How NOT to Twitter

Nate Whitehill, an online marketing genius recently wrote this excellent post with his 5 top tips for using Twitter (and what NOT to twit about!).
Enjoy!

Customer Service No-No’s

I noticed two interesting news headlines in the last few days.
Firstly, the OECD say that we are ‘at the bottom’ of the current economic recession – actually a positive thing, because it suggests (without promising) that things may begin the slow climb back to prosperity in the near future. The second indicated that the UK economy suffered a 2.4% shrinkage in the first quarter of 2009 – 0.5% worse than predicted and the worst for 51 years, apparently. Again,
although it may not at first blush seem like it, this is good news.
These type of figures are by definition retrospective – they look back at a period we have already lived through. There are many signs of recovery, mostly in the form of a slowdown in bad news!

In this week’s Marketing Edge (out for publiction tomorrow) we are re-running what was one of the most popular articles of 2008 – a critical look at customer service no-no’s. Remember that everyone struggles in a recession, but those who take customer service lightly will continue to struggle even when conditions improve. So take the key points to heart and root poor customer service out of your organisation. When you do, your customers will show their appreciation via longer, more profitable business relationships.

Sign up for your free subscription at: www.zee2a.com and make sure to verify your request before midnight tonight!

Online vs Offline?

Philip Rosenthal sent Vanessa an email asking:

‘How much effort should a consultant put into their online presence versus offline face to face networking?

It may be different for different consultants, but how do you decide how much time to put in or what mix of time to put into different areas? I am concerned that online marketing is a potentially endless sink of time and am not sure what the returns will be compared with traditional marketing.

Also, I have been on [a particular online networking facility] for less than a month and have about 30 connections – some of whom are people I don’t really know but are members of professional societies of which I am also a member and live in the same city as me – I hope to get to know them better this way. Any suggestions?’

Hello Philip,

Great question, and one which I’m sure many other Marketing Edge readers are wondering about. You raise three separate points, which I’ll address one by one:

Online vs offline networking

How much time you decide to spend in one area versus the other depends entirely on where your prospects are and you may have to do some research of your own to find out where that is. As a business owner with many commitments you simply cannot afford to waste your time, money and effort in activities that have minimal impact.

Are your prospects researching and making buying decisions from behind their PCs? If so, are they building relationships with potential suppliers through social networking, or are they using search engines to find information on specific services? (Two distinctly different approaches!) Or are they making those decisions on the golf course? Do they read specific trade journals or attend business to business shows and exhibitions? Find that out, then find a way to regularly get in front of them.

The returns compared with traditional marketing

Any marketing you do – whether online or otherwise must fit in with an overall strategy. They cannot be adhoc events or activities that get done on a whim and without proper forethought and planning. Remember too, that not all methods work for everyone. You have to test it and measure it. If it works, do more of the same. If it doesn’t work, or doesn’t work well enough, change tactics.

For example: Just because you’ve always had an advert in the Yellow Pages doesn’t mean you should just keep on renewing it. Do you know how much business you actually get because of that advert?

The same principle applies to your weekly networking breakfast; your brochures; your website; etc. Don’t blindly keep doing something just because you think you should, or because you think that ‘doing something is better than doing nothing.’

Getting to know your contacts better

Well done for creating an online profile and getting active in making connections! (For some top tips on creating and maintaining your profile, see my article Revamp Your Online Presence in Four Easy Steps.) It is important that your connections have substance and that you can add value to each others’ networks.

What is the point of hundreds of connections that are just there to boost your numbers, but you know nothing about each other and never interact? It would be just as ludicrous to collect hundreds of business cards at face-to-face events and stuff them into an overflowing business card folder that never gets opened again, other than to add more cards!

Your approach to connecting with fellow members of professional societies you belong to and people who live in the same town as you is a good place to start. May I suggest you take the initiative in arranging a meet-up to build those connections into REAL relationships. Perhaps something like meeting for a drink after work – invite all thirty connections and see who turns up. Not only will you benefit from getting to know them better, but they will benefit from meeting each other too. (By the way: This suggestion works equally well if applied to that over-stuffed business card holder too!)

Thank you for your question,

 

Other readers with questions are invited to submit them here and we’ll do our best to answer them in an upcoming issue.

How do you give gifts, thanks, and appreciation?

Colleen Francis of Engage Selling Solutions recently wrote about the pros and cons of various popular gift-giving options. For example:

•  Having your business logo splashed all over your gifts and cards (Good / Bad / Ugly?);
• Virtual vs Tangible; and
• Charitable donations on behalf of others

I thoroughly appreciated the points she raised and the suggestions she shared, so if you’d like to read her post please follow this link.

Please come back and share your thoughts!

“But I’ve Always Done it That Way!”

I was driving home during rush hour this afternoon and stopped at the petrol station to buy something to quench my thirst. I stood in a queue for six minutes just to pay for a coke, while everyone ahead of me (without exception) was paying by card for their petrol.

What’s unusual about that?

I was at Morrison’s in Basingstoke which is a “pay at the pump” filling station! So why on Earth was everyone ahead of me queuing up to pay at the cashier when that could have been done in a flash right at the pump?

I asked the cashier if it was usual for so many to avoid the much smarter alternative, and she said that people only tend to pay at the pump after hours when no one is working in the shop.

How crazy is that?

We should all be looking for opportunities to make our lives easier, and not just do something because we’ve always done it that way. This is an especially important lesson to apply to our businesses.

Please take the next few minutes to jot down five things you do just because you always have. Then look for ways to be smarter!

Grow Your eZine List The Honest Way!

You may recall my recent article, published here on June 3rd and in my eZine The Marketing Edge entitled: Right vs Wrong: How To Build an Email List wherein I outlined some of the dishonest, and soon to be illegal ways that many businesses and email marketers grow their email subscriber lists.

Many so-called marketing experts and self-proclaimed gurus are the worst offenders – adding every email address they’ve ever collected onto their unauthorised s*p*a*m*m*i*n*g lists.

I also outlined a number of best-practices for building an eZine (or email newsletter) subscriber database with people who have chosen to subscribe, by opting-in to receive emails from you. 

Few other email marketers would be prepared to share their statistics or inside information, but I would like my clients, subscribers, and readers to feel comfortable that I not only ‘walk the talk’ but can substantiate advice I give them, based on my own experiences.

The Seven Deadly Sins of Networking

Regular readers of The Marketing Edge will recall my previous articles about how to network (Networking That Produces Results) and where to network (Are You Fishing in the Wrong Pond?). This third article in the series uncovers the mistakes to be avoided if our networking is to produce outstanding results.

Now that you have the how and where all nicely in hand, the last thing you want to do is allow your investment in time, money, and credibility go down the drain by committing any of the following Seven Deadly Sins of networking:

Sin #7: Data dumping

This involves ‘dumping’ the data from all the business cards you’ve collected onto your newsletter distribution list or other marketing list without that person’s consent. I don’t know about you, but I get really annoyed when I suddenly find myself receiving a host of different e-zines that I didn’t ask for, after attending a networking lunch. Just don’t do it!

Sin #6: Trying to sell before building a relationship

Networking is first and foremost about building relationships. We talk a lot about the ‘know, like, and trust’ factor with good reason, so offering your sales-pitch prematurely is pushy and off-putting. Focus on getting to know people first. Play ‘Marketing Relay’ (Principle 1 in The Seven Principles of Professional Services Marketing) by going around the ‘track’ systematically. Remember that if you launch into a selling conversation too soon, you drop the ‘baton’ and have to start again.

Sin #5: Being the centre of attention

We all enjoy talking about ourselves, especially when we have a captive audience, but I can’t stress this point enough: You have to share the attention. No one likes a blabber-mouth who never shuts up or lets others have a word in. Allow others enough opportunity to talk, and really really listen to them. As Toby Keith states so well: Sometimes I wanna talk about ME! (you’ve got to watch this vid!)

Sin #4: Spreading yourself too thinly

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: focus on Quality vs Quantity. To make a genuine success of your networking efforts and get tangible value out of it, you simply have to be an active, visible member of the group/s to which you belong. If you are attending too many different events too frequently, you will have no option but to compensate in other areas. Either by working longer hours than necessary to catch up on your work backlogs, or by committing the #1 Sin …

Sin #3: Being unprepared

This is another major contributor to committing the #1 Networking Sin. Being prepared has many guises: You must ensure that you have sufficient supplies of business cards, a pen, notebook and your diary (or PDA). How embarrassing if the opportunity to set up an appointment arises and you don’t have your diary, or you have run out of business cards before a conversation with the CEO of one of your major targets.

You must also be prepared with something interesting to talk about. Do you know how to make small talk? Have you read something in the business news or an industry journal that you could use?

Another area where being unprepared, or badly prepared, can wreck your credibility and opportunities for networking success – is not having a decent Verbal Signature. You may call it an elevator pitch, a cocktail speech, or simply your 60 second intro. If your message is garbled, too fussy, overly creative, boring, or simply unclear then you will have to work so much harder to achieve your goals. We make an impression within that first sixty seconds, so ensure that it’s a good one.

An exercise that many of our subscribers, and all of our clients have gained tremendous value from is working through the audio programme Transform Your Networking With a Verbal Signature™ and its accompanying workbook. If you haven’t done so yet I suggest you make it your number one priority after reading this article. Download it from the private subscriber’s area on our website. If you aren’t a subscriber yet, then go to our homepage, input your details into the signup box, and you will receive a link to that download page.

Sin #2: Poor information gathering

This doesn’t mean that you didn’t collect enough business cards – it means you failed in gathering relevant information to support what is printed on those cards. Who is the person behind the name? What do they do (that the card doesn’t tell you)? How will you remember what they look like when you bump into them again? What information have you obtained to help you in building a relationship with them? What did you talk about? This is one place where your pen and notebook become more than unused props at the event. In fact never mind the notebook even – scribble some info right on the back of the business card. As an example, if I just met David at an event, the notes on the back of his card might be something along these lines: ‘Bald. Handsome South African. Sat next to me at lunch. Planning huge business expansion.’ – get the idea?

If your information gathering is deficient you have also undoubtedly committed other ‘sins’ too and will almost certainly go on to commit THE NUMBER ONE DEADLY SIN of networking:

Sin #1: No Follow Up!

There are a number of ways to follow up with a networking contact (which I’ll address in a future article and in great detail at our seminar next month) but a simple idea is to send an email or a postcard with a ‘nice to meet you’ type message. Or pick up the phone and say the same. These are such easy, well mannered, gestures that it’s a real pity that less than 1% of networkers actually do this. But I assure you that those that do reap the rewards.

©Vanessa Deakin and Zee2A Limited 2008. Would you like to reprint this article? You may do so as long as you include the copyright notice and the following paragraph: Vanessa Deakin, Operations Director at Zee2A, is a Marketing Coach who works with Professional Service Executives frustrated and disappointed with their current growth rates, marketing efforts, and business profitability. Through one-on-one and group mentoring programmes she helps them to skyrocket their results and break their own best records. To learn more, sign up for her e-zine, or make an enquiry please visit our website at www.zee2a.com.

Do you attend a lot of networking events? Are you disappointed by the low ROI of your time and money? Wish you were getting more (or better quality) referrals and business from this medium? You need to attend our Performance-Tuned Networking seminar on 5th August in Basingstoke! Book one of the 20 remaining seats today!