As a writer who’s active in social networking and the mom blogging community, I hear a lot about PR companies contacting bloggers. And unfortunately, most of it isn’t good. Companies aren’t doing their homework. They are casting a wide net without getting to know who they are pitching. And it’s blowing up in their faces.

Bloggers are not like newspaper reporters (although there are some who have a journalism background) and sending them press releases generally doesn’t work. Why would they write about your company or product? They aren’t getting paid like reporters, so writing something for free rarely appeals unless it’s a charitable cause close to their heart. Don’t underestimate the power of the mantra, “What’s in it for me?”

This is a different game. If you want to get a blogger’s attention, you must first pay attention. You must get to know them. Read their blogs. Find out if they blog semi-anonymously or if they freely post their names (I do). If you send them an email that says “Dear blogger” or worse, you get their name wrong, they will immediately trash your missive. When you can’t take the time to get the details right, why should they take the time to hear what you have to say?

Some companies do take the time to build up a relationship with bloggers. They listen and learn what works. What really surprises me, though, is that companies don’t ask for help up front. If you know someone who’s fairly active in the community, knows names, knows blogs, and is so entrenched that they know the bloggers and their audiences, why not just ask that person to consult with you?

That’s right, if you want to pitch mom bloggers, why not find a mom blogger who knows exactly who might be open to the company and even help you improve your pitch? It’s not foolproof of course, but you certainly have a much larger chance of success by talking to someone who knows the scene. It’s the same with business blogs, techie blogs, and politics. Find someone who already knows. Ask them to help.

It doesn’t dismiss you from doing your homework, but it can help cut your time by giving you a list of people to talk to and get to know. And then, you might be a little closer to actually getting it right.

image: sxc.hu

Every so often, all writers will find a glimmer of success among the daily grind. Yesterday, one of the blogs where I write was picked up on a social networking site, which made my traffic soar from about 500 hits a day to nearly 2000 hits. Today, that traffic is still going strong. At 4:00 PM EST, I’m already at around 1300 hits.

Image: sxc.hu

When you have moments of success like this, it is important to enjoy it. Some writers just smile and go on with their work, but these are the gems of your career - the “pat on the back” that a boss would give you at a 9-to-5 job. You don’t have to buy a new car to celebrate! I took a half-day in order to celebrate my success. Others things I’ve done in the past when I succeeded at something involving my writing:

• Treating myself to Dairy Queen or Rita’s Italian Ice (yum!)
• Purchasing a book I’ve been wanting to read
• Going to the movies
• Making my favorite foods for dinner

It doesn’t have to cost much to reward yourself, and you don’t have to take time off from work if you can’t afford it. The basic idea is to just admit to yourself that you’ve done a good job. After all, if you are anything like me, you always think your writing could be better. I’m never 100% happy with anything, and I’m my own worst critic.

The bottom line? Don’t forget to reward yourself for success in the freelancing world. It goes a long way in avoiding burnout.

There are several reasons to use Facebook for your business. Networking with your current customers, finding new ones, launching products or pushing information out to a large group. All can be beneficial to keeping your business in front of people.

You can create a fan page based on your business or product, if it’s something that’s appropriate for what you do. People are fans of more than just musicians, causes, and TV shows. If your customers are naturally congregating on Facebook, you can give them a place to hopefully talk with other customers about your product. And you can push information out to them by posting news, promotions, and other information to the fan page.

If you Twitter, you can set your Twitter stream to cross-post to your Facebook wall. You can also set other services like StumbleUpon, delicious, and even a blog to post short blurbs to Facebook. Why would you want to do this? For starters, it keeps your content fresh. Secondly, if you’re sharing information with your customers — and it’s helpful information — you become a trusted source for them.

You can also see what’s important to your customers. By seeing what they and their friends are talking about, it gives you a better idea of how to best interact with them. Maybe you’ll see a problem they have that you can solve. If you can offer a solution without being pushy, just offer to help, you improve that relationship.

Just make sure than you join in on conversations and do more than just promote you or your product. Add some substance to whatever it is people are talking about. If you only say “Buy this, buy this, buy this” people will ignore you. Do it enough and they’ll start telling others to ignore you, too. Don’t spam. Offer value. Earn trust. Give a little something extra. Build a fan base.

image: lumaxart.com

Although he just left Yahoo Inc. a year ago in the middle of a messy battle between the company and an investor, Jeff Weiner has now signed on to become the new CEO of LinkedIn, a social networking website for professionals. Weiner joined LinkedIn in January as its interim president and has received the support of other LinkedIn executives.

Yahoo and Weiner parted ways when the company decided to get rid of some of its executives due to its proxy war with investor Carl Icahn. Microsoft offered to acquire Yahoo last year, but when Yahoo completely refused to entertain the offer, Icahn started the proxy war in order to remove Yahoo’s Board of Directors.

Weiner joins LinkedIn as the website continues to surge in popularity, with over 42 million members all over the world. The company’s outlook is optimistic for the rest of the year and next year, as it anticipates an increase in profitability as Weiner takes the reins.

Image: Flickr

Online, many people are known by their screen names, rather than by their first and last names. Most people (myself included) use a single screen name for everything from Twitter to AIM to MySpace. And that’s fine…if you only use social networking for your business.

Image: sxc.hu

But most people don’t. I have friends that I only contact through social networking and instant messaging, and they have nothing to do with my writing business. While some people are able to use one online identity and keep communications separate, many make the mistake of forgetting that clients and business associates have their screen names. It doesn’t look good to put up an away message that says “Getting drunk with my girlzzzzz!!!” if one of your clients could read that message!

Unless you can commit to being professional all of the time, which many people (especially young writers) find difficult, get another screen name. Save “hotgirly4389″ for your friends and be “Jane.Smith123″ for anyone connected to your business. Screen names are free, but your reputation can’t be repaired easily if your clients get the wrong impression of you.

You may not think of Twitter as your portal to the world of online shopping, but as Twitter continues to consider ways of making money, the idea of selling products through Twitter has gained steam. According to Todd Chaffee, a Twitter board member, the website may offer links to products, creating a source of revenue for Twitter through corporate partnerships.
 
Twitter has been recognized as a way for users to get product recommendations from their followers, so Twitter may decide to make it even easier and allow users to buy the product in one easy step. Many companies have already made their way to Twitter and advertised directly to consumers, benefiting from free advertisement and the ability to gauge customer responses. 
 
In order to differentiate itself from search engines, Twitter would combine customer recommendations and advice with standard e-commerce practices. Also, Twitter would allow customers to learn everything they need to know about a product and then purchase it without having to navigate to several different websites.

Using my Twitter mug (Image: Flickr)

A few years ago, MySpace was the leading social networking website on the planet. Now, not only has Facebook caught MySpace in the social networking race, they’re on the verge of pulling away from MySpace.

MySpace (Flickr)

As part of that fallout, MySpace recently revealed that they will fire about one-third of their employees — or about 420 workers. MySpace says this move will allow the company to become more nimble and more comparable to Facebook. Considering before this move that MySpace had approximately 1,420 employees and Facebook had 850 employees, this move makes a lot of sense on paper.

However, this may be just a band-aid for MySpace. The company has obviously fallen behind in the technological race with other social networking websites and users are jumping ship at an alarming rate. Additionally, Google’s extremely lucrative advertising deal with MySpace will soon expire.

At this rate, MySpace is going to need to figure out how to turn around this negative trend. If not, MySpace could be in the social networking graveyard in a few years.

Many companies are watching what’s being said about them online. Social networking has made it much easier for them to find references from dissatisfied customers — and even given them opportunities to resolve any issues. Those interactions are hopefully part of a detailed marketing plan.

Having employees dedicated to navigating and monitoring social media is a great idea. Make sure they know how your company should be represented. What about your other employees? Are they aware of how their actions can affect your company?

According to Deloitte’s 2009 Ethics & Workplace Survey, 74% of workers surveyed believe it is easy to damage a brand’s reputation via social networking sites. So what are you doing about it? While I don’t believe you should curtail employee participation in their personal lives, you can ask them to be more careful.

Talk to your employees and let them know your policies and expectations. Ask them not to talk about work projects or clients in a manner that can reflect negatively on the company. Educate them on how social networking can affect their professional standing (but please, don’t use that as a threat). Maybe (hopefully) not their standing at your company, but in the eyes of their colleagues and peers.

But be aware that almost half of the employees surveyed said that a company policy would not change their online behavior. So if you do have a policy, employees may ignore it anyway. And 53% said their activities are none of their employer’s business anyway.

The best bet is to proceed with caution. If you think an employee’s actions are damaging your brand, talk to him and see if you can find a way to resolve the issue. No one really wants to see someone fired for their online actions.

[via Marketing Pilgrim]

image: lumaxart under CC: attribution/ share-alike

The word myth tends to conjure up images of Greek and Roman gods, mighty stories of struggle for power or love. And that’s a little of the expectation when you see a Business Week article titled “Beware Social Media Marketing Myths.” When really, they’re more like misconceptions that you can clear up with just a little research.

As I mentioned previously, we’re going to take a look at these “myths” and see that while social media marketing isn’t for everyone, it’s relatively easy to clear up the misconceptions about this new wave of marketing. I’ll go through each point and tell you my take on Marks’ conclusions. You can find myths 1 and 2 here. We’ll conclude with myth numbers 3, 4 and 5.

3. You need to be on all the big sites.
I actually agree with Marks on this one. You don’t need to be on every social networking site. Choose a few - whatever is reasonable to maintain a regular presence. For most people, that’s probably only about two or three at the most. You want to be able to participate with the community, build some rapport, and gain some trust that you’re not just there to use people, but to really contribute to conversations.

4. Social networking sites are for marketing.
Now this one is a fine line. According to Marks, business owners have told him that social networking sites are for service, not marketing. You should use them to foster customer loyalty and respond to their needs. And I have seen companies like Zappos and Dell do just that.

Monitoring what people say about your company and jumping into help when there are problems should be part of your overall marketing program. It’s about protecting your brand’s perception the marketplace by being responsive to your customers on their turf. And that’s still a part of marketing. While social networking sites don’t exist just for you to market your business, a little bit of savvy networking doesn’t hurt.

5. Social networking is the future.
I’ll concede a bit here, too. Is social networking the be-all, end-all of marketing? No. It’s not the only future of online marketing. Personal interactions are still your best bet for making a positive impression. You definitely don’t want to put all of your efforts into social networking to the exclusion of other marketing segments.

But for the right company, with the right potential customer base, social media marketing can enhance your overall efforts. It’s your job to filter through the information and figure out if it’s right for your company.

image: sxc.hu

The word myth tends to conjure up images of Greek and Roman gods, mighty stories of struggle for power or love. And that’s a little of the expectation when you see a Business Week article titled “Beware Social Media Marketing Myths.” When really, they’re more like misconceptions that you can clear up with just a little research.

As I mentioned previously, we’re going to take a look at these “myths” and see that while social media marketing isn’t for everyone, it’s relatively easy to clear up the misconceptions about this new wave of marketing. I’ll go through each point and tell you my take on Marks’ conclusions. We’ll start with myth numbers 1 and 2.

1. Social media sites are free.

Marks complains that social media sites aren’t free because you have to put time into them. Why, yes you do. Just as you would put time into any marketing campaign. Word of mouth advertising is free, too, but you won’t get any of it unless you commit to bettering your relationship with your customers.

2. Great places to find new customers.

Marks thinks major social networking sites may not be the best place for business owners. That could be true, but it really depends on the type of business we’re talking about. Heavy equipment companies probably aren’t going to find a lot of customers in social media, unless they are looking at a site for construction workers and heavy equipment operators. Don’t be so quick to think you can’t find your people somewhere online.

I have to question how much of a chance Marks has given these sites when he states that the most avid Facebook and MySpace users are pimply adolescents and goth teens. Or that forty somethings on Facebook are nostalgic to see how fat and bald everyone from high school has become.

He totally misses the point. It is a good place to find new customers if that’s where your customers already hang out and you have a product that fits their needs or lifestyle. There are other venues, though, and he does offer a few alternatives for small business owners.

And yes, maybe some of the self-proclaimed social media gurus/ experts are trying to make people think that all social networking sites are all things to all people. But if you stop and look around, you’ll realize it’s just like any other medium: television, newspapers, magazines, public venues. Some work better than others for your product. Your company. It’s up to you to figure out which ones will suit your company.

We’ll continue on in Part 3 with the rest of the myths. In the mean time, feel free to tell us why you agree or disagree with his (or my) conclusions about social media marketing.

image: sxc.hu