Social Media, Reciprocity, and Active Engagement

Courtesy and Personality

I am often asked how my Twitter following grew to over 25,000. How I have over 4,000 connections on LinkedIn. Those who know me ask how, across 1600 social media sites online, I was able to add over 50,000 social media friends, contacts, connections, and followers.

How?

What’s your secret?

I have thought about this a lot!

I am a relative unknown. I don’t particularly like socializing and usually stay to myself and people I am familiar with when out. I am slow to wwarm up to people and 2 years ago I didn’t have or know how to set up a website, much less know what Twitter or Facebook or YouTube was. The only reason I knew about MySpace was because my kids were on it and it was talked about in the media all the time.

I was less than a novice, if that is possible, and knew less than nothing!

When I joined Twitter on December 18, 2008 I nursed a grand total of 218 followers into March of the New Year and still had no clue what I was doing when it came to social media and Internet marketing.

Inbound marketing?

Again, less than nothing!

But I am a fast study and I realized several things right off the bat:

• The Internet was simply a communication vehicle, albeit an extremely powerful one.
• Social media was a communication vehicle within a communication vehicle and also an extremely powerful one.
• Social media was a reflection of a need expressed throughout society, a need for connection and meaning.
• Video sharing was an extension of social media and just another way to share and connect.
• Social media wasn’t about building a huge amount of followers all at once, as many people seemed intent on doing at the time.
• Social media was like the Breck commercial, one of the most famous marketing campaigns in the history of marketing. I tell two people…and they tell two people…and so on…and so on…and so on! The root of viral communication, pun intended!
• Social media was not about selling stuff online, it was about:
  • Making connections
  • Building relationships
  • Building trust
  • Forming bonds
• Social media was about converting all of the above into a Win-Win for both parties in the relationship!

But a funny thing happened on the way to meaningful social media interaction…marketing happened.

Bad marketing!

Social media marketing!

The fact is, social media has very little to do with direct marketing, it is almost anathma to what social media is all about:

• Connections
• Relationships
• Trust
• Bonds

The challenge is, everyone wants to be Dell and Southwest Airlines.

The fact is, most are not!

Yes, Dell made 3 million with social media. But Dell is Dell and has spent many millions over many years creating brand awareness. Southwest Airlines is Southwest Airlines, arguably one of the most successful customer service companies in history, in any sector, in any line of business!

Southwest and Dell did not start out on the Internet two years ago with zero visibility and no brand awareness and throw up a Facebook Page and a Twitter Page and make millions from day one. They did it the old fashioned way, they earned it over several years, banging it out, one day at a time.

No secret!

No mystery!

Solid marketing that carried over into a new medium.

Enter John Zajaros and The Ultimate Internet Image, Joe Dokes and Joe’s Auto Shop, or Julie Smith and Julie’s Flowers…or whatever.

We enter social media from basically the same space, square one!

For those you us who have little or no brand identity, little or no Internet savvy, and little or no real capital behind our inbound marketing efforts, we must do it the old fashioned way too…we have to go out and earn it.

That means one day at a time, one connection at a time, done over time, and in such a way that it benefits both parties.

In other words, we push each other up!

How?

• Spreading each other’s posts, messages, videos, tweets, etc.
• Sharing each other’s links.
• Reading each others blogs.
• Watching each other’s videos.
• Following each other back.
• Responding to open questions put to the entire commiunity, the social media community.
• Responding to each others messages.
• And much more…

Finally, and this one is so intuitive and yet is never done…show appreciation!

To say:

• “I care!”
• “You matter!”
• “You’re welcome!”
• And the biggest one of all? “Thank you!”

It is incredible how many times a day people fail to say those two magic words, any of them, but especially…

…“Thank you!”

“Please!” and “Thank You!”

Common courtesy!

The secret to building a social media following?

The secret to success at anything in life?

Push others up and show gratitude for the opportunity to connect, to be a part of someone else’s life, to contribute to the “Greater Good!”

Sound naïve?

Sound a bit starry-eyed and utopian?

Not at all!

Common courtesy and reciprocity have been around since we were all running around in tribes.

No, not Seth Godin type tribes…although he is dead on!

It is what makes us human and it is why social media is such a big hit…because people are thirsty for that connection, that sense of oneness, and that sense of being appreciated.

Want to succeed online?

In business?

In life?

Make someone else feel special, make someone else feel important, make someone else feel like you noticed them; and make sure it’s not just for some relationship ROI cr#p but because you really care about people. Do that and you will succeed in every aspect of your life.

If you are focused on where your next 1000 Twitter followers are going to come from…

Good luck!

If you are focused on how you can make a difference in soemone’s life…

You don’t need me!

This has been building up for a while. I thought this a good time to bring it up.

Thank you for reading this and I hope it resonated with you on some level.

If it did? Please leave a comment?

If it didn’t? Please leave a comment!

In any case, please leave a comment!

Thank you!

John Zajaros
The Ultimate Internet Image
Lakewood, Ohio 44107
216-712-7004

The Initial Inbound Marketing Consultation:

Discussing Inbound Marketing Strategies, AdWords,

Social Media, SEO Factors, and a Secret Ingredient

Whenever I meet with a prospective inbound marketing client for the first time the conversation invariably settles upon what the most effective marketing strategies, those required to build a significant Internet presence, what we at UII refer to as The Ultimate Internet image.

The most common advertising and inbound marketing related questions I am asked in the initial consultation have to do with getting to Google’s page one as soon as possible, and staying there.

AdWords: Many prospective clients invariably ask about paid advertising and, in particular, Google AdWords (PPC or pay-per-click) as a means of getting to page one quickly. My response is always the same:

“It depends on what your goals are, short term and long term, how deep your pockets are, and how thick your skin is.”

That is not always a popular answer…but it’s the truth!

There is no faster way to get to page one and stay there, guaranteed, than to pay for it. However, if a prospective client isn’t familiar with PPC advertising, the risks as well as the rewards, it is generally not a great place to start an inbound marketing consulting relationship. That being said, I do work with clients with sizable AdWords budgets from day one and they’ve done quite well.

However, you must have clearly defined parameters going in and there has to be a degree of comfort and confidence that usually takes time to build with a new inbound marketing consulting client.

OK! Back to organic inbound marketing strategies!

Social Media: Once we dispose of the AdWords question, the next question that comes up has to do with social media.

Social media is everywhere!

Social media is on Primetime TV with various NCIS characters checking their Facebook pages while solving crimes and being “friended” by employers and fellow employees. When I say social media is everywhere, I mean it’s everywhere! It is rare for the nightly news to run without some mention of Facebook or Twitter or YouTube. The problem is, many prospective inbound marketing clients have seen and heard the hype, they have been exposed to the sales pitch, but they understand very little about how it works or what it takes to pull off a successful social media management campaign.

Notice I didn’t say social media marketing campaign?

That’s because, if you have read any of my previous posts you already know this, social media marketing is an oxymoron. Why? Because, in every instance, attempting to market anything overtly via social media is not only ineffective…it is indeed moronic.

I probably lost a couple of readers with that statement…but so be it!

Advising a client to market anything other than a solid Internet image, an online presence via social media is playing Russian roulette with your client’s brand. Social media marketing puts your client at risk for Terms of Service (TOS) violations and having your client’s brand name permanently banned from the social media platform in question.

It is an unnecessary risk and it is a disservice to your client.

Enough said!

Finally, after we have gotten through paid advertising and social media, we get around to talking about websites, which we will cover in great detail in an upcoming blog post, and then to the best ways to get to Google’s page one organically.

The best ways to get to page one of any of the search engine results pages or SERPs, and stay there, are:

• SEO: I am talking about a well designed program from the bottom up and that sometimes means dismantling the existing Internet image and starting over from square one with the proper foundation and the right architecture. This is a radical approach but if your client is nowhere to be found on the SERPs for the keywords necessary and their PR (page rank) is 0/10, what do you have to lose? Better to start fresh and do it right. If you do so, Google, Yahoo, and Bing will reward you, at least in the short term, and certainly long enough to get the ball rolling in the right direction.
• Links: There are a number of different kinds of links and we will discuss them all in depth later. For now, all your new inbound marketing client needs to know is that links are the way the Internet confers authority on your site, on your Internet image. Links are the Internet’s way of saying: “This webiste offers something of value, it has something to offer!” Links from the right kind of sites, related sites with an equal or higher PR than your own, will enhance your Internet image and your authority online.
• Pages: Pages alone are not enough. However, pages are generally a reflection of the time and attention paid to the site by the webmaster, owner of the business, inbound marketing consultancy, or whoever is responsible for its upkeep. After all, if a website is getting enough attention to build pages on a consistent basis, chances are also very good that the type of content offered on those pages is good. Usually…not always…but usually. Interestingly, if your site has a lot of pages the new ones will get indexed quickly. There are a number of advantages to developing a big site filled with quality content as quickly as possible and then continuing to build over time.
• Content: Some say Video is King and others say Content is King. The fact is, both are so incredibly important you simply cannot have an effective inbound marketing campaign without both. Content affects your message and, without the proper message conveyed in just the right way, your blog posts, articles, descriptions, and so on will not be read. If your video does not offer quality content, it will not be watched. Video without great content is useless. Articles without quality content are useless. Blog posts without quality content are useless. Meta descriptions without….Well, you get the picture. Additionally, the more content you add, the more often you add it, and the more related pages it builds, the higher your ranking is going to be.
• Longevity: Longevity is one of those things you just can’t push. The time your website has been around is pretty much set in stone. That being said, you can tweak it a bit. Interestingly, many webmasters and inbound marketing consultants fail to take advantage of these small adjustments that, cumulatively, make a big difference. One of the best things you can do in this regard is to purchase your domain name for at least two and, optimally, five years…up front. Domain age is a crucial factor and it has been noted by many SEO authorities that investing in your domain reflects well on your site and the search engines reward you for the investment. There are other factors and we will discuss them in our next post.
• There are reportedly as many as 200 different SEO factors that affect your overall ranking. That’s right, 200! Some of the others include:
  • Keyword in the URL
  • Keyword in the Domain name
  • Keyword in the title tag – close to the beginning (10 to 60 characters)
  • Keywords in Description – It is said Google no longer relies on it but they do in fact still use it on occasion
  • Keyword in the keyword meta tag – be careful with this one of you can be penalized for getting it wrong (see link in resources below)
  • Keyword density in the body text – Careful! 5-20% of all keywords in total but watch for % threshold
  • Keyword density for individual keywords – 1% to 6 %
  • Keywords in Heading tags – H1, H2 & H3
  • And so on! Like I said…200!

There are many more issues covered during the initial inbound marketing consultation, particularly as we begin the process of building an inbound marketing strategy designed to get our client to page one.

The SERP page one ranking for the various keyword phrases determined to be of greatest significance for lead, appointment, and traffic generation, and ultimately converting the leads to sales,  is crucial to our new client’s success.

Every factor must be addressed, all 200 SEO factors as well as the additional inbound marketing components mentioned above and others we have yet to discuss.

Ultimately, your inbound marketing client’s success is based on how well you communicate what you will be doing and how your new client can help. Significantly, there is one final component that is necessary, one characteristic that can make your job easy and your inbound marketing strategy a success.

Without it, your inbound marketing strategy will certainly fail!

And that secret ingredient is:

Patience!

All of the above will come together if patience is part of the overall marketing strategy. With the addition of quality video and articles (which we will discuss next), along with an ongoing blogging strategy, your inbound marketing strategy will surely succeed. However, if your client is not willing to invest the one ingredient that must come from them, you should part friends before you begin.

Without patience in the mix, there is no amount of money that will be worth the aggravation of attempting to deal with an impatient client.

Key Point: If you explain things clearly up front and do not make promises you have absolutely no control over, you will have a great relationship and your new inbound marketing client will allow you the time and the flexibility you need to deliver amazing results.

However, if you make outlandish claims in order to make a quick sale, it will come back to bite you (you know where) every time.

Ultimately, and I am certain this goes without saying for the vast majority of inbound marketing consultants out there: be honest; be realistic; and, do your homework. If you do those three things, you will have a client long term and you will be able to deliver results that will make you look like a super hero; and, you will make your client a lot of money!

How great is that?

Next we will cover video marketing and distribution followed by article marketing and distribution. Then, we will discuss various website options and why I do everything but stand on my head to get new clients off the idea of a static website on into something far more effective. Then, we will cover linking and how to get more sites to link to you.

An aside: Don’t always believe what Alexa tells you about links, or traffic for that matter. Use Google Analytics and Quantcast, as well as one or two others that we will discuss in the coming weeks, for a more accurate picture. Google and Yahoo also seem to keep better track of links and reflect a more accurate number of indexed pages. We will discuss how to use all of these measures, and more, very soon.

If you have questions, contact me anytime. Please leave comments or feedback…I would love to hear from you!

John Zajaros
The Ultimate Internet Image
Lakewood, Ohio 44107
Skype: johnzajaros1
216-712-7004

Resources:

Check out Vaughn’s Summaries for all 200 SEO Factors

Google Analytics

Quantcast

Alexa