What marketing expert should you be working with for each marketing tactic that you want to implement? This is a short list to help you figure out who you need to call. In a larger business, it is typically the brand or product manager that writes the marketing strategy and plan and then oversees all the specialized experts who make it happen.  Here is a brief list of who to work with…

• Marketing Communications: could be an AD agency or just a graphic artist, copywriter and web designer. The Ad agency would also have a creative director that oversees the other 3 specialists. They create your identity, logo, brochures, website, packaging, ads (both online and off) and most materials. Can also create email newsletters. A direct marketing specialist would also fall into this category.
• Web site: web designer works on the visual representation, web developer handles ecommerce, community forums and other functionality, SEO expert gets your chosen keywords emphasized,
• Social Media: blog/community manager oversees blog content and responds to community members (blogger could also be in a different dept. like PR). Twitter and forum communicator.
• PR: gets feature articles written, product placements, press tours, press kits, press releases, speaker placement, quotes,and more.
• Event Marketing: identifies, schedules and prioritizes marketing events, creates booths, demos, etc.
• Channel Marketing: work with resellers, OEM, Affiliate managers and Evangelists: who get 3^rd parties to sell your products or services or use them in their own products
• Business Development & Sales – works directly with key customer accounts to close a sale.

This is most of the major categories of specialists. The ones you need to work with can vary depending on your type of business.

What other marketing specialists have you used?

How do I automate the marketing of my blog?

Do you automate the marketing of your blog posts? Here’s what I’ve done.

My blog posts are relevant to small business owners and entrepreneurs who want to market their business better. As such, I have them automatically posted to places that small business owners can find them such as Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and more. I have spent some time automating this process so I can focus on the creation of content and not the marketing of it. Here are the methods and tools I used to automate the updates of my blog posts.

Twitter

I have two twitter accounts; the first, @expertmktgcoach, I tweet each post once, and the second, @debzimmer, I use to repeat the tweets throughout the day.

I use Hootsuite to import the RSS feed from my blog to twitter. This sends out one tweet per account. With Hootsuite, I can also schedule tweets on that second account so that the tweet reoccurs throughout the day.

LinkedIn

My blog headline posts to my LinkedIn status using Hootsuite. Hootsuite also sends the status to Ping.fm which updates numerous other sites that I visit less often.

My blog is then imported into my LinkedIn Profile using the LinkedIn WordPress Application.

Facebook

I use Facebook Notes to import my RSS feed into my Facebook Page. This creates a duplicate copy of my blog on Facebook. I can also use Hootsuite to import the headlines into my wall on my personal Facebook profile or public page.

Social Bookmarking

Using the WordPress Plugin tool for OnlyWire, my posts are automatically bookmarked to numerous bookmarking sites with which I have accounts. It creates bookmarks at more bookmarking sites than I can reach through Ping.fm. Ping.fm reaches other social media sites that OnlyWire doesn’t, such as Plaxo.

RSS Reader

I use Feedburner for those who want to get my blog posts in an RSS reader format.

Kindle

If you are a Kindle user, you can read my blog by subscribing through the Amazon Kindle Store.

SEO

Each post I write is search engine optimized. I use a number of tools including WordPress plugins to assist me with search engine optimization.

Email

There’s one more automation tool I’m considering but haven’t yet implemented. I see that AWebber is now integrated with Feedburner and can send the RSS feeds in email to your subscriber base. I think that sounds way cool. I just wish the tools I currently use offered that service.

That’s all I’ve got on blog marketing automation. Do you have any tools or systems you use that you particularly like?

Who should write a blog?

Anyone can write a blog. Some people write blogs for personal reasons, some write about their hobbies. I focus on how to use a blog as a tool to grow your business.  To be an effective blog writer and to get the most return on your investment of time and money spent blogging, you will need a blog strategy, personal discipline, an internal desire, and unique content.

Your blog strategy will determine why you are writing your blog and what your goals are. You need your plan to include how frequently you are updating it, what types of content it will include, and it needs to speak to your target customer.

Your blog needs to be updated regularly according to your plan. If it is not updated regularly it will get less traffic and be less effective in implementing your strategy. Not only do you have to update frequently, you also need to be persistent and keep at it. It will take time to develop a following. It doesn’t happen overnight. This requires discipline.

You need to have the desire to create the content on a regular basis, and to be persistent. You can’t stop once you start. I have found that once I got in the habit of writing, I about my daily routines and interactions with my blogger goggles on. For example, I was at church thinking “Oh, that would make a good blog post”.

Which brings me to content. You need a content plan that offers compelling content to attract your customers and keep them coming back. You can create a 3 month rolling calendar of what your content strategy, topics and types of articles will be. You can even write them in advance.

• Strategy
• Discipline
• Desire
• Content

These are the 4 key personal characteristics that are required to have a valuable and successful blog.

What is your Blog Philosophy?

How do I use my blog?

Now that you have your blog set up, How do you use it? What is your blog philosophy?

Think of your blog as an interactive tool. With a newsletter you push information to your customers. With a blog, your customers can talk back to you by leaving comments, and you can reply to them.

Your blog becomes an extension of your company’s public persona or brand and thus it needs to reflect your brand.

Here are some ways to build your brand with your blog:

• Portfolio – Express your brand’s personality by expanding your portfolio to your blog.
• Inform – Share with your customers some key learning or “how to” tips. Inform them of new products or services or any product recalls.
• Networking – You can use a blog for networking. Go to websites of other people in your field and leave comments on their articles and include a link back to your blog. They will do the same to you.
• Awareness – Post links to articles and content on the web that relates to your business or brand.

A blog can be a powerful marketing tool as long as you have a clear blog philosopy. It is a subtle way to brand your company while appearing authentic and knowledgeable and setting you up as an authority in your field. The blog helps you to establish a relationship with your customers and build trust. Your prospective customers get to know you and your company before buying.

Do you have a blog philosophy?

How much does a blog cost?

Blogs are easy to get for free. The easiest and most popular site for hosting your blog is Blogger. If you want advanced functionality, use WordPress.com. Both of these are free. There are actually a ton of free blog sites that add more social features as well.

Why would anyone pay for a blog when you can get one free?

The downside of the free sites is that they will not give you all the benefits of search engine optimization and thus will not optimize the amount of traffic to your site.

A paid blog with your own domain will give you better search engine traffic and thus be better at increasing your customer base and your income. This blog site is written using the open source WordPress.org blog software and self-hosted at Godaddy.com. I chose this because I liked the blog philosophy of WordPress. It is easy to use, is extensible and there are thousands of free plug-ins to support it. I have over 15 active plug-ins at the time of this post. They help with everything from search engine optimization to blog monetization. And, it only costs $5 per month.

Blogging is an easy and inexpensive way to create a web presence, and a blog is easy to keep fresh and up-to-date without the expense of a web developer. If you want to make money at blogging, use a hosted solution where you own the domain name and the content resides on a server you can control.

Why do I need a blog?

Blogs can be a free or low cost way to gain more visibility for your business. It can establish credibility in your field. It helps you to be recognized as an expert and thus people will turn to you for advice in your field. This also helps you to build your brand and communicate with your customer. It creates a face to the customer and builds the personality of your brand.

Your customer can subscribe to your blog which enables them to stay in contact with you and strengthen your relationship.  Blogs make it easier for your customer to give you feedback. They simply need to leave a comment after a post.

Blogs can be monetized to increase your sales and add supplementary income to your bottom line. A blog is also a useful tool to increase traffic to your site because the blog format is naturally search engine friendly. It is optimized for search engines. Blogs make it easy for you and customers to get links back to your blog or website which enhances search engine optimization and traffic.

You hear it all the time. “You should have a blog”….

You think you need a blog but you have no idea why. What are blogs anyway? What is the purpose? How is a blog different than a website? Do I need a blog philosophy?

What is a Blog?

Blogs are a type of website with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, text, graphics, video or links to other blogs, web pages and other related media. Unlike a website, a blog enables the reader to leave interactive comments after each entry.

Why do I want a Blog?

The most important reason to blog is to create a relationship with your customer.

What is a Blog versus Website?

How should your blog differ from your website? Your blog is about creating a relationship with your customer. It is “pull” marketing or publicity. Your blog reflects opinion, personality, individual viewpoints etc. Your website is an example of “push” marketing, meaning direct response, offers and promotions.  It is corporate information. Your website is factual. For example, while your website will contain press releases, your blog will contain commentary on announcements. If you host an event, your website will include facts about the event and registration information. The blog will include photos and stories from the event.

A blog can be used to get interactive with your customer, to raise awareness of topics related to corporate goals and to assist in closing sales. From a public relations perspective your blog can be used to deal with disasters and build the reputation of the company. Regardless of your blog philosophy, the blog should always be focused on your customer and talking to their needs, wants and desires. It is a dialog.

Testimonial Advertisements & Celebrity Endorsements

The Federal Trade Commission has finally issued an update to their guidelines concerning the use of endorsements and testimonials as used on the internet and social media. The last update was in 1980, well before the influence of websites, blogs and social media.

If you are a blogger, affiliate marketer or internet marketer, you need to be aware of how these revisions affect you and your business. You may want discuss these changes with your attorney and make adjustments to your web site, blog or social media campaigns.

The full text of the press release is available here.

The full text of the Act is available here.

In summary, the clarifications to the FTC Act are:

1) Advertisements that feature a consumer and convey his or her experience with a product or service as typical when that is not the case will be required to clearly disclose the results that consumers can generally expect.

2) “Material connections” (sometimes payments or free products) between advertisers and endorsers – connections that consumers would not expect – must be disclosed. So, Bloggers who make an endorsement must disclose the material connections they share with the seller of the product or service.

3) Celebrities have a duty to disclose their relationships with advertisers when making endorsements outside the context of traditional ads, such as on talk shows or in social media.

It’s a good idea to ensure your web site, blog and social media strategy are following these new guidelines for the use of testimonial advertising and endorsements.

Have you ever heard someone say “I don’t need a blog, there isn’t enough to say about my product/service/subject?” Have you ever said it yourself? I used to think that way as well. How would I ever come up with enough to say about one particular subject? Well, there are all kinds of blogs with all kinds of purposes. The key to a successful blog is to know why your doing it and having a clear focused mission and strategy behind it.

Let’s say you are a crafts-person. A photo blog would be a practical and very effective means of sharing your custom work. A photo blog would do many things for your business, such as:

1) Create a portfolio of projects for your customers to review before making a purchase decision. For example, a painter, you can post before and after photos of her work.

2) A crafts-person could post photos of their booth and customers at the latest event they attended.

3) Allow your existing clients to post comments about the success of the project or event, thereby improving trust and probably conversion of potential clients and increasing the connection and relationship you have with your existing customers.

4) Your clients could link back to your blog post, increasing your search engine rankings and improving traffic to your site

5) When you add comments about the event/project/etc. in your post you can include keywords and increase your traffic and SEO.

6) It gives you more pages to be indexed by an search engine.

Just something to think about. There are many different types of blogs and many different reasons for creating them. One way to think of a blog is that if your business is involved in something informal, dynamic, changing, or current, perhaps it belongs in a blog. A blog is a great way to create an informal portfolio and to market your business or service.

Social Media Metrics

How do you measure the success of your social media campaigns?

Social media marketing actually encompasses a broad range of tactics, goals and strategies. Let’s look at the metrics as a function of what social media can do for you…

1) Establish a Presence

Do you have a presence everywhere your customers hang out on the web? How do you measure this quantitatively? Make a list and check it off.

2) Build Awareness and Drive Traffic.

This is directly measurable through your website analytics. Look at the source of the new traffic.

3) Capture Names and Build Lists

Well it just so happens that you can measure this directly from social media. Your basic metric is the quantity of new connections, followers, fans & subscribers (email and RSS).

4) Build Relationships and Trust

Ok, this is where social media can really shine. And, it is the most difficult to measure. Some suggestions for metrics are the number of interactions with your customers. How active are they in communicating with you? How many comments on your blog post? How many referrals to your site? How many retweets? Are you adding value? The number of inbound links to your site and any improvement in your search engine rankings (as compared to your competition) will also show the quality of the relationships you are building.

5) Conversion to Sale

When you make a special sales offer, you can use your web analytics to track conversions. But often conversions come through time with the increased relationship. It is often not one outlet that led to the sale but a series of exposures over time. Still, you can use web site analytics to trace the source of the sale. You can use surveys (how did you hear about us?). The metric is the increase in sales and revenues. Look at the dollar value of the new customers and its source (from analytics).

6) Upsell or Re-sell

How well are you getting additional sales from your existing clients? Measure this based on where the existing customer came from when they clicked through to make a purchase.

To get to ROI, you’ll need to know your sales income (by referring source) and your expenses (time/money spent on social media, opportunity loss, outsourcing costs, etc.). Again, social media is about building relationships, so the ROI should be increasing over time as you build those relationships. That’s another metric to look at. Look at results as a function of time, not just individual campaign. You should see an improvement over time of the cost of sale.