Plurkshop #4: Fractured Conversations and How to Manage Them

The internet – and social media in particular – has opened up vast arenas for conversation and feedback that can easily take on lives of their own. For small businesses, this kind of organic conversation can be especially valuable.

For instance, a post on your blog or website might prompt someone else to blog about you and then others to comment or share that via FriendFeed or StumbleUpon or Twitter and make commentary of their own. How to keep track? Tonight, our Plurkshop on the social community Plurk discussed the challenges and benefits of that reality, and uncovered a few tools to help listen to what’s being said about you, your company, and your brand on the web.

Challenges we cited:

• Conversations about you – your brand, your blog, your company – are happening everywhere, including in places you haven’t looked.
• Fragmented conversations across the web and so many tools for sharing information can make it difficult to keep track of what people are saying about you and your brand.
• Dispersed commentary makes us worry that we’re missing important feedback and opportunities to engage in conversation with people who are talking about us.
• The more a conversation fragments, the more it can lose context and relevance to the original topic. Comments without context can be less valuable to those who read them.
• As a business owner/brand manager/blogger, you need to go where the conversation is and respond to it there, which can be taxing if you have several brands and/or a lot of content that sparks discussion.
• Participating in discussions online can be intimidating for some people. How can you make it easy and welcoming for them to do so?

Some of the main takeaways from tonight:

• The spirit of community conversation is more important than trying to control it. And controlling it is futile, anyway, so it’s best to embrace it. Listen and engage as best you can.
• Fractured and organic discussion encourages new points of view. Different perspectives add value to the conversation. Actively encourage others to take the conversation to their own communities and build upon it or take it in a new direction.
• The community should be able to use whatever tools are helpful to them to engage the conversation and comment. Readers want and will embrace content portability so they can take the discussion wherever they want. It’s our job as those creating the content to do our best to follow it.
• Commenting and engaging others on their “turf” feels more natural, and demonstrates listening flexibility. It also gives businesses and brands opportunities to engage people they might not have otherwise found.
• Traveling conversation can expose new audiences to your content/brand/blog.
• Search Engine Optimization: Fractured conversations are good for search engine optimization so long as they link back the original source. Links that other people create to your content are gold, especially to bloggers and brands.
• The evolution of this kind of conversation is demonstrating the very essence – and power – of social media.
• Not all internet users find their information in the same manner, so the more avenues and options for them to participate, the better.

Some recommended tools to check out for listening/monitoring:

Google Alerts – Get email updates about search results for the terms you choose, including blogs
Technorati – Comprehensive blog search
Co.mments - track conversations related to sites you specify
Friendfeed comments plugin for WordPress users
Serph – A search engine tracking what’s being said online about your specific search terms
Addictomatic – a search engine that populates results from other sites and search engines.
Disqus - a comment system for your blog that claims to make comments more interactive and easier to manage
Radian6 – a more robust social media monitoring solution that requires some $$ investment
SiteMeter – free site counter and statistics tracker
ClickTracks – web analytics tools starting at about $50/month
Google Analytics – free web analytics tools
PageFlakes – you can create a customized page to aggregate your monitoring tools and sites
Statcounter – free hit counter and web stats tools
LiJit – a search widget for your blog that provides stats on your visitors and what they’re looking for
NetNewsWire – a Mac OS RSS feed reader
NetVibes – a personal page aggregator, like PageFlakes

Here’s the link to the full Plurkshop conversation. Take this back to your community and discuss how you’re listening to conversations, and what challenges and triumphs you’re having. What’s your take on the nomadic nature of conversation in today’s hyperconnected world?

Promotions That Make People Smile

I went to Summerfest in Milwaukee yesterday – a great summer music festival here in the Midwest. Checked into my hotel, and hit the corner to catch the $3 shuttle to the park, concert tickets in hand. Then the fun began!

First, I get on the bus and I’m greeted by a bubbly woman that says “Hi! I’m Jane from Jane and Kidd In The Morning on 99.1 FM, and we’re buying your bus ride to Summerfest!” Nice surprise!

Then Kidd hands me a package of Twizzlers (seriously, has candy ever NOT made you smile?), and proceeds to ask where we’re from, chit chat a bit. He was super friendly and engaged the whole bus full of people during the 10-15 minute ride through downtown.

Then, as we’re getting closer to the park, Kidd speaks up and says “Hey folks, now’s the time during the ride where we say hi, and hope you’ll tune in to our broadcast on weekday mornings on 99.1. If you’re not from the area, we’ve got streaming audio online! And as a special thanks for hanging out with us today, we’re buying your admission to Summerfest!” Then he hands out free festival tickets ($15 a piece at the door) to everyone on the full bus.

So, I don’t live in Milwaukee anymore, but the promotion certainly got my attention. Why? The folks doing it were fun and personable, they made it perfectly relevant to me (by being on the bus on my way to Summerfest and starting my day at the fest out on a happy note), and gave me something to talk about like I’m doing now.

The moral of this story is that you can successfully launch a great promotion for your company by making it fun and engaging for the people you’re talking to, and giving something away that they’re sure to talk about. Kudos to the 99.1 team for making their promo fun and memorable.

What promotions have turned you on instead of off? Which do you remember fondly and why? Do you remember the brands/companies they were associated with, or was it just gimmicky? Share with us in the comments!

Small Business Marketing Unleashed: Columbus, OH

Today, I wanted to give all of you a heads up about a fantabulous event I’ll be attending in Columbus, Ohio this September (the 22nd and 23rd to be exact) that’s focused on small business owners and how they can make the most of their online marketing efforts.

It can be overwhelming to digest all the STUFF that’s out there about online marketing, so Jennifer Laycock and the folks at Search Engine Guide have put together this tight knit forum with speakers breaking down the elements of search engine marketing, viral marketing, blogging and local search.

So what can you expect? The conference is limited to 100 attendees, and the workshops are limited to 25 people each to maximize opportunities to ask questions, interact, and learn. And it’s not about just piling on the theory; these workshops are designed to give you real, usable ideas that you can take back to your company and put in play right away.

Some of the super duper speakers on the agenda:

Jennifer Laycock, Editor-In-Chief of Search Engine Guide
Matt Bailey, Founder and President of Site Logic Marketing
Matt McGee, Owner of SmallBusinessSEM.com
Debra Mastaler, Owner of AllianceLink
Stoney deGeyter, President of Pole Position Marketing
Heather Lloyd Martin, President and CEO of SuccessWorks Search Marketing Solutions
Mack Collier, Owner of The Viral Garden
Christine Churchill, President of KeyRelevance
Sage Lewis, Founder of SageRock
Christina “CK” Kerley, Founder of ckEpiphany Marketing
Michael Stebbins, President of Market Motive

With such an intimate group, the networking opportunities are second to none. I know I’m looking forward to putting faces to so many of the names I’ve known from Twitter and Plurk and the slew of blogs I read. Why not come join us so we can meet in person, too?

The $750 admission is a steal for a great conference (register by 8/29 for the early birdy deal). Head to the SBMU website and complete your registration today so you don’t miss out on the fun. Hope to see you there!!

Disclosure: Nope, I don’t work for SBMU or SEG, I’m not a sponsor, I’m not a speaker. I just happen to think that Jennifer and her work is pretty darn brilliant and think you will, too.

Make Your Presentation Suck in 5 Easy Steps

Conferences abound this time of year. Here, a few ways to ensure that your audience will fall asleep and that you’ll somehow miss the invitation list next year.

Read the slides.
Actually, less text is better. Use images, prominent text when needed, and don’t read the slides. Your speaking should supplement the presentation, not repeat it.

Adhere mercilessly to a script.
Sure, you need an agenda and a great topic. But encourage discussion and questions from the audience. They’ll find more value in your presentation if you allow them to help steer the topic and extract information that they’re looking for, but that you might not have planned to include. And allowing time for Q&A is a must – it opens the floor for others to contribute to the conversation.

Focus too much on tech.
Nowadays, everyone is live streaming their presentations with comments from Twitter and questions from Facebook and video and recording podcasts and and… take it easy. Focusing too much on engaging the tech stuff in your presentation can take the focus away from your content, and can distract (and annoy) your audience. If you’re moderating a panel, encourage your panelists to keep their tech use to a minimum. If you want to monitor a live forum for questions, get some help from someone who isn’t speaking or participating so it doesn’t distract from the discussion.

Think that the folks came there for you, not the content.
True, I’ve done my share of going to conferences and attending sessions that had a notable speaker. But it’s a chicken-egg thing. A well-known name isn’t enough to carry a lousy presentation. But a great name can be built – and most of them are – by engaging your audience and giving a killer presentation that’s chock full of great content. Give your audience what they came there to get: great ideas that they can take back to work and put into play, right now.

Forget the follow-through.
The very best presentations are those that are the start to a dialogue and a relationship. If you’re speaking, don’t let your presentation end with the PowerPoint (or Keynote, for my fellow Mac users). Give your audience something great to take home with them, and if you can, get a list of those that attended and thank them for coming with a personal email. Point them to your blog or other places where they can find more information from you, and open the door for more conversation.

All cheeky sarcasm aside, presenting well is a skill that takes time and practice to master. The key is to remember that the people attending your workshop are anxious to find the golden nuggets that they can run back to work with and apply to what they’re doing, right now. Focus on the value you’re bringing to the discussion, and you’ll be a step ahead.

What presentations have left you super excited, or super disappointed, and why? Share in the comments!

Plurkshop #2: Blending Traditional And Social Media

Last night’s plurkshop opened with a great question from Beth Harte, who asked “Would you use traditional marketing to promote your social media efforts and vice versa?”

A great discussion ensued (hooray for threaded conversations), and it seems participants agreed that social media and traditional marketing should work together, and using some traditional avenues to drive traffic to social media sites can still be an effective awareness builder.
The main takeaways from last night:

• Social media should be integrated into an overall marketing plan whenever possible.

• Traditional marketing tactics like e-mail (yes, we all laughed about e-mail being “old school”), direct mail, and print advertising can still have a place in the social mediascape when used to really engage an audience and drive them to great content and information online.

• Traditional media is in fact still going to be necessary and very relevant for audiences that haven’t yet embraced online and social media outlets – older audiences, rural and non-broadband users, or simply late adopters. We all agreed that although all of us are very active in this space, we’re still in the minority.

• The trend is toward more spending on new media, while spending on traditional media continues to decrease. A recent report by Forrester expects that interactive advertising spending will move from an 8% share in 2007 to an 18% share in 2008. Overall, they’re predicting that total interactive marketing spending will surpass $61 billion in five years. Whoa.

And some great examples of Plurkshop attendees and their experiences with the blending of traditional and social media:

• Beth’s company is in a niche market, so she’s planning to leverage some traditional outreach like direct mail or e-mail marketing to drive adopters to a new social platform she’s considering. And, she’s working social media planning into her overall planning efforts as a single marketer in the company (you go, Beth!).

• Michael Jones’ newspaper publisher did multi-page spreads in all four of their papers to promote their new website. The result: The day the site launched, they got more visitors than the publisher did papers. And even the 60-year old owner is doing podcasts. Talk about embracing a new medium!

• McDonald’s is running a TV ad campaign right now that by pointing viewers to a MySpace page that’s part of the campaign, encouraging them to submit a new Big Mac jingle. (Thanks to Mack Collier for the heads up.) They’ve also got podcasts on their main website about “The McDonald’s You Don’t Know”, and investor relations issues. They still have that sorta-corporate ring to them, but a solid effort nonetheless.

• Frank Martin’s local newspaper in Roanoke, VA (The Roanoke Times), and several news outlets in Connie Reece’s hometown of Austin, TX are using accounts on Twitter to send links to local news stories and editorial. All of us rather agreed that newspapers are still a little awkward with their participation, but we all heartily endorsed their effort to embrace this tidal wave of social media.

• Andre Natta’s hyperlocal paper, The Terminal, in Birmingham, AL was the first in its market to use Twitter, and the result was markedly more readers for the paper. They use MySpace to update readers and point them to particular stories and news items. And, they’re about to use Facebook and MySpace to promote an event and drive viewers to their blog for more information. They’re still using email marketing too, with great success.

• Deb Robison used Facebook and MySpace to promote a fashion show called Frock Out! Denver for the Denver Library. Some models and designers from the show were on the sites, too, and helped to spread the word. The success was in getting kids to invite their friends and pass the word – and interestingly, the audience spanned the generations. At the event, they actually had to turn people away! Here’s the link to the video they posted on YouTube to promote the event. The best part? Out of pocket costs were zero (just Deb’s invaluable time), and the exposure got them some great press (Denver Post stories were even picked up by news outlets) and large corporate sponsors for this year’s event. What a success story!

The resounding conclusion for our Plurkshop was that traditional media and new media need to work together in this environment to really have success, and social media can be a powerful asset, indeed. As the landscape continues to change, we all need to remember that the point of social media is in connecting people to other people and giving them ways to reach out into the community. It’s not the technology, it’s a very human desire to connect that will continue to drive folks online.

As Connie is fond of saying, “Technologies change, people don’t”.

Want to join us for a Plurkshop? Get your Plurk persona rolling and look for the thread counter that keeps ticking up! Stay tuned for updates from upcomig Plurkshops.