Alberta Business Marketing

Nothing better than investing an hour with two of your best friends.  It is always great to have allies and friends across the globe who share the same mindset and goals in life.  This is what happened on July 28th, my good friend Daniel Gutierrez who hosts a business webcast each week on blogtalkradio.com invited me and my mentor Bob Burg onto his program.  Danny’s show is similar to what I do with the Ulistic Orange Files, a small business webcast focused on delivering practical business advice to small business owners globally.  I was blessed to be even consider by Danny for his show.

You can listen to Daniel, Bob and I by tuning into the recording of the show.

Besides listening to Bob and Danny speak on the Go Giver philosophies and the critical stratospheric laws of success.  I had 30 minutes to chat with Danny about social media and the future of online marketing.  Lots of stuff to cover and 30 minutes is hardly enough time to really dig deep into the key points that business must really look at in order to really hit a home run with social media and all their online marketing.

I did share with Daniel the importance of having your business plan and your marketing plan figured out first.  I may sound like a broken record here and I know I have mentioned countless times on my blog about the importance of your plans prior to moving to execution phase.  However, many still simply jump to execution and have no real business plan.

Another topics we discussed was the continued importance of meeting people face-to-face and how we can leverage social media and other strategies to enhance our overall business communication strategies.  Social Media doesn’t replace face-to-face, it enhances what we do today with our business communications and even those relationships outside of business.

I also shared with Daniel on the importance of your small business doing your homework before rushing out and hiring the first living or breathing social media consultant.  You need to do your homework and find the right fit for your business.

Thank You Danny and thanks Bob for being my partner in crime.

Tags: bob burg, Business, business plan, Business Success, Business/Finance, Daniel Gutierrez, Danny, Homework, Human Interest, Management, social media, social media consultant, Strategic management
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I got a very timely and critical email from my mentor Arlin Sorensen the other day.  Arlin just has the knack of hitting me with his virtual 2×4 at the right time and he does it well.  Arlin is the mastermind behind the Peer Power blog and Heartland Tech Groups.  Arlin is a very faithful man and a leader inside/outside the tech support community.

This post of his got me thinking about social media.  There is a lot of people making a tremendous amount of noise, but do we have a leader in our space?  Not the person who is the most technical or the smartest marketer.  Someone who is humble enough to lead our community?  A person who can call it like it is and be there to support our group?  Do we have an Arlin Sorensen in the Social Media world?

One of things Arlin did for me was tear down the walls of competition…plus he helped me through a very rough patch in my life.

Can I lead this community? Do I have what it takes to do what Arlin did in the tech world and apply what I learned from him in the social media world?

Does being a leader in the Canadian social media community mean dismissing competition and embracing those around me?  Does this mean we are here to serve and to put the needs of others before my own needs?  Do I still put my oxygen mask on first?

I know the entire online marketing community here in Calgary and across the globe needs some leadership.  A few are providing this and doing a great job.  But we can always use more.

Are you willing to step up?  This means openly sharing what you know for the great good of our community.  This is something I have noticed big time during my transition to the marketing world.  These guys don’t like to share within their community.  It is like old school business…let’s not tell anyone anything and never think about helping our competitor or someone who claims to do the same thing we do.  I even got caught in that yesterday.  I was reminded about competition from Bob Burg as well yesterday.

Gotta walk the walk if I am going to talk the talk.

Read Arlin’s blog post on Leadership in our community.

Tags: bob burg, Calgary, Human Interest, leader, media community mean dismissing competition, media world, Music industry, online marketing community, Read Arlin, social media, The Master
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Tags: bob burg, Business, Business Success, Business/Finance, Calgary, canada, dallas, EMMY award, Human Interest, jeffrey gitomer, Scott Schilling, Shawne Duperon, Social Media Ventures Inc, speaker, Wisconsin
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Are we at a major crossroads in business marketing?

I think we are at a critical junction in marketing, especially those focused on the online space and developing platforms.  Given all the challenges facing popular online networking services in the past week and the average Joe’s potential loss of trust towards online services, will it slow down the rapid advance that we have seen lately in the entire social media space?

Social Media is business can go one of two ways, it will either skyrocket or cave in.  The next few months will be crucial in determining the direction the social side of online marketing goes.

It does all begin with Trust

There are similarities between social media and the Eyjafjallajökull volcano in Iceland.  Eyjafjallajökull spewed ash for week and disrupted airspace over the North Atlantic and Europe.  Social Media is not so different.  There are many “Human Volcanos” spewing disruptive ash of their own and causing people to shut down or divert to other avenues. When you combine this with the recent privacy issues, does social media marketing have the potential of moving in the same direction as traditional marketing?

How will social media and business co-exist? This is something I spend most waking work moments striving to figure out and achieve here in the Canadian market.  Today, I am blessed to be speaking about “Trust Marketing” at the Alberta Association of Library Technicians 36th Annual Conference.  Trust Marketing is all about positioning yourself as a trusted business advisor who at least practices the 5 principles shared by Bob Burg and John David Mann in the Go Giver parable.

Trust Marketing is all about delivering value within your target marketing and community without being concerned if you are going to loss the deal or someone is going to steal your thoughts.  Here is a secret folks, all the knowledge you have is simply a Google search away, so we need to get over the fact that we know it all.  It is ok to give away knowledge to those seeking what you know, this is where the “law of value” kicks in.  You can read the 5 laws here.  What you will find is the more you give away in value and the better you serve folks in your business community, the higher your income will eventually be.

We all must be extremely open to sharing and this is the only way in my opinion social media marketing and business will work together. Business owners need to share and share often.  I have always been open to sharing information even with my so-called competitors (often beaten up by my co-workers as well about this) in the marketplace and especially with those looking to do business with us.  I think it is critical in the “feeling out phase” to be completely open and not hide a single thing.  Clients and prospects are not dumb, they know when you are holding back the goods and they appreciate it when you are open and serve them.

If your website, social media activities and online market are about sharing information, teaching people and offering insight you will be fine in the online world.

Can social media and business co-exist? What will it take for trust to shine through online?  What information do you trust more?  As a business owner, can you leverage “Trust Marketing”?

Tags: Alberta Association of Library Technicians, bob burg, Business, Business Success, Business/Finance, Europe, Iceland, Internet Marketing, John David Mann, Library Technicians, Man-Made Disaster, media marketing, media space, Natural Disaster, North Atlantic, North Atlantic and Europe, online networking services, online space, social media marketing, Social Media Ventures Inc, trust, trusted business advisor
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I was recently reading a fantastic article about failure on Facebook and Twitter.  The article published in the Boston Herald talks about how using social media services such as Facebook, Twitter and other online services to pitch your products/services can actually do more harm than good.  The journalist discusses how social media services actually hurt sales of the new Apple iPad rather than helping it.  Well, when you have a bunch of people destroying an iPad on YouTube, how does that influence you?

P.J. Lamberson, an MIT Sloan School of Management visiting assistant professor mentioned in the article that you would think the more people you talk about your products and service with would actually adopt it, this is not always the case.  As a Calgary Online Marketing professional this is a huge hurdle many business owners we consult with through our Ulistic Online Marketing program need to jump.  It is never about the product and service, it is about engaging, helping and being part of the community.

I just finished reading “Go Givers Sell More” co-written by my good friend and trusted mentor, Bob Burg.  Bob always talks about the reasons why people do business with you.  First, they need to know, like and trust you and you can not meet these critical requirements by simply pitching your business on Twitter.  There are many things to think about.  Online Marketing is not the holy grail that will save your business, but it can help if used correctly.  It can be that first step towards know, like and trust.

Deep down inside we all want to get the word out about our business (sometimes we come across very desperate), just be careful how you go about doing this and make sure it doesn’t come back to bite you in the backside.  This is how I help many business owners across North America each day, we share ideas and concepts about balance and strategize about their overall marketing, not just online.

The article from the Boston Herald goes on to speak about President Obama and how he used social media services to help connect many young voters and now using these same services to gripe about the President.  How can these networks impact your business?  Word of mouth is so powerful today and the Internet is a giant word-of-mouth network.

Tags: Blog hosting services, bob burg, Boston Herald, Business/Finance, Facebook, Facebook Inc, Internet Marketing, iPad, journalist, MIT, North America, obama, Online Marketing professional, Online Marketing program, Online social networking, President, products/services, School of Management, Social information processing, social media, social media services, Technology/Internet, the Boston Herald, The Facebook Era, Twitter, Twitter Inc, Ulistic Online, visiting assistant professor, web 2.0, Word of mouth, word-of-mouth network, World Wide Web, YouTube Inc
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