Online Marketing: Publish or Perfection?

ID-100149444Trainers, consultants, and professional coaches tend to strive for perfection. On the surface that seems like an asset but it can become the undoing of their online marketing.

The problem with perfectionism is it often becomes fruitless debate or nit picking. Gradual improvement is admirable but requires testing not nit picking.

At a certain point in online marketing timeliness runs up against perfectionism and timeliness should almost always win. There are certainly ways to avoid this conflict with marketing matrices and calendars but sooner or later revisions, improvements, and tweaks will bring you to the brink of a deadline.

And the rule should be to meet the deadline. Inevitably when relaying this message someone says, “But there are exceptions like blatant mistakes, inaccurate information, or poor quality communications/layout that need corrected.” That’s competency not perfectionism. Competency is meeting basic requirements of professional quality and clear messaging.

The best piece of marketing that never gets released is ultimately a waste of time and effort. It’s OK to refine and tweak but don’t hold up your marketing processes debating which image is most striking or what color is most appealing. As long as the communication is of a professional quality it’s better to get it out. Use the time you save debating and spend it on analyzing and testing your results. Then your next campaign can take what you’ve learned and apply it, rather than getting stuck in a cycle of “perfection”.

Image courtesy of  -Marcus- / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Consistency is Key in Online Marketing . . . Repetition, Not Necessarily

Consistency is often the lacking feature in an otherwise solid online marketing campaign.  Strategizing and planning tend to be what trainers, consultants, and professional coaches want to tackle but consistent execution can be elusive.  That said consistency can become repetition which is a sure way to lose audience interest.

Consistency is born from a marketing calendar and a company brand outline.  Following the template and schedule generate consistency.  The content can also help generate cohesiveness through follow on topics or offers that build on one another. Consistency is a proven advantage in that many potential clients will need many touches (for most people it’s 7 or more) before credibility is built up to a point where they will consider calls to action.

Strive for consistency but be wary of message repetition.

A client of ours ran monthly events.  They had a particular topic and a set way of doing their event.  Truthfully, it was a powerful topic and an impressive presentation.  The problem was that the marketing material was just as repetitive.  The description and the bullet points would change some but the title and calls to action were always identical.  What was initially a very successful promotion became tired.  By the 10th time they ran the event the email list and social followers completely tuned it out. Registration was poor and something needed done to rejuvenate their attendance levels.

So the event was revamped.  We didn’t go back to the drawing board, we just modified it: New title, new incentives, new target audience.  The consistency remained in that the landing page, email invitation, and social posts were all recognizable as part of our clients campaign but interest was renewed because the audience perceived it as something different.

Consistency is good but it can lead to a lazy approach which results in repetition.  Have a close eye on metrics and if you see interest has plummeted in a recurring offer or message, it will need to be revamped.

An Online Marketing Strategy that Works for YOUR Business

There is no shortage of email, social, and online marketing to sample from.  It’s a common occurrence for us to get a forward saying, “Can we do something like this?”  While there is nothing wrong with getting inspiration from other marketing campaigns; trainers, consultants, and professional coaches need to assess whether the marketing strategy works for their business.

Recently I had a client forward one of Seth Godin’s emails to me and say, “Let’s make our emails just like Seth’s emails.” The email sample was very simple with a short bit of content and a handful of social options.

No disrespect to Mr. Godin, he offers great content and I’m sure he has a clearly defined plan for his emails being the way they are, but this client wasn’t Seth Godin.  Seth Godin’s campaign was built around short content driven by name recognition and a library of well-established books and concepts.  This client was fairly new to his market and offering in depth consulting relationships.  The focus of the email campaign and audience size was much different.

So we said, “We can do something along the lines of what Seth Godin did but there is not any direct lead generating mechanisms on the email.  Are you comfortable if leads go away for an extended period until you’ve built up a following in the way Seth Godin has?”  The consultant adamantly replied, “Well no, I need leads to keep coming in.”

What we ended up with was short tactics and insights like Seth Godin’s email but coupled with a single call to action that would change based on the content.  It’s great to be inspired by other marketing strategies but pay attention to the details.  What works for one business won’t work for all businesses.

Business to Business (B to B) Social Media

There tends to be two extremes to opinions on social media in the business to business marketing world.

The one extreme is that it’s the same as any other business.  Put in the effort and you’ll see the same result as any other business.

The other extreme is that it’s not a good medium for business marketing.  Avoid the time suck that social media entails.

As with most things, the truth is somewhere in the middle. Social media can be a valuable marketing channel for trainers, consultants and professional coaches if they offer valuable content while driving clients and prospects to relevant calls to action.  Here are just a few key differences for business to business social media pages:

LinkedIn is the Heavyweight

LinkedIn is a social media site tailor made for business.  People on the site expect to see professional topics. It’s perfect for a B to B environment.  Provide relevant posts to your targeted contacts or groups in LinkedIn and business opportunities will come from it.  LinkedIn tends to outperform other social media sites by 300% for having people click a business to business call to action.

Quality of Contacts Trumps Quantity

Many social media marketing stats revolve around how many people like your page or follow your posts.  For B to B this can be a false metric.  A better metric is analyzing the quality of your social network.  If you are a sales trainer your network should be full of sales people, sales managers, and executives.  If you find that most of your contacts are not business related or the wrong demographic then you need to refocus and restructure your social media marketing campaigns.

Don’t Expect Overly Emotional Interactions

While you might have a big fan that can’t wait to tell the world how they didn’t know what business was before meeting you, those will be few and far between.  Emotion will get toned down.  Rather look for interactions and comments that highlight the business advantages to what you offer.  A sales trainer might get something like, “My revenues increased by 50% and the average time to complete a sale decreased by three months.” This doesn’t speak to how much a client loves their consultant personally but it’s a powerful comment that will get the attention of your target audience.

Always Have an Obvious Call to Action

Every post should include a next step, even if it’s an obvious one.  If you post an article the next step is clicking to read it.  If you post a video then the next step is clicking to see it.  If you have an event the registration link should be obvious.  etc.  Your call to action might have a follow on call to action but the first step should be a no-brainer.  There isn’t a lot of room for random asides in B to B social media posting.  Have a point, make a point, and provide a next step that supports that point.
Of course there are other differences but these are some starters to get a true sense of how B to B social media can be profitable.

Business to Business (B to B) Social Media

There tends to be two extremes to opinions on social media in the business to business marketing world. 

The one extreme is that it’s the same as any other business.  Put in the effort and you’ll see the same result as any other business.

The other extreme is that it’s not a good medium for business marketing.  Avoid the time suck that social media entails.

As with most things, the truth is somewhere in the middle. Social media can be a valuable marketing channel for trainers, consultants and professional coaches if they offer valuable content while driving clients and prospects to relevant calls to action.  Here are just a few key differences for business to business social media pages:

LinkedIn is the Heavyweight
LinkedIn is a social media site tailor made for business.  People on the site expect to see professional topics. It’s perfect for a B to B environment.  Provide relevant posts to your targeted contacts or groups in LinkedIn and business opportunities will come from it.  LinkedIn tends to outperform other social media sites by 300% for having people click a business to business call to action.

Quality of Contacts Trumps Quantity
Many social media marketing stats revolve around how many people like your page or follow your posts.  For B to B this can be a false metric.  A better metric is analyzing the quality of your social network.  If you are a sales trainer your network should be full of sales people, sales managers, and executives.  If you find that most of your contacts are not business related or the wrong demographic then you need to refocus and restructure your social media marketing campaigns.

Don’t Expect Overly Emotional Interactions
While you might have a big fan that can’t wait to tell the world how they didn’t know what business was before meeting you, those will be few and far between.  Emotion will get toned down.  Rather look for interactions and comments that highlight the business advantages to what you offer.  A sales trainer might get something like, “My revenues increased by 50% and the average time to complete a sale decreased by three months.” This doesn’t speak to how much a client loves their consultant personally but it’s a powerful comment that will get the attention of your target audience.

Always Have an Obvious Call to Action
Every post should include a next step, even if it’s an obvious one.  If you post an article the next step is clicking to read it.  If you post a video then the next step is clicking to see it.  If you have an event the registration link should be obvious.  etc.  Your call to action might have a follow on call to action but the first step should be a no brainer.  There isn’t a lot of room for random asides in B to B social media posting.  Have a point, make a point, and provide a next step that supports that point.

Of course there are other differences but these are some starters to get a true sense of how B to B social media can be profitable.

Social Media: Quality Over Quantity

Are you abusing your social profiles? A lot of trainers, consultants, and professional coaches don’t think they are but on analysis their profiles contain very little quality information.  Rather it’s a long series of hastily crafted messages or reused content with little or no value add. Social media marketing isn’t about finding and posting anything with relevance to your profession.  The value of viewing or subscribing to your social profile is in getting expert viewpoints on industry or professional topics.   Social media marketing is much more effective when the focus is on quality rather than quantity.

Regurgitating other profiles
Reposting is the most prevalent abuse of social profiles.  There is never a situation where your profile should automatically repost everything from an industry or professional resource.  People can link to that resource’s profile if they want to see everything they post.  Your social profiles should reflect you or your firm’s view on a topic. It’s OK to selectively repost from an industry or professional resource but, at minimum, any repost should have a short note on why you are linking to it.  A follow on commentary can be a nice touch if what you want to say won’t fit the space restrictions in the first post.

Posting low value blurbs
Space restrictions are a fact of social media life.  That isn’t an excuse to post gibberish that no one cares about to fill a lull in posts.  Take some time to write a message that means something to your audience. Here’s a real-life low value message from a sales training firm: “Do your behaviors today!”  That has no meaning to people unfamiliar with their content and little value to those that do know the content.  With a little tweaking it could be more impactful, something like, “Sales success comes from doing assigned behaviors designed to meet goals. What are your non-negotiable behaviors for this week?”

Pawning off other’s Content as their own
Some people ensure that they are “scooped” on everything they post to their profiles.  This happens when they largely plagiarize from other industry sources.  The internet is a big place and many people get away with taking content but it’s never really an original thought.  It’s impossible to steal an authentic consistent voice.  Worst case scenario is that your content is exposed as copies of other’s information which damages credibility.  Best case is that you have an inconsistent set of postings that provide no overarching principles.

Too much one way communicating
The beauty of social media that many trainers, consultants, and professional coaches ignore is the potential for interaction.  Ask questions of your audience.  The above revised post is an example of writing a question that can be rhetorical but invites interaction from dedicated clients or interested prospects.  There’s a fair chance that interaction will be low but the post is designed to add value even if no one responds.  However, if someone does respond then it makes for a quality interaction and encourages others to participate in the future.

Frequent reposting of the same content
It’s ok to repeat an important point.  Reuse can be spawned from calendar recurrences or current events.  Using the example above, the same post might be used at the beginning of the year for a sales training firm, something like, “The new year is here.  Are your sales goals set and behaviors written down?  If not attend our goal setting workshop on ____”.  But it’s important that some time has passed between posts and that reposts have a logical reason for reuse other than a scramble to put something new on the social profile.  For instance, if you have an event or a tactic, don’t use it back-to-back.  If you have to post something similar within a few weeks of one another, at least change the message up to generate interest.  There should never be a time where the same thing is posted more than once in a week.

There are two techniques to avoid quantity over quality.

  1. Set a social media editorial calendar.  A monthly schedule is a manageable amount of time.  At the end of a month, take a few hours and write out all your posts for the upcoming month.  This ensures a balanced calendar and gives some time to write well thought out, quality posts.
  2.  Links are your friend.  Sometimes space restrictions prevent a quality communication going right on the social profile.  Use links to your advantage by creating content on your website and then linking to it.  In that way, the social post just needs to function as a subject line teasing people to view your more robust content.

Quantity is often the focus to “fill up” a social profile.  However no one ever complains if they get higher quality content but it come less frequently.  Better to post once a week with something impactful to your audience, than to post several times a day with content that holds little value.

Social Media Automation: Pro or Con?

At its best social media is an interactive tool for businesses to engage their clients and prospects in meaningful interaction.  At its worst is regurgitated content filling a stream of SPAM.  It would seem that automating social media would lean toward the latter rather than the former, right?  It doesn’t have to be that way.  Setting automation for business social media is often the only practical way to ensure that social media channels are providing valuable content.

Automation is vital for many businesses because it’s often a time suck.  Trainers, professional coaches, and consultants especially don’t have blocks of time to dedicate to social media.  Many anti-automation proponents for social media claim to have the 10-minute a day solution.  The fact is without automation, 10 minutes becomes 30 which becomes 60 and so on.  Furthermore some small businesses don’t even have the 10 minutes to dedicate.

That’s why a dedicated social media automation program is vital.  It let’s businesses use singular content across several channels.  When done well, it’s better for the user as well. The information is available across the board so they can access it in a manner they like.

So where’s the down side?  The down side is that many people abuse automation.  They regurgitate information or seed their profile with anything, whether it has to do with their stated topic or not.  This is a waste of time as it requires audiences to sift through loads of information to find what they want.  People simply will not put that much work into a social media presence.

I recently had a person claim that they ignore all automated social media posts.  He only read what was targeted to him.  I don’t buy that for a minute.  Imagine screening the internet for what was only targeted to you.  Your email, a few personal social media posts, and websites of interest would be all that’s left.  People simply don’t do that.  When a question or problem arises, people venture out to learn solutions.  If they find your social media content and it offers valuable insights, they won’t care whether it’s automated or not.

The goal is to ensure that your social media automation isn’t robotic.  Automate recurring messages but be sure to intermix personal notes.  Also respond to comments or feedback.  If people want to interact on your social media channels you should be able to oblige.

Automating original content geared toward your target audience is vital to keeping business social media campaigns consistently providing value to drive business because doing it manually just isn’t practical.

Social Media is Becoming a Necessity (Not Optional)

Full disclaimer, I believe that social media is currently being over-hyped as a marketing medium primarily because significant metrics are hard to gather and business communication is often a subsidiary focus.  That said, almost every company should have some strategy for using it.  The reason I say this is not from a belief that it will revolutionize your marketing.  The fact is that for many it won’t.  However social media is becoming a preferred platform of communication for many people and therefore needs to be adopted in some fashion by businesses.

This is especially true for trainers, consultants, and business coaches.  Your clients and prospects look to you as a content expert.  They expect to find you making commentary on your expertise and many rely on social media.  If you won’t communicate to them in their preferred fashion, a competitor will.  Furthermore, social media is becoming more important in search engine optimization and will be important to keeping websites ranking well.

So how do I rectify a belief that social media needs to be adopted but also that it won’t have a significant impact on your marketing (at least not immediately)?  By adopting an, “I can say I’m doing it” strategy.  Most trainers, consultants, and business coaches already have communication channels online and through email.  It’s a fairly straight forward approach to integrate these messages into social media.

This strategy can be implemented by any business because it’s leveraging something that is already being done.  This keeps the time/money/effort commitment to a minimum but still communicates to the social media audience in a way that resonates with them.

The other advantage of doing this is it positions you for a more in depth approach down the line.  I have no doubt that social media applications and tracking will continue to improve, making it a vital mix in online marketing campaigns.

Starting out with a basic model allows businesses to build a social media audience where experiments can be done on the best way to leverage your social media channel.  The power of social media isn’t really just marketing.  When fully adopted social media serves sales, customer service, and personal one-to-one communication roles.

The “I can say I’m doing it” approach let’s businesses walk before they run.  When businesses dive in with a full campaign they often get overwhelmed because they don’t have resources in place to consistently use their social media channel.  Since they are stretched thin the effort is usually lacking and results are often negligible.

If you’re already using social media regularly and find that it serves more than a marketing role by being a communication channel for multiple parts of the business, you’ve likely hit a point where there is true ROI and more time/money/effort is warranted.  If you’re not using social media then taking the “I can say I’m doing it” approach is a good way to get your feet wet.

Staying on the sideline of social media is a bad option.  After all, how silly would it be nowadays to tell someone you don’t have a website/email but that you can fax information?  Social media is becoming a more critical piece to the website/email matrix because it’s how many people communicate and is likely to be a business necessity sooner rather than later.

Company’s Strategy for Social Media

Companies often agonize over how to use social media.  The process can get fairly drawn out but at the end of the day there are only three options available to companies.

 

Strategy 1: Company Communications

Doing a company approach to social media is really about setting up social media channels that get fed company communications.  Any information that the company sends publically should find its way onto every social media channel.  This is an easier strategy to put in place because all social media platforms can get linked through an email platform or social media management tool like hoot suite.  Simply put, it takes less time to manage this process.  It also comes with less risk as central employees or contractors can be used to distribute and manage the information.  So the pros are that it takes less time and closely manages the company message. The down side is that very little one-to-one interaction is available which limits powerful brand or marketing capabilities.

 

Strategy 2: Employee/Individual Communications

Every company is made of individual(s).  This strategy leverages that group of people with the ability to personally interact as representatives of the company.  The benefit here is that, as a group, interactions will be more frequent and personalized which can create a strong bond to the social media audience.  True one-to-one interaction is feasible.  The down side is that those interactions happen in real time and there is a risk of problems being presented on a public forum.  There is also a risk of wasted time as individuals can get drawn into social interactions that provide little value to the company.  Centralized control becomes almost impossible and presenting a unified message is often a challenge.

 

Strategy 3: Hybrid Style

It’s possible to create a hybrid strategy where company communications are distributed across social media channels but individuals also have access to interact with the social media audience.  This provides the pros of a centralized message mixed with personal interaction but also all the risks of less control and more time dedicated to the social media channel.  The added problem is that sometimes company communications can disrupt the personal interactions as the company communications are sent on a schedule rather than real time.

 

There is no right answer to social media strategy.  It’s more of deciding what fits for your company.  Some important things to consider is manpower to dedicate to social media, risks involved with personal interactions, and time invested in managing the channels.  The answers to these questions will help you narrow in on the strategy that works for your company.  Once you choose a strategy, it’s important that all parties involved with the social media channels understand the goal.  Once the goal is clear then it’s easier to dedicate the resources necessary but not waste time on low return activities.

Online Marketing: Don’t Mistake New for Better.

I was recently informed by a client that they needed to step up their social media presence because “email is on the way out”.  That was a shock to me as most of my clients (this one included) see a nice return on their email marketing investment.  In fact, industry wide email marketing boasts a leading ROI among online marketing efforts with $42.08 generated from every dollar spent.  In short, my client was mistaken.  He’d made the error of thinking “new” was “better”.

Social media seems to be the new “new”.  It’s one of the first things out of people’s mouths when internet marketing comes up.  And I don’t mean to pick on social media, it’s a valuable tool.  It just shouldn’t be put on a pedestal above older communication channels that still outperform it.

An older example is when CSS layouts were first appearing.  Many companies rushed to update their pages for the new “standard”.  The problem was that many of the web browsers weren’t quite up to speed in rendering these sites so web developers had to create multiple versions for individual browsers.  That made developing the site significantly more expensive.  The difference between jumping on CSS layouts when it was new and when browser support increased was potentially tens of thousands of dollars.  At the end of the day there was no difference between a tabled layout and a CSS layout to most users but the early adopters could revel in the “newness” for a short period of time.

Neglecting other marketing channels to do what’s “new” can be very problematic when resources are shifted to a new media that does not perform as well as an older one.  It’s like trading a dollar for a quarter, it might be shinier but there’s no financial upside.

Of course I’m not suggesting that you let your online marketing stagnate into a tried and true rut.  Innovation and new technology will come up and many times it should be adopted.  But focus on effectiveness not newness.  When you keep track of what’s performing best it keeps the allure of “new” out of your decision making.  Online marketing is about increasing awareness of a company, driving opportunities, and ultimately having a positive impact on the bottom line.  Newness is hard pressed to affect any of those things on its own.

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