30 Minute Social Media Marketing - Bonus Chapter by Susan Gunelius

Exclusive Bonus Chapter By Susan Gunelius October 2010

30-MINUTE SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING BONUS CHAPTER © 2010 by Susan Gunelius Copyright holder is licensing this under the Creative Commons License, Attribution 3.0. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/us Written by Susan Gunelius President & CEO of KeySplash Creative, Inc. KeySplashCreative.com susan@keysplashcreative.com 30-Minute Social Media Marketing written by Susan Gunelius and published by McGraw-Hill (November 2010) is available through Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Borders, and most online and offline book sellers. You can connect with Susan Gunelius at the following branded online destinations: • Company Web site: www.KeySplashCreative.com • Company Blog: www.KeySplashCreativeConversations.com • Speaker’s Web site: www.SusanGunelius.com • Twitter: www.twitter.com/susangunelius • Facebook Profile: www.facebook.com/susangunelius • Facebook Page: www.facebook.com/keysplashcreative • LinkedIn Profile: www.linkedin.com/in/susangunelius • Blog for Women in Business: www.WomenOnBusiness.com

The One-Month Social Media Marketing Challenge If you’re reading this bonus chapter, then it should be safe to assume that you’ve already read the first 22 chapters of 30-Minute Social Media Marketing. If you haven’t, then it is highly recommend that you read those chapters before you continue as they contain all the details and links you need to implement the One-Month Social Media Marketing Challenge. For example, if you already read chapters 1-22, then you know why social media marketing is important to every business in terms of building a brand, developing relationships, and driving loyalty and word-of-mouth marketing farther than any other form of communication or promotion. You’re also familiar with the many tools of the social Web that can help you not only join the online conversation but also affect those conversations. Furthermore, you have a variety of social media marketing strategies and tactics in your arsenal, gleaned from the pages of 30-Minute Social Media Marketing, which you can begin to implement immediately. And finally, you understand that a social media marketing plan is not a short-term strategy. Instead, it’s a long-term strategy dependent on sustainable, organic growth and relationships. But what if you’re ready to dive head first into the social media pool in an effort to speed up your entrance into the online conversation? Fortunately, there are steps you can take to jump start the development of your online presence. This bonus chapter teaches you how to begin your foray into social media marketing in high gear. The One- Month Social Media Marketing Plan included in this special bonus chapter puts you on the fast-track path used by the most dedicated people and businesses. If you’re not prepared to invest a significant amount of time to the One-Month Social Media Marketing 1

Challenge, you’ll see minimal results. However, if you dedicate several hours per day to the suggested activities included in this chapter, you’ll have a significant online presence at the end of one month, which you can use to catapult your business into a new level of success. Keep in mind, the steps you take in the One-Month Social Media Marketing Challenge won’t make you rich in 30 days nor will it double or triple your business. The goal of the One-Month Social Media Marketing Challenge is to create your core branded online destination and a variety of other branded destinations as well as to start connecting with consumers, researching your competition, and building the foundation of your online presence. When you’re done with the One-Month Social Media Marketing Challenge, you’ll be ready to start launching short-term marketing tactics, building deeper relationships with your online community of friends and followers, and publishing shareworthy content that has the chance to spread across the social Web and bring real business and sales your way. Without a solid foundation, your social media marketing efforts will fall on deaf ears. With that in mind, it is essential that you spend this month thinking like a publisher, not a marketer. Your goals are finding your audience, connecting with them, establishing your branded destinations, and putting yourself on influencers’ radar screens. All of these activities are indirect marketing activities. Be patient. Direct marketing tactics can only succeed if you do the preliminary work to actually set yourself up for success first. Getting Started Before you begin the One-Month Social Media Marketing Challenge, you need to evaluate your current online presence. Take some time to do an honest evaluation of where your business is positioned in the online space today, and determine how consumers can find you if they’re looking for the types of products and services you offer or if they’re looking for your specific business. You need to be aware of what the consumer sees. Pretend that you’re a customer looking for the types of products and 2

services your business provides. This is how your research should begin. Spend at least a week learning the paths consumers take. As you follow those same paths, you’ll find the conversations, blogs, forums, online groups, and so on that you need to join and start actively participating in. Get involved in those conversations and start communicating with the people who are spending time there. Answer questions when you can and become the go-to person at those online destinations for information related to your business and industry. Once you begin the One-Month Social Media Marketing Challenge, you’ll be able to start bringing those people with whom you’ve already begun developing relationships and who have already expressed their interest in the types of products and services you offer to your own branded online destinations. Bottom-line, do the research and start reaching out to people at least a week or two before you begin the One-Month Marketing Challenge. As with most new endeavors, you have to learn how things work and do your research before you can truly get going. Don’t try to skip steps or your efforts will not be as successful as they could be at the end of the One-Month Social Media Marketing Challenge. Also, it’s important to understand a few points before you dive into the One- Month Social Media Marketing Challenge: 1. It is assumed that you have already created the following branded online destinations: a blog, a Twitter profile, a Facebook profile and page, a LinkedIn profile, a YouTube channel, and a Flickr profile. 2. The activities included in the One-Month Social Media Marketing Challenge should be completed in addition to daily social media participation, including writing blog posts, Twitter updates, participating in online conversations, connecting with online influencers, and so on. Again, if you’ve already read the first 22 chapters of 30-Minute Social Media Marketing, then the two points listed above will make sense to you. For example, you can use the 15 jump-start tips in chapter 6 for more ideas to create branded online 3

destinations. With that said, it’s time to dive in and get started on your One-Month Social Media Marketing Challenge! Diving In The following daily plan offers suggested activities that you can implement each day to help jump-start your social media marketing participation and your business’ online reputation in the social Web space. As you learned in chapter 4, you can substitute different activities if certain social media tools aren’t appealing to you. For example, if you know you’re not ready to begin creating online videos, you can do something else in place of focusing on online video creation, publishing and sharing. Also, you can vary the order of activities. The most important takeaway from the One-Month Social Media Marketing Challenge is that you’re pursuing meaningful activities each day that will help you find and connect with your target audience, produce and share meaningful content, and get in front of online influencers. Tip: Links and details to complete all of the tasks included in the One-Month Social Media Challenge can be found within 30-Minute Social Media Marketing. Primary chapter references are provided in the Daily Plan to help you find relevant information. One-Month Social Media Marketing Challenge Daily Plan Day 1 (learn more in chapters 2 and 3) Publish at least five pillar/evergreen blog posts (or articles) throughout the first week and share the links to those pieces through your Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, StumbleUpon, and other social media profiles. Pillar/evergreen content is your best, most amazing content that is more detailed than typical blog posts and stands the test of time. 4

Day 2 (learn more in chapters 4 and 21) Conduct keyword research and set up alerts for your business name and targeted keywords related to your business using Google Alerts and TweetBeep. Also, follow those keywords to find where your target audience and online influencers spend time, and join the conversations happening on those sites. Day 3 (learn more in chapters 7, 8 and 9) Interlink your various branded online destinations. For example, place social media icons in your blog’s sidebar connecting to your profiles. Place Twitter and Facebook widgets on your blog, and add the Facebook Like button to your website and blog. Feed your blog content to your Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn profiles, pages and groups, and vice versa. Make sure your website, blog and social media links are provided in your various social media profiles, so it’s always easy to find your branded destinations, particularly your core branded destination. Day 4 (learn more in chapter 8) Search for people to follow on Twitter and add at least 20 more key users to your list of people that you follow. Start actively retweeting their content, including them in your tweets using the @reply feature, and joining their conversations. Day 5 (learn more in chapters 8 and 9) Search for people to connect with on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook by researching who your competitors are connected to already. Connect with at least 20 more key users per site based on your findings. Begin interacting with those people immediately. 5

Day 6 (learn more in chapter 9) Search for LinkedIn and Facebook groups related to your business and products. Join those groups and participate in conversations at least once per week. If the LinkedIn groups you join allow you to feed your blog content to those groups through the News feature, do so. Day 7 (learn more in chapters 8, 9 and 18) Publish discounts or exclusive offers to Twitter or Facebook connections at least once per week. Day 8 (learn more in chapter 21) Analyze your results for the previous week. Determine what activities are working to drive incoming links, discussions, and traffic to your branded online destinations, and continue them in week two of the One-Month Social Media Marketing Challenge. Also, determine which keywords are sending traffic to your site and write additional blog posts throughout the upcoming week focusing on those keywords. Day 9 (learn more in chapter 8) Search for local conversations to join and make sure your business is represented accurately on local Twitter apps such as Localtweeps and Twellow. Start publishing information and links about local sales, events, coupons, and so on using those Twitter apps at least once per week. Day 10 (learn more in chapter 7) Send an email to five online influencers who you’ve already connected with via their blogs and social media profiles offering to write an original guest blog post for each of them. 6

Day 11 (learn more in chapter 8) Use hashtags and tools like Monitter to keep up with Twitter conversations related to your business. Join in those conversations and add followers as appropriate. Day 12 (learn more in chapter 9) Send invitations to like your Facebook page to all of your Facebook friends. Day 13 (learn more in chapter 12) Make sure your listings on local search directories (not Twitter apps) are accurate, and reach out to your connections and customers asking them to write reviews about your business on those sites. Day 14 (learn more in chapter 13) Add social media profile and other branded online destination URLs to your email signature, business cards, invoices, and so on. At the very least, your core branded online destination URL should be included anywhere and everywhere. Day 15 (learn more in chapter 21) Analyze your results to date. Learn what sites are referring the most traffic to your blog (other than search engines) and reach out to those bloggers or site owners to deepen your relationships with them. Day 16 (learn more in chapters 7 and 15) Contact popular bloggers or niche bloggers whose audiences match your target audience (you should already be on their radar screens from your previous efforts started on Day 2 of this plan), and offer to send them product samples in exchange for reviews or to be used as blog contest prizes on their blogs. 7

Day 17 (learn more in chapter 9) Search for questions related to your business and products using LinkedIn Answers and answer questions when you can. Start to do this at least a few times per week. Day 18 (learn more in chapter 8) Set up a Twitter client such as TweetDeck to help you manage the various segments of your Twitter follower audience so you can better identify and participate in key conversations. Day 19 (learn more in chapters 7 and 12) Set up a review form on your website or blog to automate the process of capturing and publishing customer reviews and testimonials. Day 20 (learn more in chapter 20) Give and request recommendations on LinkedIn. Be sure to do this at least once every couple of weeks from now on. Day 21 (learn more in chapter 17) Sign up to syndicate your content for broader exposure through BlogBurst, Newstex, and so on. Day 22 (learn more in chapter 21) Analyze your results so far. Determine what content and activities on your blog or social media profiles are most popular and create more of the same kind of content and activities through the next week. 8

Day 23 (learn more in chapters 2 and 3) Write at least five more pillar/evergreen content pieces and publish them over the course of the next week on your blog or core branded online destination. Day 24 (learn more in chapter 15) Find at least one online forum community that is active and attracts your target audience. Join that forum and get involved in the conversations happening there. Be sure to include links to your branded online destinations in your forum signature. Day 25 (learn more in chapter 11) Create and publish at least three short (five minutes or less) videos and upload them to your YouTube channel. Distribute them to more online video sites using a TubeMogul account. Write about them and embed them on your website or blog. Day 26 (learn more in chapters 10 and 11) Search for popular shows and profiles related to your business on Blog Talk Radio and Flickr. Leave comments, join conversations, and for Blog Talk Radio contacts, reach out to the host or owner suggesting an interview. Day 27 (learn more in chapter 12) Join Social Spark and publish an opportunity for bloggers whose audiences match your own target audience to write about your products. Day 28 (learn more in chapter 18) Start a contest on your own blog or on Twitter giving away a prize that is sure to attract attention. Promote the contest across your social media profiles and branded destinations (make it easy to enter in order to attract the most exposure). 9

Day 29 (learn more in chapters 12 and 20) Put your pillar/evergreen blog posts together into an ebook related to a single theme that would be useful to your target audience. Offer it for free and promote it across your social media profiles and branded online destinations. Apply a Creative Commons license to the ebook, and encourage people to share it for maximum exposure. Day 30 (learn more in chapters 21 and 22) Analyze your month-to-date results. Keep doing tasks that are working and tweak tasks that aren’t working as well as you’d like. In other words, determine where to invest your time over the next month to ensure you get the biggest results for your time and effort. Sticking to It for the Long-Haul Remember, social media is constantly changing, and your efforts cannot stop after you complete the One-Month Social Media Marketing Challenge. While the One-Month Social Media Marketing Challenge can help you develop a solid social media presence and a foundation to grow on, it’s still only the beginning of a long-term brand building and social media marketing strategy. As the three steps of branding tell us, which you learned in chapter 4 of 30-Minute Social Media Marketing, be consistent, persistent, and exercise restraint, and in time, your efforts will be rewarded with long-term, sustainable business growth. Now, get out there and join the social media community and conversation! ****************************** 10

30 Minute Social Media Marketing - Bonus Chapter by Susan Gunelius

by McGraw-Hill Professional on Oct 21, 2010

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