Horse Wash Near Javitz Center in Manhattan
Business strategies for blogging
It takes some careful decision making these days when choosing where to spend your time. Taking three days out of my business to learn more is something I think strategically about.
What value do I hope to glean for myself, my readers and my clients?
What will I learn that I can apply right away to make significant changes to my business?
How will I know if I got the value I was looking for?
Besides the embarrassment of seeing what the Jacob Javitz convention center now looks like and apologizing to out of towners for the lousy set up, last week at Blog World New York was nothing but a fantastic learning experience and great networking opportunity!
As a startling contrast to conferences that I attended ten years ago, the crowd way more interesting. The variety in the demographic and the fact that the room was filled with my favorite kinds of people, early adopters!
Speaking of early adopters, my buddy Lori Richardson and I went together. Lori has been blogging since 2004 for her company Score More Sales and is an inspiration to me. We decided to split up and to cover more territory.
The following represents my top takeaways from a few of my favorite presenters:
Scott Stratten gave an exciting opening keynote. Scott’s message about keeping the new medium authentic, engaging and purposeful was right on. Isn’t this the same rule around any kind of medium? Why do some people think to take short cuts, just because you can?
What I love about social media and especially blogging is that it gives a fair advantage to everyone. Scott really drove home the fact that these new mediums must be used in the ways they were intended. Buying followers on FiveRR or posting blogs with “blah” content is not the intention.
“You can’t automate authenticity,” as Scott says; “Social Media’s greatest threat is apathy,” it is like sending a mannequin to a networking event. This is a qualitative game; you get the numbers because of your quality, not the other way around. “Social is not a numbers game, it is an engagement game.”
The bottom line is “If you have no time to use social media don’t, it is like walking into a networking event and leaving 30 seconds later.”
Twenty–one year old speaker Syed Balkhi (WPbeginners.com and list25.com) gave a high energy talk. His story is impressive and movie worthy.
The message: Know who you are marketing to and make sure it is about them. He suggested keyword driven blogging is a waste of time. Ask your audience what they want; the keywords will come more naturally.
Build your lists, but don’t treat everyone on your lists the same. Segment your lists to target users. Don’t contact form sign up users too frequently. Don’t spam them. Didn’t we direct marketers learn this 15 years ago? It is interesting how many people in my age range stared, as if this information was earth shattering. We can’t forget social media is still media and many of the same rules apply.
Derek Halpern owned the room like Liz Taylor in 1956. His charisma is as powerful as his content, and no one leaves the room when he is speaking. I will admit, I thought differently at first; especially when he informed he was going to rant loudly at the audience. I said, “Thanks for the warning,” all I could think of was Jeffrey Gitomer pointing his finger at me, and sat 15 rows back, big mistake. Some people open their mouths and gold pours out. This is true for Derek.
His message was about using social triggers (also the name of his business). Derek spoke of his drafting technique to gain press from bloggers and the mainstream press.
The message here was clearly about creating controversy in your blog by countering common opinions. The ones most people believe when a big fat claim is made by well known sources. He is not suggesting you be disruptive for the hell of it, but instead to back up your opinion with facts and statistics. After all, opinion with facts behind it is far more convincing than opinion alone.
Wednesday night Chris Brogan said something in his keynote that moved me. As many people look at blogging with desire and are holding back for whatever reason, “Be yourself online, be brave.”
In my next post I will cover the WEB TV and Video tracks and what I learned there. Stay tuned!
RSS Feed