New North Social Media Breakfast

Are you a social media fan boy or girl, dying to jump-start your company’s social media marketing campaign, but you can’t get past the miles of red tape? It’s probably frustrating to see so many companies thriving on the social networks while you stand and watch from the sidelines because management has a laundry list of reasons why they don’t want to get involved. If you’ve tried convincing the upper management team of the benefits of social media marketing only to be met with 101 objections, here are a few rebuttals for you to fire back the next time the conversation comes up.

1. Difficult to Measure ROI

If you read any social media related blogs you’ve probably seen some pretty obscure formulas for calculating the return on investment for social media marketing. However, if a company is going to invest in this new form of marketing, it’s understandable that they would want to see what kind of results they’re getting in the form of real figures.

Although I don’t know that there really is a bullet proof way to calculate social media marketing ROI just yet, there are ways to track your progress and sales leads. Focus on convincing management of the benefits of social selling and the various ways you can track sales leads via social media.

2. Giving up Control of the Message

A big fear of social media marketing stems from the lack of control a company has over their message when they surrender to the social networks. But giving up control of your message isn’t necessarily a bad thing. For example, your Facebook fans love you! That’s why they’re called “fans.” Let them write what they want about you online, chances are it’s going to be positive. Whatever negative things people have to say about your business online can be handled in a professional way as long as you monitor the conversation and stay in tune with the online community.

3. The Dreaded Time Suck

Many managers fear that if they allow employees to go on Facebook or Twitter during the work day, productivity will go down the tubes. That’s a legitimate concern, but there are ways around that. If management is truly concerned about giving employees free reign of the social networks, they could designate one or two employees as the social media managers and block access for the rest. I would recommend laying out a streamlined process for optimal efficiency, regardless of who will be managing your social networks.

4. Your Target Market isn’t on SM

This objection is the most common amongst managers of B2B companies. A lot of people have the misconception that connecting with other businesses via social media is just not necessary or even feasible. Well, that’s just not true, and you can use some pretty telling statistics to prove your point. Start with this one; 44% of decision makers at small- to medium-sized businesses use social media. Furthermore, 71% of companies are already on Facebook. Your company’s target market can be found on the social networks, it’s just a matter of figuring out which networks and making the connections.

5. Your Business is Already Established

This is like saying, “my company doesn’t need a website because we already have a solid customer base.” In this day and age, it’s almost unheard of for a company not to have a website. Pretty soon, the same will be true for companies without a Facebook page, Twitter account, and blog. There are plenty of ways established businesses can benefit from social media, aside from the obvious name-brand recognition that you’ve already acquired. Besides, would it be such a bad thing if your customer base expanded as a result of social media marketing?

If you’re going to win the battle in favor of social media marketing within your company, it’s important that you’re armed with one very important weapon: Knowledge. Know your stuff and it will be hard for management to say no to you.

LinkedIn isn't just a great networking tool; it's a powerful Inbound Marketing tool, too. We're following up last Friday’s post highlighting the basics of LinkedIn with a step-by-step strategy for taking full advantage of LinkedIn as a way to generate traffic to your website and pull in qualified leads.

Step 1. Start slow and aim low. 
Consider getting your feet wet using one of two approaches: 1) Substitute this “online networking” for a piece of your traditional “offline networking” — perhaps a networking event that isn’t producing results; or 2) Set aside 10 minutes after work or first thing in the morning to do LinkedIn tasks (joining groups, updating your profile, making contacts, answering questions, etc.). Be patient: you won’t see results overnight, but with consistent effort, LinkedIn will yield good prospects, referral sources, business partners, and valuable information.

Step 2. Create a solid profile. 
Assuming you already have a LinkedIn account, sign in and click on your profile, then click “Edit.” Fill in important information about past positions, accomplishments, goals, etc. LinkedIn helps you with suggestions for a more complete profile, and you want to keep at it until LinkedIn shows that your profile is complete. Look at other people’s profiles (especially those with lots of connections) to see what kinds of information you might include. And don’t forget about recommendations from peers; it’s critical to your credibility.

Step 3. Add connections. Connect with people in your office, vendors, partners and former coworkers – anyone with whom you’ve worked or knows you professionally. LinkedIn allows you to send a request to connect, and it includes a default message, but don't take the easy way out –  click on the default message and type your own personalized note (i.e., “Hi, Sam – I thought it was about time we connected, since we both know so much about the engineering business and this makes collaboration easy.”) Don't accept requests from people you don’t know (they’re either trolling for connections or spammers), and the same goes for asking for connections from people you don't know (don’t do it).

Step 4. Find relevant groups.

• Search for relevant groups by keyword in the LinkedIn search bar; focus first on keywords relevant to your prospects
• Look at the profile of each group that LinkedIn suggests to you. If the group is small (150 or less) and not active, it’s probably a waste of your time; if the group is very large (100,000+ members), you may not stand out
• Look for groups related to trade associations you belong to or conferences you attend
• Look at the groups populated with people with whom you already network.
• Join just a few groups at first and monitor what is being discussed and determine how active they are

Step 5. Weed out groups. 
Eliminate groups that don't interest you or that don't generate much activity. The goal is to find just a few that have enough activity by the right people to make it worth your while. Adding and weeding out groups takes some time at first, but slows down once you find where you truly fit.

Step 6. Start to comment. 
After you’ve followed a few groups for a while, you’ll get a feel for what a good comment looks like: cordial, concise, valuable…and not overly self-promotional! If your comment is all about you and your company, it’s too much. You’re trying to establish relationships and credibility, not sell (do the relationships part well and the sales will follow).

Step 7. Start discussions
. After a while you’ll see which discussions have ongoing interest and attract comments and you can start discussions yourself. One of the best ways is to ask a question. But don’t just ask the question and watch from the sidelines; respond respectfully and encourage further interaction with additional questions. Your engagement is how people learn your name and understand your value.

Step 8. Share content. 
Now it's time to share relevant content with your groups. This content can be a blog post, article, survey results, white paper or PowerPoint presentation — anything you can link to. Make it relevant to an ongoing discussion or tie it directly to a question you asked in order to start a discussion. Don't just promote your latest blog post (unless it’s relevant to a discussion); it comes across as promotional and will dilute your credibility. Content doesn't even have to be your own (though that’s ideal) – by providing valuable content, regardless of the source, you become recognized as a valuable contributor prospects will seek out.

Step 9. Deepen relationships. 
Your strategy should now be resulting in new prospects because you’re engaging with potential clients, referral sources and business partners. Feel free now to initiate an email exchange using the LinkedIn email, and try to set up a casual meeting or simply talk about opportunities to work together. Most everyone on LinkedIn is there to connect, so chances are you’ll get a positive response.

I remember the day the light went on for me with inbound marketing. It was an early webinar from Hubspot that explained the principles at a simplified, high level. That afternoon my co-workers thought I had exceeded my prescribed caffeine limits, but this was a natural buzz!

That experience showed me how easy it is to get excited about the concept of inbound marketing, to comprehend intuitively how a relevant and disciplined content strategy can be the basis for smart SEO work; that social media can be employed as a targeted, engaging broadcast and promotion network; how clever use of content offers and calls to action can help convert visitors into identified leads; and finally, how web analytics can help marketers monitor, modify, and continuously improve their online marketing.

But there's a big difference between understanding the concept, and seeing undeniable proof that it works and creates the impact businesses need. That's why I especially like this case study I found on Hubspot's website about Colt International, a privately held Dutch manufacturer of HVAC and climate control systems and products.

What I especially like about this example is they didn't wait a year or more to look at results; Colt Manager of Marketing and Communications Gertie Arts sat down with Hubspot's Inbound Marketing Manager Pamela Seiple as a relatively new customer last year to share 3 months worth of data. Here's what she revealed:

• Starting from zero (0!) traffic from social media they were already attracting 900 visitors per month after 90 days
• Total monthly web traffic grew 10 times versus their starting point
• Right from the start they were experiencing a respectable 13% landing page conversion rate

Gertie reported that she meets weekly with the Colt CEO to update him on the progress of their inbound marketing initiatives, and she shared with Pamela that Hubspot's analytic tools make it easy for her to demonstrate the return Colt is realizing. She also gave a plug for the ease of having all your tools in one place, on a single platform, making integration nothing to fret about.

Need more evidence? Weidert PR guru Sean Johnson recently wrote "Social Media Return on Investment" to illustrate the same point: if you earnestly commit to this approach, you're going to like the results! So where are you in this deliberation? Trying to figure out if it's right for your business or industry? Don't know how much it will cost or how you'll pay for it? If that's the case, let's talk. It costs you nothing, and in the end you'll be closer to knowing what to do.

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So you’ve set up a Twitter account for your business and you’re up to speed on the Twitter basics, but for some reason you haven’t gained much ground in picking up new followers. Especially when you’re starting from ground zero, gaining new Twitter followers can be quite the challenge. How do you let people know you’re out there, ready to share some really great information with the World?

Unless you or your businesses already has some level of celebrity status, attracting new Twitter followers does take some work, but luckily it’s not impossible. Here are 7 tips for building a sizeable, meaningful Twitter following from the ground up.

1. Follow More People

One of the fastest ways to attract more followers on Twitter is to follow more people yourself. However, I would caution you to exercise some discretion with this tactic, as people tend to frown upon Twitter users who simply follow thousands of random people simply to get a follow-back. Find people who have interests that parallel with your business, and avoid going on a “following spree.” Choose 10 to 15 new people to follow each week, rather than 100 in a day.

2. Charitable Promotions

You see this tactic being used by celebrities quite frequently, but there’s no reason why a charitable promotion couldn’t work for your business too. For example, you could promise to donate $1 for every new follower to a charity during a month. Make sure you talk to the chosen charity about it ahead of time, and ask them to endorse the promotion on their end too so that followers know that it’s not a scam.

3. Find the Right Tweet Frequency

If you’ve been using Twitter for longer than a week, then you’ve probably already noticed that some people just love to bombard your Twitter feed with meaningless garbage, just for the sake of exposure. I understand the need to be heard over the white noise of the 200 million other Twitter users, but I don’t think bombarding your followers with a steady stream of tweets all day is the way to do it. Figure out what the best Tweet frequency is for you and when it comes down to it, exercise quality over quantity. So if you don’t have anything significant to Tweet about, wait until you do.

4. Interact

Twitter should be used as more than just a platform from which you project your message. People who use Twitter as a means for two-way conversations and quality interaction with their followers are the ones who get the most out of the social network. Find people with interests that align with your business or industry and see if you can strike up a conversation with them. Take this practice one step further and try interacting with more high-profile people in your industry. Not everyone will respond, but odds are pretty good that eventually someone will like what you have to say and engage in a meaningful conversation with you.

5. Use Hashtags

Twitter Hashtags give users a way to categorize tweets so that people can easily find tweets on a specific topic. For example, if you are Tweeting a link to your new blog post, you can include a hashtag with the main theme or topic of the article. Simply type the “pound” (#) symbol in front of the word you wish to emphasize. If I were to use a hashtag for this post it might look something like this: “#twitterfollowers.”

6. Integrate

If your company has a well-rounded web presence, take the time to integrate Twitter into everything else you do on the Internet. For example, do you send out a monthly e-newsletter? Make sure to encourage newsletter subscribers to follow you on Twitter and embed the follow button right into each newsletter. It’s fairly common to include a Twitter share or follow button on your blog, but have you thought about including a live stream of your Tweets on your website?

7. Complete Your Bio

Have you ever been followed on Twitter by someone who is represented by an egg? It’s not very impressive and it doesn’t make me confident about following them back. It’s important to fill out your profile completely and include a picture of yourself or your brand’s logo so that people can easily identify you.

Of course everyone on Twitter wants more followers. It’s about being heard, but there’s also a reputation factor that comes into play. Because everyone can see how many people are following you on Twitter, there’s more motivation to have a higher number of followers as validation that you are a popular person to follow on Twitter. However, I would make the argument that quality is better than quantity with respect to Twitter followers. Focus on quality, and quantity will be soon to follow.

The blank page taunts you as you stare at it. 

If you could just come up with something - a few words - you know it would break the logjam and the rest of your blog would simply flood the page. But mostly you are kidding yourself at this point. You really have no idea what you are going to write, and you are hoping a sudden burst of inspiration will fill the page. Never mind if its an appropriate topic or if you have targeted certain keywords. Getting it done is all you are after now. 

Sound like a familiar scenario? You are not alone. Content marketing - particularly blogging - is a lot more work than we want to admit. Yet, because it's a creative process, we often don't plan for it the way we approach other aspects of our business. We want to be inspired! We don't want our creativity cramped.

It's awfully hard to be creative and effective when you are struggling to put words on a page. The creation of an optimized blog post - or any other piece of content - while relying just on inspiration is a waste of time and resources.

What you need is a plan, what we would call an editorial calendar. 

An editorial calendar is pretty much what it sounds like. It's a plan of what content you are going to create, in what form, and when you are going to publish it. Prospects are coming to your site to get information they want and need in the buying cycle. You need to have a plan to deliver it. 

Before you think "just what I needed, something else to do," let's review two critical ways an editorial calendar will help you with your inbound marketing blogging and content creation: 

1. You will spend less time worrying about WHAT you are going to create
2. You will have more time to concentrate on HOW you will create it, allowing you to devote your attention to things like the quality of the content or targeted keywords 

Your editorial calendar can take many forms. Here at Weidert Group, we use a spreadsheet that tracks who will be writing for our blog each day that we publish, as well as information on what they will be writing about. It also tracks other content offerings we are working on, such as e-books and tip sheets. Yours does not need to be that complex. A simple list will do. 

At a minimum, there are three things you need to address: topics, publication dates and form - blog, tip sheet, etc. Generate your content ideas, assign them dates and determine the best way to present the content and now you have a basic editorial calendar that will bring discipline to your content creation. Believe it or not, that structure is an important factor to you success.   

For help generating content, check out these Weidert Group resources:

• 5 Tips to You Make a Blog Part of Your Marketing Strategy
• How to Consistently Create Content for Your Blog
• Developing a Content Strategy for Inbound Marketing Success

As your content becomes more robust, so will your editorial calendar. You will eventually want to include items such as targeted keywords and calls to action. At the start, keep it simple.

By knowing what you are going to write and when, you will be less tempted to stray from your message. By producing consistent, relevant content, you will attract more prospects, which leads to more leads and opportunities for you to convert them into customers. 

Learn more about the role of content for inbound marketing with our free guide:

It seems it's hard to go through a dozen or more tweets on Twitter or posts on Google+ these days without coming across a post that features an infographic. Their power to grab people's attention just by using the text #INFOGRAPHIC, leading to a higher CTR and actual consumption of content, is impressive. It doesn't come as a surprise since we've become a society that retains more knowledge through the use of visual learning (50% retention compared to 10%), and with the increased popularity of content marketing they have a tendency to go viral through their use of striking visuals and concise facts. But when and where did infographics originate, and how long have they been utilized as a form of content? These were questions I had personally so I set out to find some answers.

What a better way to learn about the history of infographics than through an actual infographic itself! The folks over at Visual.ly felt the same way, and since they're experts in infographics and data visualizations they created their own which is included here. Rather than have me ramble on I'll let you read the history for yourself but it's interesting to think that cave paintings and Egyptian heiroglyphics were in a way an early form of infographics if you base them on the definition below.

      via

If you're like me and can't seem to consume enough infographics but don't have the time to read them all, here's a notable collection of marketing-related infographics that you can bookmark and read at your leisure. Have a good addition you would like to share? Please offer your suggestions!

Inbound Marketing vs. Outbound Marketing

The Science of Social Timing

Anatomy of a Facebook Fan

The Value of Being LinkedIn

How Executives Are Using Social Media

Meet The Connected Consumer

How to Get More Clicks on Twitter

Just for Fun: 40 Useful and Creative Infographics

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Accountants are in high demand this time of year. Everyone’s scrambling to scrape together financial statements and receipts from the past year and people need answers to questions before they can move forward with their tax prep. Many will attempt to file their taxes on their own, while others will pass on the burden to a professional accountant. Either way, there’s a high probability that questions will come up in the process that require the expertise of an accountant such as yourself.

While other accountants are hiding behind a computer and stacks of financial statements, you can make yourself available via the social networks. Here are 5 ways accountants can use social media to educate clients year round and mitigate the stressful flurry of activity from clients come tax time.

1. Twitter Tax Tips

Everyone’s looking for ways to pay fewer taxes. Writing out that check every year or every quarter takes a little piece of our soul, so any way we can reduce the size of our payment (legally of course) is greatly appreciated. Captivate your followers on Twitter by handing out free tips on how to find tax breaks. You can also use Twitter to give advice on maintaining financial records so that everything is readily available and easy to digest come tax season.

2. Facebook Reminders and Updates

Tax laws change frequently, but keeping up with these changes isn’t a top priority for the average citizen. Since you have to stay on top of these changes anyway, why not share the news with your followers? Facebook is a great way to keep clients informed so there aren’t any surprises at the end of the year. You could also use Facebook to remind followers about important deadlines and remind them when it’s time to start putting financial information together.

Contests are a great way to pick up Likes on Facebook. You could hold a contest once a year where followers can enter or compete to win a free or discounted tax preparation from you. Of course, if you work for a firm, you probably want to ask permission on this one.

3. Blog About Taxes Year Round

A good way to avoid that flurry of inquiries come March and April is to keep clients informed and educated all year round. Expand upon those tips and updates that you write about on Facebook and Twitter by maintaining a blog.

4. Open up the Lines to Questions

Encourage people to reach out to you on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter with general questions that would benefit the rest of your followers as well. As an accountant, you know all there is to know about accounting and taxes so it may be hard to think of questions to address. However, chances are, if one follower has a question, they’re not the only one. If possible, address these questions publicly on the social networks in order to help as many people at once as possible.

5. Get LinkedIn

LinkedIn is the ultimate social network for trade professionals such as accountants. LinkedIn is inherently great for networking and picking up new clients. But it’s also a great tool for establishing yourself as a thought leader and being known as an expert on any given subject. LinkedIn Answers is a forum where people can post a question and anyone can answer it. Of course some answers are more thorough and helpful than others, so the person who asked the question has a chance to select the answer that was the most helpful and mark it as the best question. For every “best answer” you submit you earn expert points, and people can see on your expert status on your profile.

As with a lot of professions that deal with personal or confidential information, there is always a concern about violating privacy with social media. Of course, it’s important to use your discretion when deciding what is appropriate to write on the social networks. Try to stay generic when addressing your followers at large and reserve the personal advice for private consultations and meetings.

“We don’t have time to write a blog article three times a week”, “We know all of the players in our industry and we talk to them directly”, “I hate getting emails so I don’t want to send out a lot of messages”, “Our competitors and customers aren’t doing much in social media so it would be a waste of our time”.

If you’re like most companies, you’ve used at least one of these objections not to engage in Inbound Marketing. Truth is, none of those apply in 2012.

Here’s a few quick facts to consider:

• Companies that blog have 55% more web visitors and 97% more inbound links
• 98% of B2B buyers search online via Google
• Unpaid, organic results account for nearly 90% of clicks
• B2B companies that blog generate 67% more leads than those that don’t
• 65% of internet users read a blog daily
• 61% of B2B companies have acquired a customer from LinkedIn and 41% have acquired one from Facebook
• 3 out of 4 Inbound Marketing channels cost less than ANY traditional, outbound channels

There’s no doubt that Inbound Marketing works. In just six months we increased leads from our website by 4800%! 

So, the big question becomes should you tackle implementing Inbound Marketing on your own or hire a team to help?

Here are the top 5 reasons to hire an Inbound Marketing agency this year:

1. Your team already has a full time job – like most companies, your internal resources are already wearing multiple hats and don’t have time to dedicate themselves to learning and successfully implementing a new initiative. Hiring an Inbound Marketing agency gives you the needed support without overtaxing your marketing team.

2. A broader perspective – Because you live your business everyday, you may not realize how much you know and what you have to offer to potential customers. Your Inbound Marketing agency will find those nuggets and be able to help you create valuable content for your prospects.

3. Fully integrated marketing efforts – A good Inbound Marketing agency will be able to integrate your traditional tactics with your inbound activities. If your online and off-line efforts aren’t consistent, you’ll be wasting valuable budget.

4. Faster ROI – Because the right Inbound Marketing agency already has the experience and understanding of what it takes to be successful, you’ll be up and running in less time. That means quicker lead attraction, more prospects in your pipeline and more active customers!

5. It’s cheaper! – Think about the costs associated with hiring just one additional marketing resource. By hiring an experienced Inbound Marketing Agency, you’ll be employing an entire team fully engaged in making your program a success.

If you’re considering implementing an Inbound Marketing program but not sure if its right for you, find out with our no-cost Inbound Marketing analysis. No strings attached – honest!

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This is the first official installment of “what I’m reading this week” for 2012. As some of you may have read earlier, I’m shooting for a book per week in 2012. So far, so good! (the first couple of weeks were spent re-reading Engage! by Brian Solis and Connected Marketing by Justin Kirby, et al.)

When you look at our reading habits after college, researchers found an 18% decline in reading activity from ’92 – 2002 – imagine what’s happened in the last 10 years with the advent of social media, more Internet accessibility, gaming and the proliferation of easy, on-demand entertainment. More to the point, one particular survey survey of executives found 14.4 percent read seven to ten business books a year, 21.4 percent read four to six books, and 45.8 percent read one to three books. 74.9 percent of respondents said they’d like to read more, but are limited because of time. (Source: Bersin & Associates Research Survey) Should we all read more? Of course.

Anyone else up for the 52 Books / 52 Weeks Challenge? How about 12 Books / 12 Months? You’d still be well ahead of the average CEO in reading. We know that reading broadens our perspectives and even allows us to become better writers as we absorb more nuances of the language. What do you say?

Putting the state of reading in our nation aside for a moment, let’s talk about this week’s book, The Compound Effect, by Darren Hardy

Perhaps it’s just my bias, but I always feel a bit weird reading self-development material (even though I read a TON of it – have nearly 100 books in the library devoted to a range of self-dev topics) – not so much from the perspective of what I think of it, but wondering how others see it. That said, I’ve never actually met someone who scoffed at the idea of reading a modest dose of self-development material. In fact, most of the people that I respect, admire or follow generally have a habit of consuming positive literature from a variety of sources that contributes to their overall growth. So, it’s in the spirit of ongoing development that I’m re-reading (sort of…listened to the Audio book before, but reading is better…) The Compound Effect.

Darren Hardy, the author of The Compound Effect is the mastermind behind Success Magazine. His own success in life can be traced back to many of the lessons that he shares in The Compound Effect and there are a few big ideas in this book along with some practical/tactical insights that may be useful to all of us. Darren’s position at the helm of Success Magazine doesn’t hurt either. The access that he has to the great thought leaders through his position at Success and the influence that experience has had on Darren makes this book much more than “the sum of its parts” so to speak.

First, let’s look at the book summary from the book description:

No gimmicks. No Hyperbole. No Magic Bullet. The Compound Effect is based on the principle that decisions shape your destiny. Little, everyday decisions will either take you to the life you desire or to disaster by default. Darren Hardy, publisher of Success Magazine, presents The Compound Effect, a distillation of the fundamental principles that have guided the most phenomenal achievements in business, relationships, and beyond. This easy-to-use, step-by-step operating system allows you to multiply your success, chart your progress, and achieve any desire. If you’re serious about living an extraordinary life, use the power of The Compound Effect to create the success you want.

I’m of two minds on the book. On one hand, there’s quite a bit in here that you’ve likely seen in other similar literature. However, the big idea that Darren brings to life in the book – the effect of compound efforts over time on your overall success – really stands out and sets this book apart. Much of the book is concerned with illustrating the power of that concept.

There are several major lessons from the book:

1. The simple truth of the book lies in the title and the effect of compound effort over time can’t be ignored. Small improvements, made daily, lead to the overnight successes we so often envy. Yes, it’s simple, yes, you’ve heard it before, but read it again.
2. Daily discipline is what makes the best among us so different from the rest among us. This can’t be stressed enough. We’ve all read about it, but discipline and willpower are high-value commodities. If you can trade in that currency, you’re among the best.
3. Think about “becoming”, not about doing or having or acquiring. This is a huge deal and even after reading so many books like The Compound Effect, this point gave me pause for a moment. When you think about it, the wildly successful business mogul is a fundamentally different person (not in the “you’ve changed man!” sense, but in the personal growth + confidence sense) than the person who was “becoming” for so many years. It’s not the flip of a switch, but rather a daily compounded progress. The lesson here is to stop “wanting” and start “being”. (again, you’ve heard this before, but how many of us are “being” right now?)
4. The formula for lucky. Receiving luck is all about choices. I’ve chosen to work out, read, follow up and so on…and so I’ve become what those choices have made me. If I’d chose to veg, watch TV and ignore people, I’d become what those choices then delivered. It’s simple, but are we always thinking our choices through? Oh, and the formula for lucky?
   Preparation (personal growth) +
   Attitude (belief/mindset) +
   Opportunity (a good thing coming your way) +
   Action (doing something about it) =
   LUCK!
5. Keeping score is essential. How many of us keep score of the goals and objectives we’ve set for the year. I’ve started using a new format for scorekeeping this year that I picked up along the way which details the end of year numbers I’d like to hit and then works backward by quarter so that you’re working 90 days at a time toward a 365 day goal. So far, so good. One other tool that Darren suggests is a “weekly rhythm register” which is a very powerful tool for tracking the score of your commitments.
6. Formula for life.
   CHOICES (decisions) + BEHAVIOR (action) + HABIT (repeated action) + COMPOUND EFFECT (Time) = REACHING YOUR GOALS
7. Bookend your days. You have control over few things in life, but in most every case, you can control how you start your day (when you get up, what influences you first, how you prepare for the day ahead) and how you end your day (when you rest, how you close out your affairs, how you prep for the next day). Bookend your days with positive routines to boost your productivity and mastery over your life. As a bonus, Darren actually walks through the detail of his morning routine bookend. It’s pretty impressive, actually.
8. Darren states that his key competitive advantage is consistency. I agree with this being a competitive advantage and we’ve talked about it in the context of publishing, content marketing and social media before. Consistency is a trait of winners.
9. Influences and associations matter. Be mindful of who you listen to, spend time with and take your cues from.
10. Learning without execution is useless. The Compound Effect has a full appendix of resources to help keep you on the path and moving forward. More to the point, the resources will help you to become, not just do.

All in all, The Compound Effect is well worth the read. It’s definitely doable in a week’s time, maybe even in just a few evenings. The lessons from the book are designed to be much longer lasting, but only time will tell! Lessons and formulas aside, this is one of the better “success” books that I’ve read in a while. Of course, much of what’s here is “nothing new under the sun”, but then again, few things are truly that “new”. What the book is, however, is a great refresher and resource for some daily reminders of how to get from here, where you are, to there, where you want to be.

The funny thing about these weekly bits of marketing inspiration is that they come from either an experience or from reading. I have a bit of both to share this week.

12 Reasons to Read One Book Each Week
Joshua Becker over at Becoming Minimalist has set a challenge to read a book each week this year. I’m trying to follow his lead (so far, so good 3 weeks into the year) and am loving it. It’s truly amazing what you learn, how much you grow and who and what you become as a result of your reading. Admittedly, I don’t have much of a stomach for fiction, so much of my reading is related to marketing, business or self-development, but there will be a few good stories (non-fictional accounts of history most likely) mixed in there as well. I also like what Scott over at Live Your Legends has suggested with his 80/20 rule of reading. He recommends picking 5 books to reread every year instead of 50 new ones. There are a few books that I re-read (or listen to) each year. I guess I’ll count those in my book-per-week as well.

This Week’s Book – The Compound Effect – Lessons in CONSISTENCY
There are many lessons that one can learn from the book, but the one that should resonate most with marketers is the concept of consistency.  In fact, (we talk about this all the time in class) consistency is the one thing that we see as the key differentiator to success with social media marketing and the alternative.

The power of consistency can be expressed using the water pump metaphor.  (quick aside: we actually have one of these at our cabin and use it for water, so I know exactly how this thing works…in case you wondered).  To get water from a well using a hand pump, you must put some effort into pumping before even a drip of water flows (aka, results) but when the water flows, the effort to get gallons and gallons of water is relatively easy. In fact, you often slack off considerably with your effort to get the water you need.  Now, what happens when you stop pumping?  Yes, that’s right – you have to start all over, and not just from where you left off, but from the beginning.  That’s why consistency is so important.  Keep it up, and it’s easy to get results over time… Drop the ball (or the handle) and you need to start all over.

Marketers who are consistently at it every day, building their business, should be an inspiration to all of us.

#BUAD273 – Social Media Marketing Class at St. Norbert College
One of the big reasons that I enjoy teaching at the college level is the depth to which you can explore ideas and conversations with a class over a period of weeks (even months in a proper semester) that you just don’t get in a 2 hour or even 2 day seminar with working professionals.  Don’t get me wrong, I love doing social media classes whenever and wherever I can, but there’s something about the college atmosphere that’s just beyond compare.

So here’s a quick “thank you” to my students in BUAD273, the Social Media & Thought Leadership Marketing course I teach at St. Norbert, for being great sports, great contributors to the class, for the novel ideas that came up with in their projects and for the bits of insight and inspiration they provided over the past 3 weeks.

The Time Between Facebook Posting
EdgeRank Checker released some important research this week when they shared that the brands acieving the greatest returns from Facebook are those posting about every 3 hours. Any more is wasted, and any less frequently and you miss out on the natural rhythm of how often your fans are likely checking Facebook. The lesson here: Consistency and Timing!
http://techcrunch.com/2012/01/17/how-often-should-facebook-pages-post/

The Internet: for Their Effort to Stop SOPA and PIPA
It’s official. January 18th, 2012 was the largest online protest in history to stop the internet censorship bills, SOPA & PIPA. On January 20th, Congress shelved the bills indefinitely. Outstanding display of collaboration and unity across the web. Obviously, we all made our point. Inspiring indeed!