Marketing for a Cause.

I’m working on a project that involves using various marketing metrics as a baseline to structure and fund future team projects.  I’ve gathered my baseline marketing data from Google Analytics, determined my target percentiles, factored engagement metrics, and structured an incentive plan based on time and resources that I’m certain will work for both the client and project team.  I feel confident this is a sound and measurable methodology to base our project and incentive goals on.  But is it?

This same scenario happens all too often in project planning.  We over-think, over-quantify, and over-organize our plan and forget to factor in the most important component: flexibility. Think about it: if any team member received a project plan where success was based solely on mathematical measurements such as “hits received per day” or “comments generated per week” we’d be focusing only on the numbers and not on the larger picture. Where does creativity get calculated? Or innovation? What if half-way through the project, a team member finds a better metric, but because it’s not included in the initial project plan, chooses not to measure it? Likewise, if the project plan is so specific that it holds only certain people accountable for certain goals, how likely is it that our team members will be willing to work together versus individually?  Are we eliminating the opportunity to reap the benefits of collaboration and brainstorming?  Creating silos in an organization operating in an industry that has just accomplished knocking them down?

As an analytical person by nature, I love data.  I love numbers.  They help me gauge most of my successes in work and home life. But the more experienced I become in the workplace, I’m realizing they are not the “golden ticket” to measuring all results, especially when teams are involved. It can’t just be about hitting predetermined goals because chances are you’ve forgot a variable or your baseline has changed.  Also and more importantly, despite the fact that we live in an increasingly connected and networked world, people will work themselves back into a cubicle if you create a plan that allows them to.  Factoring in time for teamwork, flexibility, creativity and collaboration may impact your timeframe, but it also will impact a team’s ability to create innovative products and services.  And at the end of the day, those are the ones that sell.

Congratulations!  You finally decided to start your blog.  If you’re a newbie like I was, chances are you wrote a few posts, added some eye-catching graphics and in return you’ve gotten… crickets.  Maybe a few likes, a few tweets, but no comments.  You look at other blogs that appear similar to yours and notice they all have plenty of comments.

So what’s the problem?

As a content moderator for a well-known blog community, I’ve seen first-hand what type of posts generate the most comments.  These “power posts,” if you will, typically do more than one of the following:

• Pose a question
• Cover a hot or controversial topic
• Contain share buttons
• Are syndicated on other websites

For any new blogger struggling to generate comments, I always give the following advice:

1)      Take a look at your content. Are you trying to start a conversation, or just talking at people?  Are you asking questions or inviting feedback?  Many people who are experienced in their field have a tendency to “give away the kitchen” sink with their blog posts. If your goal is to generate comments, give readers an opportunity to finish the story. Invite participation and contribution from others.

2)      Take a look at your topic. Is it fresh or news-worthy, or boring and dated?  Hopefully this won’t come as a surprise, but people want to read something new and relevant to their niche, rather than something that’s already been covered or off-topic.

3)      Share it. Tweet it, post it on Facebook, change the title and repost it again. Cross-post it among relevant groups on Linkedin. Email it to colleagues, friends, or anyone in your network who may be interested.  Much research has been done to show that sharing content during certain times of the day or week can have an impact on how well people engage with it.

4)      Syndicate it. Reach beyond your immediate network. Create an account with a niche-specific blog aggregator, such as The Energy Collective or Carbon Capture Journal.  The more mileage your post can get across the social web, the more comments it’s likely to generate.

Taking the time to optimize and market your content can pay off in increased views, comments and overall engagement.

For our more seasoned bloggers, am I missing anything?

It’s all bells and whistles until you get it home, right?  If you’ve ever had an experience like mine, you’ll know what I’m talking about.

Last year, one of my small business clients wanted to switch their CRM.  They were currently overpaying with their current provider, and wanted to switch to another at a lower cost.  After doing a bit of research, there were 2 clear alternatives. While the first alternative was the cheapest, the second alternative had the bells.  They had the fancy demo, the slick marketing materials and the fast support.  However, after testing them both out, I realized that while Alt#1 was the less jazzy version, it actually had everything we needed.  It was a clean slate and easy to use.  Alt#2 on the other hand, was littered with bugs, error messages and a clunky interface.   Later reporting to the client, I noted my experience with the trials and gave my recommendation for Alt#1.  Naturally, the client wanted to see a product demo before deciding, and unfortunately once that happened, all bets were off.  Alt#2 it was.  They had the look, the power and the support the client wanted.  After one last unsuccessful push back, I folded.  Dropped my guns.  I was an agreeable person… I loved a challenge…I’d make it work.

I’ve spent the last year of my life regretting the decision to “drop my guns.”  Since we implemented Alt#2, I’ve dealt with more support headaches, bugs, and data quality issues than we ever had with our previous CRM.  The flashy demo we saw was a mere illusion, a joke in contrast to what we actually given to work with.  Having implemented CRMs in the past, I should have known better.

As a marketer by education and trade, I know how to spot good marketing when I see it.  Yet after seeing how much money is paid to CRM and Demand Solution providers promising things they can’t deliver,  I often wish I went to school for programming instead.

In the last few years, blog platforms have become a great meeting place to connect with others and learn more about what makes them tick.  Regardless of what interests you, chances are there is an audience of people online who want to read about it. And with the right balance of personality and professionalism in your writing, partnerships, career and joint venture opportunities are right at your fingertips.

So why isn’t everyone doing it?

I was talking to a colleague of mine about why she doesn’t blog.  “I don’t have time.  I spend all day working for clients and at the end of the day am simply too busy,” she said.

Let’s face it- we’ve all got too much on our plate these days.  With everything we do, there needs to be a win-win or benefit gained from your time investment.  As an online marketing consultant, I attribute much of the success of my business to the content I’m able to generate and share online.

Here’s how:

Networking – There’s no better way to put yourself out there than through blogging. Between all of the different blog platforms, aggregators and social networks, like-minded people have a chance to connect and converse with both you and your content.

Marketing Opportunities – Who needs a cocktail party, exhibit hall or career fair?  Blogging is a cheap and effective way to market yourself, your business or your cause without having to wear a logo or suit.   Whether you decide to run your own blog or guest blog on other sites, you can easily showcase your experience and credibility on a topic to mass audiences.

Creative Outlet – It’s well-known that writing is a very therapeutic outlet to express both your personality and experience.  Creating and sharing content through blogs gives you an opportunity to contribute to society and make an impact in your field of work.

With everything in life, there is a give and a take, an investment and a return. When it comes to blogging, what are you taking from it?

Regardless of organization size, the role of a marketing manager is to design and manage campaigns that can report on effectiveness to determine ROI of effort.  Whether you’re using free tools such as Zoho CRM and Google Analytics or pricier platforms such as Marketo, Genius or LeadMD, the success rate is based on how well you set the system up.

When collecting lead or prospect information, you’ll need to collect the following information at a minimum:

• Contact info
• Lead source
• Area of interest
• Level of interest

If the lead is then qualified and passed to Sales, you will then need to know the following:

• Did they buy?
• When?
• What?
• For how much?

Understanding how to collect this basic information is crucial to setting up your marketing system correctly.  Ask yourself, where are my prospect touch points?

• Contact forms on landing pages
• Emails
• Phone conversations

Take advantage of these opportunities to collect and document the necessary information you need to build reports that automate your marketing system.  Good marketing is about collecting good information on your customers.  And in the end, you’re only as smart as the information you collect from them.



I just finished reading Phil Simon’s The New Small: How a New Breed of Small Businesses is Harnessing the Power of Emerging Technologies, and I have to say, it’s a must-read for students, entrepreneurs and budding business owners alike.   I’m not a huge fan of “get rich quick” guides or self-help books by any means, and happy to report this book does NOT fall under either category.  In fact, my first impression was ”Where was this when I was in business school?” 

If a single book could summarize what the last ten years of technology has helped small businesses achieve, this is it.  Simon paints a realistic portrait where a one or two man company can compete with a global corporation with less cost and greater efficiency, highlighting real world examples and case studies. 

Being a huge fan, a dedicated employee and aspiring owner of small business, I found the book both inspiring and delightful to read.  Gone are the excuses of “no budget” “no resources” and “no time.”  Affordable CRM, web conferencing, online project management and fileshare programs have replaced in-person meetings, expensive travel and file-o-faxes, giving small business the advantage it needs to compete with the big guys.   I’m a huge believer and user of this emerging business model and would recommend it to anyone interested in running their own business or improving their employer’s.

I just registered for Dan Zarella’s latest webinar The Science of Email Marketing and was asked the following question upon signup:

What’s your biggest marketing challenge?

Without hesitation I thought “content!” 

With the evergrowing number of media channels continuing to become more overloaded with news and information, sourcing fresh content becomes an increasingly real dilemma for marketers.   When you’re expected to tweet 10-15 times a day, blog 2-3 times per week, and post status updates every other hour, the resources to create or borrow ideas tend to get a little strapped. 

It got me thinking on the subject of Content Marketing.  Doesn’t all marketing pertain to content these days?  It seems not so long ago we used to focus mostly on media channels… how much budget you should allocate to a magazine placement, a radio ad… you’d spend all your resources buying space for your message to be run once, twice, three times a quarter and pay an astronomical price to have an agency create it for you.   With the rise of free or peanut priced services  such as SurveyMonkey, MailChimp and Yugma, we’re creating and posting links to polls, whitepapers and webinars (oh my!) at an exponentially increasing rate to an expotentially increasing number of free online channels.  The focus has gone from print to online, and production has gotten cheaper with less barriers (which means we’re producing a heck of alot more of it).  

In the everchanging field of marketing, these days it’s ALL about content and creativity.  How much you can produce, repurpose, source.  How quickly you can dish it out and on how many outlets.   We can’t blame our lack of advertising budget anymore.  It’s all out there, free and waiting for us.   News ready to be shared. Images ready to be tweaked.  Ideas ready to be tapped.  People waiting to see.  And the best part, we dont need money.  We just need a little creativity and a good internet connection.

Taking the advice of his own open government initiative, President Obama has further extended his State of the Union address by utilizing various social media and web 2.0 sites.   In addition to hosting Facebook roundtables and soliciting Twitter feedback,  the President will be answering public questions via YouTube tomorrow (see www.youtube.com/askobama). As well as encouraging more government transparency, the initiative allows the public to actually ”get involved” with our government through the use of technology. 

This two-way street of open dialogue is great for education and morale, but one can only imagine the flood of questions and comments the American public has.  As with other crowdsourcing projects, the question arises: who’s collecting and analyzing all of the public feedback?   Or better yet, who’s going to do something about it?

2000-2010 brought about some rapid advances in enterprise technology. From cloud computing to SaaS, small and large businesses alike became equipped with cheaper, more efficient programs to conduct their operations. Improvements in web technology and the increased availability of information leveled the playing field for start-ups, entrepreneurs and virtual companies to compete with the “big guys” as an era of “collaboration” and “wikis” took the world by storm. Employees and business owners chose to work smarter rather than harder as competition in the service industry skyrocketed. And as Thomas Friedman predicted so eloquently, the world got flatter, and in this new world we developed new markets that spanned both coast and country lines. The ability of businesses to evolve on pace with technology quickly determined their success or demise, as departments that once had no tangent with IT found themselves reliant on it for daily operations.  Marketing merged to become Techmarketing and Finance to become Finechnology, and the employees who were quickest to understand those unions were first to take advantage of their benefits.

It’s been an exciting decade of advancement and accomplishment in the ever-expanding fields of enterprise and web technology– two fields that power most businesses operations today.  Having had the benefit of using many of these emerging technologies myself and for my clients, I look forward to what the next 10 years has in store for us.

Between Wikileaks becoming the target of a series of cyberattacks and site founder Julian Assange getting “red listed” by Interpol, many people are left wondering what information can really be trusted on collaborative knowledge sites.   In my opinion, the extent to which we put our faith in the veracity of wiki information largely depends on both the subject matter covered and the credibility and motives of contributors.  Not knowing the latter is often what causes people to question what is true and what is not.  

Does the recent Wikileaks scandal impact your impression of wikis or collaborative knowledge sites?  What would you say are the qualities of a trustworthy one?