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The real truth: What business owners need to know about social media

When you work in social media regularly, one of the best things to have on hand is a book that you can hand to business owners that don’t recognize the benefits of social media. One of my favorites Eric Harr’s recent book entitled The Real Truth About Social Media.

Despite it’s modest size (about 100 pages), Real Truth is filled with actionable insights that are easily understood by traditional marketing executives and business leaders, without time-wasting jabber or hollow social media evangelism.  Real Truth answers the most common question that business leaders have about social media: Why bother?It’s not about social media. It’s about customer service.

“If you deliver old-school customer service to your customers — if you care, listen, and have humility, and if you put people first — you will reap rich rewards from social media. You will build a volunteer army of passion-driven, newly-empowered marketers,” Harr said. “The brands that are winning in social media do it old-school.”

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Want to be ‘likeable’? Stop TALKING about yourself… and DO something!

When it comes attracting followers, fans, and friends to social media channels, too many marketers focus on the ‘laws of attraction’ instead on the ‘laws of reciprocity.’

The laws of attraction, popularized by 2006 film The Secret (and the subsequent book) suggest that the the path to being liked is mastering ‘likeability’.  If you act like a ‘likeable person’ — or offer a ‘likeable brand’ — fans, followers and friends will flock to your door.  Using the laws of attraction, marketers seek success by creating a strong, likeable brand and promoting it with a large marketing budget (AKA mass marketing).

That doesn’t work in today’s world… where ‘likeable’ is akin to ‘forgettable.’ Actions speak louder than words– and that’s what the laws of reciprocity are all about.  Two concepts drive the laws of reciprocity: 1) Treat people well (the golden rule); and 2) perform likeable acts without specifically requiring an in-kind response.

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Ten Tips to Unblock your blog

Summer dry spells are common — even for bloggers.  Good weather and summer activities can wreak havoc on a bloggers writing habits.

If you find yourself in a blogging dry spell, don’t panic.  Instead of accepting a dry spell as a ‘failure,’ approach the experience as a brief writing sabbatical that allows you to assess what’s working, tweek what’s not, and return to your keyboard with a new-found enthusiasm.

Based on nearly a decade of blogging experience, here are  unblocking tips I shared during a recent #blogchat session: [Read more...]

Social Pro Files: An Interview with Network for Good’s Katya Andresen

We recently had the opportunity to interview Katya Andresen, COO of Network for Good, and a popular speaker, author, and blogger on topics related to non-profit marketing, online outreach, social media, and fundraising.  Katya is a Social Pro, so we wanted to share this entire interview with everyone. Enjoy!

Let’s start out with a good understanding of Network for the Good. So what are the services that Network for Good provides for non-profits?

Andresen: Network for Good helps non-profits in two basic ways. One, we give organizations tools to do online outreach, so everything from a donate button for your website to a donation page, e-mail campaign tools, events tools, and through our partners, tools for doing fundraising and outreach on Facebook and other social media. We also help non-profits with training because it’s one thing to have a technology tool, it’s quite another to figure what messaging and what marketing will make it successful. And so we have Webinars and an online learning center and all kinds of free resources for any organization that wants to learn more about how to effectively engage supporters online.

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10 ways to boost event participation with social media

Social media is a great way to increase event participation by promote upcoming events.  Use these tips to boost your event’s performance.

You may want to begin promoting your event on social networks three or more months before the day of the event.  The basic strategy used by social-savvy event managers is to create appropriate pages on Facebook and EventBrite that can be used to promote the event, predict attendance and enable event attendees to share information about your event with others. [Read more...]