Successful Blog

Create Unique Content and Own Your Business Niche

by

By Paul Biedermann, re:DESIGN

Sharing other people’s content on social media is nice, but the best content sharers are content creators. Makers. Producers. Originators.

create your own content

It’s one thing to cover that ’80s band on stage with a bad wig at the local fair — it’s a completely different thing to perform a song you’ve written and then share it with the rest of the world for the first time. If it’s good, people will snap to attention. If it’s not so good, well… people may head to the side area for a corn dog, but if it’s really, really good? You could soon find yourself on a much larger stage with a vastly larger audience.

Whether it’s a great song, a witty visual, an interesting article, a compelling video, or an innovative dance routine — making something new that only you could have made captures the imagination and sets you apart from the rest. Heck — being original is what moves the ball forward on the field of human civilization.

As social media continues to evolve — and as all media continues to evolve — the noise quotient goes up.

Everybody is a publisher these days with the potential to reach a vast, global audience within a matter of seconds. What you do with that incredible opportunity is up to you. It’s quicker and far easier to just share what other people have created. Most people do that and that’s fine. But if you want to separate yourself from the crowd, the best way to step it up is to use your own special talents and create original content for your niche that others will want to share.

If that sounds challenging, it is. A bit risky? Maybe. But it is also incredibly gratifying — not only to carve out your own unique space in this always-on, 24/7 online world of ours, but also to have produced something original — perhaps evolving into a broad body of work that could only have come from you. Hone those latent talents! Take a creative writing class, practice your on-camera skills or learn to draw!

The important thing is to be original!

That’s always preferable to going down a path of relative sameness. When you write a blog post, fuel it with passion and take an angle that’s different from what others are doing, even if the topic is a popular one. When you create an infographic, draw a diagram in the sand and photograph it to create your image — anything to be different! Some of the content that has the biggest potential for going viral isn’t necessarily the most polished, but it has a good idea and oozes originality. People love that!

Now that many of us have been on social media for a while, I sense that people are starting to rethink things a bit.

  • Where is the best place to put your time?
  • How can you most effectively manage the online presence you’ve worked so hard to establish?
  • Things change — how do you keep it all going, especially as more people are vying for attention online with no end in sight?

Define your business objectives.

Of course, it all starts with what you are trying to do and defining your business objectives — then developing a strategy that will best reach the people you need to reach, solidifying your brand.

This includes fortifying your efforts with content that will get noticed, get shared, and drive the results you’re looking for. But if you’re interested in real business results, and not just high follower counts of dubious relevance, producing original, unique content and developing relationships is the way to get there. And if you don’t possess the skills to create a specific type of content, that’s fine too. The most successful businesses source the talent they don’t possess themselves to bring their content to life and power their brands — anything less presents a less-than-professional vibe to the world that should not be taken lightly, for it is a reflection on you and your business. Mediocrity is rampant, and sometimes we need to put the ego aside and make an honest assessment of where our time and skills are best spent.

Keeping an eye on the bigger picture and how to achieve real benefits for your business over the long-term should always be central. Yet, to my continued surprise, there is far less talk about content creation and an over-abundance of talk about the tactics themselves — advice on how to use social media, the hottest online tools, SEO, etc. is everywhere — necessary and important, but mostly irrelevant when it comes to producing the kind of meaningful content that will truly make you stand out and get noticed.

There is an avalanche of content flooding the social streams — day in and day out — much of it looking the same, rehashed over and over again. It has only just begun. The time to focus on creating your own original, unique, valuable content is now. It’s also a lot more fun.

What are you doing to create your own amazing content?

Author’s Bio: Paul Biedermann is the Creative Director/Owner of re:DESIGN, a small design agency specializing in Strategic Design, Brand Identity, and Visual Content Marketing — intersecting smart design with business strategies that reach, engage, and inspire people to action. Blending traditional and leading-edge media tactics. Paul consistently delivers integrated, award-winning results for his clients. Connect with him on Google+ or Twitter.

 

Photo credit: Pixabay / Photo illustration by Paul Biedermann, re:DESIGN

Small actions, taken consistently, can move mountains

by

When Rosa Parks decided she wasn’t going to give up her bus seat, she may not have had in mind kicking off a movement that would change life in America.

Herman Melville, writing the sentence “Call me Ishmael,” probably didn’t sit down to write “the novel of the century.”

Mother Teresa simply decided to care for one person at a time. She had no thought of becoming beatified by the Catholic Church.

We all have to find our own first small action.

One organization that is truly living this credo is Milaap. It’s a crowdlending platform that has raised more than $1.5 million, with a 98.48% repayment rate. They are celebrating their fourth anniversary with a 24-hour online conversation about sustainable giving.

Members of the site choose a project/borrower to support, and how much they wish to lend, and Milaap gives 100% of your loan funds to the borrower.

You then receive updates on the project via email, and get repaid. The funds can be reinvested in another micro-loan if you wish.

The concept is so simple. With each small loan, lives are changed. With each changed life comes promise and possibility for everyone touched by that life.

Reading through the available campaigns to support, you see families who can use a $100 loan to buy chickens to expand their chicken coops, to help abused women start their own businesses, or bring potable water to underserved areas. Each of these project groups are taking a single small action to improve their lives. The ripple effects over time will be enormous.

Maybe today you’re reading this post with a mountain sitting in front of you.

Is it a physical disability?
A financial hardship?
Do you have an enormous challenge at work?
A burning idea for a new business?

Whatever the mountain is, you can find a first step. Even if you’re moving it with teaspoons, you can make progress right now in this moment.

Maybe you can be inspired by Milaap and gather supporters to help you carry teaspoons.

Molly’s lovely post from this past Monday reminded us that we can’t do it alone. That’s even more true when the mountain looms large.

If you’d like to learn more about Milaap and the work they’re doing, visit their site at Milaap.org.

If you’d like to get help and support from your fellow teaspoon carriers, let us know in the comments. Let’s take the first action together.

Milaap infographic
Author’s Bio: Rosemary O’Neill is an insightful spirit who works for social strata — a top ten company to work for on the Internet . Check out the Social Strata blog. You can find Rosemary on Google+ and on Twitter as @rhogroupee

Having Inconsistent Contact with Customers?

by

acontact

You have a fantastic website that gives customers all of the information they need about your product or service. You may even have a blog to go with your website to provide further information or to answer questions.

However, many businesses often overlook the importance of one page: the Contact Us form.

Even if they include it on the site, they fail to maximize its potential.

Call to Action

Businesses often lack the knowledge on how to use call to actions to convert more customers by making the contact form a bigger part of the website.

It’s commonly added to the menu along with the other pages on the site. However, a link to the form should be included with all of your calls to action.

At the point where you invite customers to contact you, there should be a link that makes it easy for them to do just that. If they have to navigate from somewhere else, they may get distracted and forget to complete the action.

What Makes a Good Contact Page

After viewing your website, the Contact form is the next “first impression” that you make.

If someone is taking the time to contact you for any reason, you want to make it a positive experience for them. It should be easy to access and have personality, but it should not be cluttered. You don’t want your visitors to get bogged down with what is on the page and forget to actually make contact with you.

The problem with many standard Contact pages is that they are designed solely for functionality without thought about the people that will be using them.

As Howard Yeh, founder, investor and president of ContactUs.com says about the process of designing a contact form, “We approach the problems that websites face not just as web developers, but as online marketers, experienced lead-generators and sales account managers. And with that mindset, we’ve built both features and data solutions to make those jobs easier.”

You want to look at your Contact page as a marketer.

Does it provide a warm welcome and then a call to action that visitors will understand?

It should also be short and efficient.

Collect the necessary information to provide an accurate and thorough reply but don’t waste your visitors’ time filling out unnecessary fields.

Multiple Avenues to Reach You

While some customers will feel more comfortable with the idea of sending out a message or email, others still prefer a phone call.

A contact link should be visible on all pages right in the area where it does the most good.

On some pages, this may be as a sidebar while on others; you might want it right below a product or list of services you provide.

An effective Contact Us form is one that converts your visitors into customers. It is included as a way to help you establish new relationships and continue to grow current ones.

Make sure your contact page is working for you.

Photo credit: Image courtesy of Stuart Miles / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

About the Author: Joyce Morse is an author who writes on a variety of topics, including content marketing and small business.

The Secret of My Success

by

Moving into a new home is a major undertaking.

Once the boxes are cleared and the new neighbors start bringing over key lime pie, you invariably have to start calling contractors of various stripes.

moving is hard

Lawn guy, handyman to fix the screen door handle, pest control, air conditioning repair, you get the picture. Making all of these calls over a compressed period of time gave me a true education in “who gets the business.”

You know who gets the business?

The person who answers the phone. If everyone fails that test, then it’s the one who returns the call the fastest.

Woody Allen has been often quoted as saying “showing up is 80 percent of life.”

When asked later about the quote by William Safire in the New York Times, he elaborated:

“My observation was that once a person actually completed a play or a novel, he was well on his way to getting it produced or published, as opposed to a vast majority of people who tell me their ambition is to write, but who strike out on the very first level and indeed never write the play or book. In the midst of the conversation, as I’m now trying to recall, I did say that 80 percent of success is showing up.”

Do you have an ambition to start a business, or are you actually doing it? Doing it means answering the phone when it rings.

Businesses hanging out a shingle, getting that Google places listing, polishing up their SEO to get a good search engine rank, and hoping for good word of mouth are truly only 10 percent of the way to the sale.

If all of those things happen and you don’t answer the phone, you’re dead in the water.

Yes, this same imperative applies to online businesses, consultants, writers, and everyone else.

Three Keys to Answering the Phone

  1. Manage your time effectively. Make answering the phone a priority. Yes, it’s probably more important than posting on your Facebook page.
  2. Create a system so that nothing slips through the cracks. Whether you’re using a notepad or a sophisticated contact management system like Salesforce or Nimble, put a mechanism in place that will remind you to follow up.
  3. Practice active listening when you do answer. Don’t launch into a pitch; wait and let the person on the other side tell you what they are contacting you for.

If you show up and answer the phone, you’ll come out ahead every time. (But let’s keep it our little secret, ok?)

Author’s Bio: Rosemary O’Neill is an insightful spirit who works for social strata — a top ten company to work for on the Internet . Check out the Social Strata blog. You can find Rosemary on Google+ and on Twitter as @rhogroupee

Is Your Home Office What You Want It to Be?

by

aofficeMore and more people are working from home.

Maybe it’s telecommuting for an international multi-billion dollar company, or it could be running your own small business from home where you are your only employee. Maybe sometimes you’re in a company’s office, other days you’re at home.

Whatever the case may be, it’s becoming more the norm for people to be working at home.

According to a Forbes piece, at least 30 million Americans work from home at least one day a week. This number is growing and is expected to continue to do so over the next few years.

One of the main reasons people do opt to work from home, and why companies are supportive, is because work productivity is shown to increase for those who work from home.

Not only do home officers save time (which means money) by skipping the commute, they also can be more productive at home by working in more personalized comfort.

When it comes to that personalized comfort, which is conducive to productivity, how do you get the optimal home office for an affordable price?

Take a look at some of these tips to find what works for you and enhances your own space:

• A designated space – It’s important to have a designated work space aside from your home life. Keep the doctor bills and PTA forms somewhere else. Make sure this space stays all business and your productivity will increase. It’s not cost prohibitive to do this, you just might need to do some organizing.

• A comfortable space – If you are at your desk for any extended time, you need to be comfortable. Major retailers, including Walmart, offer great specials on affordable and comfortable office desks to make working from home a positive, comfortable and productive experience. Along with the desk, you need a comfortable chair to keep your posture and back healthy.

• A well-lit space – You will be happier working in a space with good lighting. If you can’t have natural lighting, find some lamps that offer good light. Even the paint color on the wall adds to the lighting feel; choose a color that works well for you, makes you happy and that you find positive energy from. Paint is an affordable way to make a big change in a space.

• A clutter free space – Even if you’ve banished all your home clutter from your work space, make sure you continue to keep it clutter free. Toss or file old documents, organize material on a regular basis and keep what you can electronically, toss the hard copies.

If you can set up your work space when you first start your home office experience, your productivity will shine. It’s beneficial to do it the right way from the start so you don’t need use valuable time to make changes.

But if you do need to change something, do it – it will be worth it for your comfort and productivity.

Photo credit: decoist.com

About the Author: Heather Legg writes about small business, staying within a budget and making the most of what you have.

 

Don’t Let Ties That Bind Lead to Content That Strangles Online Growth

by

By Lisa D. Jenkins

Last week, I was supporting a radio broadcast team covering a long-standing, week-long live event with tweets. This is the fourth year I’ve been part of the KOZE Sports team and this year I keyed in on something new. Not with the event but with the team of two announcers responsible for bringing the event to thousands of people across the nation.

NAIA media pass

Over the several years Brian Danner and Mike Tatko have been announcing NAIA World Series Baseball, they’ve developed a history. They’ve created and maintained off-air relationships with each other, coaches and players, families of coaches and players, fans, officials and a host of other people. A natural part of those relationships is personal experiences that spawned stories most of the listening audience knows nothing about, but those stories come up in on-air color commentary. Because that’s what sports color commentary is … stories to fill dead air between plays.

What I keyed in on, was they way these two men were able to share their histories. Instead of cracking a private joke on-air about something that happened in the past, they took the time to fill in the back story. Every memory reference was colored in. Every person listening was provided with an explanation that invited them into the conversation.

In the same way that Danner and Tatko have developed a history, brands that were conceived and launched online or brands that have been curating content over an extended period of time have a very real history.

One thing that makes a brand and its content attractive to people is a consistent voice that shares that history and the new events that continue to contribute to it. This takes on increased importance when you have a team of people managing that voice.

With any good team you want to encourage ties and relationships that give your team members a sense of connection. A cohesiveness that allows them to pull together to pursue common marketing goals. The danger comes when the intimate aspects of those ties and relationships begin to bleed over into the conversations that take place on your social media profiles.

I’m not writing about behind-the-scenes snapshots of Team Member Josephine caught sleeping at her desk during a quick power nap. Or teasers of an almost-ready-to-launch product. I’m writing about insider banter made up of private jokes and subtle references to previous events new followers might not be familiar with. Instead of being invited to participate in and contribute to conversations that occur on your Facebook Page, Twitter stream, Tumblr profile, or LinkedIn presence, your followers become observers, voyeurs if you will, over an exclusionary conversation.

An oblique reference once in a while shouldn’t damage your brand but if your team becomes comfortable with presenting too many tweets, updates or posts that have overly private resonances and not enough public appeal, people will stop retweeting, sharing or giving +1’s because they don’t have the contextual references they need to understand the content your team is publishing. It will kill your online momentum.

The best time to manage this situation is before it occurs by addressing expectations for your team’s online behaviors in a set of social media guidelines.

If you find yourself having to navigate the situation as it’s occurring online, you need to find a way to help your team bring the content back around to a place where your followers feel included and invited to take part in a conversation.

Author’s Bio: Lisa D. Jenkins is a Public Relations professional specializing in Social and Digital Communications for businesses. She has over a decade of experience and work most often with destination organizations or businesses in the travel and tourism industry in the Pacific Northwest. Connect with her on Google+