9 Reasons Why Your Content Is Not Shared on Social Networks: New Research

By Phil Mershon 

Reprinted from Social Media Examiner

Do you wonder how to get your content seen amidst a sea of information?
What if you could understand why your audience shares some information and not other? That would make your content stand out from the competition.

The Science of Sharing

30 billion pieces of content are shared on Facebook each month, including blog posts, links, news stories and photo albums.

HubSpot’s Dan Zarrella has found that three things must happen to get your content shared.

First, people must be exposed to your content (be a fan on Facebook or follow you on Twitter). Second, they must be aware of your content (meaning they actually see it). Finally, they must be motivated by something in your content to share it.

Many articles have been written on how to increase your audience size and make people aware of your content, including these by Mari Smith and Denise Wakeman. This article will focus on the motivations for sharing.


The New York Times recently partnered with Latitude Research to unpack the psychology of sharing. Based on their study of 2500 participants (and some other recent research), here are 9 reasons why your customers aren’t sharing your content.

#1: Your customers don’t trust you

Stated plainly, people won’t share your content if they don’t find you or your content to be trustworthy.

The 2011 Edelman Trust Barometer found that globally only 56% of people trust businesses to do what is right. However, in the US, the UK and Japan, that number fell significantly between 2010 and 2011.

Notice the evolution in trust.

Key takeaway: To build trust, Guy Kawasaki says the first step is to be trusting. The other recommendation is to lead honest and open public dialogues where you’re not afraid of negative statements.

#2: Your customers don’t care about your brand

That hurts to hear, but customers have short memories. They wonder “what have you done for me lately?”

Your customers are looking for valuable information, great deals and a chance to meet other people who share their interests. As soon as you stop offering these things, your fans will go looking elsewhere.

They may not feel a commitment to your brand, but you can keep them interested in your content. The next couple of points offer some remedies you can implement immediately.

Key takeaway: Determine what your audience values from you and keep giving it to them. In fact, exceed their expectations.

#3: Your posts are boring

“Don’t be boring,” says Grandma Mary, the alter-ego of Social Media Examiner’s Facebook community manager, Andrea Vahl. People are far more likely to share something they find intriguing or funny.

Look at the case of Volkswagen’s videos. Their Cannes-winning episode, The Force, a spoof on Star Wars, earned over 40 million views. None of their other videos, more traditional marketing content, came close to 1 million views. Of course, most of us would love a million views. But look at the relative difference in sharing power.

Key takeaway: People love to share humor. Get some of your creative staff to find ways to bring humor and fun into some of your posts. See this post by Jason Miller for some ideas.

#4: People care about causes more than brands

The New York Times found that people are more likely to share about something they are passionate about.

Let’s face it. People rarely wake up wondering what they can do for XYZ brand today. But they do dream of ways to help their favorite cause. Whether it’s ending poverty, supporting Greenpeace or advancing a local charity, many people give sacrificially to help things they care about.

Notice how CREE has taken a boring subject like lighting and made it a mission and revolution to change lighting in public places across America.

While not a cause in the humanitarian sense, this does get people excited about being part of something bigger than your brand or product.

Key takeaway: Show your human side. Let fans know what causes excite you and give them a chance to help you spread the word.

#5: People share to build relationships with others

Research shows that people value relationships with other people, not necessarily with brands. They are definitely looking for community. Your brand might be able to create a platform for that community.

Here are two interesting factoids from The New York Times study:

• 78% of respondents use links to stay connected to people they might not otherwise stay in touch with.
• 73% of respondents said sharing content helps them find people with common interests.

Red Bull does a nice job of sharing content their fans might be willing to share with their friends.

Notice how Red Bull asks a question and then encourage sharing.

Key takeaway: Evaluate your posts and ask why someone might share this content with their friends.

#6: Customers are looking for validation

Some things haven’t changed since junior high. We are all trying to build credibility in the eyes of our friends. We want to be seen as experts in some area(s).

The way we do that online is through the content we share.

68% of The New York Times study participants said they share content as an advertisement for themselves. They want to give others a better sense of who they are.

Key takeaway: Share highly valuable content and links that will give your fans access to information that will enable them to look good in the eyes of their friends. Ask your fans what they would like to know.

#7: People share to manage information

You’ve heard it said, “I’m just thinking out loud.” Today many people think out loud through social media.

In fact, 73% of the study participants said they process information more deeply, thoroughly and thoughtfully when they share it.

Additionally, 85% of respondents said that reading other people’s responses helps them understand and process information and events. 

Social media scientist Dan Zarrella found the following words generate the most comments in his research.

Notice how popular words like "giveaway" and "jobs" are.

Key takeaway: People who share your content may be using it to crystallize their thinking. Make sure to give them some new thought-provoking content and don’t forget to invite their comments.

#8: You’ve misunderstood your audience

If you’ve been around marketing for very long, you understand the concept of a marketing persona. This idea has been around for at least 20 years and advocates understanding your customer profile by creating detailed pictures of your ideal customer(s).

The New York Times study found there are six sharing personas for online fans and I’ve listed a seventh based on my experience and our audience. Understanding who your customers are can help you identify common motivators:

1. Altruists—Altruists share content out of a desire to be helpful and aspire to be seen as a reliable source of information. Preferred tools: Facebook and email.
2. Careerists—Careerists are well-educated and seek to gain a reputation for bringing value to their networks. They prefer content that is more serious and professional in tone. Preferred tools: LinkedIn and email.
3. Hipsters—Hipsters are younger sharers who have always lived in the “information age.” They use Twitter and Facebook to share cutting-edge and creative content. They share content to build their online identity. Preferred tools: Facebook and Twitter.
4. Boomerangs—Boomerangs seek validation and thrive on the reaction of others to their content, even when it’s negative responses. Preferred tools: Facebook, email, Twitter and blogs, wherever people will engage them.
5. Connectors—Connectors see content sharing as a means of staying connected to others and making plans. They are more relaxed in their sharing patterns. Preferred tools: Facebook and email.
6. Selectives—Selectives are more thoughtful in what they share and with whom they share it. They personalize their sharing and expect responses to their content. Preferred tool: email.

Although this is not based on The NY Times research, I’d like to add a seventh persona to the list:

1. Trendsetters—Trendsetters are thought leaders, marketers and business leaders who purposefully seek to stay abreast of breaking news and trends in their industry, sharing it quickly and aggressively. These people are typically seen as experts (or aspire to be seen as such). Preferred tools: Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.

A couple of observations: 1) notice how many of these personas prefer email; 2) notice that the platform significantly predicts the motivation pattern.

Key takeaway: Think through your content-sharing strategy for each platform, knowing whom you are likely to reach.

#9: People are more personal with email

The study authors discovered that people have not abandoned email. In fact, participants share most frequently through email and consider it more private. Therefore they have higher expectations for responses through email.

Key takeaway: Don’t forget to integrate your email strategies with social media. Jay Baer will be speaking about this at Facebook Success Summit 2011. He also wrote this article.

Some final pointers

If you want a deeper understanding of the psychology of sharing, see this article by Dr. Rachna Jain.

One of the most overlooked rules in content creation is the rule of simplicity. Shorter posts (80 characters on Facebook) get shared 27% more frequently. Keep your writing style at a fifth grade or lower level of understanding.

Create a sense of urgency in your writing. Give people a reason to respond now. If they don’t act immediately, they probably never will.

Finally, remember that getting your content shared is just the first step. See this as part of longer-term strategy of building a loyal following.

5 Things I Wish I Knew When I First Started Blogging - Blogging Tips

We all make mistakes. I’ve blogged full-time since late 2008, after roughly a year of going at it. While I love the lifestyle of blogging for a living, I can’t help but kick myself every time I think back about my first year or two blogging, and what I wish I could change.

If you’re just starting out, here are some powerful concepts that are important even when you’re beginning — delaying and waiting could be essentially costing money and maybe even any long-term success at all.

5 Things I Wish I Knew When I Started:

I could write a small library on what I didn’t know that I should have known, but here are the most important to bloggers just now starting out:

Email Marketing.

This is the big one. Nearly 75% of my income now comes from my email newsletter, even though I launched it in 2010. That means I have literally years worth of email subscribers I could be making money with that I don’t have — I always planned on setting up a newsletter, but just never did. Learn from that mistake, and set up your email list today.

Personal Branding.

Writing isn’t just about bluntly talking about your topic — it’s about creating a voice that allows your readers to picture you in a certain way. Try to add a personal story to every post, figure out how you want your readers to “see” you in their mind, and start playing the part. The first year of my blogging I focused on the topic — while forgetting about myself. Focus on your brand and your content — they’re both important.

Info Publishing.

The most profitable week of my life so far has been writing a relevant report/ebook for my readers, and sending an email pitching it. Unfortunately, I only did this for the first time a year ago. Several books later, I just wish I’d started my website with a report for sale — it would have sped up the journey. Write a report on something important to your readers, set up a sales page, and sell it — worst case scenario, you only sell a few copies — but it’ll make you seem at least a little more of an expert in the eyes of your readers.

Real-World Authority.

If you’re not an authority on the topic you’re writing about, then you have two legit options: become an authority by learning, or hire one. One of the most important projects I’ve launched was a debt web site where I hired a debt collection specialist who had worked for the New York Times Company. It was amazing to watch how people linked to her content, shared it on social media — while ignoring mine. I learned my lesson: there’s nothing wrong with bringing in a real live expert if you’re not personally one.

Legitimate Networking.

Internet marketers love to “network”. Almost every day someone in one of my niches will send me an email literally saying “we should network!” Unfortunately, they don’t bring anything to the table and end up making me click the delete button. Looking back, the most important marketing campaigns I’ve worked on involved at least one other friend in the niche. No blog is an island — make legit friends, and use each other to become more successful.

Blogging is all about growth and conversion — grow your traffic while converting it as efficiently as you can, and you’re destined to a fantastic income. That’s why every systematic tip and every actionable concept can literally take you from doing pretty good to doing better than you thought possible — don’t put off anything, or you’ll regret it later.

Shaun Connell

Shaun Connell is a full-time blogger and investor from Live Gold Prices, where he writes about gold and silver. Oddly enough, he doesn't own a blog about internet marketing.
View my posts Visit my homepage

 View the article as it appeared:
5 Things I Wish I Knew When I First Started Blogging - Blogging Tips

Pitch perfect: A startup’s guide to getting coverage

Most young startup’s needs 3 things: Money, a good idea and a dogged determination to see that idea through to completion. But what about publicity?

Some may argue that if an idea is good enough, people will discover it one way or another, and there may be some truth in this. But there’s little question that a spot of positive coverage can boost business and accelerate the word-of-mouth process.

What we’re talking about is public relations (PR). This could be in the form of a charismatic CEO who loves nothing more than courting the media, or an appointed PR firm that manages the publicity on a firm’s behalf. But in the case of young startups, they often won’t have the funds at their disposal for an experienced PR firm, whilst the company founder may be far more comfortable getting stuck into some Python programming than penning a press release.

And this is a key point. A young entrepreneur could be a world-class coder and have the biggest game-changing product since the wheel, but if they don’t know how to communicate their vision to the wider world, the path to profit can be that little less smooth.

The Next Web gets to meet some of the most exciting tech startups around the globe, from Los Angeles and London, to Lisbon and Luxembourg. How we first encounter these startups is normally one of two ways – either we proactively set out to meet them at events, or we are approached and directly pitched to. And we do see a lot of pitches.

With that in mind, we thought we’d pull together a few tips on how startups can effectively pitch their products and ideas. Most of these are gleaned from our own experience at The Next Web, but they’re likely applicable to any publication, whether it’s a national newspaper or a niche website.

As you’ll see, the pitching process is a lot more straight forward than you may first have thought.

Remember: We like pitches

A key point to remember is that the relationship between a company and the media is a symbiotic one. On the one hand you, as a startup, want the public to read about your company in well-read publications, but also remember that we need you because you are what will ultimately give us good content.

We genuinely want to hear pitches from interesting startups.We want you to contact us.

You can be confident that at the very least we will listen to what you have to say and assess whether it’s relevant and exciting enough for our readership.

Avoid hyperbole and buzzwords, just tell us what it does.

“I narrow-mindedly outlawed the word ‘unique’. Practically every press release contains it. Practically nothing ever is.”

This quote is attributed to Fred M. Hechinger, a former New York Times editor. Even if what you have is genuinely unique, so many pitches use this word that it has become an almost redundant adjective. All we really, really want to hear about is what your product or company does.

So, it’s best not to fill your pitch with hyperbole. Stick to the facts, tell us what you’ve got, what it does and what it solves. Practical information beats buzzwords every time, so ‘unique’, ‘revolutionary’ and ‘game-changing’ can be left at the door.

KISS: Keep it short and simple

Depending on who you speak to, KISS either stands for keep it simple, stupid, keep it short and simple, keep it simple or be stupid or even keep it simple and straightforward. Either way, the KISS principle holds firm and should apply to all pitches – simplicity is the name of the game and you should avoid unnecessary complexity.

A 500-word pitch in an email is quite a daunting prospect, so if you can nail your elevator pitch in the opening paragraph that is ideal, and you can expand on this over another couple of paragraphs.

Also bear in mind that just because you’ve been immersed in your startup for the past 6 months or more, an editor may not be as familiar with your particular subject area as you are. Short and pithy is good for pitches, but you also need to use the space you have wisely and explain the basic concept behind the product without making too many assumptions about the editor’s knowledge.

Seeing is believing

My ideal pitch would consist of no more than about 150 words, accompanied by a link to the company/product or screenshots if it isn’t live yet. However, even better than this is a link to a video of the product in action.

We wrote a piece last week outlining some free and easy ways to create professional screencasts, and it’s definitely worth considering this and maybe even recording a voiceover to explain what’s happening on each screen.

You really can’t beat a good demo to illustrate what a product does.

Know your competition

As we’ve established already, a particular editor may not be as familiar with your area of industry as you. You can make their job much easier by giving examples of other similar companies/products – this not only illustrates that there is a demand, but it also gives you the chance to outline why you’re different.

Unique selling points (USPs) are what investors look for in startups, and it’s also a key factor for journalists too. If you can easily and quickly explain what it is about your offering that’s different to what’s already out there, then that is likely to get people interested.

Speaking of competition…

An assumption that many companies make is that having been featured in another high profile publication, this means that we will want to feature it too. The chances are, if your company or a new product from your company has just been featured somewhere else, we would probably pass on it.

It’s fairly common that a startup’s pitch will include links to very recent features about them, and this isn’t necessarily a bad thing as it does make our job easier in terms of researching prior coverage. But The Next Web, and probably most other top blogs and publications, like to offer fresh news, features and insights so we would probably pass if we see you’ve just been featured on another high profile blog.

However, if you have new developments to throw into the mix, by all means link through to other coverage as a means of demonstrating that there is interest in your company.

As a general rule of thumb, you are best pitching to one publication at a time in order of preference and let them know that they have the possibility of an exclusive. Ask them if they could quickly review it, and it’s fine if they’re not too keen on it or don’t reply within a couple of hours, it just means you can then go and offer it to the next publication in your list. Also, don’t be afraid to ask for feedback on why they’re not interested – you can either offer up new information to persuade them, or alter your pitch for another publication. The other route is email a select few sites/blogs and see who pounces on covering the product first, if it’s exciting enough, I assure you they’ll be competing to get the post up first and if you’re lucky, you’ll get coverage from a number of them.

Find the right person

The Next Web, as with many blogs and publications, have editors that specialize in particular areas of industry or in particular geographic locations. For this reason, it’s a good idea to identify the right person to pitch to. And it’s always good to personalize your pitch too, a mass-sent press release with BCC’d email addresses may still get interest if it’s good enough, but it’s not nearly as appealing as a personal pitch.

If you’re not sure who the right person is at a publication, there is almost always a generic email address that’s monitored.

Such email addresses aren’t provided as a means of stopping you contacting us, they’re genuinely monitored as a way of centralizing incoming messages to help us dispatch them to the right people.

For example, The Next Web has tips@thenextweb.com, we’ll see your email in seconds and ensure the correct editor gets it. This also means your pitch should contain key information such as where exactly your company is headquartered, whether it’s a mobile app, Web app, and other pertinent details.

Be confident, but not pushy

So we’ve established that media outlets such as The Next Web are keen as hell for you to contact them with your news. But that doesn’t mean you’ll definitely receive coverage. We may have just covered a company exactly like you and it may be too soon to run a similar feature – that doesn’t mean we won’t keep you on our radar for further down the line.

And there’s also many other opportunities that can arise for good coverage, maybe not as a dedicated piece on your company, but a more general feature on your industry where we discuss, compare and contrast different companies or products.

You absolutely should be confident in your pitches, but it’s also good to keep relationships solid and not be overly pushy about receiving coverage.

When to follow up

This is a question that many people wonder about. Once you’ve pitched to a publication, should you follow up if you don’t hear back? Most editors would probably say yes.

Even if a publication doesn’t want to cover your startup, it is only manners to respond to your email. So, if you don’t receive a response, follow up maybe a week or so after the initial pitch. It could be that you are already on their radar but they just haven’t gotten ’round to responding yet, or they may simply have forgotten.

In your follow-up email, simply ask if they received the email okay and whether you can offer them any more information. In fact, if you can offer more information that’s actually a good excuse to follow up – maybe a new development has emerged since the first pitch?

There’s no hard and fast rule about when or how often you should follow up, but it’s probably safe to assume that if you haven’t heard back after a few emails that it’s a non-starter.

It’s also safe to assume that if you haven’t heard back within a few hours of sending out your pitch email looking for coverage, you probably won’t be getting coverage for that particular release of your product. That’s not to say future releases/updates won’t be covered, but that particular one didn’t catch the eye of any of the editors.

Email or telephone?

There’s a lot to be said for telephone pitches or even personal pitches over a coffee, but email is almost always the best way to pitch a story in the very first instance.

It means an editor has the time to properly assess a new startup or product, test it out for themselves and decide whether they want to run with it. A follow up call on Skype or an in-person product demo may then be necessary, but most publications these days will probably prefer a pitch in writing at first.

So…what does the perfect pitch email look like?

There isn’t an easy answer to this question because pitches will vary for each story. But I’ll give an example here of a good pitch from a (fictional) startup seeking coverage of a new app.

Hi [First Name],

I’m [full name], founder of a London-based startup called [name + link to website], and I think you may be interested in our new product. We’ve developed a GPS-powered app that helps drivers instantly see how much they’re spending on petrol with each journey they make, and whilst there are similar apps out there (e.g. xxx and xxx), this is the first time an app has been created that uses up-to-date, real-time data from local service stations around the world.

We are releasing the Android version next week, and we expect the iOS version to be approved shortly after. I’ve attached a few screenshots of what the app looks like, and here’s a link to a video that demos exactly how it works.

I thought I’d give you first refusal to review this app before contacting other publications. If you could let me know if you’re keen to learn more, I’d appreciate it.

Thanks a lot for your time.

Name
Position
Telephone number
Twitter Handle

These are just a few tips on how you can effectively pitch your startup or new product to the media. This isn’t set in stone and it’s not meant to be overly prescriptive, you can ultimately inject as much of your personality into a pitch as you see fit. But the key points to glean from all this is keep it simple, short, friendly and informative.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Paul Sawers is UK & Media Editor at The Next Web. Follow Paul on Twitter: @TGW_Paul, email him at paul(at)thenextweb.com or peruse his personal blog at The Good Word.

The article as it appeared on thenextweb.com

How to plan a social media campaign like an art thief

Let’s get this out of the way up front: I am pro art heist.

I know, I know — stealing is wrong. I know that; I do. I just happen to also really appreciate intricate, daring, transgressive acts with the potential for a huge payoff — or a huge disaster. I’d like to tell you I would have made a great criminal mastermind in another life — but the truth is that I’m way too much of a goody two-shoes. But I still marvel at the audacity of capers like the theft of a $250,000 Rembrandt drawing from a hotel in California last weekend.

Maybe that’s why I like social media marketing so much. At its best, social media campaigns are intricate, daring, transgressive acts with the potential for a huge payoff — or a huge disaster. If you’ve never looked at it that way, more’s the pity, because a lot of the potential of social media is tied up in being willing to think big and then plan small, just like an art thief.

Here are six ways social media marketers can take a page from the big book of art heists:

Dream big or don’t bother. Nobody ever steals paintings of dogs playing poker. Sure, bad art would probably be easier to steal — but good luck finding a buyer for it. Social media is no different. You can do the bare minimum of setting up your Facebook page and telling your customers they can now “engage” with you, whatever that means. But why go to the trouble? Unless you’re willing to actually put in the work to create something of value for your audience, they’re just going to ignore you — and then the tiny amount of time you were willing to spend on your social efforts will go for naught. I’m not saying you have to develop a world-beating campaign right out of the box; but if you don’t at least start out with a big goal in mind, you’re likely to end up the proud owner of a velvet Elvis instead of a Rembrandt.

Know what people like. Art thieves don’t just steal works by artists they personally appreciate; they target artists whose work will sell. Otherwise they’d just be making work for themselves down the line. Art experts say Rembrandt’s work is the second most-likely to be the target of a robbery because he has a great deal of name recognition and his works sell for a lot of cash. Instead of focusing your social media efforts on your company or the issues that your company cares about, think about your customers and the issues that matter to them. Talk about subjects that have a great deal of resonance with your intended audience and draw a lot of attention. Otherwise you’re just making work for yourself down the line.

Remember that simple plans are best. One of the interesting things about last weekend’s heist is that the thieves didn’t employ any high-tech trickery. They didn’t even break in. They walked into an art sale at a hotel; one person distracted the curator; another person took the drawing off of an easel; then everyone walked out before the hotel could put two and two together. The whole thing took less than 15 minutes. The thieves didn’t make work for themselves by complicating the plan. Look at your social media presence. Is it more complicated than it needs to be? Are you wasting effort or taking unnecessary risks?

Sweat the details. Don’t mistake simple for easy. I’m sure it took a lot of research and planning to get all the details just right and then a lot of practicing to make sure the caper came off without a hitch. Are you adhering to social media best practices? Are you honing your craft? Or are you winging it and hoping for the best? The little things don’t seem very sexy, but when a social media campaign goes off the rails, it’s usually because someone got careless and sent a tweet from the wrong account, or something just as trivial.

Recognize you can’t control everything. There is no such thing as a perfect plan. Putting a plan in motion means involving other people and other people are unpredictable. The best plans take a wide variety of variables into account and allow for adaptability and improvisation once the ball gets rolling. Don’t set your program on auto pilot; that way you’ll be able to adjust when your viral video doesn’t go viral or when you get negative comments instead of praise.

Think about the day after. Law enforcement officials say that most art thieves get caught not while stealing their prizes, but when trying to sell them later. It turns out that the market for stolen art is somewhat limited. Similarly, too many social media campaigns focus on attracting a ton of fans and followers without any consideration being given to what the brand will do with these relationships once they’re formed. You need to have a plan for turning your acquisition into return on investment. Fortunately, the number of uses for a Twitter follower greatly exceed the number of uses for a stolen masterpiece. I guess staying on the right side of the law has its benefits after all.

By Jesse Stanchak on August 16


Article as it appeared on Smart Blog

Image credit: jorgenjacobsen, via iStock Photo

What Startups Can Learn About PR and Crisis Management

by MARK SUSTER on AUGUST 14, 2011

I was recently approached by Fast Company to comment on “crisis management” at startups in the wake of the Airbnb “ranksackgate” story. I agreed to do the interview because the story was about what other companies can learn rather than about airbnb in particular.

What are the teachable moments? The short article in Fast Company is here if you’d like to read it.

In a nutshell – I think airbnb eventually got to the right place and I was impressed with the letter their founder Brian Chesky wrote and their new commitment to safety and damages. Obviously they wish they would have figured this out a bit more quickly, but as a young team I personally cut them a little bit more slack than I would if it were Oracle, for example.

And as long as people put things right and show contrition, situations like this eventually become a “tempest in a teapot.” Today’s Internet titans are filled with such momentary lapses.

But I thought I’d use the situation to talk more broadly about some PR lessons you might learn for your own business and also incorporate some situations I’ve faced recently with some portfolio companies.

1. If You Don’t Shape Your Story, Somebody Else Will
My golden rule of public relations is that “if you don’t shape your story somebody else will.” We see this in politics all the time. Think John Kerry and the “swift boat” scandal. Whatever your political view we can all agree that John Kerry is a terrible communicator. He’s verbose, often off message and wooden.

During the 2004 election he was accused of having made up material facts from his service in the Vietnam War in an election against somebody who didn’t serve in a war. How do you lose that debate?

Simple: he let other people tell the story. He didn’t respond quickly and forcefully. Journalists write stories that have an appeal to readers whether the accusations have merit or not. Just look at the silly Obama birther debate that we wasted so many news cycles on.

You know the saying, nature abhors a vacuum. The story will get written whether you want it to or not.

Don’t be “swiftboated.” Shape your own story.

2. Understand the Gravity of the Situation for Your Customers
So how do you know when to publicly come forward with information and when to not do so? Is it ever appropriate to just let a news cycle pass assuming the story will move on and die down? The obvious starting points to think to yourself are:

• Has something happened that fundamentally affects my customers or partners?
• Is there a story that negatively affects how people perceive my brand?
• Is there a reason I need to communicate to my constituents?
• Is there a need to change my policies, announce a mea culpa or get a topic focused on the right points?

If you’ve done something that is wrong you should put it right immediately. Do not expect it to blow over. The perception of your brand by not responding will not recover. You cannot seem overly defensive. If you believe that journalists or competitors are telling a story that isn’t right you need to put that straight. Do so by winning the hearts and minds on substantive talking points rather than attacking others. Attacking always comes across as petty.

3. Don’t Bury Bad News
If you have information about a situation that has gone terribly wrong don’t cover it up. Remember that the cover up always ends up worse that the actual infraction. We learned that from the original “gate.” If you were hacked and customer passwords were stolen, get the story to your customers ASAP. Yes, it will be bad. But imagine how much worse the story will be in 30 days when people find out you knew their information was stolen and they didn’t have a chance to reset passwords, cancel credit cards or whatever other remedies they would have preferred to make.

Consider the flawless response from Brian Norgard at Chill. His product auto-posted a testimonial from Dave Morin into Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg called the tactic “lame.” Pretty tough when you’re called out by Zuck himself. Yet a quick response clearly made this Chill moment into lemonade.

If you want to see flawless in action, read Chill’s post. They shaped the story. They reacted quickly. They didn’t try to bury the news of what they’d done. They turned off the feature (took the high ground) while defending the practice in their post. Moreover, they drove a lot of attention to social TV viewing and Chill through their response. 10/10.

4. Never Blame the Press
The most tempting thing for inexperienced entrepreneurs to do is to attack the press. It’s easy to say somebody hates you, got the story wrong, is lying, has biases, etc. In fact, some of these things may even be true in some circumstances. Your job is to change the situation, not shoot the messenger. Build deeper relationships. Have private conversations to change opinions. Find other media outlets to tell your story. Know your positive talking points. But don’t pick a fight with the press. That’s a war you’re not going to win.

We live in a free society. It’s the job of the press to hold us all to account and question our conduct, our performance, our accuracy our businesses. Sometimes the story will be dead-on and will benefit us all by protecting consumers, sometimes I won’t agree with the story and think it will be proven largely wrong. In any event, I’ll take a free press any day. Journalists are doing their jobs. When many do it simultaneously – even when some stories aren’t 100% accurate – we have way more transparency in our system.

The positives far outweigh any possible negatives.

5. Know Your Key Messages
I was recently talking with an entrepreneur who had just gotten a ton of press around his company for an interview he gave to a journalist. The story was controversial enough that it created follow-on articles. He seemed proud, “all press is good press, right?” Wrong. I told him,

“Look, all of the press you got was totally ‘off message.’ You’re being talked about for the wrong thing. I don’t mind controversy. But if you’re going to say something controversial make it about the market you serve. Make it about the point-of-view you’re trying to change.

Make the story be about your market. Journalists aren’t going to write about you all the time unless you’re Facebook. You just burned a story. You wasted that opportunity with that journalist and that journal. What a shame.”

Know your talking points at all times. Know what you want the market to talk about. Stick to your script. All press isn’t good press. Off message press is a wasted opportunity.

6. Don’t Take the Bait
Another entrepreneur contacted me recently because a competitor had attacked his company in the press. I’ve written about this topic before – you should make your competitors frenemies, even when the do stupid things like attack you. Sure, if it’s a major attack that you believe will hurt your business you need to respond. But my view is that you take the high ground. Attacking back makes you both look petty. Two wrongs don’t make a right. Lead in the press with your positive attributes. Use it as an excuse to get a journalist to write about you.

The story of X company attacks Y, how does Y respond is an angle journalists can sink their teeth into. Of course they want you to attack back hard – that makes a great story for them. It doesn’t help you. Stay focused on your message.

And privately reach out to your competitor. Go meet them in person. Explain that your biggest competitor is inertia as it almost always is for startups. That, or incumbents. But tit-for-tat between small companies NEVER makes sense. Don’t do it.

See here how much perfect bait was tee’d up for MG at TechCrunch in this public fight between Google & Microsoft andagain and again. Public fights are the gifts that keep giving for journalists and those fighting never come off looking good – they just convince themselves they do.

7. Develop Trusted Advisors
Like in every part of your business you need advisors. Startups often have advisors that help on recruiting, fund raising, biz dev, sales, etc. You need friends who have lots of experience in dealing with the press and hopefully relationships with journalists themselves. Trust me, these advisors will prove invaluable if you don’t have a lot of media experience. It isn’t something that comes naturally to most.

I’m always surprised how friends ask me for media help after they fawked up a story and never in advance when they’re planning. With portfolio companies I’m always involved in the planning phase. I want to know our media roadmap.

8. Get to Know the Press Now
Most startups talk to the press when they have a big event they want to talk about. That’s too late. I know it’s counter-intuitive because it seems like you shouldn’t talk with the press until you’re ready with something to say.

The reality is you want to have journalist relationships well before you have a story. Help them with other stories. Get to know what areas they’re knowledgeable and passionate about. Become interested in their profession and in them as people. Just like I advise people to get to know VCs early, so too with journalists. Here is a quick action plan for you in how to build journalist relations.

9. Get Media Training
I do a lot of public speaking and that includes speaking on television. Very few people are good at TV and many are sh*t scared of it. Yet with some simple media training you can be an effective communicator.

The same goes for press interviews. Knowing how to stay on message, knowing what your talking points are, knowing what the journalist’s angle in the story is, etc. are all parts of effective media training.

And any great PR firm will have a media training department. It’s how I learned the golden rule of TV interviews – ABC. Answer, bridge, communicate. Answer the question your asked briefly, use a bridge sentence to change to what you want to talk about and then communicate your key messages. It works every time. No media training for me = no ABC. It was worth every penny.

10. Have a PR Strategy
You probably also want to have PR people with whom you work. Sometimes they will work inside your company, sometimes they will be external. Here’s a 10-point guide on how to work with PR firms.

PR doesn’t happen by accident. It’s a business function and a very important one at that. Good PR will help you punch above your weigh class. Bad PR will bury you and make everything harder: funding, recruiting, biz dev, sales.

Draw yourself a chart as a CEO of all the activities for which you must dedicate time. Make sure at least 5-10% of your time allocation is in this bucket. Year round. PR is a continual process, not an event.

Read the article as it appeared on Both Sides of the Table

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Image courtesy of Fotolia.

5 Simple Steps to Getting Started With Mobile Marketing

By Jamie Turner
Published August 15, 2011 

Are you thinking about mobile marketing? Wondering how you can use mobile marketing to connect with customers?

The good news is that mobile marketing is not all that complex.

Here are five things you can do to get started in mobile marketing. Once you’ve mastered the steps below, you’ll see that mobile marketing is a great way to open up new revenue streams for your business.

Ready to get started?

#1: Set up your mobile website

This is actually easier than you might think. One option is to use the automated systems offered by many companies. They essentially take your existing website content and auto-format it for a mobile screen.

WordPress has some plugins that do a pretty good job of this and GoDaddy has an automated system that does it, too. But for the best user experience, I recommend you focus on one of the options outlined below.

Your mobile home page should have a clean and simple design. On the left is the standard 60 Second Marketer home page seen on a smart phone. On the right is the mobile version of the site.

Option number two is to use one of the many plug-and-play platforms offered online. These companies actually create a separate mobile website that is completely independent from your regular website.

Just Google “How to set up a mobile website” and you’ll find a number of companies doing this. There are some good organizations offering these plug-and-play systems, but there are also some real losers, so do your research before you choose a company to work with.

Mobicanvas.com, GetGoMobi.com and Onswipe.com all seem to have good solid platforms to work from.

You can build and manage your website quickly and easily!

A third option is to add a simple line of code onto your existing home page that “sniffs out” the screen size of the person visiting your site.

If the person visiting your site has a screen that’s more than 600 pixels wide, they’re probably coming from a PC and are directed to your regular site. If the screen is smaller than 600 pixels, they’re probably coming from a mobile device and will be redirected to pages designed for a smartphone screen.

Out of these three options, the third option is the best approach. Just ask your web designer to do a search for “mobile website redirect code” and they’ll find plenty of options like this one on CSS-Tricks.com.

Redirects are a critical step in ensuring your website is search-engine friendly.

#2: Claim your business on location-based platforms

You should claim your business on location-based platforms like Foursquare,Gowalla and Facebook Places, especially if you have a brick-and-mortar location.

Claiming your business just means that you’re raising your hand to these services and saying, “I’m an official representative of XYZ business and want to be listed on your platform.” Claiming your business is similar to calling up the phone company to get a free listing in the Yellow Pages, only now you’re reaching out to these location-based services instead of Ma Bell.

Once you’ve claimed your business, you can start using these platforms to run mobile promotions. For example, Chili’s ran a promotion where everyone who “checked in” to their locations using Foursquare got free cheese dip.

Better still, Chili’s improved on the promotion by making it so that anybody who checked in at another store within 200 yards of Chili’s got the same offer. Yup, you heard right—if you checked in at the florist next door, you got a digital coupon for free cheese dip at the Chili’s a few steps away. Brilliant!

Users can unlock the free appetizer coupon at participating restaurants by checking in at Chili's through Foursquare.

#3: Immerse yourself

You can’t fully understand mobile marketing until you use mobile marketing. So when you get through reading this article, grab your smartphone and mess around with it—check in on Foursquare, buy some shoes using the Zappos app, do a voice search using Google Voice Search—just get comfortable with all your smartphone’s nooks and crannies.

The Google Voice Search App lets you speak your queries without pushing any buttons, and also lets you do local searches without specifying your location. Faster web search with fewer keystrokes.

When you’re ready to take a deeper dive into your smartphone, download theStarbucks mobile payment app and use it to pay for your next cup of coffee. That way, you can look even cooler than the guy who ordered the “double whipped mocha Frappuccino with a twist of whatever to go.”

You can pay for your Starbucks drink using the Starbucks Card Mobile app!

The more you use mobile media, the more you’ll see that it’s really not all that complex. It’s just the newest marketing channel in a long line of marketing channels introduced throughout the last several decades.

Tip: For smartphone overachievers: 1) Download LinkedIn to your smartphone, 2) enable your Bluetooth function and 3) open up the LinkedIn application. In the LinkedIn app, you’ll notice an icon with two people shaking hands called “In Person.”

Find someone in your office who has LinkedIn installed on their smartphone, then “bump” your phones together. Ding! You’ve just used Bluetooth to exchange your LinkedIn profile without having to type a word.

LinkedIn's app allows you to bump smartphones to exchange information.

#4: Run a mobile ad campaign.

A mobile ad campaign is great for all kinds of companies, but particularly good for companies that have brick-and-mortar locations. After all, if you own a restaurant, wouldn’t you want to have an ad pop up when someone searches for “restaurants near my house”?

Mobile ad campaigns can be bought on a cost-per-click basis, a cost-per-thousand basis or a cost-per-acquisition basis.

Sound confusing? Don’t worry—just visit any of the most popular mobile advertising platforms (like Millennial Media, iAd from Apple or AdMob from Google) and they’ll walk you through the distinctions and how to use the services.

AdMob provides innovative solutions for brand and performance advertisers, effective distribution for app developers and revenue opportunities for mobile site owners.

#5: Scan a QR Code.

QR Codes are those little barcode-like squares that are popping up all over the place. For an in-depth introduction to QR Codes, you can check out How QR Codes Can Grow Your Business.

QR Codes (or their closely related cousins EZ Codes, Microsoft Tags, SPARQCodes, etc.) can be scanned by smartphones. Once scanned, they drive you through to mobile web pages that offer discount coupons, bonus content, special offers or some other additional content.

How to download a QR Code reader to your smartphone:

• Turn on your smartphone and open your web browser.
• Visit BeeTagg.com or Sparq.it and click the link that says “Download QR Code Reader”.
• Launch the app and hold your phone’s camera up to a QR Code. The app will automatically scan the code.

Looking for a QR Code to scan? Glad you asked. Just scan the QR Code below and it’ll drive you through to a post called “100 Top Mobile Media Applications.” It outlines all of the most important mobile media applications you’ll want to be familiar with.

Bottom Line

By now, you’re probably realizing that mobile media really isn’t that complex. It’s just like social media or email marketing or organic search, the only difference is that the delivery mechanism is a smartphone or a tablet computer instead of a PC.

These are just five of the ways you can kickstart your use of mobile marketing. I’m sure there are dozens more.

Article as it appeared on social media examiner

ABOUT THE AUTHOR, Jamie Turner

Jamie Turner is the co-author of How to Make Money with Social Media and blogs regularly about mobile marketing on the 60 Second Marketer. He’s also a well-known marketing speaker. Other posts by Jamie Turner »