Tag Archives: writing

Permalink to Brands Are Taking Social Media In-House. Is it Only a Test?

Brands Are Taking Social Media In-House. Is it Only a Test?

by Angie Sanders|on February 10, 2013 |in Content marketing, Social Media |tagged , , , , , , , |2 Comments

social inhouse credit searchenginelanddotcomPatrick Coffee with Mediabistro’s PRNewser is noticing a trend of large, well-known brands taking their social media engagement efforts in-house.

“The sneaker king {Nike} isn’t the only company to take a greater degree of responsibility for its own social media efforts in recent months,” Coffee writes. “Competitor Reebok conducted an internal audit of all its social channels after rejecting contract offers from agencies, and Digiday reports that other big names like Ford and Campbell’s Soup have done the same.”

So should contract public relations and digital strategists be worried about this trend? Not exactly.

In a Utopian society, all brands would handle their social networking and community management in-house. After all, who knows the company’s voice better than the staffs themselves? Unfortunately, this isn’t always practical.

Expecting all companies to handle social media engagement internally is like expecting them to handle all writing, public relations and advertising in-house. And that’s just not going to happen. Most of the time, it’s these entities that give and develop companies’ voices and make them resonate with customers.

Smaller brands will continue to struggle with this dilemma. On one hand, they may not think they can afford to outsource their social media efforts. But because they’re balancing social networking with the other daily tasks it takes to run their businesses, engaging customers and other audiences via social media will always suffer.

The big brands like Nike and Reebok are testing the waters and appointing internal teams to handle social media—and they have the budgets to do so. The question are going to be how large are these teams and how is the work being distributed among the members.

In a previous post, we talked about how a small, internal digital team could benefit from outsourced support. This is a prime example. An internal digital team at Nike or Reebok might be able to handle company-wide social media efforts on its own, but what happens when the needs of the company grow or when individual product lines within the company require their own social media management? Will this team be able to scale with the needs of the company and keep abreast of technology that seems to change by the second?

Successful social media engagement requires strategy that aligns with company goals, consistency, awareness of the latest trends and execution. Situations like these are the prime reason why we developed our Monarch product. The packages cover the smaller organization that’s just looking to get its feet wet using social media all the way to the more sophisticated and technologically savvy company that’s looking for a customized solution.

Coffee says that “insiders worry that this industry-wide shift will eventually bring PR/marketing firms’ profit margins down as brands hire more internal social media managers and outsource fewer and fewer tasks.” Only time will tell how permanent this shift will be.

In the meantime, he points out that Nike never said it was planning to “sever ties with all third-party firms.”

Share with us: Does your company outsource its social media engagement or is it looking to bring these duties in-house. If your company manages its social media internally, do you think the support of an external team could benefit your efforts?

 

monarchMonarch is our content marketing and community engagement support product—a resource that backs you up and leaves you to free to do the job you’ve always done successfully. Monarch breaks engagement efforts into four packages that allocate set hours per month for content creation, community building and engagement. When you choose the package that works best for you, you know exactly what you’re getting per month and how much you’re paying for it.

Permalink to (Over Lunch) Blogging: Reading is Fundamental

(Over Lunch) Blogging: Reading is Fundamental

by Angie Sanders|on February 5, 2013 |in Content marketing, Social Media |tagged , , , , , , |Leave a comment

OL-bloggingReading and consistency are both critical to maintaining an intelligent blog. In this week’s episode of “Over Lunch,” Chief Content Architect Angie Sanders explains how reading industry news and the blogs of other thought-leaders helps her generate ideas for the aiellejai company blog. Check out her “old-school” method for digesting and interacting with the vast amount of online content she consumes.

Permalink to What Content Management Systems Should be Today

What Content Management Systems Should be Today

by Angie Sanders|on February 4, 2013 |in Content marketing, Social Media |tagged , , , , , , |Leave a comment

content management credit arnimadotcomWhen you hear the term “content management system” what comes to mind? Probably a web-based system that allows you to log in and manage your company’s website content using a WYSIWIG editor. This editor looks similar to a Microsoft Word document and provides you text editing tools and options for adding links and graphics.

Systems like this gained popularity when everyone was concerned about having a nice website. We all still want websites that are aesthetically pleasing and make it easy for visitors to find the information we want them to consume. But in the past few years, the word “content” has taken on a new life.

Now, content is not limited to the pages on your company website. It includes written content you share via social media, whether it’s actual tweets, statuses or links to PDFs or other pages you share. It includes short videos you’ve shot in-house. It includes slideshows packed with actionable information. It includes the email communication you send out to your customers.

Where is all this content being stored at your company? On an office-wide shared drive? And when you’re creating a piece of content—say a white paper or annual report—how do you control versioning? How do you manage and differentiate the document changes your communications director gave you from the edits your vice-president of marketing provided?

And taking our thoughts of content one step further, how are you tracking how this content is distributed? How do track which segments of your audiences received which pieces of content?

In a business world where the term “content” has not only catapulted in importance but has varied meanings, the technology we use to manage this content must adapt.

In a recent blog post, Marketing Consultant and Coach Jeff Bullas listed 10 characteristics of the ideal “social media at scale technology.” The first two characteristics—one repository and database for all content (including video) and the ability to plug into cloud-based video platforms—are also important for any standard content management system.

See Jeff Bullas’ blog post and his entire list of the perfect social media at scale product.

Share with us: Do you agree with Jeff’s assessment that we’re 2-3 years away from seeing the type of product he describes in his blog post?

retaingo logo

 

 

 

We’ve seen a mad dash toward social media marketing, but did you know that 35 percent of marketers still use direct mail to stimulate sales? Ninety-seven percent of businesses use email marketing to convert subscribers to buyers. More than half of business owners are even interested in sending text message reminders to their customers. To a consultant, a client campaign that encompasses direct mail, email, text and social media can be a tall order. You’re going to need at least four different web-based systems and a small tanker full of time to get it all done, right? Not so fast.

esolutions360 (aiellejai’s parent company) is seeking beta testers for RetainGO, a new automated marketing campaign solution that allows you to manage all four of these tactics within one web-based system. Beta testers get exclusive access to the software and use of features prior to release. They also provide feedback to shape a product that could ultimately help streamline their business processes. Beta testers’ monthly usage fees are waived. For more information, call (703) 229-6249 or email info@retaingo.com.

Permalink to Why Auto-Tweeting Blog Content is Completely Okay

Why Auto-Tweeting Blog Content is Completely Okay

by Angie Sanders|on January 27, 2013 |in Social Media |tagged , , , , , , |Leave a comment

Let us start by saying that auto-tweeting blog content is completely okay, but there are some purists out there that frown upon automatically and repeatedly sharing “old content” on Twitter.

Okay, what are we considering “old content”? Unless our blog content falls into the TENS category—time, event or news-sensitive—we let it live for months. When we’re compiling research for an industry-specific e-book or white paper, we stick with content that’s been written in the past year, but of course, we’ll take a more recent article or blog post over one that was published earlier in the year.

The reason we, along with everyone else, auto-tweet our blog content is because the Twitter sphere is a never-ending vacuum of content. When you look at your timeline, you’re only capturing a snapshot of all the content the people you follow have published. Auto-tweeting ups the chances that our content will be seen by more members of our audience.

So which auto-tweeters irritate us the most? Two types: people who auto-tweet the same content every 30 minutes and people who do this without any other engagement with their followers.

The top three functions Twitter serves for us is sharing content, consuming content and interacting with others. Although I can see why some are annoyed by the auto-tweet function, sharing content automatically doesn’t take the place of engagement.

What suggestions do we have for bloggers and other content creators on how to use the auto-tweet function correctly? First, continually evaluate your content. The auto-tweet tool you use should allow you to pull posts from the rotation. Remember the TENS rule—any content that’s time, event or news-sensitive should probably be taken out of rotation a few weeks to a month from its original publication date. Or else your audience will be wondering why you’re still talking about that when they’ve clearly moved on to the next hot story.

Second, you should continue to share content that provides how-twos and strategy. If there have been any updates or changes to the advice you’ve given, write an update post, link back to the original post, but replace the original post with the new post in your auto-tweeting rotation.

Third, Twitter isn’t a set-and-forget medium. Read others’ content and share it. Ask them questions. Respond to others’ questions to you. Thanks folks for re-tweeting your content. And follow through on your social media strategy.

Wait, you do have a strategy, don’t you?


Share with us: Do you auto-tweet content? How do you decide which content to continually share?

 

Read 6 Myths Blocking Your Social Media Engagement, our special report that addresses misconceptions that are keeping your company from investing time into tools that will can help increase two-way communication with your customers—current and potential. Print this report. Read it on the train ride home. Highlight key points. Share it with your colleagues. And please, jump in the social media marketing game and get started.

 

Permalink to Over Lunch: PR firm vs. Content Creation Consultancy

Over Lunch: PR firm vs. Content Creation Consultancy

by Angie Sanders|on January 24, 2013 |in Content marketing, Just good business |tagged , , , , , , , , , , |Leave a comment

orgin-of-aiellejaiStrong 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.

 

Permalink to How to Use Content to Build Thought Leadership in 6 Steps

How to Use Content to Build Thought Leadership in 6 Steps

by Angie Sanders|on January 21, 2013 |in Content marketing, Just good business, Social Media |tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , |Leave a comment

thought leader credit damiencummingsdotblogspotdotcomAt a Washington Network Group entrepreneurs roundtable event last Wednesday night, speaker Angelique Rewers, also known as The Corporate AgentTM used two terms during her talk that caused some audience members to look at her like she’d sprouted eight arms: Content marketing and thought leader.

She explained that content marketing involves creating and distributing relevant and valuable information to attract, acquire, and engage your target audience and lead them to a desired action. “You want to be a thought leader,” she said.

“But the challenge is how do you provide good content without giving away all your strategy, right?” asked an audience member.

You may remember that I wrote a blog post a while back that reassured you that you can afford to give away some of your ideas without fearing that a potential client will run with them and never give you or your business a second thought.

The keys to content marketing and framing yourself and others in your company as thought leaders are to: 1. Give your audience simple information that they can either act on right now or that answers pressing questions and 2. Plant a seed in the audience’s mind that you and your company are the leading authorities on this subject.

Face it. If your audience doesn’t get this information from you, then they’ll perform a Google search and find someone else who’ll give them the answer.

Business owners think that being a thought leader means that you have spout Confucius-like, life-changing tidbits that no one else is close to even thinking about. If you can do this, then congratulations. But there’s not much new under the sun. It just has to be new to your audience.

So here are six steps toward establishing yourself and your team members as thought leaders online.

  1. Think about the pillars on which you operate your business.
    What are your company’s top business offerings? Why do you offer these services? Why should your audience come to you for these services?
  2. Define who you’re serving with those pillars.
    This is an important one. Who is your audience? Who usually buys the services you offer? Be very specific with this description. What do these people do for a living? What do they look like? What do they read? Even better, identify actual points of contact at your client organizations and use them to create a detailed profile of your target audience for each of your services.
  3. Determine what questions your audience asks.
    When potential clients approach you, or your ears perk up after meeting a potential client, what is it that they’re seeking? What problems do they tend to come to your company to solve before they become a client? What are their pain-points?
  4. Consider how you can help your audience answer these questions quickly and the best ways to present the information.
    Now that you’re familiar with your audience’s common questions and pain-points, how can you address these in succinct and interesting ways? Should your company start a blog? Which team members should contribute? Perhaps you should begin shooting short videos? Is there information that could be presented in infographics? Do you have PowerPoint presentations that you can upload to Slideshare?
  5. Create an editorial calendar.
    This step is tricky, but helpful. Determine all the channels through which you’d like to share content (blogging, video, e-books, etc.). Then create a calendar that details when these items will go live and be available to share. For example, you may decide that your company will publish four blog posts and create four short videos per month, release one e-book per quarter, and curate content via social media on a daily basis. Your editorial calendar should provide a brief description of subject matter for each piece of content, estimate when each will be completed/posted, and how all content will be shared.
  6. Be consistent.
    I realize that we live in an instant-results kind of society, but this process takes time. Be consistent with your content creation. Monitor what kinds of content resonate best with your audience and keep giving them what they want.

Share with us: How do you define thought leadership? How are you using content to raise your/your company’s professional profile in your field?


Read 6 Myths Blocking Your Social Media Engagement, our special report that addresses misconceptions that are keeping your company from investing time into tools that will can help increase two-way communication with your customers—current and potential. Print this report. Read it on the train ride home. Highlight key points. Share it with your colleagues. And please, jump in the social media marketing game and get started. 

 

Permalink to 5 Ways to Distribute Social Media Responsibilities Among an Internal Team

5 Ways to Distribute Social Media Responsibilities Among an Internal Team

by Angie Sanders|on January 14, 2013 |in Social Media |tagged , , , , , , , |Leave a comment

team credite onemillionskatesdotcomWorkflow management is crucial to any social media team supporting a small-to-midsized organization, including yours. A team of four or five people maintains all your organization’s social media accounts, but small tasks can accumulate and overwhelm. Just like your communications team, your social media team needs the support of all departments to succeed.

Which team member handles which social media account(s)? How will the team get content to share? What are the ground rules for speaking to journalists through a social media platform? These are all examples of important questions that need definite answers so that your organization’s social media strategy is deployed effectively.

Here are five ways that your internal social media team can distribute work among the group and execute your organization’s strategy seamlessly:

Designate department social media liaisons.
If your team handles organization-wide social media engagement, then they’ll need content from just about all departments to provide your audience(s) with a composite picture of your organization’s work. The team should work with these departments to designate at least one person within who will flag shareable content and funnel it to the team.

Set deadlines.
Department liaisons should be clear about when and how often the social media team needs content. The amount of content to be shared will be left to the departments’ discretion. However, if those staff members care about the visibility of their work, then this shouldn’t be a problem.

Divvy up social platforms.
Your social media team should be assessing their workload and making clear determinations on which team members will be responsible for what. Maybe your organization holds multiple Twitter accounts, so two team members may split those and handle an additional two or three other social media accounts each.

Revisit the social media guidelines document with department liaisons.
Your social media team should review this document with department liaisons so that they understand how content is shared, what content is appropriate and how the team responds to a variety of situations like speaking to members of traditional media, customer complaints and negative comments.

Create a workflow diagram.
Your department liaisons know their deadlines. Your social media team has split responsibilities among team members. Department liaisons and the social media team are clear on engagement guidelines. Now it’s helpful to diagram the workflow so that an easy-to-understand visual exists of how content moves from department staff to your audience(s). This diagram will also help your team see and correct holes or stumbling blocks in the workflow.

Share with us: What techniques does your social media team employ to obtain and share content? What roadblocks do you encounter and how do you overcome them?


Read 6 Myths Blocking Your Social Media Engagement, our special report that addresses misconceptions that are keeping your company from investing time into tools that will can help increase two-way communication with your customers—current and potential. Print this report. Read it on the train ride home. Highlight key points. Share it with your colleagues. And please, jump in the social media marketing game and get started. 

 

 

 

Permalink to Over Lunch: The Origin of “aiellejai”

Over Lunch: The Origin of “aiellejai”

by Angie Sanders|on January 8, 2013 |in Just good business |tagged , , , , , , |1 Comment

orgin-of-aiellejaiWhen people see our company name on our business cards, we can tell by the looks on their faces that they have no idea how it’s pronounced. It’s A.L.J.  Pretty simple, right?

So how did we come up with this name and why is its meaning so important to us? To launch our new, biweekly short video series, “Over Lunch,” our founder and Chief Content Architect Angie Jennings Sanders breaks the name aiellejai down to the syllables. 

 

Permalink to 4 Things to Consider Before Opting for Multiple Social Media Accounts

4 Things to Consider Before Opting for Multiple Social Media Accounts

by Angie Sanders|on January 6, 2013 |in Content marketing, Social Media |tagged , , , , , , , |Leave a comment

IMG_2190Right now, you’re working on either crafting or revamping your company’s social media strategy. Among the many details you’ll need to work out is whether or not individual divisions within your company should start their own accounts.

The company engages (or plans to engage) audiences on roughly 3-5 platforms.  Sure, there are tools out there that will help to manage a number of accounts across multiple social media platforms, but agreeing to the idea of each department holding its own account(s) could still compound your workload by 5, 10 or 20. Saying no could affect your company’s diverse messaging.

So what do you do? When faced with this dilemma, here are a few things to consider before you make the final decision:

Company size
Consider how big your company is, how many divisions it comprises and how the audiences these divisions serve differ. If your employer is a large company with thousands of employees, offices that are dispersed geographically, a company that produces various products, then yes, multiple social entities would benefit you.  Most likely, these audiences don’t overlap, so maintaining separate accounts will help your employer communicate with these different groups.

Effectiveness
Would your messaging benefit from a siloed approach in the social space? Are you speaking to a number of audiences? Are you using social media for different reasons? For example, one division may use social media to communicate product offerings, while another could be communicating breaking news and information to the media. Determine if all the messages your company disseminates would be better served if they were pushed from one account or spread over separate ones.

Manpower
Does your team have the capability to handle many accounts? If not, are these divisions able to appoint staff within to handle these accounts? And if the departments handle their own social media engagement, how will their activity be governed? Do you have a social media guidelines document? How will these guidelines be enforced?

Content
Before you vote to allow these divisions to hold their own accounts, determine what content they’ll be sharing and where their content will come from. Do they have their own library of relevant content to share or will they be depending on other departments to create or supply it? What will be the workflow process to ensure that content gets to the appropriate person who’ll be managing the account(s)?

Share with us: How active is your company on social media? Do you maintain one account per social platform or multiple accounts for each of your company’s departments? Are these accounts maintained by a centralized team or do these departments take responsibility for their own social media engagement?

6MythsRead 6 Myths Blocking Your Social Media Engagement, our special report that addresses misconceptions that are keeping your company from investing time into tools that will can help increase two-way communication with your customers—current and potential. Print this report. Read it on the train ride home. Highlight key points. Share it with your colleagues. And please, jump in the social media marketing game and get started.

Permalink to 4 Ways Internal Social Media Teams Can Benefit from Outsourcing

4 Ways Internal Social Media Teams Can Benefit from Outsourcing

by Angie Sanders|on January 2, 2013 |in Social Media |tagged , , , , , , , |1 Comment

social team overload credit business2communitydotcomYour social media team is overextended. Yep. I said it.

You don’t believe me, do you? You’re thinking, “A four-person team should be able to adequately manage our social media presences, funnel content from necessary departments, write content when needed and track and measure the results of their work.”

If this same team worked for a small or mid-sized organization, then yes. But they serve the behemoth which is your organization. Not only is this team charged with maintaining your presences across numerous social platforms, but they’re responsible for a staggering number of accounts on these platforms. They must figure out an airtight content flow from millions of silos within the office, devise and enforce guidelines for a million more silos that insist on managing their own social media accounts, and even write original content from time to time.

But a small social media team like yours could benefit from outsourcing a portion of the workload to an outside team. I know. You’re thinking, “We hired a social media team so that these duties can be handled in-house.” True, but the social media space and your engagement goals are ever-changing and have probably expanded beyond your internal bandwidth.

There are four ways that a contract digital team can make your internal team’s workload more manageable and ensure that your social media strategy is executed more effectively. An outside team can:

Fine-tune your social media strategy.
Perhaps your team has been working from the same social media strategy since 2009. Although I applaud them for even devising a strategy and sticking to it, this strategy was probably written to be a working document. Unfortunately, your team may be too close to this document and the parameters it has set to make necessary changes. An outside team can provide a fresh perspective, reviewing it against your fluid communications strategy and making some much needed adjustments.

Assist with the execution of your social media strategy.
Social media may or may not be your team members’ only jobs. Perhaps other duties—most likely ones that are communications or marketing related—have fallen in their laps or were there from the beginning. Even if maintaining the organization’s social media presences is their only function, frequency of posting, response to customer inquiries, effective measurement or other duties may have waned. An outside social media team can help pick up the slack and perhaps make suggestions for how social media work can be better distributed among the team.

Distribute workflow across platforms.
Your organization may only be engaging audiences on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, but each division within your office has its own account that it expects the social media team to maintain. And you know that your office is heavily siloed. Funneling relevant news and information from these divisions and posting to social platforms in a frequent and timely manner is a considerable challenge. An outside team can shed light on ways to improve the information flow.

Help manage multiple properties.
Revisit the above example. Your four-person team is responsible for managing multiple accounts for each platform on which your organization engages. Not to mention that there are at least three other social platforms in which divisions within your office have expressed interest in experimenting. Again, this is a considerable challenge for a small team. However, an outside team can assume the maintenance of at least one of these platforms and explore the viability of the new platforms that interest some in your office.

Share with us: Does your office have an internal social media team or does this team comprise employees from other departments? How are you handling the rapidly changing social media climate and the diverse needs of your organization?


Read 6 Myths Blocking Your Social Media Engagement, our special report that addresses misconceptions that are keeping your company from investing time into tools that will can help increase two-way communication with your customers—current and potential. Print this report. Read it on the train ride home. Highlight key points. Share it with your colleagues. And please, jump in the social media marketing game and get started. 

 

Permalink to Why Facebook Engagement Beats Television Advertising

Why Facebook Engagement Beats Television Advertising

by Angie Sanders|on October 17, 2012 |in Social Media |tagged , , , , , , , , |Leave a comment

“Brands with more than 1 million fans reach only 3% to 5% of them a day,” Jeff Widman of PageLever, a Facebook page analytics solution, told Fast Company. The magazine labeled this their Unpleasant Truth No. 4 as part of their special “The Social Media Road Map” section in the September 2012 issue.

But is this truth really that unpleasant? Maybe not. Engaging 3-5% of one million fans works out to 30,000-50,000 Facebook fans talking about a given brand. These people may represent a small sample of the total Facebook fans this brand has, but these are people the brand knows detailed demographic information about and has engaged in two-way communication. And 30,000 to 50,000 is a lot of people.

Compare this level of communication, demographics and engagement to television advertising. Lucas Donat—founder of Santa Monica advertising agency Donat Wald—explained in a December 2009 Ad Age article that, “When it comes to measurement, most TV advertisers know audience reach, some demographics and probably some level of top-line results.” This information doesn’t match “the depth and granularity of data we can get for online campaigns, where we know who’s responding to our ads, what they’re doing on our websites, how much time they spend there and whether or not they complete a purchase.”

However, Donat says his agency has developed a method to gather and interpret data from television advertising that fills in the gap between imperfect, incomplete information and a clear picture that communicates the results of an advertising campaign.

“To deal with the relative ambiguity of TV ad measurement, my agency adapts the concept of fuzzy logic into what we call ‘fuzzy analytics,’” Donat says. “Here’s how it works: Find a level of tracking we can do, accept its imperfections, gather data, analyze it and improve our ability to understand it as we go. It evolves into a system that is nearly as accurate as following a click online.”

As an explanation for the “low” Facebook engagement numbers, Widman asked social marketers if they ever visit fan pages as users. “Oh, never,” they replied. This information could be viewed two ways: either social marketers don’t have a clear picture of how to engage Facebook fans because they’ve never visited fan pages themselves, or the social marketer isn’t an accurate representation of the audience set that would visit and interact in this space.

Whatever the reason, these numbers probably shouldn’t be viewed as “low” or a “failure.” Demographic information, two-way communication and any type of engagement and attention from 30,000-50,000 people is a win.

Share with us: How does your company use its Facebook fan page, or does it have one? Can a brand achieve a high number of fans and a high percentage of engagement, too?

This post is the fourth in a series of five posts discussing ideas presented in Fast Company’s “The Social Media Roadmap” section (September 2012 issue).

Permalink to Fast Company: A Social Media Executive’s Biggest Gripes about Working with Brands

Fast Company: A Social Media Executive’s Biggest Gripes about Working with Brands

by Angie Sanders|on October 15, 2012 |in Social Media |tagged , , , , , , , , , |3 Comments

For our past few blog posts, we’ve been pulling interesting tidbits from Fast Company’s “The Social Media Road Map,” featured in the magazine’s September 2012 issue. First, we discussed 13 key takeaways from the special section. Then we talked about why social media engagement responsibilities will always fall into the hands of a chosen few individuals inside or outside the company.

We’ll continue rocking with the Road Map today by discussing another short article from the section (Insiders’ Secret No. 5) titled, “You Hired the Wrong People.” In the article, an anonymous executive at a social media platform reveals some of his (I’m only assuming this person is a man) biggest gripes working with brands.

“Their CEOs now articulate their social media strategy,” he said. “They track how they’re doing against their rivals But by the time they come to someone like me, whose job is to actually put their plans into action, they have no idea to get what they want.”

The executive’s problem is one that we’ve been noticing lately with our potential clients, which is a huge gap between social media strategy and implementation. Consultants and even internal employees are getting a better grasp on social media and its capabilities. But when it comes to acting on those capabilities, setting reasonable goals and producing results based on those goals, these teams are clueless as to how to proceed.

However, the executive in this article is concerned with the lack of qualified counterparts to work with on the client side to execute strategy. “Companies haven’t empowered the right people, and they’re not hiring or training or converting the right people for these jobs. To be a good social media person at a brand, you have to have a background not just in digital or marketing but also in your product. There are so few people with that kind of blend of experience.”

To the client’s credit, if employees existed with this perfect blend of social, marketing and brand experience, then there’d be no need to contract with the social media executive. There may be employees on the client side with one or two of those characteristics, but it’s unrealistic to expect a counterpart with all three because social media is still just a toddler.

Companies won’t invest in hiring or training or converting the right employees until they can see value in social media overall. It’s the consultant’s job—in this case the griping executive—to show this value until the client decides to invest in internal staff or it continues to pay the consultant’s retainer.

On the other hand, this executive seems bothered by clients who shove social engagement responsibilities into one department. “People are always shoving social into marketing, or they’re shoving it into digital. It’s actually all this stuff: It’s marketing, it’s digital, it’s creative.”

We discussed in last week’s post why this shoving is to be expected, but just to reiterate: Social media will always be shoved into any department that serves an external communications function simply because these are the people within the organization who are deemed best equipped to handle it.

And we should look on the bright side. At least we’re slowly moving beyond leaving social media to the interns.

Share with us: How does your company handle its social media engagement? Is it the responsibility of the marketing communications department or a separate digital strategy team? Social media strategists: do you also struggle with the lack of a counterpart on the client side? How do you work around this?

This post is the third in a series of five posts discussing ideas presented in Fast Company’s “The Social Media Roadmap” section (September 2012 issue).

Permalink to Why a Chosen Few Will Always be Responsible for Company Social Media Engagement

Why a Chosen Few Will Always be Responsible for Company Social Media Engagement

by Angie Sanders|on October 10, 2012 |in Social Media |tagged , , , , , , , , , , , |2 Comments

In last Wednesday’s post, we gave you 13 key takeaways from Fast Company magazine’s “The Social Media Road Map,” that ran in their September 2012 issue. However, their Insiders’ Secret No. 3, an article titled “What Your Social Media Consultant Should Tell You,” warranted a post of its own.

Anjali Mullany, the magazine’s social media editor, says, “If social media consultants are doing their jobs, they should put themselves out of business. Your company will never be truly social if you silo social activity within a consultant or staff manager.”

Well, yes and no.

Saying that a company isn’t truly social if one person, small team or outside entity handles this function is like saying that that same company doesn’t really perform marketing or communications functions if everyone in the company isn’t doing it, too.

Shared responsibility for the actual act of engagement is a respectable goal, but it may be a bit lofty and impractical. Communications and marketing departments have a hard enough time getting buy-in from other departments to reach out to the company’s audiences outside of social media. Expecting all employees to participate in social may be a stretch.

Plus, by keeping responsibilities for social media engagement with a certain internal team or outside consultants keeps a good handle on messaging within the social space.

Because social media engagement is an external communications tactic, it will probably always remain in the hands of those who are already responsible for external communications—unless the company decides that developing a designated digital strategy team is warranted.

Now we’re not saying that the rest of the company should take a completely hands-off approach to social media because it shouldn’t be taking this approach to its overall marketing strategy. Whichever team(s) is responsible for both marketing communications and social media need support from the rest of the company in the form of free-flowing information.

The only way these teams can tell your company’s story to the audiences that live outside the four walls of your office is if you funnel the information to them that’s necessary to tell this story in a compelling way. This involves keeping these teams abreast of company milestones, achievement and impact.

If there’s a new product launch or breakthrough, new clients or partnerships, client or customer testimonials, video or photos from the field, or any other groundbreaking information affecting your current or potential clients, your marketing communications and social media teams need to know. The success of both these teams depends heavily on your ability to ensure that these teams get the compelling information they need to engage your audience and get them excited about your brand.

Share with us: How does your company funnel information through to your marketing communications and social media teams and out to your external audiences?

This post is the second in a series of five posts discussing ideas presented in Fast Company’s “The Social Media Roadmap” section (September 2012 issue).

Permalink to 13 Key Takeaways from Fast Company’s “The Social Media Road Map”

13 Key Takeaways from Fast Company’s “The Social Media Road Map”

by Angie Sanders|on October 3, 2012 |in Social Media |tagged , , , , , , , , , , , |5 Comments

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:

  1. A YouTube home page, half-page auto-play video ad is $500,000—for one day. This ad reaches more than 26 million unique U.S. visitors, but if you’re paying half a million dollars for that, then what’s your total marketing budget?
  2. Lady Gaga stole the title for most Facebook likes from Skittles, but Big Spaceship CEO Michael Lebowitz says there’s no way to tie this this bragging rights title to a bump in sales.
  3. Fast Company, along with a whole gang of other media outlets, really wants Mindy Kaling and her new show The Mindy Project to win, so I guess we should, too. But will realizing how much of a television industry insider she is make me watch her new show? Unclear.
  4. Let’s just set the record straight that it’s officially uncool and generally frowned upon to refer to yourself or anyone else as a “social media guru.”
  5. The women in the sexy photos used for spam bot profiles on Twitter are real people, and those chicks just might ban together and sue you for using their likenesses. Maybe.
  6. What the hell was Kraft thinking when they asked Klout to refer to their scoring as a “fun score”?
  7. There are already whole books about how to use Pinterest. How does it feel to write a book filled with information that’s probably instantly out-of-date upon publication?
  8. There are at least eight services that help you back up your social media platform archives. Never knew there was a need for this, but I guess it’s always good to keep a record of everything you’ve said or shared for future reference.
  9. “We use the phrase ‘social media’ but they’re really communications services, not media properties,” said Bo Peabody, creator of Tripod (the web’s first social network that debuted in 1992). In actuality, we probably refer to the collection of these platforms this way because each of them serves as a medium through which we communicate. And the plural form of “medium” is…
  10. If you want to see some forward-thinking ways of employing social media, then study the fashion industry.
  11. FourSquare’s first major deal was with BravoTV. Tristan Walker, FourSquare’s former business development executive, said the network had great local content which the digital company used to get people “to get out and explore new things, based on shows like ‘Real Housewives’, which felt very much in line with the product but without a sales pitch.”
  12. To support relief efforts following the Haiti earthquake and the tsunami that struck Japan, social gaming titan Zynga created items within their games for players to buy and donated the proceeds to charity. “In the first 24 hours, we generated $1 million, and it got up to more than $3 million over a week or so,” said Zynga Executive Director Ken Weber. “We had people paying for items in the games, but we also had players who don’t ever pay for anything who got their credit cards out to do something good.”
  13. It’s officially uncool and generally frowned upon to refer to any video you create as viral, unless it truly does become, well, viral. “Rather than ideas propagating for generations, almost everything terminates within one degree of the seed,” said Microsoft Research’s Duncan Watts. “If you want something to spread, generate an enormous number of seeds.”

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).

Permalink to Tweet Talks: How a Historian Schooled Me on Thesis Statements

Tweet Talks: How a Historian Schooled Me on Thesis Statements

by Angie Sanders|on October 1, 2012 |in Content marketing, Social Media |tagged , , , , , |Leave a comment

@grumpyhistorian had me scratching my head something terrible a few weeks ago.

On Sept. 8, Lee Kallerup @readywriting asked:

@grumyhistorian replied:

Write the paper first, then the thesis statement second? Not only was I confused, but this goes against everything I’d ever taught in my short former career as an adjunct English instructor. So I asked:

@grumpyhistorian replied:

I had never heard anyone describe an essay as a problem-solving exercise, but after a few hours of thinking this over, it made perfect sense.

Just a bit of background on how I normally teach essay structure: I first ask students to think about the assignment at hand and what their position is on the issue. I then ask them to state their position on this issue and the reasons they feel this way (briefly) in one sentence. This sentence is their tentative thesis statement. I then explain the tell them what you plan to tell them (introduction), tell them (supporting paragraphs), then tell them what you told them (conclusion) structure of essay writing. However, to have a position on an issue, a problem must initially exist.

I then asked:

To which he replied (I’m only assuming @grumpyhistorian is a man.):

@grumphistorian went on to explain:

I love having conversations about writing practice via social networking, but I especially love when these conversations give me a new perspective on ideas that I’ve held so tightly to or on methodology that I’ve taught.

Share with us: Have you ever had an eye-opening conversation with someone you don’t know via social media? What did you learn?

Permalink to For Businesses, Social Media Means Nothing Without These 3 Things

For Businesses, Social Media Means Nothing Without These 3 Things

by Angie Sanders|on September 26, 2012 |in Just good business, Social Media |tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , |6 Comments

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?

 

 

Permalink to Four Reasons Why You Can Afford to Share Your Ideas

Four Reasons Why You Can Afford to Share Your Ideas

by Angie Sanders|on September 24, 2012 |in Content marketing, Just good business, Social Media |tagged , , , , , , , , , , |1 Comment

During a local chamber of commerce networking event, an ambitious and interesting older gentlemen told me that he was looking for an entertainment lawyer to help him pitch a game show to Hollywood gatekeepers.

“Oh really?” I asked. “What’s the premise of the show?”

“Well, I can’t tell you,” he said. He was saving all his ideas for the entertainment lawyer and the bigwig producers to whom he’d one day persuade to give him the green light on this show.

I then joked that if he told me the particulars, then he’d have to shoot me.

This got me thinking about which ideas require such top-secret protection and which ideas should be shared.

Truthfully, there’s nothing new under the sun. And ideas are a dime a dozen. It’s execution that’s rare. Not to mention that executing is hard work. So I believe it’s a good idea to share a good deal of our ideas publicly and strategically.

Now you may be thinking, “My ideas are how I make my living. I get paid for my ideas.” Yes, that’s true. However, when I say ideas, I don’t mean the engineering plans for your new product. Instead, as a communications professional, I’d share best practices for how to communicate the particulars for how your new product works. So by ideas, I really mean information. I could hold my input until I get you to pay me for what I have to say. However, if you don’t get the information from me, you’ll just Google it.

Here are four reasons that I think that as business owners, we should be a bit freer with our information and ideas:

Most people need a sample before buying. Have you ever met a person at a networking event he asks you for quick advice upon learning what you do for a living? What do you say? “You better pay me”? No. Most likely you engage that person in conversation. It’s only natural because you’re an expert and are passionate about what you do. That’s okay. The best part of this situation is that not only do you reinforce in his mind that you know your stuff, but it gives him an incentive to pay you for your services.

It establishes you as an expert. Before social networking, a lengthy client list on your website stood as evidence enough that your business is good at what it does. Now, potential clients expect to see us sharing information online and through seminars and speaking engagements. Sharing information about your craft frames you as an expert. And who do potential clients want to pay to help them through their business challenges? Experts.

It draws people into your sales funnel. People I happen to meet and cultivate into clients don’t just learn that aiellejai creates content and throw money at us. They usually consume our content. Or they’ve heard me speak. Or they’ve liked something I’ve shared via social networking. Sharing information draws people in, much like a fishing hook. We can’t throw out naked hooks and expect the fish to bite. We have to cast out some juicy nuggets to get the fish to school and be intrigued. Not to liken potential clients to fish, but you get the message.

You want to be your audience’s first resource. If potential clients have questions, and I don’t answer them—especially if it’s simple for me to do so—then they’re going to get the answers somewhere else. And by doing so, they’ll most likely jump into someone else’s sales funnel. Even if I share information with someone and they don’t commit to becoming a client right away, the idea that I’m an accessible expert has been planted in their head. When they do decide that they need some paid help, hopefully aiellejai will be the first company they think of.

Share with us: Are you guarded with sharing information about your business or industry online or via social networking? Are you afraid someone will steal your ideas?

Permalink to 4 Reasons Why You Can Trust a Consultant to be Productive

4 Reasons Why You Can Trust a Consultant to be Productive

by Angie Sanders|on September 17, 2012 |in Just good business |tagged , , , , , , , , , , |Leave a comment

In February 2010, a nor’easter dumped 2-3 feet of snow on the mid-Atlantic and crippled productivity for at least a week. In January 2011, an ice storm left thousands stranded on highways and roads in the Washington, DC area. They all left work early to avoid the impeding storm, but were caught right in the midst of it.

With each storm, the case for teleworking became that much stronger. However, it seems that employers are still slow to adopt this method of work.

The Harvard Business Review released the findings of a study supporting the idea that remote employees are more engaged than those who are in the office.  “The team members who were not in the same location with their leaders were more engaged and committed — and rated the same leader higher — than team members sitting right nearby,” said Scott Edinger, founder of Edinger Consulting Group.

Some employers reject employee requests to work from home, possibly because they believe these employees will somehow be more productive if they’re under the employer’s watchful eye. And even though these same employers may trust the advice of a consultant over their own employees, they still seem to reject the idea of working with a consultant. Perhaps they think she’ll inflate the working hours on her invoice.  Or, again, employers prefer to keep an eye on those who work for and with them. However, here are four reasons why that same consultant has every intention of completing projects on-time and to the best of her ability.

You’re not her only client. Time management is critical for a consultant, especially if she works on an hourly rate. All of her clients want what they want when they want it. And all their projects are urgent. Therefore, goof-off time is nonexistent.

She has less time to get to know you. You and the consultant have agreed on a project plan that dictates that the job will be completed in a finite amount of time. Unlike an employee, this consultant doesn’t get a 90-day trial period to get to know you and how you work. Instead, she probably only has a few billable hours. A good consultant is efficient enough to get the most out of these few hours to get her job done right.

Her reputation is on the line. And even if she had the wacky idea to goof-off on your project, not put her best foot forward, and exceed your expectations? What would that do to her business? What good would it serve her to jeopardize future work by performing shoddy work for you?

She’s a consultant because she works independently and doesn’t need constant supervision. Consultants excel at what they do because they’re able to multitask and identify problems and solutions quickly.  She wouldn’t do her job any better if you were there to look over her shoulder. Most likely, her performance would be worse. And that would be bad for her and you both.

Share with us: How does your company regard working with outside consultants? Consultants: do you sometimes have to work to overcome the misconceptions potential clients have about how you work?

Permalink to The Most Important Lesson I Learned About Self-Publishing

The Most Important Lesson I Learned About Self-Publishing

by Angie Sanders|on September 12, 2012 |in Content marketing, Just good business |tagged , , , , , , , , |Leave a comment

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?

Permalink to 7 Steps to Completing Your Content Style Guide

7 Steps to Completing Your Content Style Guide

by Angie Sanders|on June 6, 2012 |in Content marketing |tagged , , , , |3 Comments

On Monday, we shared five points you can use to rally your office colleagues around the idea of creating a content style guide. They’re completely on board with the idea. Now what?

The work begins.

But don’t worry. Creating a style guide sounds harder than it actually is. Although you don’t need to be an astrophysicist to create this document, it will take you a bit of time. Follow these seven steps and you’ll be well on your way to a content rule book that your coworkers won’t hesitate to reference when they’re in a jam:

Collect hard copies of edits.
Whether you and your colleagues edit using the “Track Changes” function in Microsoft Word, or you print hard copies and break out your red pen, keep a file full of these edited documents for three weeks to three months—depending on how much content your office generates.

Spot preferences and style decisions.
Once you have a good stack of edits representative of the content you produce, sift through these edits individually. Look for areas where style decisions have been made. Perhaps you see preferences for certain types of punctuation or product/program names. Make a note of all these preferences either by hand in a notebook or in a separate document on your computer.

Get department/other company writers involved.
Once you have a list of all the style preferences, ask others in your department or throughout the company for their input. Do they agree that an em dash should be preceded and followed by a space? Do your colleagues have problems with comma and which/that usage that should be spelled out in your company guide?

Surf the net for other style guides.
After talking with others in your office, you should have a good list of items to develop the content guide. But to find for more items that should be on your radar, check the Internet for sample style guides. Magazines and other online publications are usually good about publishing their style guides for contributors. Take a look at a few of these for ideas.

Decide how this document should be written and where it should live to help ensure its use.
When you begin to produce the content style guide, you want to make sure it’s so easy to use that your colleagues have no choice but to consult it first before asking anyone else—or guessing—about a style issue. Should you design it to mimic the Associated Press Stylebook? Maybe it should exist as a clickable .pdf or .html file. Also, this guide should live in a place that makes it easy for everyone in the office to find. If no one in your office uses the company intranet, this may not be the best place for the guide to reside.

Treat your content style guide as a working document.
Although creating your company’s content style guide is a victory, don’t wipe your hands and consider the project completely over. Style issues will continue to arise. Make note of them, get your colleagues to make final decisions on preferences and add these items to the guide.

Page 1 of 212