Social Media Congres - "Blogging Business"

BLOGGINGBUSINESS HOW A BLOG CAN GROW YOUR BUSINESS Chris Garrett http://twitter.com/chrisgarrett Friday, 27 February 2009 1

Business Blogging WHY BLOG? Attract an audience • Inform and Interact, learn from your audience • Retain your audience • Energize your audience and motivate action • Recruit help, contacts, employees • Respond to stories and customers • Friday, 27 February 2009 2

Business Blogging BLOG SIDE-EFFECTS Grow Links for trafﬁc and to improve search rankings • Build familiarity and trust • Communicate and establish your brand • Grow a sense of community • Offer better service • Initiate more sales • Friday, 27 February 2009 3

Business Blogging BLOG VERSUS ... • Website - Static pages of information or sales letters • Newsletter - Information sent to inbox, drive action • Forum - Conversation and interaction • Blogs combine elements of all of the above Friday, 27 February 2009 4

Business Blogging ATTRACT, RETAIN, RECRUIT SEO Social Links PR Email RSS Twitter BLOG Referral Forwards Re-tweets Friday, 27 February 2009 5

Business Blogging RETAIN WITH STICKY FACTOR • Provide value with empathy, keep engaging, be inclusive • Video/Audio - keep on site longer, more emotive, entertain • Comments/Polls/Surveys - show interested in opinion, interaction • Series/Related Posts/Categories/Tags - serialize content • Events/Competitions/Call-in - fun, rewards, excitement Friday, 27 February 2009 6

Business Blogging PUBLICITY+- 2004 2009 The conversation is happening with or without you Back in 2004 Kryptonite had a famous PR problem with blogs - today companies learning same lessons You have to have a place where you can put your story, state the facts and establish your position. Friday, 27 February 2009 7

Business Blogging SUCCESS STORIES • Gary Vaynerchuk • Family wine store • Wine Library TV • $50m business Friday, 27 February 2009 8

Business Blogging SUCCESS STORIES • Woot.com/blog/ • Launched July 12, 2004 • Sold its 1,000,000th item, a 4GB micro hard drive, on February 5, 2007 • Little to no advertising. Friday, 27 February 2009 9

Business Blogging SUCCESS STORIES • Thomas Mahon • Bespoke Tailor • Using only blog as marketing • Full order book, including celebrities inc. Prince Charles Friday, 27 February 2009 10

Business Blogging WHO SHOULD NOT BLOG? Be Present, Be Interested, Be Authentic • Listen, Serve, Delight • Starting a blog raises expectation of openness and interactivity • If you don’t want a conversation, • don’t start one. Friday, 27 February 2009 11

Business Blogging PLAN • Must start with a plan, or at least know where you want to go • Why are you building a blog? • Who do you want to attract? • What story do you have to tell? Friday, 27 February 2009 12

Business Blogging RESEARCH • Find out what your audience is interested in, needs, wants • Surveys, Polls • Forums, Comments, Q&A sites • Social Bookmarking sites • Search.Twitter • WordTracker, Adwords Tool Friday, 27 February 2009 13

Business Blogging YOUR COMPETITIVE EDGE Audience Your Needs Positioning Brand Experience • Serveyour audience needs, wants, motivations in a way that is uniquely yours Friday, 27 February 2009 14

Business Blogging WHAT TO TALK ABOUT What What they you want know Friday, 27 February 2009 15

Business Blogging DRIVE THEM HOME Don’t leave your content scattered. As • well as post on Flickr, YouTube, etc, also post in on one easy to ﬁnd place - your blog. Find people where they are and bring • them to you. Drive people from their inbox or feed • reader to interact with you rather than passively read. Your Brand Here Friday, 27 February 2009 16

Business Blogging GROW YOUR AUDIENCE • Think long term • Offer overwhelming value • Be genuine, approachable, helpful and friendly • Raving fans are created by going extra mile • Make strong and lasting connections based on mutual respect • Ask questions, get feedback, learn as they learn Friday, 27 February 2009 17

Business Blogging TRAFFIC PROBLEMS • Attract targeted, engaged trafﬁc • Attention for own sake = bad your brand • Remember photo by chadmiller Friday, 27 February 2009 18

Business Blogging STICKINESS Stop the “revolving door” • Harder and more expensive to attract • new visitors and customers than to retain existing. Happy, loyal visitors also much more • valuable than constant stream of strangers. Friday, 27 February 2009 19

Business Blogging SOCIAL MEDIA JOURNEY • Take your audience on a journey Advocate “Converted” Subscriber Return Visitor Visitor Friday, 27 February 2009 20

Business Blogging PERSUASION+CONVERSION Education, Articles - Inform, solve problems, demonstrate your solution works • Community - Encourage conversation, involvement and sense of belonging • Call to action - Remember to make offers that match audience wants/needs • Friday, 27 February 2009 21

Business Blogging TWEAK YOUR SALES ENGINE • Audience Targeting • Attraction Tactics • Persuasion Content • Conversion • Consumption + Results = Proof Friday, 27 February 2009 22

Business Blogging CONSUMPTION • Encourage sampling • Follow-up, encourage, enquire • Get to consume then consume more • Consumption leads to best positive “Word of Mouth” • Positive experience shared leads to powerful trust in your brand Friday, 27 February 2009 23

Business Blogging PEOPLE NOT HERD • Keep interested with engaging content • Personalization • Empathy ➙ Loyalty • Learn from actions • Customer Service • Segmentation We are all unique individuals! Friday, 27 February 2009 24

Business Blogging SEGMENTATION Create an email list just for customers, if possible split along product lines • Use highly speciﬁc topical lists to Sell / Cross-Sell / Up-sell without annoying • uninterested Discover your best customers and give them extra special treatment • Work out via email unsubscribes which content causes defection, loss of interest • Friday, 27 February 2009 25

Business Blogging SOME DON’TS • Don’t Me-Me-Me - It’s not all about you! • Don’t force it if it isn’t working • Don’t over-sell - Give ﬁrst • Don’t use business-talk - and don’t assume • Don’t try to “control the conversation” • Don’t ignore your audience Friday, 27 February 2009 26

Business Blogging SUMMARY • Attract targeted visitors who have a problem you can solve. • Inform, advise, discuss, help. • Build trust with positive experience over time. • Demonstrate positive results. • Make offers that match audience wants/needs. Friday, 27 February 2009 27

Business Blogging ACTIONS • Decide agreed metrics (eg. Links? Sales? Trafﬁc? PR mentions?) • Gather keywords and content research • Create valuable content that meets audience wants/needs • Promote content with social bookmarking • Retain with email, feed, and social media engagement • Learn from feedback and metrics, repeat Friday, 27 February 2009 28

Business Blogging THANKS FOR READING ;) • http://chrisg.com • http://twitter.com/chrisgarrett Friday, 27 February 2009 29

Social Media Congres - "Blogging Business"

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Notes on slide 1

62 Favorites & 1 Event