Posts Tagged ‘business’

The four truths of social media: It’s about dedication

Tuesday, May 25th, 2010

Semper Fidelis: Always Faithful.  As a Marine, I heard these words all the time.  They were not just a motto; they were a call to action, a call to remain faithful to our fellow Marines, the Corps and our country.

As I left the Corps and started running social media campaigns, the words kept creeping up in the back of my head.  I couldn’t put my finger on why I thought about the motto so much until it hit me: to be successful at social media, you need to be Semper Fidelis.

As social media has quickly become a dominant power in the business world, more and more companies are jumping on the bandwagon.  This is a great thing but it will make it more difficult for you to be successful due to all the other companies going after the same piece of pie.  Even if you put together a great campaign, it will take time for things to get off the ground.  Although it can be frustrating that you are not seeing a return on the assets you are investing, you need to always be faithful that the results you want will come.

That said, all the time in the world will not help you if you are not always faithful to your followers.  Although social media may appear free, time is its true cost.  In order to be successful you will have to dedicate a good amount of time to creating content, finding new followers and interacting with your community.  If you do not put in the time to foster and interact with you community, you will not see a return on your investment.

As I have said, the only reason a company should implement a social media campaign is to see bottom-line growth or to hit strategic marketing objectives.  Assuming that is the return you are looking for, it will take the dedication of being always faithful to see that kind of return.  As long as you use the words as a call to action, you’ll find the success you are looking for.

This is part four of five in the four truths of social media series.  To catch-up on the posts you have missed, or to sign-up for the remaining posts, we invite you to visit timeforarebel.com/blog and put us on your RSS feed.

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The four truths of social media: It’s about communication

Friday, May 21st, 2010

Social media is a lot like polygamy.  Now, before you write me off for the loony bin, hear me out for a second.  I’m a huge fan of Big Love on HBO and, in the show, one husband has several wives that he must care for and attend to.  He must communicate with them and encourage them to communicate with each other in order to ensure the marriages work.   Personally, I have trouble keeping my one girlfriend happy so I can’t imagine doing this for multiple women at once, but that is for another day.

The fact of the matter is that social media is set-up much the same way as a polygamist marriage.  Whether you are promoting yourself, or a brand you represent, you play the husband role.  As you grow your community, which we talked about in the previous post, it becomes your responsibility to care for and attend to your followers.  Each one of your followers is a “wife” with their own needs and desires.  It is your job to foster each one of those relationships to ensure you meet their needs and desires.

As just about any relationship expert will tell you, the key to a good relationship is communication.  You have to be able to start conversations, listen to what people are saying and respond accordingly.  If you do not start conversations, it is not communication.  If you don’t listen to what people say, it’s not communication.  If you do not respond to what people are saying, it’s not communication.  And if you’re not communicating, you’re not going to have those relationships for very long.

Now, I’m a realist and I realize that businesses are not going to use social media to simply build relationships.  As I have said all along, social media is a tool to grow businesses, which is exactly why communication is so important.  If you are properly communicating with you followers, you will be able to address any concerns that would prevent them from buying from you.  If you are properly communicating, you will enable your current customers to encourage other followers to buy from you.  If you are properly communicating, you will have proven to your followers that you are the business they should buy from.

Proper communication starts by simply addressing the problems your community has that you fix.  If you don’t know what I’m talking about, I invite you to checkout last week’s blog.  Once you start communicating with your community, it is a simple matter of dedication, which will be covered next week.  Until then, start communicating with your wives, it’s what a good husband should do!

This is part three of five in the four truths of social media series.  To catch-up on the posts you have missed, or to sign-up for the remaining posts, we invite you to visit timeforarebel.com/blog and put us on your RSS feed.

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The four truths of social media: what it’s all about

Thursday, April 29th, 2010

I recently heard someone talk about the “rules” social media and it really rubbed me the wrong way.  First off, despite what all the “experts” will tell you, there is no right or wrong way to use social media.  There is only what works for you to achieve the goals you want to achieve.  Secondly, if there were rules, as a Rebel, I would have to break them.

While this may make social media seem like a lawless domain, incapable of providing bottom line growth, it is in the ambiguity of social media that you will find its strength. Although I cannot offer you a how-to guide, I can offer up the only constraints you will need to creatively grow your business.  These constraints are not the highbrow thinking of academics; they were simply created by the very users of social media.  All I have done is observe these users, over the course of working with dozens of different companies, and now present you with their truths:

It’s about community: The first thing I have my new clients do is describe their ideal customer.  I don’t care about the normal demographic listings; I want to know what makes them tick.  What keeps them up at night, what do they think about all day, what problems or desires do they have that you can solve?  As you start to answer these questions you will know what kind of community to create.  From there its about finding how to create this community by offering value to your audience.

It’s about communication: As any good relationship expert will tell you, communication is a two way street.  If you’re the only one talking, you’re not communicating.  For anyone that has ever been talked at, instead of talked with, you know how annoying this can be.  Luckily social platforms make it very easy to ignore the people that simply talk at you.  If you don’t want to be ignored then find a way to talk with your community, not at them.

It’s about dedication: Social media is quickly becoming a cluttered space, as every business under the sun jumps on the bandwagon.  This means two things for you.  First, it’s probably going to take longer than you think it should to grow your community.  Even if you are providing great value, don’t expect things to take-off over night.  Second, you will have to pay even greater attention to the community that you do create.  If you don’t provide the value and responsiveness that your audience desires, they’ll gladly and easily go elsewhere.

It’s about flexibility: As I said at the beginning, there are no rules to social media.  What has worked great for some of my clients has absolutely tanked for others.  Not only that, there are constant changes and adaptations that you’ll have to stay on top of.  To stay ahead of the game you will have to constantly test, measure and monitor your campaign.  Find what works for you and then find out how you can make it even better.

Over the next several weeks I will be covering each one of these truths in detail.  If you have any questions before then, just let me know.

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I may be slow but I am dumb

Monday, March 15th, 2010

Sometimes things are so obvious that you just completely forget about them.  When these things smack you in the face you can’t help but feel stupid for not thinking of it earlier.  Well, in true Kyle fashion, I had one of these realizations this week.

For those of you who do not know, I am a social media guy.  I eat, live and breathe it, day in and day out.  Whether it is my social media presence, or that of my clients, I am constantly working to expand networks and build communities.

One of the questions my clients generally ask is what they can do to help expand their network.  I always suggest integrating social media invitations into their traditional marketing pieces to help build their community.  This way the consumer not only learns about you but they also connect to your community, pretty cool stuff.  Beyond the traditional forms of marketing, I also suggest they include links to their social media sites in their email signature.

Now, I am the subject matter expert, the one making these suggestions to my clients, you would think I would do this stuff for myself.  But, low and behold, I realized this week that my email signature didn’t include any reference to my social media sites.  How boneheaded!  As I quickly updated my email signature I realized there are two lessons that you can take away from my oversight:

1) If you don’t have links to your social media sites in your email signature, add them.  They are a great way to connect with people and share networks.  Trust me, just because I was so aloof to the concept, does not mean that it is not a valuable add-on.

2) Take a look at what you advise your clients, customers, colleagues or employees to do.  Do you follow suit in this action?  I know we would all like to say that we do but unfortunately that is not always the case.  Just take a quick second to run through what you ask of those around you to ensure you are meeting that expectation yourself.  I wish I had done this a while ago!

I’ve always said that if I can start a company than anyone can.  This just goes to prove that!

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It’s not about you

Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010

A friend of mine recently sent me a great article by Joel Spolsky on why he was shutting down his blog.  It appears Joel had great success in creating a blog about programming but he felt it was time to focus his time on taking his business to the next level.  As he prepares to shut down the blog, he reflected back on what made the blog such a great tool in growing his business.

What Joel did, without even trying to, was create a community of programmers that were highly interested in his product.  He did this by not focusing on himself or his company but rather the industry as a whole.  This allowed him to draw-in over a million unique visitors a month that may have otherwise not had an interest in his company.  While he admitted it was hard to not give into the impulse of self-promotion, he saw it as the key to his success.

As Joel shuts down his blog, he does so having used it to grow his company from a single person, bootstrap company, to over 30 employees and millions in revenue.  Not bad for a man with a vision and a blog.  What interested me in the story though was HOW he did it.  Time and time again he pointed out that the only reason why the blog worked was because he didn’t focus on himself or his company, only on his industry.

This is an important lesson to take away.  Even as a seasoned blogger I sometimes succumb to the temptation to self-promote, although the times are few and far between, they show how easy it is to do.  All too often I run across blogs that have aired on the side of self-promotion and they immediately seal their fate that I will not return.  Even if the writer is amazing, witty and captures my attention, it is not worth sifting through the sales pitch.

This is even a problem that I will run into with my clients.  They will love the traffic and response they are getting and decide they want to through in a quick pitch for one of their products or services.  I try to warn them against the move but it is ultimately their blog and their company.  And although the results of this quick pitch might not be immediately felt, it is evident that repeated self-promotion leads to stagnated growth.  Even an expert in growing a blog’s reach, like me, can do little if the content is not what people are looking for.

I guess my mom was right; it’s not all about me.

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What a great problem to have?

Thursday, January 7th, 2010

All December I felt like a title wave of work has been pounding against me.  New clients were signing up, existing clients were expanding and hot prospects were pounding on my door.  As the work began to pile up, things began to slip.  Projects were launched a week late, things I thought I sent never got sent and follow-ups were never completed.

When I would explain to people how tight my time was they would generally respond with “what a great problem to have!”  Of course this would make me blush and agree, yes, it is wonderful to be busy because it means that business is booming.  But is it really so great to be so busy?  As I begin to pull myself out from the mess, the resounding answer is no.

A month plus of simply trying to keep my head above water certainly did nothing to help my business.  New clients got started on shaky ground, prospects were turned off because I couldn’t answer their questions and current clients began to question my loyalty to them.  All of this because I wanted to do everything at once and I was convinced that growth was good at any cost.

Now that I am getting reorganized and refocused I know things need to change.  Yes, I do need more help and that is on the way soon.  I also realized that I personally must change the way that I do business.  Just because a prospect decides to sign-up does not mean that I need to drop everything to get them started at once.  From now on I will only be launching one project at a time.  This allows me to focus on the launch, ensure my current clients are still catered to and frees up time to return calls and emails.

Might I loose some clients because they do not want to have to wait to launch their campaign?  Sure, but I would rather loose business because I could not meet their schedule than loose business because I could not meet their expectations.  Time is a very valuable asset and I must carefully assess where I spend it.

So, yes, it is great that my business is growing and people are interested in my services.  But is it great to be too busy?  Absolutely not.  Having clients that are too happy is the only great problem that I want have!

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Beat the Recession – Joblessness can spark the entrepreneur in you

Tuesday, April 14th, 2009

The Business Journal of Milwaukee – by Kathy Bergstrom

Starting a small business during a recession is scary, but Kyle Blades’ fears are tempered by his two tours of duty as a U.S. Marine in Iraq.

His military service provides “perspective on just how short life is and how lucky we are even in this down economy,” he said.

Blades, 25, of St. Francis, started his marketing company Rebel LLC after returning from his nearly year-long second tour of duty in September.

His position as a contract worker in the retail environment group at a Milwaukee manufacturer was eliminated while he served in Iraq. When he returned, the company told him it had a hiring freeze.

Rather than look for another job, Blades decided to strike out on his own. His experience in Iraq gave him the inspiration.

“I have my entire life ahead of me to do what it is I want,” he said.

Blades took three months to do research and meet with advisers from the U.S. Small Business Administration and the Service Corps of Retired Executives. In December, he got a $40,000 SBA loan through the Patriot Express program from U.S. Bank. The SBA loan program is for military members and veterans.

Rebel LLC bills itself as a customized consumer outreach company. Blades drew on his experience as a client of other marketing firms.

“I never really found anything that satisfied what I wanted to see from a marketing company,” he said.

His idea is to learn about the client first and find new ways to help the company reach its customers, whether that’s through public relations, business-to-business marketing, developing a marketing plan and other services.

Rebel LLC operates out of his St. Francis duplex and has 10 clients, including a bar, production company and a theater company. He hopes to generate $50,000 in revenue in his first year. January and February failed to meet projections, but business picked up in March.

He sees now as a “perfect time” to start a business, because other businesses may be looking for assistance in evaluating their operations.

“It’s absolutely a very scary time to be in business, but also very exciting because we can help turn things around,” Blades explained.

Russ Roberts, manager of the Small Business Center at Waukesha County Technical College, said it’s important to consider the business environment when starting a small business, but environment is not the only consideration.

Someone who has been laid off should consider whether they have what it takes to be an entrepreneur.

Some of the common qualities are persistence, drive, determination and passion for work.

Entrepreneurs also should be motivated less by the desire to make a lot of money and more by a love of what they do, Roberts said.

Prospective entrepreneurs can find an array of counseling services from places like the WCTC center, University of Wisconsin System and SBA.

If you’ve been laid off and don’t have an income, it might be wise to find some kind of job while the business is in its early stages, Roberts said.

Jeff Hekkers, 51, of Oconomowoc, stumbled across his idea for a business through volunteer work.

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