Working From The Basement

Sorry for the month long absence folks, but I’ve been working on a few things and trying to catch up with some other projects.  Anyway for those of you that know me I’ve had this side thing going on for awhile now where I got out and listen to local music on the weekends.  Well a few weeks ago while I’d been working on the website (which isn’t finished), I decided to promote my fan page on Facebook.  Initially I had convinced 4 of my friends to join but hadn’t posted anything, but with about 50 videos up on YouTube I finally had something for people to see.

Initially I sent invites out to about 100 people that are my friends this generated about 50 people signing up within a day or two.  Well I wasn’t exactly happy about that number, but eventually it organically grew to about 100 fans.  Considering I have slightly more than 150 friends on Facebook that’s not a bad number, but I really wanted to see if there was any interest in what I was trying to accomplish.  So I decided to take the plunge and set aside some money for a Facebook advertisement.

Well I am a newbie at this but Facebook has a really easy system for creating an ad, especially for Fan Pages.  I am not going to go into detail on how to do this part because it is really simple and Facebook has some great help documents on how to do it.  The biggest decision I had to make was in the pricing section either Pay per 1000 Impression (CPM) or Pay per Click (CPC).  Based on Facebook’s advice I went with CPC which means you only pay when somebody clicks on your Ad.  I targeted my Ad with the criteria listed in the image below, which gave me a pool of around 175,000 people.  Wow really, that’s a lot of people to reach, what’s the circulation of a typical daily paper?  No wonder the paper’s are losing advertising revenue, and remember these are targeted.

So after about a week and a half of playing with the daily maximum that I was willing to spend, along with the cost per click out of 175,000 people, 77 people clicked on the Ad and 42 people signed up for a total cost of $54.99.  The Ad actually was displayed over 175,000 times but that is irrelevant because I choose CPC, it would only have been a factor if I had chosen CPM. 

So here in a nutshell is what I learned:

• It was in my mind over 50% effective in getting people to become a fan when they clicked on the link.  This was with hardly any effort in producing the Ad, I took my logo and mission statement and did a cut and paste.
• Fan Pages have a viral quality, since the people who joined the Fan Page also had friends with similar interest for each person that became a fan other’s joined. This is because the newsfeed now posts when somebody joins a Facebook Group or Fan Page.
• I wasn’t selling anything so your results may vary if you are promoting a product or service.
• People on Facebook don’t click on the Ads very much, but this is irrelevant if you select CPC.
•  Know your target demographics bid as close to the suggested maximum and keep an eye on it; reduce it when you don’t think people will be into what you have to offer.  I increased my bidding in the afternoon, because if you’re into local bands and have been out I doubt you’re going to be up early.
• I now have the confidence to go through with the project, based on the feedback and people I have met through the Fan Page.

So the inevitable question becomes will I continue promoting the Ad and I have mixed emotions on this one.  While I want to promote the community the final website isn’t up so is it worth paying a $100/month, I’m not sure.  Once the website is up, yes I would use Facebook advertising to drive traffic to the Fan Page, then ultimately to my website.

Anyway I hope everyone is having a great year so far and check out my Local Band Review Fan Page and the Local Band Review YouTube Channel.  Also make sure to go see some of our hard working local talented bands most of them work  for little money and they put on a great show.  Technically all band members work from the basement or at least the garage.

WFTB
Michael Lawson

We all know the story of the cobblers kids walking around shoeless.  Well, I have been feeling that way for awhile now.  While Diana has had the B-Law LLC Fan Page up, I’ve been negligent and hadn’t done one for either WFTB or 2ndot, so last week I took the plunge.  The experience so far has been interesting in that, while I am used to getting followers on Twitter, a Fan Page can be a one-way street.  Twitter encourages conversation, while Fan Pages are more passive and the only way to talk to people you don’t know is to become their friend – unless they participate, which kind of defeats the purpose.  You can start a discussion, but there is no guarantee that anyone will participate and sending a Facebook email seems too invasive.

So what use are they, you may ask? Well, it does provide you with a fairly low-maintenance way to interact with potential clients and build a referral network without much work.  I have always found it annoying when people update their personal Facebook status from TweetDeck or some other Twitter-related tool because most of the time it is Twitter speak (lots of @ symbols and short talk).  Facebook now provides a link to go the other way, which seems more effective as long as your first 120 characters gets your point across.  (The other 24 characters get turned into a shortened link pointing back to the Facebook post). It is also easier to update than a Blog, which actually takes time to think about, write, add links, and check your spelling and grammar etc., while adding an external link, photo or status update in Facebook with a comment is a fairly quick and easy process.

So the next question is what do you put up there? Do you just rehash the same thing that you put on Twitter?  My answer is no.  Since I started with the 2ndot Fan Page, let me explain a little bit about what I did with it.  Since @2ndot is my primary work-related and personal online personality, I wanted the page to reflect that persona.  So I decided to provide links to information that an everyday computer user would find interesting or useful.  My business normally doesn’t provide home computer support, just business-related services. But I have a wealth of information that can help home users, so a Facebook Fan Page provides a perfect platform for this.  A bonus here is that I don’t need yet another website to maintain, and it’s a totally opt-in relationship.  Also being able to use the discussion feature allows people to ask home computer related questions.  Facebook is also a great product to use for event scheduling, with attendance tracking and just notifying people in general, so having a Fan Page opens up another communications avenue.

While my personal profile on Facebook is very active, I don’t like spammy Fan Pages, so I have decided to limit my posts to only one or two a day maximum.  I think this may even be too much and I will adjust it if I get complaints.  As for the WFTB Fan Page, well, for now I will probably use it to promote the site much in the same way I do in Twitter.  Since WFTB is a blogging website I think you would use it to direct traffic to the blog, but only time will tell.  I am really interested in any feedback about my techniques used here and how other micro-businesses use their Fan Pages, so feel free to comment.

Again thanks for visiting WFTB…

WFTB – Michael Lawson

OK, by now you are probably wondering what a picture of me dressed up in a blue bunny fur coat and a cowboy hat is doing in this article.   Well the CT TweetCrawlers are meeting at Public’s in Middletown Wednesday night for Karaoke and I thought I would present a challenge.  If we can get 25 people to vote in the poll to get me on the stage in this getup (My Halloween Costume) and donate $10 to Operation Home for the Holidays, I will do two songs dressed like this.  Since I am mostly bald shaving my head would have been a bad fund raising idea at best.

So please pledge your support in a comment attached to this article and vote on the sidebar poll. I am looking to raise a mere $250, but would like to do better.  In order to get more people to attend please go to the Facebook Page for this event and invite your friends and direct them to this post to pledge their support.  You can also post a link to this article on your Facebook page or use Twitter, the more the merrier. Public is one of the best night spots in Middletown and is always a lot of fun, please come and join us.  Also remember that the “Open House to Bring Them Home” Party is now free this Saturday.  Below are the details and links for both events, we hope to see you there.

UPDATED EVENT INFO FOR KARAOKE FUNDRAISER:

Wednesday November 11^th 2009
Karoake TweetCrawl at Public’s in Middletown
337 Main Street
Middletown, CT
6:00pm – 9:00pm

UPDATED EVENT INFO FOR MAIN FUNDRAISER:

Saturday November 14^th 2009
Operation Home for the Holidays TweetCrawl
The Warehouse of Lisa Davenport’s Home Gallery
9 Austin Drive
Marlborough, CT
1:00pm – 5:00pm
This Event is now “Open House to Bring Them Home” party
Kid Friendly and lots of Raffles and Prizes, please RSVP on Facebook.

WFTB – Michael Lawson

When Diana and I started this blog it was pretty much for shits and giggles, well almost.  After attending Podcamp in Boston this year we wanted to try publishing content centered on small and micro-businesses.  Initially promoting the site just using the Social Media skills we had acquired in the past year also seemed like a good idea.  Since I already had this domain name registered it was just a matter of installing WordPress on one of my servers and setting up email.   If you ask me I don’t even remember registering this domain name, but the name fit and we where off to the races.

Our goal was to create a collaborative site; the reason for this is that both of us had gone very spotty on our independent blogs.  Writing one or two posts a week isn’t as hard as writing the three or four a week which is what I believe is the minimum you need for an independent blog site.  Still with our busy schedules it is still fairly difficult to maintain the pace, but we did it.  This will be our twentieth post in a month’s time which is right in line with what we wanted.

A funny thing happened though – I don’t think Diana and I have written very many articles from our original lists.  This is because we picked a really broad subject area to write about based on our everyday experiences and interactions from which we get fresh ideas. A lot of these ideas come from the comments left by our readers; these outnumber the articles 3 to 1, when you consider all the Social Media postings. The feedback we get when we attend networking events has also helped drive and motivate us like we never imagined.  So what started as a cathartic release on the joys and frustrations of the small business owner has became something bigger.

I included a chart at the beginning of the article to depict our traffic patterns using WordPress statistics which show some predicable results.  When we tweet and link the articles on Facebook, traffic is double or triple what it is if we don’t do anything.  Our rise in Google rankings is also helped by our frequent updates and posts linking us to other sites.  So anyone thinking of a way to drive traffic to their blog or website needs to post frequently and share the information using Social Media techniques.  Diana’s articles also usually rank higher than mine when we measure direct links back to the posts. This may be because I tend to promote Diana’s posts more than mine or she is just more popular, either way it is an interesting phenomenon.

We intend to expand the blog over the next few months to include podcasts and video to keep it fresh and interesting.  We really appreciate everyone’s feedback and comments both good and bad, and if you want to contribute please let us know.  We are particularly interested in expanding WFTB beyond Connecticut so if anyone is interested in covering events in different States please contact us.  Thanks again everyone for a great first month and for reading what Diana and I quietly refer to as the Seinfeld of blogs (it’s about nothing and everything, but it’s always entertaining).

WFTB – Michael Lawson, Diana Bartolotta

Bet the title of this article got your attention didn’t it, well that’s the point. Sticking out in the crowd with all the information available to us today is hard. The real title of this post should be how to write a ransom note, but the serial killer title just sounded too good to pass up.  While you can’t really plan on what is going viral, you can stick out from the crowd by just being different. A good example of this is the wedding entrance dance video that even made it to an episode of the Office. I’m sure they didn’t plan on it being such a phenomenon, but it was unique and got passed around on the Internet.

 Just look at your mail box to figure out what does and doesn’t work. How many of those slick and square mailers with lots of colors do you use as Frisbee’s and throw toward the circular file. On the other hand look at those fake governmental mailers that trick you into opening them, with special seals and wording.  I am not recommending these practices but it is obvious that just a slick flyer with pretty colors doesn’t grab your attention anymore.

In my last business I signed up for Robin Robin’s Technology Marketing Toolkit and while I am not endorsing this product I must say at the time she had some good ideas.  One that caught my attention was sending out a plain typed paper, like it was done on a manual typewriter, believe it or not this stands out especially when it is about technology. A friend of mine makes sure that he buys the most colorful and varied stamps to put on an envelope with different denominations.  He also slaps them across the envelope so they stick out; this ensures that his envelope will at least be looked at. If you are still engaging in traditional marketing and it is no longer working for you try something different next time.

On the Internet you have to learn how to get noticed and draw attention to yourself.  After all this is what Web 2.0 is all about getting people interested in you or your services and seeking you out. Social Media sites such as Linkedin, FaceBook and Twitter let people learn about you and your brand at a more personal level. So don’t be afraid to take a few chances and be funny, or supply information that relates to your personal interests.  You have to be very careful about not spamming them, so creat a Facebook Page and Linkedin group and invite people to join. If you have a flair for writing then start a blog, especially if you produce a newsletter now.  Wordpress.com is a great place to start, or you could just contribute an article to WFTB or another collaborative blog. If you are handy with a camera consider doing videos and posting them on YouTube, try and keep them under 2 minutes though, but we’ll discuss more about that in a later article.

My main point here is that if you are broadcasting a message that is the same as everyone else you are not going to be able to use Web 2.0 techniques to your advantage. If you’re doing traditional marketing it has to stick out from the crowd or it  gets thrown away.  So start thinking viral and send out your first Ransom note to your prospective clients.

Sidenote: I created the Ransom Note on my Iphone here, just for some fun.  In case you can’t read it, it says “Buy my Product or Else!”.

WFTB – Michael Lawson

Last week, I attended the Middlesex Businesswomen’s Alliance monthly event.  The presentation that evening was “LinkedIn 101,” by Gateway Financial Group’s President and resident social media expert, David Wood.

First, let me tell you what Little Dave got right:

1.  Put a picture on your LinkedIn profile. His reason – take the profile seriously.  My reason – what does your face look like?  Have we met before?  It creates a personal connection, which is what internet connections are supposed to facilitate.

2.  Groups, groups, groups. Little Dave hit this on the head.  In fact, he said this in a presentation a year ago and, honestly, this was the first time it had occurred to me.  Groups can be your greatest way of connecting with those who need your services.   Join groups whose mission and values appeal to you, develop real connections, and then when those people need services of the professional nature you offer, you will be the first name that comes to mind.

3.  Don’t advertise.  It annoys people. That’s why it’s called “spam.”  Create valuable content with real benefit to the end user, and that person will seek out your services.  Don’t come right out and say “Buy my 3bed/2bath ranch in West Hartford.”  Instead, provide the people following you with useful information, such as, “The tax credit ends on November 30.  Did you realize that’s on the Monday right after the five-day bank vacation of Thanksgiving?  Better aim for the beginning of the month.”

Now, let me tell you what Little Dave got wrong:

1.  His advice, “Connect with people whose connections are valuable to you, pick up the phone, and call them.”

He missed the whole point of Web 2.0 (soon to be Web 3.0).  He advised to apply traditional methods of networking – figure out who people know, whether you can use them or who they know, pick up the phone, and start a dialogue.

Don’t call me.  Email me if you’re really brave (caveat emptor), but definitely don’t call me.  Connect with me online – follow me on Twitter, connect with me on LinkedIn, and join my fanpage on Facebook.  But don’t call me.  When I need you, I’ll find you.  If you call me, you’re getting yourself blacklisted for cold-calling me.  When you need my help, find me and tell me you need my help.  You’ll already know what I do, because we’ve legitimately connected, shared resources, and discussed ideas.  But definitely don’t call me.

2.  Judge people by their connections.

I disagree completely.  LinkedIn, to me, is like a virtual exchange of business cards – in one direction only, in my viewpoint.  If someone invites me to connect, I connect.

Caveat – I am NOT an open networker.  I do not follow people on Twitter, simply because they follow me, and I don’t connect with everyone who wants to connect with me.

But why is he wrong?  Three points:

a.  LinkedIn profiles are dynamic.  Just because someone is not valuable today does not mean they might not be valuable in the future.

b.  When someone invites me to connect, that person is allowing me to pump their head full of my propogand…..er, marketing materials.  That, by itself, is a value.  And once I spread my prop…er, marketing materials to that person, the viral nature of the internet means that it’ll end up exactly in the hands  of the right person.  So, the more, the merrier.

c.  Database.  By connecting with the person, I can see the details of his/her connections when I’m using the database feature of LinkedIn.  (A hidden secret, for later discussion.)  So, we all know people who are Division 3 in the world of business.  But, since we all know them, then they all know us, right?  When I need another Division 1 or 2, I can find them through the database feature, which gives me much better information than a simple Google search.  I can figure out quality, education, background – everything – by using the person I don’t want to connect with as a filter.  (Thank you, LinkedIn, because I know that wasn’t intentional.)

3.  I do really have 300 friends.  They’re Facebook friends.  It’s a different category.  Facebook friends are, again, people with similar interests, with whom you have crossed paths at some point in your life.  They are people whose kids’ photos you actually do want to see, whose ham sandwich you do know about (because she’s vegan and shouldn’t be eating ham), and whose thoughts and interests you are genuinely interested in.

I want to see pictures of my college roommate’s kids, because when am I going to get back to Pittsburgh again anytime soon.  I want to hear Jochen’s adventures in whatever crazy European country he is now.  I want to hear about Isaac’s adventures teaching English in Korea.  Because that is interesting to me.

I don’t want to be Facebook friends with the Governor, because I don’t think she’s giving me the cow I need for FarmVille, and she’s probably not going to challenge me to a game of Farkle or Bejeweled.  That’s not a Facebook friend; that’s a LinkedIn colleague.

Facebook friends are the ones you would sit and chat with, laugh with, and play with, if time and geography were not limiting you.

The future of business:  Real relationships with people you like

I say – this is the dialogue, connecting online is the dialogue, the relationship.  Business is no longer about who you know and how powerful you are.  Business is about who you are. Be yourself, and the people who want to do business with a person just like you will find you.

Connect with people you like.  Do business with people who like you, just the way you are.  With the advent of social networking technologies, you can now locate and develop relationships with people just like you.  Under traditional networking approaches, you were limited in scope to those you could connect with physically.  Now, remove those boundaries and use the internet as a network to connect with those most like you.

Do business with people you like.  Enjoy life.  Because life can be amazing, if you just let it.