my plans closely guarded. If I fail, no one is the wiser. If I succeed, everyone is caught off guard by my triumph.
I gave up what I referred to as FCS—fries, chips, and soda. (I actually chanted in my head: “NO fries! NO chips! NO soda!) I tracked my eating online with Weight Watchers. And I worked out no less than three times a week. I’d also read that it takes 21 days to start a habit. Once I’d gotten through one month of my mission, I figured I was home free.
By the time I turned 31, I’d lost 25 pounds. I eventually hit my goal of 30 pounds a month or so later.
I was reminded of this goal a few weeks ago while talking with a woman I met at the April Executive Women’s Roundtable luncheon in Tysons Corner. She explained to me that her colleagues saw a need to start a company blog, but no one had the time to devote to it. Blogging, like weight loss, has also been a lingering mission taunting me to accept its challenge. Once I saw the parallels between both goals, I was able to apply the same nuggets that helped me lose weight to maintaining a blog.
Determine a blogging frequency that’s reasonable for you.
One reason why resolutions to lose weight fail is unrealistic goal setting. Don’t say, “I’m going to hit the gym every day this year.” Because you won’t. And when you don’t, you’ll feel bad for not hitting that goal—a goal you were destined not to reach. When I started working out, I told myself that if I could get in the gym twice a week, then I’d be winning. I began there and eventually added one or two more days. You’ll catch the “experts” saying you should blog every day, but you should start with a weekly goal that’s reasonable for you. With my blog, I set the same goal that I set for my exercise. If I post twice a week, then I’m winning.
Be consistent.
With any goal, only a few stand by to cheer you on. But a whole heap of folks wait patiently for you to fall off. If you tell yourself you’ll post to your blog twice a week, try to post on the same days each week. Once you get into your rhythm and you have readers checking for your posts on those days, you won’t be the only one noticing that you’re winning!
Keep your blog in the forefront of your mind. Always.
Just like I chant to myself, “NO fries! NO chips! NO soda!”, I’m constantly thinking about my blog while reading anything online, while watching TV, and while in conversation. Blog topics pop up in everyday life. You just have to recognize them and assess their value.
Plan blog posts ahead of time.
A physician friend recommended James Orvis’s Weight Training Workouts that Work instead hiring a personal trainer to encourage me to pick up a dumbbell. I’ve worked through volume one twice and am starting volume two. If I work out four times a week, then I’ll focus on cardio two days and weight lifting the other two. Plan your blog posts the same way. When ideas pop in your head, jot them down. Write 10 or more blog posts even before you launch. This head start will buy you time to think of and write 10 more posts. You want to prevent that weekly “What will I write about?” internal struggle.
Keep yourself accountable.
Now that I’ve gotten accustomed to exercising throughout the week, I beat myself up a little when I don’t. You want to have this same feeling about blogging. Remember, there is a hater(s) waiting to take pleasure in your flaky blogging. Don’t give her the satisfaction.
Reward yourself.
Weight Watchers is designed to give me a cheat day once a week if I choose to use it. And if I work my points just right, then I get little cheats throughout the week. You should reward yourself, too! What will you allow yourself to do or have if you put in a whole month’s worth of consistent blogging?