Are you letting your Army drift away?

Growing up, we always looked forwards to walk-a-thons and bike-a-thons. I guess the money went to help some cause or another, usually cancer I think. I do not remember if we got a thank you after the fact. We did it because it was fun. Now I wonder why they did not keep in touch. Sure, I am old and keeping in touch was more expensive back then, but we were an army of kids going door to door collecting money for them. They could have built a much more powerful advocacy group if they got creative. Who is your army of advocates and potential advocates? What are you doing to keep them your advocates when they are not directly involved? Your Potential Army is bigger than you think:

• Employees
• Customers
• Family
• Friends
• Ex Employees
• Co-workers from previous jobs
• Classmates from school
• Suppliers/vendors you do business with
• Other business owners in your community
• Business Reporters and bloggers
• Local government officials (While they cannot promote you, they like to talk about success stories)

OK, so you have a lot of potential advocates. Now what? Begin by setting some very long term goals for yourself and for your business. Some examples might be to double your referrals. One may be to find a new job or to find new employees. Now build a database of your advocates and start communicating with them periodically. Do not start your first communication as “I need…” Build the relationship back up and when they ask how you have been, that is the opportunity to say, “I am well, thanks. I would be much better if I could…” Don’t do it for the goals though. Do it because you want to. Do it because you want to help the people that also care about your success. This is the road to growing your army of advocates.

Blog comments - How do they effect you?

The funny thing about blogs and the comments is that it is an open invitation to slightly promote yourself. People are so self conscious of the comment that they fear posting something. Our friend Phil at Make It Great has a lot of traffic and is asking for people to post, but still only has 2 comments as of 10:00 AM on July 17th. Get over there and post something. Create a little buzz for yourself. He even gives you a format, to make it really easy.

Do they love work?

David Lorenzo at Career Intensity has a nice post about knowing if your job is right for you.... If your employees feel this way, they are waiting on direction from you on how to create more buzz.

Ingenutiy Festival - Cleveland

Today starting at 2:00 (until late) I will be volunteering at the Red Room Revolution booth at the Ingenuity Festival in Cleveland. Stop by and say hi. If you follow what I write, you know that I practice what I preach. (This blog is one way of many I create buzz.) Volunteering and being involved in local economic development are other ways I create buzz. I will make about $10 today in drink money, but I will also get to meet a bunch of people, and that I find fun and valuable.

Go Big Network - Building a place for entrepreneurs to meet.

I was down in Columbus to meet a client yesterday, and we took time to meet up with some local entrepreneurs. We met Eric Corl and Wil Schroter from GoBig. They had great energy and vision, and it was a lot of fun. If you are involved in business, the goBIG network is great. I get a lot of buzz by posting select blog posts in their blog tool (which is more of an aggregated.) Check them out at: www.gobignetwork.com and feel free to look me up and add me as a connection.

Creating Buzz with your Existing Customers

Yesterday I was talking to one of our long time clients. He is enamored with a new feature in our Outstanda eMarketing solution that allows him to build databases on the fly. I am worried he is going to spend his whole weekend building simple data forms. As I was guiding him through some of the special features he asked if there is a way to do a grid. Why not use surveys? I asked. Those are just for eNewsletters, aren't they? He asked back. No, You can do huge research projects with this thing..... He'd been a client for years and never realized some of the key features and products he had under his nose and free for him to use. Within 24 hours of finding this out, he was so excited he was out creating buzz and sent us a referral. My point is this: Make sure your existing customers know everything you do, even if they do not need everything you do today.

Success Secrets for your Personal Buzz Marketing

Here are some basic principles that will help you be more successful with buzz challenges. These success secrets are centered around building quality relationships and being generous. Keep these in mind when buzzing and you will be building good will and standing out from the crowd.

• Talk less than half the time. A good listener will always stand out more than someone that dominates a conversation and does not give others a chance to express themselves
• Build a personal network even if you do not need it. You may not be in sales and you may not need to know lots of people, but start behaving like a network is essential to your job and success. A strong network will always pay dividends eventually.
• Don’t be afraid of Link Love. Link to other people’s websites, blogs and other online resources and they will often link back to you.
• Don’t hold back. Connect with people when you have the chance. Say hi and smile more. Don’t wait for someone else to break the ice.
• Give generously. No, don’t give away your money. Give people value by making introductions with people they will benefit knowing. Give people information they will like reading. Give value and knowledge without worrying about how you are going to make money that day.

Buzz depends on people talking to other people. It starts with you. Build good will and great relationships and creating buzz will be a much easier task.

Amanda Congdon & Rocketboom

First my confession. I'd heard of this Rocketboom before but had never taken the time to check it out. I'd never heard of Amanda Congdon. This post is for people just like me. You see, I started seeing so much news about it that I had to check it out. If you are unfamiliar with this, check out the CNN article. The article mentions blogs, Craigs list, video blogging and how to become well known on a shoe string. If you go to Technorati, Rocketboom and Amanda Congdon are top searches. I have seen mention on several big name blogs, which is what first brought them to my attention. I frequently talk about making every employee into an expert or celebrity. Here is a great example of someone who has done it. Just be sure to have a back up plan.

Frontier Towns and the Internet

I live in a city that is celebrating 200 years of history this year. It got me thinking about what it was like back then. With a few thousand dollars and the spirit of adventure, you could set off into the wild and not just strike gold, but build a city. Heck, lots of people were founding cities. You bought some land, ideally along a river, path or railroad, and you started your buzz marketing campaign. “Come live in the best new city in Ohio…” Practically anyone could do it. If you got a good location and good buzz, you succeeded. The Internet really is the new frontier. Myspace is a big city. Look at the July 2006 trend briefing at trend watching. If you think of your new Web 2.0 system as a new city you need to create buzz for, you have a much bigger chance to succeed.

What is your Niche Attitude?

In business, we know that by focusing on a niche we can often be more successful. If you try to be everything to everyone, you are a watered down jack of all trades and no one will see you as a specialist. Many small business owners water down their attitude as well. They are afraid of offending someone and loosing sales. By no means am I suggesting you go out and upset people, but take some time to figure out what attitudes make you who you are and take pride in them, even if not everyone agrees. For example, I have an attitude that many business owners do not like. I believe that if an employee is not willing to spend 5 minutes a day on their own time creating buzz for where they work, it is grounds to fire them. I believe that is the owner’s responsibility to provide guidance, encouragement and incentives to do this, and that employees along with owners and management must do it. Period. You would be surprised at how many owners have said “But my employees hate working for me…” Then stop worrying about buzz marketing and fix that problem first. That is my Niche Attitude. Love it. Hate it. I don’t care. (And yes, I know it is easier said than done.) What is your niche attitude? Use the comment option on this blog to let us know, if you are brave enough.

Reenergize your advocates

Whether you have a small group of people that care about your success or a world cup soccer stadium full of raving, fanatical fans, it is always good to reenergize your base whenever possible. How do you do this? Ideally, you have a way to contact people that are fans of yours. It may be an email list, it could be a newsletter and it could be doing presentations at regular networking or social groups. How do you reenergize them?

• New product release
• Big Success Story
• Discount offered for referrals only
• Contest
• Survey

For example, for the last week I have been doing marketing research on the mock up’s of our new book cover. People stay after meetings just to participate and one person today said “Make sure you let us help you promote it.” (As if I will say no….) Don’t assume people are keeping you top of mind. Having something new and interactive will help you energize that base and get people to actively think about you again.

Interview Questions - Starting trends on other blogs.

Over at Career Intensity David used my Interview Question post to start a trend of his own. If you have some favorites, send them to him.

Should your company be in Fast Company?

Celebrating success stories in the Akron Ohio area could get your company profiled in Fast Company. I just found out the top 12 will be published. If you do not qualify for this conference, find one you do qualify for. Nominations are a good way to create buzz.

Favorite Interview Questions

Whether marketing interview questions or technology interview questions, this list of 5 interview questions will help you cut through the clutter and find out who the applicant really is. I am listing these here, because to hire great people that are going to buzz about your organization, you have to look past the skill set and find out if they are capable of creating buzz for you. Here are 5 interview questions to add to the basics.

What are the last 3 books you have read and when did you read them?

What is the most important thing you have learned outside of school?

Who are the 3 most influential people you know personally and how did you meet them?

What is the worst product or service you have experienced in the last year and why? What could have made the experience positive?

Why did you choose this career? Why do you stay in it?

10 Ways to Make It Great!

A friend of mine has a great book out on attitude. 10 Ways to Make It Great! by Phil Gerbyshak ISBN: 1-4196-2998-0 It's a quick read that will brighten your day.