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How to Promote Your Business Without Being Seen as a Smiling Shark

March 8, 2010 by Liz 20 Comments

Gotta Be Visible Authenticity

cooltext443809558_authenticity

The entrepreneurs and brand managers I work with both often start by asking how to use the social web. Their goal is to promote their business or their brand. The worry that seems consistently common in every first question is that they appear professional and helpful. No one wants to appear to be too aggressive in social web space.

How to Promote Your Business Without Being a Seen as Smiling Shark

When the wrong kind of promotion comes our way, it feels like we’re not being seen as people, but more like prey. Who wants to do business with someone that comes at us like a shark? No one in a marketing or sales role wants to be perceived like that.

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I’ve found that the key to elegant and authentic promotion is being fully present in the conversation. Too often we start talking before we listen. Too often we haven’t fully considered what brought us to be interacting. Knowing who we are, what we offer, and how it fits our reader-customers before we even start a conversation can make promoting a blog, a business, or a brand as seamless as talking to a friend about how our day went.

These questions can get us to that information.

  1. Are you truly passionate and excited about it? If not, go find out how you can be. Be clear on what drives you.

    “Can I tell you why I’m so excited to be working with big companies on big ideas that connect people and change lives in ways that really mean something.”

  2. Can you articulate that passion and excitement? What words explain why you are willing to invest the time of your life building that blog, business, or brand? Be able to tell the story that connects you to what you’re sharing. People will identify with that.

    “Every day people I work with tell me that they think that what we’ve put together to connect with new business is going to be so much easier and so much fun.”

  3. Can you name and claim what you offer so that folks can attribute it you? Can you explain how your blog, your brand, or your business will change people’s lives in a clear and specifically good way? Give that a name so that the idea stick. Draw a picture with words and name that. Become the person who is the only one who provides that.

    “Folks who know how to talk about their unique value attract amazing people who want to be part of what they’re doing. Knowing what you offer is powerful.”

  4. Do you call folks to action and offer them an easy way to talk about what you’re building? Can you show them how joining you will make what they do easier, faster, and more meaningful? If you don’t tell folks how to join, be a part, they could think you don’t want them to. Gotta invite them.

    “If want you to talk about how to do that, it only takes about 45 minutes.”

  5. Do you invite people offer their experience? Do you ask folks how you might reach more people who could benefit from your brand, your book, or your product? If they offer suggestions, do you follow through?

    “If you were me, what would you differently to offer folks like more value in faster, better, more meaningful ways?”

  6. Do you ask people to talk about you? Do you give them ways they might do that, ways that make them feel proud for helping you?

    “So glad you found value, would you tell your colleagues about our work together? I’d love to help them too. We can all grow together.”

Not every questions fits into every conversation. The thing is that when we know ourselves, our business goals, how to partner and how to extend an irresistible offer, promotion gets to be as passionately authentic as the other parts of the work we do.

How do you make sure that your promotion is authentically you?

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

Buy the ebook. Learn the art of online conversation.

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Filed Under: Marketing /Sales / Social Media, Successful Blog Tagged With: bc, irresistible, LinkedIn, offer, personal-branding, promotion, self-promotion

Connecting with Fiercely Loyal Customers By Being Helpful in a Hypeful World

February 17, 2009 by Liz Leave a Comment

He’s So Sure He’s So Good

relationships button

Just read an email about how much I needed someone’s help. To put it mildly, the person who wrote it doesn’t stand a chance of doing business with me. He’s so sure that what he’s got so good. That he bet his sales on impersonal email blast to people who don’t need what he does.

The email he sent was filled with huge promises, hype of grand results, and a future that would have me set for life. I’m wondering why he needs to work if he has that secret.

Some folks sell by telling everyone how good they are.
Some folks sell by making claims that are bigger than life.
Some folks sell by pitching every person they can contact.

I feel safe in saying that it’s not the way to make fiercely loyal customers.

Connecting with Fiercely Loyal Customers By Being Helpful in Hypeful World

Great businesses have always been about customers — how to make their lives easier, more free, and more meaningful. Great companies invest in getting to know their customers and showing they value them. That builds fiercely loyal customers. Fiercely loyal customers come back and bring their friends.

Ever watch people who love what they do when they talk about their work? They talk about what they do as fluidly as water. Even when they first explain what they do, they don’t ever seem shameless. They talk about the kind of people they help and the help they give.

When we’re fully-engaged in our work, telling others about an offer is like talking to our friends about what we do. It’s natural, conversational, and about them. If you have something of value, here’s how to have conversations that matter.

  • Do your homework. Find out who’s interested. Research to know the people or businesses who need your product or service. Know their needs before you even say hello.
  • Be curious about their dreams. When you meet with prospective clients, start by asking them about their goals.
  • Be a learner, not a hunter. Look and listen for ways to help them move their goals forward.
  • Then talk about how your goals and theirs work together. Let them know the kind of helping that you do.

Don’t wait for the stars to align. Align your goals with theirs. Sit on the same side of the table with your customers. Business happens when it’s to their benefit to do business with you. Show them how working with you will get them where they want to be.

Great promotion is helpful, not hypeful. How do you talk about your work as helpful?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!

Buy the eBook. and Register for SOBCon09 NOW!! Learn to align your goals.

Filed Under: Marketing /Sales / Social Media, Successful Blog Tagged With: bc, conversation, LinkedIn, promotion

Social Media and Promotion: How to Get Your Network Pulling for You

July 15, 2008 by Liz 18 Comments

Think Teamwork, Not Self-Promotion

insideout logo

A friend emailed me asking if I would pass along information about a product just coming out. The email was a sale pitch I could pick up and pass on. The rest of the message was over the top for me — kind of pushy and kind of “wink, wink, nudge, nudge — you help me and I’ll help you later.”

I didn’t find that compelling. What I found was a way to say, “I’m sorry, not this one.”

It takes time to build a network. No one wants to abuse theirs, but wasn’t investment partly for support when we need it? What’s the right way to enlist the support of the people we call our colleagues?

I asked a few friends . . . they led me to these steps.

In his blog post, War Paint and Promotion, Todd Jordan offers these words of wisdom . . .

It’s partially about having something great to say, but it’s equally about sharing your story and making them a part of it.

Keep them as you read through these.

    0. Seed the garden. As Dave Navarro said, ” . . . Spend time either a) getting *their* name out or b) helping them move forward on their site goals … well before you need promo.” via Twitter.

    1. Offer something worth sharing. Sure I love you, but if your product is bad or boring. I’m going to find it hard to pass it on to the other friends in my network. < 2. Show confidence and courtesy. If you get nervous, self-conscious, or overly humorous, It makes it seem like your products can’t stand on its own.

    3. Let me opt in! Tell me about what you have in a way that leaves me lots of room to choose for myself. If you hang your promotion on our relationship, you might find that our relationship wasn’t strong enough to carry it.

    4. Make it easy to talk about you — have a simple message. You can offer me the way to say what your point is, but don’t give me a speech.

    5. Give me a way to feel proud. I’m going to be sharing your message with other folks I care about.

And Don’t forget . . .

what. Martin Neumann said.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!

Filed Under: Marketing /Sales / Social Media, Successful Blog Tagged With: bc, promotion, relationships, social-networking

The W-List: Gathering a List of Outstanding Women Bloggers

August 8, 2007 by Liz 118 Comments

Hear the Women

PR PowerWomen-logo

Meet some spectacular women in blogging.

ToddAnd made the Marketing Power150. It was built to offer some organization and respect to the wide world of marketing blogs. The Power 150, based on an algorithm of five ratings, is now a partnership between ToddAnd and AdAge.

Yesterday, Valeria Maltoni at Conversation Agent shared the list of Women’s PR blogs that was originally pulled from Todd’s list by Kami Huyse at Communications Overtones. Valeria points out the focus on and the power of male bloggers in the blogosphere.

The statistic Kami drew out is valid pretty much all over the place. Go to Fast Company Expert blogs where I post every Thursday and count the males and female bloggers — 26 to 6.

Are there truly 5+ to 1 men bloggers to women bloggers? Why should we care?

We should care because women are great at conversation, strategy, and writing. We should care for the same reason that no one should be overlooked.

So Valeria has made a suggestion.

Maybe we can start a W-List to help us all discover great blogs authored by women.

I’ve been exploring these blogs since yesterday. I’m proud to present them. I’m surprised at the one I didn’t know were out there. With that in mind, I’m passing on the entire list with these additions:

  • Ask Dr. Kirk
  • The Artsy Asylum by Susan Reynolds
  • Brain Based Biz by Dr. Robyn McMaster
  • Brain Based Business by Dr. Ellen Weber
  • Build a Solo Practice, LLC by Susan Cartier Liebel
  • Christine Kane by Christine Kane
  • CustServ by Meikah Dalid
  • Creative Curio by Lauren Marie
  • Debbie Millman by Debbie Millman
  • Designers Who Blog by Cat Morley
  • Design Your Writing Life by Lisa Gates
  • Do It Myself Blog by Glenda Watson Hyatt
  • Enter the Laughter by Marti Lawrence
  • Escape Blog by Melissa Petri
  • Essential Keystrokes by Char
  • Every Dot Connects by Connie Reece
  • Fish Creek House by GP
  • Franke James by Franke James
  • Great Presentations Mean Business by Laura Athavale Fitton
  • ifelse by Phu Ly
  • Joyful, Jubilant Learning by Rosa Say
  • Making Life Work for You by April Groves
  • Small Biz Survival by Becky McCray
  • The Kiss Business Too by Karin H.
  • The Parody by Sasha Manuel

The W-List

I’ve incorporated the above blogs in the list.

  • 45 Things by Anita Bruzzese
  • Ask Dr. Kirk
  • The Artsy Asylum by Susan Reynolds
  • Back in Skinny Jeans by Stephanie Quilao
  • BlogWrite for CEOs Debbie Weil
  • Biz Growth News by Krishna De
  • Brain Based Biz by Dr. Robyn McMaster
  • Brain Based Business by Dr. Ellen Weber
  • Brand Sizzle Anne Simons
  • Branding & Marketing Chris Brown
  • Brazen Careerist by Penelope Trunk
  • Build a Solo Practice, LLC by Susan Cartier Liebel
  • Christine Kane by Christine Kane
  • CK’s Blog CK (Christina Kerley)
  • Communication Overtones Kami Huyse
  • Conscious Business by Anne Libby
  • Conversation Agent Valeria Maltoni
  • Corporate PR Elizabeth Albrycht
  • Customers Rock! Becky Carroll
  • CustServ by Meikah David
  • Creative Curio by Lauren Marie
  • Debbie Millman by Debbie Millman
  • Deborah Schultz by Deborah Schultz
  • Designers Who Blog by Cat Morley
  • Design Your Writing Life by Lisa Gates
  • Diva Marketing Blog Toby Bloomberg
  • Do It Myself Blog by Glenda Watson Hyatt
  • Dooce by Heather B. Armstrong
  • Email Marketing Best Practices Tamara Gielen
  • Enter the Laughter by Marti Lawrence
  • Escape Blog by Melissa Petri
  • Escape from Cubicle Nation by Pamela Slim
  • eSoup by Sharon Sarmiento
  • Essential Keystrokes by Char
  • Every Dot Connects by Connie Reece
  • Fish Creek House by GP
  • Flooring The Consumer CB Whittemore
  • Forrester’s Marketing Blog Shar, Charlene, Chloe, Christine Elana, Laura and Lisa
  • Franke James by Franke James
  • Get Fresh Minds by Katie Konrath
  • Great Presentations Mean Business by Laura Athavale Fitton
  • Hey Marci by Marci Alboher
  • Get Shouty by Katie Chatfield
  • ifelse by Phu Ly
  • Inspired Business Growth by Wendy Piersall
  • J.T. O’Donnell Career Insights by J.T. O’Donnell
  • Joyful, Jubilant Learning by Rosa Say
  • Kinetic Ideas Wendy Maynard
  • Learned on Women by Andrea Learned
  • Lindsey Pollak by Lindsey Pollak
  • Liz Strauss at Successful Blog by Liz Strauss
  • Lorelle on WordPress by Lorelle VanFossen
  • Making Life Work for You by April Groves
  • Manage to Change by Ann Michael
  • Management Craft by Lisa Haneberg
  • Marketing Roadmaps Susan Getgood
  • Moda di Magno by Lori Magno
  • Modite by Rebecca Thorman
  • Narrative Assets by Karen Hegman
  • Presto Vivace Blog Alice Marshall
  • Productivity Goal by Carolyn Manning
  • Small Biz Survival by Becky McCray
  • The Brand Dame by Lyn Chamberlin
  • Spare Change Nedra Kline Weinreich
  • Talk It Up Heidi Miller
  • Tech Kitten by Trisha Miller
  • The Copywriting Maven Roberta Rosenberg
  • The Blog Angel by Claire Raikes
  • The Engaging Brand by Anna Farmery
  • The Floozy Blog by Kate Coote
  • The Kiss Business Too by Karin H.
  • The Origin of Brands Laura Ries
  • The Parody by Sasha Manuel
  • The Podcast Sisters by Krishna De, Anna Farmery and Heather Gorringe
  • Water Cooler Wisdom by Alexandra Levit
  • Wealth Strategy Secrets by Nicola Cairncross
  • What’s Next Blog B L Ochman
  • That’s What She Said by Julie Elgar
  • Ypulse by Anastasia Goodstein

Now the list seems to be filling out nicely. What women bloggers can you add?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Is your business stuck? Check out the Start-up Strategy Package. Work with Liz!!

Filed Under: Marketing /Sales / Social Media, Successful Blog Tagged With: bc, Power-Women-of-Marketing, promotion, Valeria-Maltoni, W-List

121: What's the Key to a Promotion Strategy?

July 18, 2007 by Liz 6 Comments

one2one blog post logo

A Strategic Conversation

Where we left the conversation, DAWUD MIRACLE asked me (and you),

What do you feel is necessary to create an effective strategy to promote a business?.

Wow! I’m grinning. Okay, Dawud, you’ve got me now. Strategy and promotion in one question. Hmmmm. I bet my readers will do better than I do on this one. Maybe I’d better unpack the question first.

Strategy . . . I’ve always liked the idea but forth in the book, Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make Competition Irrelevant. Much of why I like it is in the title — find an uncontested space where competition is not. The idea is simple. . . . Why swim in the shark invested blood-red ocean where the fight is always on? Why not swim in the calm blue ocean where I can be a category of one?

For once in my life, maybe the fact that I’m different (you are too — right?) can be a fabulous plus if I turn it to my advantage. That’s a strategic thought!

Strategy for promotion . . . As I look back I see a two-part blue ocean-type strategy that has been a part of tpromoting the business I’ve built behind Successful-Blog.

A great product is its own promotion. I’ve created unique value my ideal customers love. The Perfect Virtual Manager — even the concept that we all deserve a personal manager as a rock star might have — has been helping entrepreneurs, small businesses, and a corporation or two take a new look. We’re working as partners to focus their business and find their ideal customers. The PVM is a one-of-a-kind business support structured around a foundational plan I’ve built during 22 years of training people who teach.

The new series, Inside-Out Thinking, in like manner, is unique in an Internet of “me too” content. It promotes itself. The series is something readers need and hasn’t been offered before. The series provides the hows and whys about building a solid business foundation and finding the ideal customers who love what we love to do. By conceiving and designing from my own experience and proven track record — yours might not be where mine is, but you have yours — I’ve created something others cannot also create. They can follow, but they can’t duplicate it.

Open Comment Night, the Virtual Conference last March, this one2one conversation that we’re sharing are all value offerings that I can create unique customer value. Soon enough as I focus my content in the areas that reflect what I’m particularly good at discussing, my competition begins to fade.

Promotion. Promotion is easiest when you ask cusomters to choose between two options:

  • A. YOU
  • B. Everyone else in the world.

Here’s my most effective promotion strategy.

Set up a choice between me and the rest of the world. Then promote the rest of the world.

And since this is a one2one conversation… to Dawud, (and you too)

How important is strategy to your business? How does your strategy get built?

If you’re reading this, I’d love to hear your answer too.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!

One2One is a cross-blog conversation. You can see the entire One-2-One Conversation series on the Successful Series page.

Filed Under: Business Life, Successful Blog Tagged With: 12+1, 121 Conversation, bc, Business Life, Dawud-Miracle, Liz-Strauss, one2one-conversation, promotion, Strategy/Analysis

Writing YEAH! 10 WHOLE NEW Reasons to Get Jazzed About Writing

September 6, 2006 by Liz Leave a Comment

Writing in Times of Cabin Fever

Power Writing Series Logo

Artists, designers, painters, woodworkers, crafters . . . all of us who put our hands in our heads . . .

First we learn the habits and tools of what we do.
Then we take on the values they represent.

The real tools of writing are thoughts and ideas.
The real values are the relationships we make with them.
–ME Strauss

We call the time cabin fever. It’s the end of Chicago winter — no sun, not much sunshine in people. Everyone’s tired of being cooped up. One dismal Sunday last March, I wrote Writing–Ugh! 10 Reasons to Get Jazzed about Writing.

Jazz helps when you’ve got cabin fever.

Then it was over. The sun finally came, and we wrote. We wrote through spring tulips, young love, and baseball season. We wrote through summer vacations, the World Cup, and fireworks. We got into some serious writing.

Like everyone who’s been busy writing, I didn’t stop to notice much. Until today, now I’m jazzed all over again!

YEAH! Now I’ve got . . .

10 WHOLE NEW Reasons to Get Jazzed about Writing

The original 10 reason still hold fast. Writing is a phenomenal tool. What I’ve discovered are new reasons are about how writing has made a difference in our lives.

Here’s what I see and why I’m jazzed all over again.

    1. Writing has given us a place we can meet. We talk about writing — in public now. Think back a few months, a few years, talking about writing was something that got left behind in school and in writers’ groups, or it was the private venue of folks who worked in intellectual property. Now it’s become the conversation of regular people.

    2. Writing has led us to read more. In order to write, we read. Many of us read more than we ever did before. We read to find out what folks write about. We read to find ideas. We read to find out our own thoughts. We read more than we would if we didn’t write.

    3. Writing leads us to read like writers. “If it’s in print, it must be true.” Remember that? Writing takes the shine off the coin and the glamour off the print. We’re not so quick to be taken in by words that “look” good. We’re separating fact from opinion more quickly and more accurately, and letting folks know when they get mixed up about them.

    4. Writing has brought more of us to care about how we write. Good enough isn’t the standard any more. What once was a “have to” has become a “want to.” We’re learning to write for ourselves and our readers, not for our job roles and our teachers’ approval.

    5. Wrting is making us better communicators. People talk back and push ideas forward. We’re having conversations we never would have had were we not writing. Each communication offers a secret something new that adds to what we already know about writing and people.

    6. Writing builds confidence and expertise. Every piece we write is just that much better than the last — over time it shows. Go back and look. Have you stopped to see how much better your writing is since you started? . . . how much more you know? Other folks have. That’s why they read what you write.

    7. Writing allows us to think more deeply — a crucial skill. People don’t spend time typing “small talk.” Only weather folks type about the weather, and when they do, they’re not having casual conversation. We organize our thoughts before we publish them. We consider the world differently in search of ideas and points of view to write about. We think about the folks who will read what we write. We no longer think on the surface of ideas. We’re learning to push past sound-bytes and infosnacks, so that readers have something to respond to.

    8. Writing can make us better listeners and better people. We’re finding out people say the same things in different ways. Writing is the best way to learn that different doesn’t mean wrong, and letting go is the first step in learning. Sometimes folks send our message back in entirely new ways — they hear something valuable, but not what we said. We learn to listen to them and to ourselves as well.

    9. Writing is contagious, builds relationships, and changes lives. Writing great content still means search engine ranking and link popularity. It also means people — real human beings. People come who take an interest in the writer. Writing begets writing. Conversations lead to conversations. Relationships grow between like minds, and people meet. How many folks have you written to in the last week? How many of those people will you meet in your life? How many folks have you met that you trust?

    10. Writing can break down walls and build communities. Corporations are finding that customers write. Big companies are taking down their brick walls to listen and starting to write back to us. Walls are falling down all over the Internet. Communities are replacing them. There were 456 comments from people across the world who were talking to each other about their favorite neighborhood. Enough said.

You might find other ways on the Internet to communicate — podcasting, video — but they’re not the same.

Writing is interactive, individual and social, makes a person think first and filter out thoughts that don’t matter. What I realized today is the greatest way that writing is changing us.

We’re becoming literate people who know more about ourselves, the world, and each other.

Now . . . . I’m even more jazzed about writing than I was last March.

Can you blame me?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related articles
The 9 Rights of Every Writer — Peer Pressure Is for Jr. High School
4+6 Things to a Product Review Even James Bond Would Trust
Why Dave Barry and Liz Don’t Get Writer’s Block

Filed Under: Blog Basics, Successful Blog, Writing Tagged With: bc, blog_promotion, business, personal-branding, power_writing_for_everyone, promotion, survival_kit, writer's_block

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