Social Media Marketing and your Business

Posted on13. Sep, 2011 by Douglas Richardson.

As a business owner, and you’re not aware of “Social Media Marketing” (SMM). You are either so busy with the customers that are coming into your business, or you live under a rock out in the desert somewhere with no internet connection! All kidding aside SMM is the fasted growing segment of advertizing out there and in many cases it is FREE for the taking!

SMM sites such as FaceBook; Twitter; Linkedin and YouTube are visited literally by hundreds of millions of people a day! Now I know that the first thought that comes to you is, Hey, I am not a national or international business! My customer base is fifty or less miles from Bend or even smaller! Well read on this applies to you also in more ways than you may realize.

Nearly all consumers (97%) now use online media when researching products and services, according to BIA/Kelsey’s ongoing tracking study. The misconception that only young people use (SMM) for shopping, but in fact nearly all of the buying public now use them. Marketing has shifted from a one-way broadcast to a multi-point conversation. In the past, communications were broadcast exclusively through mass marketing channels like radio, TV, newspapers door to door distribution of directories like the Yellow Pages.

Businesses are wise to think beyond their websites and reach out to prospects and customers where they spend their time online, whether it is on Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, YouTube, other social networks, or through blogs or podcasts. This strategy involves establishing a presence in multiple locations of SMM, where prospects can engage with your company in conversations that will eventually lead to business relationships.
This also helps your business become the “go to” when someone needs an expert in that area of interest.

Between the four sites listed above there are hundreds of millions of users going to these sites daily. The fasted growing demographic among Facebook users is the 35 to 65 year old women. Another statistic: 300 million people visit You Tube every month and watch more than 12 billion videos, according to ComScore’s January 2010 figures. Did you know that You Tube is the second largest search engine on the internet at this time. People go there to learn how to bake a cake or how to create a Fanpage on Facebook.

Proactive businesses are making plans to get the prospect to follow them, friend them, subscribe to their channels, etc. Once connected, your business can start offering information, expert prospective on topics your businesses specializes in, recommendations, news, coupons, membership privileges, etc. in an effort to get prospects to give permission to follow up with them through email, text messages to their mobile phones, regular mail, or what ever form of communication they prefer. You and your business are building relationships with prospects, earning their trust and ultimately, earning their business.

Once you have established relationships with your prospects online, you need to continue to provide valuable information and continue to make offers because it is proven that it is much easier to get an existing customer to buy from you again than it is to get a new customer to buy from you the first time. It sounds simple, but this is where most businesses fail on an epic level. Most businesses miss the opportunities for incrementally increasing income because they don’t follow up with their customers.

Most business owners find it difficult to allocate their time to develop a marketing program. Approximately 26% of small businesses have a SMM program in place. A SMM consultant can develop an online marketing plan and organize the resources to execute it so it generates results cost effectively without impacting your primary focus, of managing your business.

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Lauren Richardson & Shady Lady Pole Bending

Posted on29. Apr, 2011 by Douglas Richardson.

Here is a video of my daughter Lauren and her horse Shady Lady competing at the final OHSET meet for the Central Division.  Of course that is me in the background.

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FTC Endorsement Guides!

Posted on19. Nov, 2010 by Douglas Richardson.

Please leave a comment on this video, this is very important stuff!

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Creating a Summery Post

Posted on02. Nov, 2010 by Douglas Richardson.

I have created a short video to show you how to create a summery of your post on the main page of your blog, to increase your SEO and get more people clicking on your articles.   Special thanks to my friend Clifton Hatfield, for this little tip!  They don’t call him the “Blog Rockstar” for nothing, please checkout his site, you will be glad you did!

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“Head in a Helmet”

Posted on20. Jul, 2010 by Douglas Richardson.

I know that the rule of thumb is to not speak of your religious beliefs in your posts in order to not offend ones beliefs?  “But?” This story is something that I felt needed to be passed on.  About two weeks ago a friend from my church was doing some extreme mountain biking at Whistler Mountain in Canada.  He had been riding with some good friends and they were on their final descent from the summit for the day.  Now from what David said the terrain is very extreme and the path of descent is narrowly tree lined with a large drainage ditch off to one side.  David said that some of the jumps were as much as a, forty foot drop.  (Sounds a little too extreme for an old guy like me?) [...]

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“The Tribal Mindset”

Posted on07. Jul, 2010 by Douglas Richardson.

Tribe Syndication seems to be everywhere in the Social Media arena?  It is just the logical progression of leverage of ones self.

If you look at the recent growth in Social Media the Tribe Syndication concept is at the foundation.  Everywhere you look people are talking about creating Tribes or Mastermind groups, one can only accomplish so much on their own?  [...]

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Resilience and Social Media

Posted on23. Jun, 2010 by Douglas Richardson.

Resilient: an ability to recover from or adjust easily to misfortune or change.  Now those are words to live by!  I have been reflecting on my Social Media and Tribe Syndication career for the last several days, sometimes it seems like I am going NO Where!  I am taking action; I am Syndicating my Tribe members content; I am adding to my Tweeter followers; I am making new friends and relationships on FaceBook, and I am trying to recruit in to my primary business.  I am spending several hours a week learning from the people that are successful in this industry.   But as I look at my current position I am not seeing much positive results?  No one can relate to that I bet? [...]

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“Meekness Isn’t Weakness”

Posted on15. Jun, 2010 by Douglas Richardson.

In today’s society “meekness” is considered to be someone or something that is defined by Webster to be “deficient in spirit and courage: submissive”   Now there are some qualities that we should all strive for?  I don’t know about you but that is not the qualities that I would hope that people would see in me as a person.  “There goes Doug; he is one of the meekest people I have ever known”.   Doesn’t sound like something you would be very happy to hear now is it?  Well let’s take a closer look at the virtue and see what we can fine out. [...]

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Syndication and the Unified Tribe!

Posted on11. May, 2010 by Douglas Richardson.

Last night I added a widget to my blog “NetworkBlogs” after doing so I realized how empty it appeared setting there with just me as my own best follower?  So I thought what can I do to get some followers?  Well recently I have joined the Unified Tribe.  So I sent an email to my new friends that I have made and this morning I believe I have ten new followers and a number of retweets and facebook shares. This was very nice to see!  I must mention that I sent the same message to my friends in the Tribe Intensive also. [...]

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Wisdom-What Does It Mean To You?

Posted on04. May, 2010 by Douglas Richardson.

Last Saturday I attended my weekly man’s Bible study, and one of the subjects that we discussed at length was the word Wisdom.  Now this sparked a vigorous debate among the men attendance.  There seems that people have several opinions as to what the word Wisdom means to them?

Webster’s dictionary defines Wisdom in several ways:

Wisdom: 1 a: accumulated philosophic or scientific learning: knowledge b: ability to discern inner qualities and relationships: insight 2: a wise attitude, belief, or course of action

Wisdom is described as a noun, but in my mind it is really a verb, an action to something we have learned or experienced and we use this knowledge to make our decision.  Hence the expression “As we get older we become wiser”?  In many cases I believe that this is a true statement, but for others it is not.  So why is this?

Well in my humble opinion the hardest part of having Wisdom is to take our learned knowledge and life experience and implement them into our decision making process.  It is our human nature to make decisions on emotion rather than actual fact.  With Wisdom we take what we have learned from our experiences and written knowledge and use this to help us make our decision or course of action.  So as we gain life experience and knowledge, if we do not take away anything from these situations, we just go stumbling down the same road we have always been on.  The wisdom is there we just choose to ignore it?

Ok, let’s consider the quote “They are Wise Beyond Their Years” So what does that mean?  Well once again in my humble opinion, this is someone how is using the knowledge of other people and their life experiences, be it good or bad to help them make a decision.  So when they take action they will make a wise decision from the Wisdom they have gained from others.  Make sense? There is much to be learned from others, be it good or bad.

This is why I think when we are teenagers and we know that we know everything, we really don’t.  But as we get older our parents seem to get smarter.  In reality we are gaining Wisdom and are beginning to understand that there is knowledge and life experience that we can gain from others.  Isn’t that interesting how that all works?

Bottom line here folks is that Wisdom is a action that we take in order to make a decision rather right or wrong.  We can receive bad Wisdom as well as good, the object is to discern from these experiences and develop the ability to have our own Wisdom, but also using other peoples Wisdom and experiences to help us through the decision making process.  A wise man once said “not making a decision is making a decision in itself”.

I hope you have enjoyed this bit of advice, please leave a comment and pass it on to your friends.

Sincerely

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