Successful Blog

Laura Petrolino Loves #SOBCon

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Laura Petrolino“SOBCon was much more than I could ever have begun to imagine expecting, it was truly transformational!  The joy of being able to collaborate and brainstorm with talented and passionate peers, the ability to take a step back, pull my self out of my day to day race (phone calls, meetings, clients to please, presentations to put together, investors to woo) and really think about myself, my business, my purpose, the mark I serve to make in the world, was immeasurably valuable.

I’m already looking forward to the next one. I had no idea how much I craved that ability to share and grow with my peers, until I experienced it.”

Laura Petrolino, Ignite Venture Partners

How Social Media Is Like Sex Education

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At First Blush …

The thought struck me as I was leaving an offsite meeting I spoke at not long ago. The presentation was about using social media to share your story. The group was all from the same company, but to a person their experience with social media was varied. Some were avid fans who logged onto Twitter daily. Some were curious and experimenting. Some were living in fear of the stories that if they tried anything horrible, unforgivable things would happen.

As I headed home after a fabulous conversation that got the group thinking, I found myself realizing that sharing information about how social media works is a lot like sex education.

5 Ways Social Media Is Like Sex Education

At first blush, it might seem a reach to you to connect these two topics. But as I look back on my experience in that corporate meeting and other meetings like that and compare them to my experiences as both a student and a teacher of sex education certain compelling similarities stand out. I’d like to share them.

  1. Beginners, experimenters, and the experienced In every group and every meeting, we have those who know nothing, who know some, and who have experience. To make it interesting for all of them, storytelling is still the best way to relate new information or give context to those who might need a refresher.
  2. Definitions and history The simple definitions are necessary, but deep explanations and history of best practices are only fascinating to folks who already know the basics.
  3. Pictures, diagrams, and conversation Powerpoints and pictures might underscore what the presenter is saying, but they’re not the same as hands on experience. No matter the room or the age group, the role of the presenter needs to be like a blog post — a short burst of information followed by comments, and questions. If the meeting becomes a guided conversation the participants ask their questions and follow their curiosity. The whole group learns more from each other than they could ever take from a presentation.
  4. Safety and reputation Frank talk about keeping ourselves safe from “malware” and viruses is crucially important. And in our enthusiasm for these new “fun” interactions, we all need to touch base with our values to decide how we will be appropriately social without being promiscuous or shameless in our relationships.
  5. Revisiting the information If you are, like I am, a student of social media, you know that scaffolding — returning and revisiting the information as we gather experience — is important. After we try a few things, it’s good to explore what we know, what want to learn, and what we didn’t understand the first time we tried what we’re doing.

And the test for success of great social media presentation can be likened to a test for a great talk on sex education …

If you

move the audience from fascination with the tools and the transaction,

steer them clear of harassing behavior and selfishness

show them the marvelous and meaningful relationships

that are enhanced through sincere concern for others,

then your social media class will be better because they knew you.

(and so will your class on sex education.)

Be irresistible.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!

Beach Notes: Waiting for the Mullet

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by Guest Writers Suzie Cheel and Des Walsh

On a recent afternoon walk we saw the local fishers’ trucks and boats lined up and we stopped to talk. They were waiting for the mullet to come their way from the nearby estuary.

We’ve seen this team explode into action once the fish arrive, working the boats and nets and trucks with a huge expenditure of energy and fast, military-like precision. But right then they just had to sit and wait till the fish arrived. How would they know? Simple, the color of the sea would change. Simple for them.

Knowledge, experience, skill, the right tools ready, the team assembled, ready for action.

All good.

But sometimes you just have to wait.

Suzie Cheel & Des Walsh

Thanks to Week 297 SOBs

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muddy teal strip A

Successful and Outstanding Bloggers

Let me introduce the bloggers
who have earned this official badge of achievement,

and the right to call themselves
Successful Blog SOBs.

I invite them to take a badge home to display on their blogs.

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They take the conversation to their readers,
contribute great ideas, challenge us, make us better, and make our businesses stronger.

I thank all of our SOBs for thinking what we say is worth passing on.
Good conversation shared can only improve the blogging community.

Should anyone question this SOB button’s validity, send him or her to me. Thie award carries a “Liz said so” guarantee, is endorsed by Kings of the Hemispheres, Martin and Michael, and is backed by my brothers, Angelo and Pasquale.

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Want to become an SOB?

If you’re an SO-Wanna-B, you can see the whole list of SOBs and learn how to be one by visiting the SOB Hall of Fame– A-Z Directory . Click the link or visit the What IS an SOB?! page in the sidebar.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Guess What? Customers Really DO Respond to Online Ads

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A Guest Post by
Diana Pohly

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If you’ve been getting new customers by running online ads, here’s some good news for you. New research from Google (http://www.youtube.com/v/Xpay_ckRpIU?hl=en&fs=1) has shown that the online ads you place on websites really do work. In fact, they work better than most people imagined. You can see it in this YouTube video.

For its test, Google saturated specific test market areas with online ads for specific company products, then measured consumers buying in those regions against buying elsewhere. And the ads worked. Here are some highlights:

  • Online ads attract customers and sell more. In the Google study, a national retailer ran online ads in 59 target markets for products in one product category and saw a 2 percent increase in sales in that category, compared to sales in other markets where no ads were run.
  • Online ads create a “halo effect.” Companies that ran online ads achieved an across-the-board increase in spending for a range of products, not only for the products that they advertised online.
  • Online coupons deliver results too. Coupons improved sales 2.5% for the products they promoted and thanks to that “halo effect,” resulted in a 1.6% increase for all product sales.
  • Online advertising offers a significant return on investment. Companies that participated in the test earned as much as a $10.00 return for every dollar they spent advertising online.
  • Offer something that is attractive, desirable, and free in exchange for contact information. For example, let visitors enter their email addresses to get a discount coupon for one of your products, a free sample, a chance to win an iPad, a free yoga lesson in your studio, or a complimentary technology training session from one of your consultants. Be generous! Remember, you may never have a chance to win that customer again.

So let’s say that you are running those online ads and people are visiting your website to either buy or investigate.
How will you make the most of the fact that they are there?

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Diana Pohly is with StepbyStepMarketing and she’s happy to offer you high-performing strategy recommended in this free downloadable report

Thanks, Diana!

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!

How to not get burned out

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by Patty Azzarello

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Business is Hard

Sometimes business opportunities, challenges, activities, and responsiblities become overwhelming. You get tired.

And as your business grows, things don’t tend to get easier or less busy!

Pick your pace

It’s important to find a pace that you can maintain, so you can keep making forward progress and not get burned out.

I am a cyclist.Â

There are some tough hills that can challenge a rider to the point of total system failure — you can’t breath, your heart races, your legs are on fire.  The only problem is that that happens after 10 minutes, and it may take 30-60 minutes to ride up the thing!

“I can do this all day”

So I force myself to pick a pace, one where even though it is still really hard, I can say to myself “I can do this all day”.Â

When I get my thinking, my legs, and my heart rate and lungs calibrated to “all day”, when I finally reach the top I have accomplished the task, and I am still not at the absolute end of my energy.Â

If you know the how long the hill is, you can push yourself to get to the top faster. But you don’t always know how long the hill is.

So you need a strategy to make sure you don’t burn out on the way.

What is your pace that you “can do all day”

If there is no end in sight to the craziness or turmoil, how much physical and mental energy can you invest over an indefinite amount of time so that you can make it to the top no matter how long the hill is? and still have energy to go forward after you get there?

Get ahead of the competition

When the market gets easier and there are more opportunities, you want to have the energy and the resources to use another cycling term “jump”— to go really fast, right away — while the competition has burned out, given up, or failed along the way.Â

Don’t let you head give up before your legs

Part of the “I could do this all day pace” it to make sure you don’t talk yourself into stopping before you really need to.

I compare this to miserable tough jobs I have had. It is always interesting to note how much of the misery I put on myself, compared to that which was strictly imposed or required by the job.Â

You can actually make a pretty big change in how you feel about your job, by deciding how YOU will manage your energy, and not letting your head give in.

Some ways to get up the hill:

It is your job to keep making forward progress in uncertain and challenging times.  Otherwise you end up just working really hard, and not really moving the business forward, or getting anywhere personally.Â

  • List all the things you are worried about.  Are they all equally worthy of worry?  Budget your worry.  Don’t burn yourself out worrying about things that are not worth it.
  • Stop something. Identify at least one thing you will negotiate “away” and stop doing.
  • Pick a single area to ensure success. Choose one thing that you won’t fail at no matter what – and don’t let the uncertainty throw you off course.  Complete that, then do the next one.
  • Talk to your team. Let them tell you what they think is hard about the current state.  Don’t underestimate the value of letting them talk about this.  Acknowledge the difficulty openly, then focus everyone on something they feel they can control and do well.
  • Build your Personal Brand.  How you act in difficult times does a lot to show the world your brand.  Are you positive and in control, or are you changing your mind all the time, uncertain, all over the place? When you are stressed, are you treating people with respect or are you nasty?
  • Don’t give up on your aggressive brilliant plans.  I do some of my best problem solving on a long hill.  Keep learning, keep thinking, keep building so that you are ready to jump when the obstacles clear.
  • Think. No matter how over-scheduled you may be, schedule some time to think every day.

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Patty Azzarello is an executive, best-selling author, speaker and CEO-advisor. She works with executives where leadership and business challenges meet. Patty has held leadership roles in General Management, Marketing, Software Product Development and Sales, and has been successful in running large and small businesses. She writes at Patty Azzarello’s Business Leadership Blog. You’ll find her on Twitter as @PattyAzzarello. Also, check out her new book Rise…

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