Just because someone uses drugs or alcohol, doesn’t mean that they’re a drug addict or alcoholic, or even, for that matter, that they have a problem with drugs or alcohol. As for me, if I’m not a drug addict or an alcoholic, I’m definitely someone who shouldn’t drink alcohol or use drugs.
Read MoreFacebook Pages are for brands and businesses. This is your place to create a community of current and potential clients, and collaborators.
Read MoreBeing inside the right community can build your business, give you insider knowledge and get an edge in your niche.
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By Sharon Givoni
Sharon Givoni is a branding and advertising lawyer and principal of Sharon Givoni Consulting. Contact Sharon.
For further articles by Sharon on IP and trade marks, visit http://www.sharongivoni.com.au/articles.html
A website, it is has been said, is a virtual store. It’s where people go to find out about you and your products. It needs to look good, have something new every time people take a look at it, and its content should invite people to engage.
Read MoreRegardless of industry, website traffic is almost always a leading indicator of small company success. More often than not, website traffic directly correlates with sales—meaning slow months on the website can translate to slow months at the cash register.
Read MoreNot only can you build up your audience and their awareness of your brand, but you can also monitor what the twitterverse is saying about you and your brand. From there you can plan how to bolster or correct the public conversation about your brand.
Read MoreTo quote The Twitter Book (O’Reilly & Milstein 2009), ‘The biggest mistake we see companies make when they first hit twitter is to think about it as a channel to push out information. In fact, it turns out to be a great medium for holding conversations rather than making announcements.’
I have found Twitter to be a heap of fun as well as a virtual library once you find the right streams of conversation (right now I’m enjoying the very lively #ausvotes). As an example of great information that flows to you on twitter, I was tweeted a link to this great blog www.twitip.com/how-i-will-add-1000-twitter-followers-this-year/. It gives you a few ideas of what to tweet and how to publicise that you are on twitter.
Interestingly, the twitip blog also brings up the idea of rapidly acquired app-generated followers, as opposed to those you work on building a relationship with. Personally I think that the point of getting followers is not for the quantity, but rather the quality. If you are in any sort of business and you are on Twitter for this reason, what you want to be concentrating on is creating win-win relationships with people. You want to get to know who’s out there, what they know and what they can do. And you want people to know that about you too. You also want to have a bit of a laugh along the way as well. It is, after all, social media.
An interesting site that I came across while flicking through Twitter Marketing for Dummies (I wish they wouldn’t call it that) is http://www.crazybob.org/twubble/. This site analyses who you currently follow on Twitter and then suggests more people for you to follow. You might want to check your following list first though, and cull any with disappointing tweets to avoid more of the same.
Just remember with Twitter – or any social media for that matter – the key is to earn the trust of your community. As Chris Brogan and Julien Smith wrote in The Trust Agents, the idea of networking though social media is to make yourself someone that people can put their confidence in and do business with on the web. On Twitter, things will happen just because you’re there. Be patient. Differentiate yourself by serving people’s needs instead of being yet another salesperson with your hand out. Share your expertise and people will get to know you as an expert in your field.
Twitter is just one tool in the social media arsenal. Use it well and it can generate a lot of good will, enhance your reputation and even help someone else along the way. And who knows, you might even end up laughing while tweeting during Gruen Nation like me.
A lot of people ask me, when I tell them I’m all for organics and environmental conservation – why go eco? “Hey, I was born in the ’70s, so why not eco. ” But really there’s more to it than that.
Sure I always had a keen interest in the environment – joined the green group at RMIT, cycled or walked everywhere, grew my own vegies, shopped at Friends of the Earth, recycled and was practically vegan… but this vague notion of the right thing to do never really made it as far as committing to purchasing organic produce. Sure I was broke, and organics were a lot more expensive and harder to get back then.
In February 2008, the issue of environment and chemical pollutants got a lot more personal for me. Because in February 2008 my husband died of Creutzfeldt Jakob Disease (CJD) – a.k.a. Mad Cows’ Disease. Not from meat, but ‘acquired’ - most probably from agricultural sprays that he was exposed to while working a season in hot houses in Greece. He’d told me once that the chemicals they used in those hot houses turned a cucumber or tomato from something that had barely taken form to a fully sized and saleable item. Serious chemicals!
So these days I choose to vote with my dollar. I vote for ethically produced, sustainable organic produce. I aim to do business based on this model – minimal travel, minimal paper usage (and where needed, let’s use recycled) and green powered!
Suzy Stojanovic
1. The need for FOCUS and CLARITY on your specialty. You cannot be all things to all people. You much be clear about the one thing you can do to serve and help people. You can’t be known as a master of ten different things. A lot of people can’t really tell you the one thing they do well, because they don’t want to miss an opportunity by being too narrowly defined. Get over that fear. It will kill you.
2. The ability to clearly articulate what that is. You’ve heard people say that you should be able to describe your story in one sentence. As in, “FDR got us out of the Depression and helped win WWII.” If you cannot clearly articulate what your specialty or skill is, your personal brand will be muddled and confusing. You have to make it clear. You have to make it easy to understand. And if you have to explain in detail what you do, you’ve already lost.
3. Consistency delivering this well-articulated message both online and offline. Most people’s problem? They aren’t consistent in telling their story over and over. Or they say one thing on Twitter, and another thing at a Chamber mixer. Or explaining what you do in different ways, to different people. Or changing what you do again and again and again. I tell my political clients to stay on message. Same thing applies here.
The three concepts above aren’t rocket science. So what’s the hard part? Being disciplined enough to execute on these three points over time. If you can do that, you will be on the right path…and your personal brand will be one that resonates and helps you go-to-market with strength and clarity.
So ask yourself, “Am I really following these three key steps?” Be honest, and good luck. Got any other thoughts?
