Successful Blog

What Cool People Can You Tell Me About Today?

by

With social media and social networking everything changed.

66561_soccer_ball

Some say the playing field is leveled. I’m not so sure that’s the analogy. First of all it’s not a game. What’s happened is that everyone who has a voice has a chance to put their signal into the stream. Whether it’s a blog, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or the smallest, most targeted social site you’ve ever seen, every business needs to seek out where our customers are and start talking with — not to — them.

Why? If we’re not talking to them, something else is happening …

  • maybe someone else is telling their version of YOUR story.
  • maybe folks are saying things you could be learning from.
  • maybe no one is saying anything about you at all.

How can we improve that situation? Certainly asking people to say nice things about us might be one way, but it’s not the best way to start.

Social networking is best when we learn, listen, and engage — telling great stories other people and businesses (not about ourselves). Find good things that great people and businesses are doing. Find people who are making strides doing things that relate to what you do. Help those doers tell their valuable stories. People will notice.

The best form of networking is telling folks about the great people you know and what they are doing. Sharing the news of cool people is a great way to show our own values.

What cool people can you tell me about today?

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

Buy the ebook. Learn the art of online conversation.

I’m a proud affiliate of

How to Deliver Yourself to Your Dream Everyday … in Small Amounts

by

What Are You Doing

When I was young my dad used to say, “If you’re going to be a teacher, own the school.”

I’d explain that’s not how schools work — that schools provide a place to do what I want. I’d tell him about what I’d teach and how what kids would learn would change the world.

He said I had my dreams in the clouds.

1237681_moon-and-clouds

My dad proposed.

  • In our own ways we can make any place our own by filling them with ideas that turn into action.
  • It’s the action not the ideas that make the difference, the difference that wouldn’t happen without us alone.
  • People who do things build their future by delivering value that would be missed if they weren’t there..

Whether we work in the most obscure company, or work for ourselves at contract jobs. People notice value added contributions. People look for folks who offer them unique value.

Value added is an irresistible contribution and it brings surprising opportunities as a reward.

Don’t wait for your dream to deliver … deliver yourself to your dream everyday … in small amounts.
It’s easy to get where you’re dreaming by always showing up with your dream work. Every little value will bring you closer to that dream you’re after.

How do you add a little of yourself to what you deliver today?

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

Buy the ebook. Learn the art of online conversation.

I’m a proud affiliate of

Twitter, Are You Listening?

by

Listening Well Involves Knowing What Was Said

I ended an interview today with this idea.

As everyone now can add to the conversation. People overvalue the power of talking. They think putting words out makes it easier to be heard, seen and found.

Yet as the signal rises, I find folks passing on things that they couldn’t have had time to read, answering questions that they’ve misread. Other folks are taking a listening posture, but they they’re just looking for what to say or pass on next.

I’ve started to think of that as Twitter FAIL … pretending to listen to Twitter friends.

Some folks have unfriended everyone and started over. Maybe they found it easier to block out most of it.

421497_portrait_ellen_03

Lots of folks don’t worry at all as long as they feel heard.

Still I think the stronger power lies in listening … with both heart and head. When we listen we learn.

Are you listening? How can I tell?

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

Buy the ebook. Learn the art of online conversation.

I’m a proud affiliate of

SOB Business Cafe 12-04-09

by

SB Cafe

Welcome to the SOB Cafe

We offer the best in thinking — articles, books, podcasts, and videos about business online written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.

The Specials this Week are

Abundance Highway
Like many people whose parent came out of the Great Depression, I was bought up very abundantly, but with a sense of caution,

“we can’t afford that” ” Money doesn’t grow on trees”

and other such limiting beliefs

Catskill Cottage Seed
That being said, the most interesting social media plays I’ve been involved in had noting to do with pre-existing relationships. They were spontaneous and unpredictable.

chrisg
Are you afraid of what people will think of you?

I bet you have skills, knowledge, experience or time that you could share with others, that you could offer to people to help them, but something is holding you back.

The Fluent Self
Me: It’s like I don’t want to put it out in the world yet. I love it. It’s beautiful. And there is something there that is just… not ready.

CK’s Blog
… it’s imperative that those of us who have been working and participating in social media for years take a BIG step back and remember that this space is still brand new to most B2B companies… and change takes time (and comes with objections aplenty). That’s just the nature of change.

siliconANGLE
We spent a lot of time talking about the FTC blogger guidelines when they were proposed and approved over the last several months. The new rules, in case you missed the news, went into effect a few days ago, with more or less a whimper.

Related ala carte selections include A SPECIAL OFFER!

Get to be a Super Genius!!
I’ve been invited as a guest to be part of Word of Mouth Supergenius Seminar on December 16th!! 12 How-To Classes, 12 Case Studies, 6 Authors Word of Mouth Supergenius!

Here’s the important thing: IT’S NOT ABOUT SOCIAL MEDIA.

Social media is an incredible tool. But social media is not word of mouth marketing. It’s a tool we can use for the online portion of word of mouth. But it’s not even the main tool there. I would argue that more recommendations go by plain old-fashioned email than all the social networks combined. …

The point of word of mouth isn’t ecommerce; it isn’t to count clicks and CPAs.

The point of word of mouth is to be a brand worth talking about. To be a company that people are proud to tell their friends about. It’s to replace paid marketing with personal connections. To replace cash with love. To be fantastic.

And that’s what this conference is all about: A revival of TRUE WOM. A home for the simple idea that HAPPY CUSTOMERS ARE YOUR BEST ADVERTISERS.

True WOM is a movement.

It’s a movement that makes things better. It teaches companies to treat people better. It shows us that customer happiness is what it’s all about – for all these warm and fuzzy reasons… and because companies that are nice to people make more money.

You can attend too for a discount price of only $144 — that’s almost 1/2 price!! — if you use the code VIPSUCCESSFULBLOG. The discount goes all to you. I just get the pleasure of passing it on. Check it out here!

Sit back. Enjoy your read. Nachos and drinks will be right over. Stay as long as you like. No tips required. Comments appreciated.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

I’m a proud affiliate of

The Ties That Bond

by

A Guest Post by Linda M. Lopeke, The SMARTSTART Coach

relationships button

Not feeling the love in your social media relations?

Social media is a channel for building relationships from the comfort of home while cloaked in the anonymity of the internet. A place where your own actions and behaviours determine whether you thrive or dive. A place where your voice is a more likely to be unheard, lost in the gathering crowd, or (worse) deemed unremarkable. The same place where lasting friendships and stellar reputations can be made (or lost) in 140 characters at the touch of a send button.

If you truly seek to connect and fully experience the wonder of social community, you must first accept that the same standards required for successful face-to-face interactions apply to creating distant ties that bond. Satisfying relationships are born when you communicate effectively and establish mutual trust. Only then can bonds grow strong enough to meet our human need to connect. If you remain anonymous, or are incongruent in your actions, comments and tweets, the digital world will likely be a lonely, meaningless place for you.

In the virtual world, everyone is suspect until proven otherwise. And body language is expressed in punctuation, personality in photos and multi-media and both are responded to by sharing, digging and re-tweeting. The good news is it is entirely possible to feel close to someone you have never met. Sharing the truth about who you are is one way. Seeing the truth about those you encounter along the way is another.

Don’t overcomplicate the friendships you establish online. Just wear your truth. Unpretentiously. Confidently. Through trial and error, you’ll soon be able to quickly see who is loyal, interesting, and trustworthy and who is just there to pimp a link or push another product.

Ditch the fake personas, wannabes and also rans. Care less about what people think about you and more about whether or not you have anything useful to contribute. Be harder on yourself than others, but don’t take any of it so seriously you start measuring your own worth (and that of others) in meaningless friend and follower counts.

There are many ties that bond across the digital divide if you let them. The mentor who can teach you things you won’t learn in any book. The v-friend you feel comfortable reaching out to and sharing private information with. The e-lover who is neither friend or frenemy but who could turn out to be either in a nanosecond. The i-quaintance whose name you recognize but with whom your relationship is more casual than committed. There’s even the f-buddy who fails at social media because they’ll never see you as anything other than an outlet for link lust or an opportunity to pimp themselves.

Ahh, the digital playground. Where everyone wants to plug in and get naked. And everyone else needs to learn how to play safe and follow the unspoken rules.

Take care! —
Linda M. Lopeke
SMARTSTART: Success-to-go for people working @ the speed of life!

Thanks, Linda! I couldn’t agree more!

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Make social media work toward your goals!

Buy the ebook. Learn the art of online conversation.

I’m a proud affiliate of

It's Easier to Plan an Irresistible Event When …

by

relationships button

At a meeting this fall, we brainstormed ideas for events that might bring more people into a client’s store. The conversation was exciting the way ideation can be. No holds barred. We were having fun imagining the themes and content that would be the most irresistible offer.

Wait, wait, wait.

We were planning an event and we hadn’t even thought about who we wanted to come.

It’s hard to be irresistible when the audience — the customers for our products — have no faces or names. How can we be irresistible for people we don’t even know?

Have you done that before? I know that I have.

What’s more fun is to find out who’s looking for an event, a meal, a learning experience, get to know them and to make every bit of the event exactly what would rocks their world.

It’s easier to be irresistible, we need to know who we’re being irresistible for. Then we can

  • chose and build every nuance to be exactly what they love.
  • leave out the things that distract, irritate, or disrupt their enjoyment of what they came to share.
  • and build in a special surprise that will be make the experience unforgettable — something that lets them know you know them really well.

If we make a great meal and invite people, some folks will come and eat and be satisfied. But when we find out who we want to serve and put every thought, every detail toward making the experience one that perfectly suits them, they tell each other and often bring their friends.

Promotion changes from “why this is better” to “You belong here. We listened. We made this for you.”

1052611_speaker

That’s the formula for an irresistible event. And with that attention to that group you’ve chosen, you can bet they’ll remember and be talking about when you’ll be offering something like your event again.

Businesses thrive like that. People know when you care about them.

How do you find the people you want to invite to shape your irresistible business?

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

Buy the ebook. Learn the art of online conversation.

I’m a proud affiliate of