Authenticity

FOCUS: What About Customer Experience and Relationships?

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Visitors Audience Customers Community

On the lookout for…?

“Relationships?! How do you do that when your business is all about selling boxes of widgets? Folks come to my site, order them and I ship them out…”

This is a common question. You have always viewed your company as one that makes something that others buy (hopefully more than once…), and then you make sure they get it. Pretty much the definition of “transactional”, and, especially if you operate an e-commerce site, you only know them by a name, address and order number. It doesn’t look like the opportunities to establish and grow a relationship, as you’re thinking of it, are that ripe.

…or are they?…

I’ve written before about a descriptive construct I call the VACC. It stands for Visitors/Audience/Customers/Community. There are different ways of looking at the people who interact with your business: The Customer Journey, the Sales Funnel, and so on. Viewing these people through the VACC lens focuses on the stage of the relationship they have with you business, and how you communicate and interact with them. Each stage is valuable and there is no hard line dividing them. Nonetheless, knowing, in greater depth, what each set of these people are looking for, how they act and react to you and your business, what their expectations are, and how you can communicate with them is vital to your business growth. Not knowing is the same as tossing your product out on to a virtual (or real…) sidewalk and hoping the right folks come by.

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More Promising and Valuable: a Partner or a Customer?

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Still in the early years of your business and riding the revenue roller coaster? Yeah, me too.

Things are Really Fat for several months (maybe even longer…), so you focus on project delivery and all of the work that entails. Make those clients happy!!!!  Things lighten up a bit, so you take a TEENSY breather (maybe a couple of actual days off in a row….what a concept…).

Things continue to back off, you realize that you’re experiencing the business equivalent of “the pig in the python“, and you’re staring at a mostly empty pipeline. This is not good. You redouble your efforts on business development, lay out some ads, reach out to some referral sources, revisit your business Facebook page (wow….when was the last time you DID that!?), hit those chamber of commerce lunches, contact some leads, and engineer an email campaign, but getting meetings is hard and they all seem to be too busy or in “let’s talk in about 60 days or so” mode.

Again, not so good.

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FOCUS: The Simple Obsession of Mindful Marketing

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Mindfulness is a light of honesty within yourself that is fed by each moment that passes.

Mindfulness and “being in the moment” are ancient ideas found across cultures. This self-awareness is partly being truly aware of the moment, and partly acknowledging and letting go of the things and thoughts that cling to you or come flying back at you, only to be noticed and let go of again in that moment. It’s an enlightening and maddening place to be, for sure…

I read an article by Seth Godin recently about self-awareness and marketing that brought me to reconsider the role of marketing in my thought life and decision-making process, and in that of my customers and yours, too. To say that we are all relentlessly marketed to by just about everything and everyone is a statement of the obvious that we have become so numb to that we tend to ignore it.  We are in danger of losing the awareness that can allow us a margin of critical thinking.  Godin writes, “Mostly, marketing is what we call it when someone else is influenced by a marketer. When we’re influenced, though, it’s not marketing, it’s a smart choice.” In other words, it’s not “just marketing” when it influences me! I’m not as influenced by the marketing beast as “those other folks!”

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Across My Desk: The Best of the Month of Love & Presidents

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There are a LOT of great articles published this past month. Vetting them for you is a pleasure by which I learn more AND glean the “wheat from the chaff”, so to speak.

So here we go!!!!!!

Look at the Stats!

Look at the Stats!

Normally random statistics & numbers flow past my eyes without really catching on anything. These stats are worth looking at because they are recent AND may help you recognize the criticality of have a strategy for your social media marketing, the importance of getting some expert help in this area (that IS what my company does, you know!), and the fact that it likely applies to and impacts your business more than you know.

Facebook flex targeting

Facebook flex targeting

You probably haven’t heard of flex targeting on Facebook. Flex targeting lets you serve Facebook ads to people who share a highly customized combination of interests, behaviors, and demographics. It allows you even more refined and tailored targeting to ensure that your ads get seen by the right folks and don’t get lost in the noise of the other posts and ads.  This is a particularly helpful How-To article.

Keys to Success on Social Media

Keys to Success on Social Media

Major Keys to Success on Social Media

To those of you who have worked with me and with my company, Social Sapiens (or subscribe to my newsletter), the keys listed in this article will sound very familiar. Strategy, intention, discipline, community, #H2H, content…..the building blocks and road to success. If you’d like to check out another solid point of view, read on and enjoy!

Facebook: News Feed Algorithm Now More Influenced By User Feedback & Surveys

Any business that is fully engaged with their visitors, audience, customers and community on Facebook will wish to stay on top of ANYTHING that impacts the news feed. As it states early in the article, “Facebook’s News Feed algorithm is relying more heavily on user feedback and surveys, and not in the form of the traditional signals such as likes, comments and shares.” If you want to find out how this impacts your work on the channel, read on.

Top 10 Social Media Blogs - 2016

Top 10 Social Media Blogs – 2016

Top 10 Social Media Blogs: The 2016 Winners!

One of the biggest challenges of staying on top of what I’ll call “reputable trends” in social media is carefully choosing the voices to listen to. Fortunately, every year Social Media Examiner publishes a list of the top 10 Social Media Blogs from across the industry. The selections are made based upon input from social media professionals and influencers globally. If you wish to add a site or two to your regular “keep the business marketing improving” reading every month (or week), one of these may fit the bill.

Get this kind of information more regularly – sign up for my weekly Social Sapiens newsletter.

Want even more? Like and Share the Social Sapiens Facebook page, sign up for Notifications under the Like button, and add us to your “See First in Your Newsfeed” group.

Related articles

It’s Here: A Practical Way to Get Your Focus Back

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English: The spotlight model of attention.

The spotlight model of attention. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

“Come on!! FOCUS!!!”

I don’t know how many times I’ve heard that in my life in different contexts….in musical groups who have been rehearsing a tough section, in a classroom that was a bit too warm during a lecture (or lab) that seemed to go….on….for….ever…., or that internal voice when I’ve been staring at the screen for awhile working on research or a project and notice that my eyes have blurred and so has my mind.

You’ve probably heard it too…

As an entrepreneur, you put a ton of time, attention and energy into your business, both the business pieces AND the product or service delivery (then there’s the ongoing customer service and support bit, too…..). Staying of top of everything can burn you out, leave you sleep and life deprived, and make it much harder to do the A+ job you normally do. Even making a bit of space becomes a challenge since your brain doesn’t necessarily “walk away” from your business (even if you do), so you could be “taking a moment” but you’re churning away inside. If that’s going on, you’re not in the moment of rest and relaxation, you’re distracted and those around you can tell, aside from the fact that the restorative nature of a break is severely diminished.

If you don’t take care of yourself, your life, your relationships and your business suffer.

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What is the Truth about Now for You?

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“Well, that happened.”

That’s still one of my favorite movies quotes. It’s uttered (actually more “admitted”) by Bob Berrenger (Alec Baldwin) upon crawling out of an upside down car accident in the movie State and Main. He seems a bit dazed, but not very concerned, despite suffering from a bad cut on his head and, subsequently, walking away from the scene of the accident.  He’s not worried about his past actions and mistakes…..he just moves on. That comes back to get him, but I will let you check out the movie….it’s excellent.
Taking the context of that quote a different way, I’ve spent some time thinking about how this kind of detached view of my past and future can affect me and my business.

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10 Important Fears You Can Challenge

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Man expressing horror

Fear

Are you scared?

Never mind what it is you’re scared of…..are you scared? How does this drive your life decisions and your business?

I was reminded several days ago about something I said in a conversation with a colleague: “Most problems in business stem from one simple emotion: fear.”

Many of us don’t recognize this, as it can be very subtle. It can hide behind what we feel is desire, responsibility, and sometimes “doing the right thing.” Overt fears are a bit easier to recognize, but can be just as hard to manage.  So much has to do with how much attention you give the fear, especially in relation to how much actual, real control you have over what drives it. The fear derives its strength from this perceived helplessness….no one wants to feel at the mercy of things, but when we confront that fact (lack of actual control), we get even more scared and grasp at almost anything to try and “regain” control, even though it’s not possible.

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The Emerging Truth About The Change of Business

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Dealing with Change is a Class-A Pain!

No, really…

First, what does change mean to you, your life, and your business? Is it rapid, gradual, ignored, accepted or the object of ‘magical thinking‘?

Second, how do you manage? Can you really manage without engaging a fortune teller and hoping against hope you can see the future and get ahead of the unknown?

Lastly, how do you feel about it? What does this mean for your business? I’ll get to that…

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Is there Anything Simple About Simplicity?

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English: Albert Einstein Français : Portrait d...

English: Albert Einstein Français : Portrait d’Albert Einstein (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

“Easy” is a temptation.

I work with many clients who take the Do-It-Yourself (DIY) approach to their digital and social media marketing, because “How hard could it be? It’s just Facebook??!” Besides, they each have a business to run, customers to satisfy and entice, meetings to attend and maybe even employees to work with.

After spending time with each of them to discern their business and marketing goals, I begin to walk them through some of the opportunities and challenges they face and the different ways to optimize and engage, based on the goals and resources available. As we begin to dig into the strategy and planning, each of these business people begin to see the advantages of “doing it right” and where their current process might be falling short, hurting their business.

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Is Your Tribe Remarkable, Unfocused or Mainstream?

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Which Tribe do you belong to?

That seems to be an over-riding, occasionally unsaid, concern in our society. Conservative or Liberal? Religious or Agnostic? One percent or ninety-nine percent? Blue collar or white-collar? Introvert or extrovert? College Graduate? Technical? Gender? Race? We have innumerable ways of identifying, classifying and limiting the understanding of ourselves and those around us.  Labels and categories carry assumptions and expectations, whether they’re true or not. And how much of this relies upon context? It’s something that has challenged our species for all time and it doesn’t seem to be getting better….

That’s a pretty broad brush with which to start a conversation.

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