Lessons

Lesson Info

Segment 12 - Mining Social Networks

Let's review a couple things that we talked about earlier in the program this is going to come back too because in some ways I'm really hanging this entire theme of this entire program you know, on this idea that creating loyal customers is mostly about you choosing the right customer so everything that I talked about earlier in the programme everything that I'm going to talk about really from this point forward really really hinges on this mindset shift and some of you I think immediately got it yesterday I'm hoping that that this is something that you take from here and really in all of your planning and all of what you're going to do, you know from moving forward that you really start to embrace this idea we talked at length about this idea the marketing and sales hourglass and that it really is this end and relationship that we have to be managing and we we want to be organizing behavior a cz much as really just coming up with this idea that's going to get the phone to ring or this...

idea that's goingto convince somebody to buy from me again probably a mindset shift that that's really the fundamental to everything that I've talked about previously and everything I'm going to talk about really the rest of this program and then finally the idea that that sales has changed and the act of selling has changed primarily because the act of buying has changed it's not just that we have these new tools that we have these new ways to contact people and to convince people to buy from us it's the way in which people have chosen to buy choose to buy you know every single day now I think has fundamentally changed and so the things like prospecting and pitching and and convincing you know people who buy really given way to things like listening and teaching and providing insight and telling stories and nurturing and always connecting instead of closing so for those of you that we're unable to tune in earlier in the program that was what we've covered so far today but I suggest that you go back and review um what was that six hours you know worth of detail in what we just covered there in about two minutes so this segment we are going to focus primarily on social networks and mining social network so we're going to go really deep into a topic that I know is is generally on everyone's mind these days because everybody's talking about it you know there's a lot of pressure I think around this idea for people because they feel like oh I'm kind of lagging behind here or I don't get all these new things or everybody else is doing x and so I need to do x andi I think what I want to try to do is relieve some of that pressure demystify some of the hype around social media and again talk about it in a way that has you thinking about integrating it into what you're doing as opposed to considering it as some sort of foreign arm or leg or whatever appendage of marketing that that you choose because if you don't think in terms of integrating it into that journey into your strategy your core message your ideal customer if you don't think about it in ways that will will be useful to those groups and to your strategy you are going to find yourself wasting a great deal of time in social media and I think that that again is a lot of the angst around this idea is that if you wanted to on any given day you could probably find some very special individuals who would like to talk to you all day long on twitter right I mean you could use your entire day you know, doing something like that but would that would that unnecessarily advance your business objectives I'm going to suggest for most of you probably not right so we have to think about social media about our ability to sell to create awareness to educate in the end social media the same way we think about it in all the other elements of our business so let's start with why what are some good reasons to participate in social media period just tweeting just finding you know, new friends finding new followers is not necessarily a great objective but following up with prospects using social media, staying top of mind with customers so doing things like creating list of your customers on twitter on dh responding to them retweeting what they put out at least following what they're doing and hat and gaining sort of that inside in public knowledge that they're sharing you know, every single day is a great is if you do nothing else on social media would be a useful expenditure of your time keeping an eye on an entire industry again goes back to this idea of listening, but there are so many ways for you to plug in and tune into what everyone in other people in your industry not necessarily competitors but maybe competitors but also other people leading authorities in in your industry. You know, we talked earlier in the programme about the podcasting and how that was a tremendous way to gain access to influential people will a lot of the ways that you're going to meet those people or start building relationships or at least understand you know what those people are working on like the example I gave when I was talking about how I would find or choose a podcast guest a lot times I paid attention when they have a new book coming out that in my world and my my show that's a great opportunity when somebody's probably going to be a little more interested in entertaining my invitation. Well a lot of times I find that out just by following those people on social media and I hear what they're saying I hear them talking about a new project they're working on or some need that they have and it really allows me to then decide hey, this is a great opportunity because I've been following because I've been listening it doesn't necessarily 00:06:00.812 --> 00:06:03. mean again that I was I was doing any kind of engaging 00:06:03.75 --> 00:06:06. or any kind of tweeting or any kind of saying anything 00:06:06.03 --> 00:06:08. in social media and I'd still get that benefit 00:06:09.81 --> 00:06:12. increasingly organizations are turning to social media 00:06:12.85 --> 00:06:14. to provide customer service 00:06:15.41 --> 00:06:17. one of one of my one of the tools I'm going to talk 00:06:17.92 --> 00:06:21. about today happens to be a tool that I've used since 00:06:21.81 --> 00:06:25. its inception called buffer and if you're not familiar 00:06:25.76 --> 00:06:29. with it you will be by the end of an end of the program 00:06:29.59 --> 00:06:33. but they almost they have million's now of users and 00:06:33.43 --> 00:06:37. customers and if you follow its buffer app and just 00:06:37.48 --> 00:06:40. say it's worth taking a look at because they they 00:06:40.12 --> 00:06:43. have a whole team of customer service people that 00:06:43.27 --> 00:06:45. provide certainly you can email them and ask question 00:06:45.87 --> 00:06:48. of support but I would I would suggest that seventy 00:06:48.47 --> 00:06:50. five to eighty percent of their customer service is 00:06:50.93 --> 00:06:54. performed completely online through twitter and the 00:06:54.74 --> 00:06:58. interesting thing about that is they not only are 00:06:58.38 --> 00:07:00. able to demonstrate publicly that they take care of 00:07:00.87 --> 00:07:03. their customers they take requests very seriously 00:07:03.34 --> 00:07:07. they solve problems very proactively they generate 00:07:07.61 --> 00:07:10. tons and tons of new users and new customers because 00:07:10.61 --> 00:07:14. precisely because people see them you're doing you 00:07:14.33 --> 00:07:17. know really good things you know on behalf of their 00:07:17.07 --> 00:07:20. customers so a lot of times we promise you know we're 00:07:20.37 --> 00:07:22. going to get a result for somebody maybe even have 00:07:22.03 --> 00:07:24. great case studies but then imagine the ability for 00:07:24.56 --> 00:07:27. somebody to tune in and actually watch you in real 00:07:27.3 --> 00:07:30. life you know, providing great customer service I 00:07:30.23 --> 00:07:32. mean it's pretty amazing now of course obviously the 00:07:32.1 --> 00:07:34. flip side of that is they can also watch you providing 00:07:34.43 --> 00:07:37. not very good customer service so it is a it is a 00:07:37.58 --> 00:07:41. choice to be very transparent and authentic to pull 00:07:41.11 --> 00:07:44. it off but it is a is a tremendously powerful use 00:07:44.5 --> 00:07:46. because they are not only serving their customers 00:07:46.47 --> 00:07:48. I would suggest that they are actually attracting 00:07:48.71 --> 00:07:51. many, many new customers who really have the ability 00:07:51.6 --> 00:07:55. to see how who they really are by how they use this 00:07:55.09 --> 00:07:55. public tool 00:07:57.65 --> 00:08:00. could be a great way social networks could be a great 00:08:00.64 --> 00:08:04. way to develop your strategic part network we're gonna end today one of the last segments in this program we are going to talk about building your strategic partner network and how I think that you know after listening to most of you yesterday how I think that every single one of you could benefit from that that sort of approach to building strategic networks well a lot of cases finding those people online sharing their content you know building links back to your site kind of traditional networking really can occur almost exclusively for some businesses in social media so you know these are there are many, many reasons to use it to create awareness you know, to educate to build trust all the things that we talked about yesterday but these are some really to me you know, proven practical reasons why you know and and the reason I'm kind of starting here is there still some people that think in terms of well I can only do this much in social media or where do I start in social media? And I always tell people and I have for years start with your customers if you have existing customers today find ways to use some of the new social media tools and the social networks to serve them better because if you can do that you will always get a return on the time that you spend if you're serving your customers better and I would suggest that would then give you the ability and the experience to started experimenting with ways to then say ok how could we do this to attract more customers or how could we do this to network more thoroughly or how could we generate referrals for example with our existing customers so always start with your customers in fact, if you're considering one network over another for example like again question comes up all the time should I be on facebook or should I be on linked in well a real easy way to make a decision about that again we could also make a case that you should be on both but if we have to make a decision about one or the other a really simple way to make that decision is where your customers what network do they use because most of the social networks have a little bit of a personality or a bent or a certain way in which they're used that that really would make them more attractive or less attractive for you as a priority for example and we're gonna have ahh actually an expert from linked in come in today which is a pretty big pretty big treat exactly big treat for me because you know I think a lot of times in these social networks you know we think of them as you know the little bird on twitter is twitter right but they're actually really people that work at these companies and on make all those little things go and so actually having somebody from one of those networks come in I think is should should be pretty eye opening for all of us but linked in is for example typically I mean it is the first it was the first network that was created for business people who wanted to network, kind of in that traditional sense where you would go to a chamber of commerce meeting and you'd meet other business people and you you were there to talk potentially about business or about what you do in business and the idea that both parties both people that you know we're going there to find maybe suppliers or buyers people there we're going there to kind of talk about their business and introduce themselves to potential customers and so linked in is really has that personality and has always had that personality where is facebook as many people know is is much more personal it's muchmore about me it's very very common obviously to share your experiences with family and to share the things that you did on vacation and share the things that were more edgy or entertainment driven and is typically not so be to be driven I mean it is really a great market place if you're looking for that consumer customer it is definitely that is definitely a richer marketplace for that but also has a different personality if you will and we'll go into really both of those so let's set the table for the networks that we're going to talk about no surprises here you know this is kind of the big four pretty much everybody uses he's almost and interchangeably or in one breath when they talk about social media these days lengthen already talked about facebook already talked about google plus it is obviously google's foray into social networks and then twitter in terms of as I said, they have different personalities in terms of size depending on what day they are you know they are different sizes facebook I'm I should know this but it doesn't really matter I think facebook pride has the most users google pluses is coming pretty quickly I would say linked in its prime number three and twitter is you know maybe number two in that and maybe even linked in cocoa will tell us differently because I bet you he stays on top of those statistics a little more than me but actually it doesn't really matter they all are sufficient in size and user behavior that they offer various benefits for really for all of our almost every type of business and now it's a matter of of in some ways prioritizing where you're going to spend your time and how you're going to spend your time with the network I'm going to talk about each of them individually kind of in a best practices way but I do want you to think in terms of as you hear me talking about them I do want you to think in terms of you know which one of these should it again if you have all kinds of time and you're looking for ways to spend time on social media could you think that would be a really high payoff activity for you you might decide well I'm going to go deep into all of these but I'd like you to think in terms of going deep into one maybe or two at the most if you're not currently s so that you can really get a better feel you could get more long term payoff in using that tool but then also having a president's really in all of them so before I go into kind of talking about them individually let's just take a little a little poll here how many of your on lincoln and okay and use your hand up if you use it on a weekly basis in anyway yeah so everybody's on it right but but not everybody is using and that's actually typical a lot of work I probably their their networks I've forgotten about you know that I that I have a profile on I'm certain how about facebook okay everybody on it and is that something that you use in your business primarily or in personal or us so really and then again that's you know most everybody kept their hands up everybody's on facebook and I think a lot of people came to facebook if they got on early at all for a personal use and then especially some of you they're just starting businesses now you're exploring you know the business use of it and that's a really that's that's extremely common in audiences I talked today. How about google plus? Okay, so fewer people on google plus are you using it in any significant way for your business? Yeah and again that's that's one of the I'm going to talk about some of the best practices for google plus but but in the audience again there's about seventy five percent here are on it and then of course a lot of hands went down pretty quickly when I started talking about what are you doing on it right andi I think there's a lot of people have come to google plus and not founded in some ways as enticing his facebook maybe not as many of their and a normal friends or family or on google plus and so you know, in in terms of the hype machine google plus is probably you know, you see people talking about how it's it's days over you know and that google really struck out with google plus but the user growth on google plus is is significant on dh there's some really good reasons valid reason certainly for a lot of business is to use some of what they've built there even if you don't end up viewing it is an essential go to place every day for you to find you know your information and you two network. How about twitter who's on twitter so again, everybody is on twitter looks like you guys aren't in a zoo company you're not on twitter not yet on dso those have you had your hands of how many of you are using twitter on a daily basis in front some fashion okay so not so many hands went up for that okay so you know believe it or not this was not that I have scientific data to back it up this is very common your guys responses right um and particularly common was the fact that you're aware of all these networks right you can't go through a day without hearing about him any more and you're on all these networks but I'm gathering a sense that nobody yet has really figured out how to get a lot of value out of them but let me I'm making an assumption here so let me ask you is anybody on any of these networks in a way now that you want to share that you say you know I may not have perfected this but I am getting I'm starting to see some result in my use what are you doing? I found a lot of strategic partners through social media so talk about that a little bit so I'm now guess blogging for a website called health greatness was has about hundred seventy five thousand fans on facebook and it's all fifty on twitter so we've done some networking just threw retweeting each other's content and then they contacted me and said can we put up some of your videos can we put up some of your posts and then do you want to be a guest contributor for our website so that that is awesome and that was actually I couldn't have like scripted out a better process of how that actually goats how that works right? I mean you didn't just write to him one day and say hey, I've got some great content I want to put it on your site maybe they would have considered it and said yeah that's great content will put in our sight but you build a relationship by that networking and that's a you know that's a mindset shift I think for a lot of people too because when you talk about networking we again we anybody who's been in business any amount of time that's like going to the cocktail party and introducing everybody you know what you do right? But the social networks I mean that that type of networking is prolific on dh again particularly if you're doing it in a way that's useful right? You were making comments you were maybe expressing your opinions on things that people found useful and that is how you build some of these connections to that can lead to a much deeper your engagement like the writing which I'm guessing is going to end up paying off long term right right and just kind of tio add to that something that kind of came out of the blue was I don't know if you're familiar with the spartan race it's, right? Kind of like a tough mudder obstacle course I think through continued consistent content around the same subject whatever they found me for however they were able to find me I wasn't contacting them on twitter retweeting anything and they have given me race entry to give away to my fan base and um some discount codes school so if anybody out there and internet land wants to interest a free spartan giveaway race you go facebook dot com slash molly pearson fitness and you can enter there but just cool kind of way I guess if if you keep showing up in your business well and so again another point you really hit on that we talked a lot about early in the program was that having a point of view consistently writing about some of the same things and I think that one of the traps a lot of people fall into is oh this would be a good idea to write about her this would be a good idea to write about her I hear a lot of people talking about this and those may actually present some legitimate opportunities but long term your consideration needs to be and we're going to end on you know, kind of creating some of these content themes your consideration needs to be how do I want to get known? Because because the noise is so loud out there the only way to get known maybe for one or two three things that are going to be significant for your difference is to keep going back to him to a point where and I guarantee you you'll be tired of them way before anybody even notices you're writing about right I mean it's sad as that is you know to say and I would suggest that you you should actually maybe do a little work and find out how they actually found you because my guess is quite frankly that there was probably something that was written by you are about you that they googled and they found in that led him to on dh you you know you ought to know about that and we can talk off off line about some ways too dig in and find that very specific result if everyone awesome anybody else found that they're using any of these networks not a benefit facebook just at first it started like just posting pictures on facebook and naturally all my thousands friends like saw it and I'm like yes I realized gives thiss reminds people off my presence on my services yeah people like wow he's doing a good job and next time they know someone oh they need pictures themselves that contact and now I'm I started a page like about a year ago and I'm still like inbee dilemma for where that were to post mawf my new work is in the page or personal his personal it's more powerful because personal connections most of the people I met with them at least once or twice and by the facebook page itself is open to everyone and people and I have a thing for my website yeah that's ah that's actually a bit of an age old dilemma particularly for people that started in a personal profile which a lot of people did on dso then they have that dilemma of okay do I want I have mohr following their already so do I want to bring my business things over here and what is that how do I keep the streams separate? I mean you have a lot of privacy settings you have every time you post something you could say on ly show this to you know, acts or you know show this publicly you actually even have now the ability with facebook too toe open your page up to subscribers so that they don't people won't have to friend you or follow you or be you know anyway you know, part of your network but if you choose to make your content public they can actually see it on dh that the nice thing about that aspect is that on the personal pages, for whatever reason they still limit you to five thousand fans I'm not really sure I'm gonna hurt anybody give a really good x nation for why that is but it's always been the case on so there are people that have used facebook as a business tool their personal profiles a business tool that they bump up against that I can't have any more friends but they they have this now they look into it it's just a setting that you can actually now allow people to subscribe you can now make your content public on dh so you know, I was one of those people that started on facebook to the chagrin of my college aged daughters at the time you know, in about two thousand eight or so and the only thing available was a personal page and so that's where I built my business now I have ah now I have both and essentially I'm you know, there's there they have different followings and but essentially show about the same content in both because there is a little different functionality is well, I'm not sure I have the best possible plan but in some ways I feel little kind of stuck to you know, to using both almost in the same functionality but I think if somebody came to me and said, what should I do getting started? I would say and, you know, create the personal profile use it for how you're going to use it but then really for your business, you know, start with the business profile because I think you have the business page as your primary home for facebook because you have a lot of functionality options there. But one of you started off saying you're starting to get some traction by showing your images and that really is I think facebook is terribly suited I know number of photographers both here and out there you know I have found that a lot of these sites that are more visual in nature are terribly suited for business is that that our photographers or that have anything visual to show so you know a couple other ones I'm not going to go deep into these but you know pinterest instagram slide share our networks that really offer a lot for anybody that has something visual to show you know instagrams actually owned by facebook now and so has pretty deep integration into facebook it is I don't know if this trend is still occurring but 00:24:10.913 --> 00:24:14. a lot of a lot of those twenty and thirty year olds 00:24:14.38 --> 00:24:17. are jumping off of facebook now and starting to you 00:24:17.66 --> 00:24:22. know really favor networks like instagram and some 00:24:22.7 --> 00:24:26. of the you know like tumbler and some of the microblogging 00:24:26.25 --> 00:24:29. tools as opposed to facebook because no facebook's 00:24:29.59 --> 00:24:32. just not cool anymore now that people like us got 00:24:32.05 --> 00:24:36. on it so so you do need to continue to explore you 00:24:36.57 --> 00:24:38. know some of these and I kind of put him down is also 00:24:38.79 --> 00:24:40. consider there's some of you out there and I'm sure 00:24:40.99 --> 00:24:42. that some of the photographers and the audience have 00:24:42.71 --> 00:24:45. been using pinterest for years and that it is a primary 00:24:45.8 --> 00:24:49. you network for them but that's not not necessarily 00:24:49.08 --> 00:24:52. true for you know most businesses but if you have 00:24:52.65 --> 00:24:56. any visual aspect, and I have things to show it. And 00:24:56.73 --> 00:24:59. again, that doesn't mean that you have to be a photographer. 00:24:59.01 --> 00:25:01. I mean, remodeling contractor has some great images, 00:25:01.84 --> 00:25:04. probably hopefully of, you know, before, after kind 00:25:04.04 --> 00:25:06. of shots of, you know, of a project they've done. 00:25:06.43 --> 00:25:08. So. There are a lot of things that you can do, using 00:25:08.17 --> 00:25:12. those tools to get to extend or open up kind of these 00:25:12.32 --> 00:25:13. channels even farther.