Think about it, WOM or Word Of Mouth advertising has been around forever. And what better medium and channel than to Social Media to harness WOM. It’s the ham and eggs of advertising. It doesn’t make any difference if your technical orientated, nitch specific, a shopping B2C or a Manufacturing B2B. You should be collecting the kind of followers that need and want and understand what you do and sell. You can be almost sure that in your collection of friends and followers there is at least 1 if not more people that need to tell everyone the latest news and gossip about you, your brother or your latest Blue Duggers.
These WOM wonders are the virtual influencers of your world. Give them something to talk about. They are asking, no begging you to say something good, new and juicy for them to spread around. They are your hidden virtual marketing team. Your online hidden sales force but how can you put any muscle to this online power house?
1) Find the influencers. There are processes and software (especially on Twitter but also MerchantCircle and Facebook if you’re watching. If you find and locate the leaders of discussions and repostings you stand a greater chance of yours getting retwitted or posted or whatever. Research people as to who does the most retwitting and thoroughly understand who they are and what they cover and topics they like. Then develop a relationship with them online.
2) Listen to them. Ya shut your mouth and listen. You need to listen and understand these top influencers. Track and monitor their online discussions. See if they are positive people or come off as negative or just plain vanilla neutral. Not everyone posts and reposts equally.
3) Find and make your advocates. Some of your best social media WOM marketing examples just simply begin with a company (person) giving a group of influencers previews to their product or service and simply asked them to tell their networks what their ideas and thoughts were and are. You will get great feedback and everyone loves to get the inside scoop first, don’t they?
4) Give them a forum or soap box. You have gone and provided them with the information on you and your company’s product or service, now give them the keys to door. Give them a megaphone. Make them special. How many times have I been a featured person in a Ning? And what do you think I do. I post it on my Facebook fan page http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans which flows into my twitter account which flows into my LinkedIn account and bingo their site is all over my social media sites.
Larson Notes & Satire: Your one person, only one. So am I no matter how bad I want to clone myself it’s just not going to happen. Yet WOM can seemingly make more of you and really get you into new places fast and some you would never get into without out help. People like to help. They really do. There are bullies out there in cyber land. People who have no reason to be in a social network site because they are just not social. All they do is push their way in and take over. Or if you choose to disagree with them they blast you into submission. These you should avoid.
But the good ones? Embrace them and run with it.
Remember our 3 new programs for 2011
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3rd our Virtual Business Consulting Program
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
Monday, February 28, 2011
Friday, February 25, 2011
Why Are You Doing Social Media?
Why are you involved in Social Media & Social Media Marketing? To pass the time away or to promote and make money for your business? I’m in it for the money. If I pick up a friend or two, wonderful but show me the money.
Social Media Marketing can produce spectacular results in more way than 1 but it needs to be carefully crafted and planned out sooner or later or it becomes a black hole of time and possibly money.
If you can develop a disciplined approach to your social media marketing you can reap in the promising rewards that are out there seemingly just beyond your reach.
The key is engaging people at the critical touch points of the buying cycle; you know the critical spots you engage people in when they are thinking about your product or service.
So when you sit down how can you get all this done and done in a way that lets you touch people in the way that want to be touched?
1) Get your audience right. If I have said it once I have said it a thousand times: Go narrow nitch. If you try to be everything to everybody you will be no one to yourself. Look at your top 5 to 10 customers. Who are they, what are they and why do they buy from you?
2) What makes this group of people buy? What is special and unique that makes this kind of person buy? What triggers them to open up the check book? Emotion? Relevance? Originally? Need?
3) What is the 1 most important touch point? Of all those things what is the 1 most important point of why they buy? Go narrow my friend as narrow as you can. You can’t sell to the entire world but you can sell to those who need what you got.
4) Measure, monitor and do it again. Go on and tally up the numbers. From unique hit numbers to actual sales. Use some of that gray muscle up there in your head.
Larson Notes & Satire: Setting your tag line right Special Site Only Coupons. Special Site promotions. Whatever the mind can conceive you can do on your site. Push it, push it hard. Find what works for you as fast as possible and leave the rest and push hard in that direction.
You can’t and don’t want to be everything to everybody. Think of the inventory or the service line you would need to be providing? Ouch!
Remember our 3 new programs for 2011
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3rd our Virtual Business Consulting Program
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
Social Media Marketing can produce spectacular results in more way than 1 but it needs to be carefully crafted and planned out sooner or later or it becomes a black hole of time and possibly money.
If you can develop a disciplined approach to your social media marketing you can reap in the promising rewards that are out there seemingly just beyond your reach.
The key is engaging people at the critical touch points of the buying cycle; you know the critical spots you engage people in when they are thinking about your product or service.
So when you sit down how can you get all this done and done in a way that lets you touch people in the way that want to be touched?
1) Get your audience right. If I have said it once I have said it a thousand times: Go narrow nitch. If you try to be everything to everybody you will be no one to yourself. Look at your top 5 to 10 customers. Who are they, what are they and why do they buy from you?
2) What makes this group of people buy? What is special and unique that makes this kind of person buy? What triggers them to open up the check book? Emotion? Relevance? Originally? Need?
3) What is the 1 most important touch point? Of all those things what is the 1 most important point of why they buy? Go narrow my friend as narrow as you can. You can’t sell to the entire world but you can sell to those who need what you got.
4) Measure, monitor and do it again. Go on and tally up the numbers. From unique hit numbers to actual sales. Use some of that gray muscle up there in your head.
Larson Notes & Satire: Setting your tag line right Special Site Only Coupons. Special Site promotions. Whatever the mind can conceive you can do on your site. Push it, push it hard. Find what works for you as fast as possible and leave the rest and push hard in that direction.
You can’t and don’t want to be everything to everybody. Think of the inventory or the service line you would need to be providing? Ouch!
Remember our 3 new programs for 2011
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3rd our Virtual Business Consulting Program
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Driving Your Social Strategy
Social Media has come. We know what Facebook is doing number wise, Likewise twitter, LinkedIn, MerchantCircle and others. Social Media is now established enough that it is considered an actual channel in marketing programs, be it so all over the place so that is hard to get a real handle on it.
To establish your Social Media marketing and presence requires an execution of some tired and true practices to get you credibility and trust. This is your investment not so much in dollars (unless you enlist a company like mine to do it for you) but an investment in time.
The key ideas that you need to be following to help you to create this social presence are reciprocity of and open relationship, keeping relevant and commitment to the long term of the site.
When someone chooses (and is a choice), chooses to listen and follow you they are doing it with a certain expectation of what to expect from you. For you to stay on topic and relevant to them. If you digress into other areas you are going to lose them. So stay consistent above all else. Going out and sticking up a profile page does not make you social either. You need to interact on a regular basis to become a “topical” expert in your field, a go to person.
So now what?
1) Interact. Don’t blast your friends with your emails about what YOU want. Enable a sharing attitude of your content throughout your channels.
2) Advertise. Yes you can advertise on and through social media but do it topically. Know your Social Media Place. Social Media by its very nature is supposed to drive people to action. Take a roll in that action.
3) Segmentation. If you are in different topical Social Media sites recognize that and stay on topic. If you are in a board based site, expound, if a narrow nitch site, so narrow, but again stay on topic of who and what you are and can provide.
Larson Notes & Satire: So are you ready, really ready to get involved in Social media or should you be hiring me to do it for you: http://www.larsonassociates.ws/SocialMediaMarketing . I am not what I call an expert. I am an active user that puts forth the effort to be engaged in Social Media. If flows and new things are always happening. Because we are actively involved we can implement quickly trends that are working for us into our clients programs. You can be doing the same thing. But you got to be active and be a player. There are few mistakes in Social Media except 1 and that is sitting around doing nothing.
Remember our 3 new programs for 2011
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3rd our Virtual Business Consulting Program
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
To establish your Social Media marketing and presence requires an execution of some tired and true practices to get you credibility and trust. This is your investment not so much in dollars (unless you enlist a company like mine to do it for you) but an investment in time.
The key ideas that you need to be following to help you to create this social presence are reciprocity of and open relationship, keeping relevant and commitment to the long term of the site.
When someone chooses (and is a choice), chooses to listen and follow you they are doing it with a certain expectation of what to expect from you. For you to stay on topic and relevant to them. If you digress into other areas you are going to lose them. So stay consistent above all else. Going out and sticking up a profile page does not make you social either. You need to interact on a regular basis to become a “topical” expert in your field, a go to person.
So now what?
1) Interact. Don’t blast your friends with your emails about what YOU want. Enable a sharing attitude of your content throughout your channels.
2) Advertise. Yes you can advertise on and through social media but do it topically. Know your Social Media Place. Social Media by its very nature is supposed to drive people to action. Take a roll in that action.
3) Segmentation. If you are in different topical Social Media sites recognize that and stay on topic. If you are in a board based site, expound, if a narrow nitch site, so narrow, but again stay on topic of who and what you are and can provide.
Larson Notes & Satire: So are you ready, really ready to get involved in Social media or should you be hiring me to do it for you: http://www.larsonassociates.ws/SocialMediaMarketing . I am not what I call an expert. I am an active user that puts forth the effort to be engaged in Social Media. If flows and new things are always happening. Because we are actively involved we can implement quickly trends that are working for us into our clients programs. You can be doing the same thing. But you got to be active and be a player. There are few mistakes in Social Media except 1 and that is sitting around doing nothing.
Remember our 3 new programs for 2011
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3rd our Virtual Business Consulting Program
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
Monday, February 14, 2011
12 Steps To Your Success
If you are an entrepreneur, by choice or by necessity, I have a short list of important characteristics for you to look at, measure yourself and strive to become. Anyone can be a successful entrepreneur. I really believe that, if I can, you can. It might take hard work, determination and unwavering persistence in the face of real and perceived hardship but you can become a success as an independent. Here are the essential entrepreneurial qualities that anyone who is interested in great success should work on:
1. Independence. No more guaranteed paycheck. No more guaranteed anything. This is the most common denominator or all entrepreneurs. We are an independent cuss of people. We tend to want control of our future. We are the captain of our ship, the Grand Poobah of the Lodge, the Head Honcho, the buck stops here guy. We chose to become our own boss instead of working a 9 to 5 job. Now we get to work a 6 to 7 job and smile about it. We have a strong sense of independence and will keep moving forward with a purpose to accomplish something great and meaningful our own lives.
2. Visionary. An entrepreneur has a vision for the future, their future. This vision is for both short term and long term. The accomplishment of greatness rests on their great ideas and accomplishments that are out there sitting to be achieved. We are the ones who paint a canvas of a future, our future. You might call us dreamers but we put those dreams into action.
3. Persistence. Churchill said it best. “Never give up… never give up… never give up.” A very important quality of a successful entrepreneur is the persistence to continue pursuing a goal despite setbacks, despite obstacles, despite nay sayers. We might encounter road bumps along the way but at least we have a road map to our personal success and our personal persistence is demonstrated with our personal action which is followed up by even more action. . We “Never give up.” It's just not in our nature.
4. Determination. If persistence needed a friend, that would be determination. Determination is the inner drive and mindset that pushes you forward that drives you over the top. Determined is not being stubborn it’s the self motivation to claw your way to success when everyone and yes sometimes it seems like everyone is against you, claw you way to achieve your goals.
5. Creativity. Entrepreneurs tend to be curious and inquisitive. As a group we know that the name of the game is not just to fit in, but to stand out. We want to be seen. Creativity is a skill that can be learned and developed. We all have the ability to be creative and think outside the box but as a group we tend to do that more than others.
6. Honesty. Winning and keeping customers is all about being known, liked and trusted, heavy on the trust! This has always been an important characteristic of success. If you are honest with yourself and with others you have mastered this one major ingredient to becoming a great entrepreneur.
7. Self-Confidence. As a group we believe in what they are capable of. Self-confidence is built on wins, tiny wins over and over until we are capable of almost anything we put our minds to. This keeps leading to bigger and bigger wins and is the fuel to momentum. A successful entrepreneur goes after what they want with a strong desire and sense of self worth that supports their efforts and their determination.
8. Risk-taking. We realize that loss and failure are part of any business possibility. An entrepreneur is always ready to make calculated risks and face whatever consequences those risks might have. We know that to win some they have to lose some, but loosing is a life experience to learn from and not do again and again and again.
9. Tolerance. We have the courage to face failure and start again no matter who, what, when, where and how we face life. The qualities of a successful entrepreneur include never giving up, never panicking in the face of obstacles and in picking up the pieces and continuing the journey even if failure momentarily sometimes gets in the way.
10. Perseverance. We never stop moving forward. I am not saying attack, attack, attack but when we know what they want and see what we can achieve in any given situation, we know why they want it will do whatever it takes! We do not give up! There can be no real success without perseverance.
11. Commitment. An entrepreneur will not achieve success if we give up at the first sign of hard work. A 100% Commitment is absolutely essential and that means a willingness to do whatever it takes for the long haul to achieve our goals, not letting the nay sayers have their way. Doing whatever it takes includes all the things we would rather not do or don’t like to do. Not just what we want and like to do.
12. Organization. An entrepreneur knows the value of being organized. Systems, resources, time management and action plans are all part of the organizational process and are vital for success. Being organized both mentally and physically is a skill that needs to be cultivated in order to make significant progress.
13. And don't forget your sigificiant other. They are so imporatant to keep in your mind and heart. Let them come with you.
Larson Notes & Satire: All of these qualities don't mean a thing unless you take action! To think a thing does not make it happen thinking is only the beginning! You must take action and you must keep taking action! Yes you need to believe but without action there is nothing but your thoughts. Do you have what it takes to be a successful entrepreneur? This checklist is full of some of the best qualities and characteristics for you to check were you stand. If you can rate yourself at 8 (on a scale of 1-10) or better on these traits then you can absolutely be a success in business.
This is only the start to a world of self determination and entepreneurmentship, It’s not always pretty being the main Person but if you what to live by your rules and can handle the pressure, and there is big time pressure, do it. You will or might make mistakes and you need to be ready to fight thought those mistakes. It's not always pretty, in fact it can be ugly. If this is not for you, you can go back and find someone who will heir you for all your good qualities. You aren’t a failure if you can’t make a go at running your own company. It’s just another way to live.
Remember our 3 new programs for 2011
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3d our Virtual Business Consulting Program
Howad Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
1. Independence. No more guaranteed paycheck. No more guaranteed anything. This is the most common denominator or all entrepreneurs. We are an independent cuss of people. We tend to want control of our future. We are the captain of our ship, the Grand Poobah of the Lodge, the Head Honcho, the buck stops here guy. We chose to become our own boss instead of working a 9 to 5 job. Now we get to work a 6 to 7 job and smile about it. We have a strong sense of independence and will keep moving forward with a purpose to accomplish something great and meaningful our own lives.
2. Visionary. An entrepreneur has a vision for the future, their future. This vision is for both short term and long term. The accomplishment of greatness rests on their great ideas and accomplishments that are out there sitting to be achieved. We are the ones who paint a canvas of a future, our future. You might call us dreamers but we put those dreams into action.
3. Persistence. Churchill said it best. “Never give up… never give up… never give up.” A very important quality of a successful entrepreneur is the persistence to continue pursuing a goal despite setbacks, despite obstacles, despite nay sayers. We might encounter road bumps along the way but at least we have a road map to our personal success and our personal persistence is demonstrated with our personal action which is followed up by even more action. . We “Never give up.” It's just not in our nature.
4. Determination. If persistence needed a friend, that would be determination. Determination is the inner drive and mindset that pushes you forward that drives you over the top. Determined is not being stubborn it’s the self motivation to claw your way to success when everyone and yes sometimes it seems like everyone is against you, claw you way to achieve your goals.
5. Creativity. Entrepreneurs tend to be curious and inquisitive. As a group we know that the name of the game is not just to fit in, but to stand out. We want to be seen. Creativity is a skill that can be learned and developed. We all have the ability to be creative and think outside the box but as a group we tend to do that more than others.
6. Honesty. Winning and keeping customers is all about being known, liked and trusted, heavy on the trust! This has always been an important characteristic of success. If you are honest with yourself and with others you have mastered this one major ingredient to becoming a great entrepreneur.
7. Self-Confidence. As a group we believe in what they are capable of. Self-confidence is built on wins, tiny wins over and over until we are capable of almost anything we put our minds to. This keeps leading to bigger and bigger wins and is the fuel to momentum. A successful entrepreneur goes after what they want with a strong desire and sense of self worth that supports their efforts and their determination.
8. Risk-taking. We realize that loss and failure are part of any business possibility. An entrepreneur is always ready to make calculated risks and face whatever consequences those risks might have. We know that to win some they have to lose some, but loosing is a life experience to learn from and not do again and again and again.
9. Tolerance. We have the courage to face failure and start again no matter who, what, when, where and how we face life. The qualities of a successful entrepreneur include never giving up, never panicking in the face of obstacles and in picking up the pieces and continuing the journey even if failure momentarily sometimes gets in the way.
10. Perseverance. We never stop moving forward. I am not saying attack, attack, attack but when we know what they want and see what we can achieve in any given situation, we know why they want it will do whatever it takes! We do not give up! There can be no real success without perseverance.
11. Commitment. An entrepreneur will not achieve success if we give up at the first sign of hard work. A 100% Commitment is absolutely essential and that means a willingness to do whatever it takes for the long haul to achieve our goals, not letting the nay sayers have their way. Doing whatever it takes includes all the things we would rather not do or don’t like to do. Not just what we want and like to do.
12. Organization. An entrepreneur knows the value of being organized. Systems, resources, time management and action plans are all part of the organizational process and are vital for success. Being organized both mentally and physically is a skill that needs to be cultivated in order to make significant progress.
13. And don't forget your sigificiant other. They are so imporatant to keep in your mind and heart. Let them come with you.
Larson Notes & Satire: All of these qualities don't mean a thing unless you take action! To think a thing does not make it happen thinking is only the beginning! You must take action and you must keep taking action! Yes you need to believe but without action there is nothing but your thoughts. Do you have what it takes to be a successful entrepreneur? This checklist is full of some of the best qualities and characteristics for you to check were you stand. If you can rate yourself at 8 (on a scale of 1-10) or better on these traits then you can absolutely be a success in business.
This is only the start to a world of self determination and entepreneurmentship, It’s not always pretty being the main Person but if you what to live by your rules and can handle the pressure, and there is big time pressure, do it. You will or might make mistakes and you need to be ready to fight thought those mistakes. It's not always pretty, in fact it can be ugly. If this is not for you, you can go back and find someone who will heir you for all your good qualities. You aren’t a failure if you can’t make a go at running your own company. It’s just another way to live.
Remember our 3 new programs for 2011
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3d our Virtual Business Consulting Program
Howad Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
Friday, February 11, 2011
Twitter 140 Letters Of Power
Twitter, what good is it. 140 letters or do you say characters? At any rate that is not a lot of ability to get your point across, is it?
Say you need a very special kind to dooger for a piece of equipment and don’t know where to get it. Tweet it out there and let the power of micro social media do its work. From your friends and followers you will get places to buy it, order it or another approach you might not have even though of and find you don’t even need it. And this can happen in the span of minutes and seconds rather than hours or needed to go to your one key supplier and take to their customer service desk.
Now if you look at my desk top it tends to get a little cluttered (like my desk) they tell me it’s a sign of genius and I believe them. I have my email account up. My Facebook, LinkedIn MerchantCircle and twitter all open. Scanning them once every 30 min to see if there is anything important I need to act on.
Because twitter messages are 140 characters or less there are people out there reading them all the time. You can use this. They are reading them on their PC’s as well as their phones. As a result of this mini message you can push out or grab in small bits of information.
To date Twitter has (only) 7% of the US population, 12 years old and over. That translates out to about 17 million users. That is much smaller than Facebook and its whooping 41% or the US population but the people using Twitter can be valuable because they tend to be more educated and more affluent then the population at large. 30% of Twitter users have a college degree, compared to 27% of the population as a whole. Additionally 51% of the Twitter users are out there following companies. Like I do.
Now the fun.
A somewhat new way a company or retailer can connect with its customers on twitter is to host a Twitter party. Yes you heard me a Twitter party; this is a party-like dialogue within Twitter for a set amount of time. The attendees use a hash mark say something like: #LarsonLeads . Attendees use this “hash tag” as the search term to the conversation thread. You the host keep the tweets flowing by salting the conversation with questions and comments that revolve around the conversation and comments. As you keep customers and prospects engaged weaving in giveaways and tweet only specials, online coupons. Some of the larger Twitter Parties can range upwards of over 700, so we are not talking small here friends. This is big stuff and has netted some companies upwards of over $7,000 for one hour of work. Then there is the aftermath where you have gained new followers you might have never had before. Again it is a building process. Many companies are able to do these parties on their slow days or slow times of the day, making them more profitable.
If Twitter boots customer and prospect awareness it is working for many companies. I’m talking about actual sales, not “involvement”. Sales that translates to real money, something to base your ROI on, real numbers that would make your banker smile.
Larson Notes & Satire: Twitter is a unique online platform that lets you show off to prospects exactly who you are in bite size pieces. If you do it successfully you will be successful.
What are the demographics of a Twitter Person?
College Degree
30% - Twitter
27% General population
Advanced Degree
17% - Twitter
11% General population
Household incomes of over $100,000
13% - Twitter
10% General population
So you tell me. Do those sound like the kinds of customers you want to have?
Remember our 3 new programs for 2011
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3d our Virtual Business Consulting Program
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
Say you need a very special kind to dooger for a piece of equipment and don’t know where to get it. Tweet it out there and let the power of micro social media do its work. From your friends and followers you will get places to buy it, order it or another approach you might not have even though of and find you don’t even need it. And this can happen in the span of minutes and seconds rather than hours or needed to go to your one key supplier and take to their customer service desk.
Now if you look at my desk top it tends to get a little cluttered (like my desk) they tell me it’s a sign of genius and I believe them. I have my email account up. My Facebook, LinkedIn MerchantCircle and twitter all open. Scanning them once every 30 min to see if there is anything important I need to act on.
Because twitter messages are 140 characters or less there are people out there reading them all the time. You can use this. They are reading them on their PC’s as well as their phones. As a result of this mini message you can push out or grab in small bits of information.
To date Twitter has (only) 7% of the US population, 12 years old and over. That translates out to about 17 million users. That is much smaller than Facebook and its whooping 41% or the US population but the people using Twitter can be valuable because they tend to be more educated and more affluent then the population at large. 30% of Twitter users have a college degree, compared to 27% of the population as a whole. Additionally 51% of the Twitter users are out there following companies. Like I do.
Now the fun.
A somewhat new way a company or retailer can connect with its customers on twitter is to host a Twitter party. Yes you heard me a Twitter party; this is a party-like dialogue within Twitter for a set amount of time. The attendees use a hash mark say something like: #LarsonLeads . Attendees use this “hash tag” as the search term to the conversation thread. You the host keep the tweets flowing by salting the conversation with questions and comments that revolve around the conversation and comments. As you keep customers and prospects engaged weaving in giveaways and tweet only specials, online coupons. Some of the larger Twitter Parties can range upwards of over 700, so we are not talking small here friends. This is big stuff and has netted some companies upwards of over $7,000 for one hour of work. Then there is the aftermath where you have gained new followers you might have never had before. Again it is a building process. Many companies are able to do these parties on their slow days or slow times of the day, making them more profitable.
If Twitter boots customer and prospect awareness it is working for many companies. I’m talking about actual sales, not “involvement”. Sales that translates to real money, something to base your ROI on, real numbers that would make your banker smile.
Larson Notes & Satire: Twitter is a unique online platform that lets you show off to prospects exactly who you are in bite size pieces. If you do it successfully you will be successful.
What are the demographics of a Twitter Person?
College Degree
30% - Twitter
27% General population
Advanced Degree
17% - Twitter
11% General population
Household incomes of over $100,000
13% - Twitter
10% General population
So you tell me. Do those sound like the kinds of customers you want to have?
Remember our 3 new programs for 2011
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3d our Virtual Business Consulting Program
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
What Could Do With A Facebook Fan Page
Do you have a Facebook fan page? No? Why not? Stop right where you are and go make one. I am of course assuming that you are on Facebook.
How do you actually get people to like your page? I started with my friends (yes I have friends) who were or had a business related connection with me. Then I started posing my fan page in various places like social media sites and as a link of my email signature line, again all business oriented of course. If you are selling in the B2C world you might want to start using it on all your emails.
So you have a fan page with a few followers
The first thing you want to do is you want to start to create an offer Facebook. That they can only get on your Facebook Fan Page. What you are doing is to create exclusive Facebook content. To be sued by your Facebook fans.
If you are also on YouTube or if you are also on Twitter (we are going to talk about Twitter parties in another blog) the same thing can be applied, but for the Facebook content here are a couple of things you can do:
Give specific discounts for your fans. These discounts will only come up for your fans and they can use it if they are fans. You can track it that way.
Have fan-only giveaways by running an unofficial contest through your Facebook page and you will give away merchandise.
Have fans submit pictures or videos. Set the guidelines for the contest and have the fans create content for your site. Once they do then you go out there and pick a winner, based of course on the criteria that you set up.
Have exclusive stories, video clips, and things that you mentioned just on Facebook. You won't post it anywhere else so for them to get it they will actually have to come to your Facebook Fan Page.
The more that your content ends up getting liked then of course the more people are going to be watching that or looking at it and it gets passed around. You are in essence making Facebook your own little VIP club room and we know everybody wants to be treated like a VIP.
So go on and create your Facebook (VIP) Fan page today.
Larson Notes & Satire: This for me will be the next frontier. Now that I have most of my different social media sites have enough followers rather than do social media wide special I am going to work on exclusives. See which one gives me the most bang for my time and maybe push a few hard earned Larson Dollars in that direction. No use giving money to a Social Media site that does not produce, but it if does. . .
Remember our 3 new programs for 2011.
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3d our Virtual Business Consulting Program
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
How do you actually get people to like your page? I started with my friends (yes I have friends) who were or had a business related connection with me. Then I started posing my fan page in various places like social media sites and as a link of my email signature line, again all business oriented of course. If you are selling in the B2C world you might want to start using it on all your emails.
So you have a fan page with a few followers
The first thing you want to do is you want to start to create an offer Facebook. That they can only get on your Facebook Fan Page. What you are doing is to create exclusive Facebook content. To be sued by your Facebook fans.
If you are also on YouTube or if you are also on Twitter (we are going to talk about Twitter parties in another blog) the same thing can be applied, but for the Facebook content here are a couple of things you can do:
Give specific discounts for your fans. These discounts will only come up for your fans and they can use it if they are fans. You can track it that way.
Have fan-only giveaways by running an unofficial contest through your Facebook page and you will give away merchandise.
Have fans submit pictures or videos. Set the guidelines for the contest and have the fans create content for your site. Once they do then you go out there and pick a winner, based of course on the criteria that you set up.
Have exclusive stories, video clips, and things that you mentioned just on Facebook. You won't post it anywhere else so for them to get it they will actually have to come to your Facebook Fan Page.
The more that your content ends up getting liked then of course the more people are going to be watching that or looking at it and it gets passed around. You are in essence making Facebook your own little VIP club room and we know everybody wants to be treated like a VIP.
So go on and create your Facebook (VIP) Fan page today.
Larson Notes & Satire: This for me will be the next frontier. Now that I have most of my different social media sites have enough followers rather than do social media wide special I am going to work on exclusives. See which one gives me the most bang for my time and maybe push a few hard earned Larson Dollars in that direction. No use giving money to a Social Media site that does not produce, but it if does. . .
Remember our 3 new programs for 2011.
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3d our Virtual Business Consulting Program
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
4 Steps To Better Relationships
As in the past not much has really changed. You never know where you will meet your next customer. It could be anywhere from the barber shop to standing in line to get a cup of coffee somewhere. How you choose to begin that relationship with this new contact and future customer does have an impact on how well you well and can stay connected with them. The world of social media opens up an ever increasing way for you to meet people. Rather than at the barber or the coffee shop it can now be twitter or Facebook.
So you want to be a Social Media Business success? Follow these steps to get the necessary information to nurture your relationships and find customers
First thing is to just relax. Take it slow. I really don’t care what kind of business you are in. There is no real rush. Believe me. If you are in business to stay in business for a long long time, just relax. If you want to establish long term customers you need to do things one step at a time. Do them completely and thoroughly and if you’re like me, you can’t do this fast and on the fly. So again sit down have a cup of coffee.
Let’s look at it this way, you need to act online as you would as if you were meeting people F2F. If you exchange an online business card, if you email back and forth a few times, your LinkedIn connections, you need to treat them as if they are real people because guess what? They are real people. Each one is an individual who could and can become a customer.
The next step could be to invite these new prospects to receive your email or join your Facebook fan club. The idea is to get them involved with you.
Side note here is that if your sales cycle is 1 month or 18 months don’t think that just because this is online that it will shirk to half the time and go down to 15 days or 9 months. As in all your sales your cycle was created over time and the channel you are choosing to work in for your marketing is not going to change that.
Second thing is to use the information you are collecting wisely and keep it clean. Housecleaning might seem like a never ending task (and it is) but if you want to have data you can use keeping it clean and up to date is a primary task. What you are achieving here is making your database a prospecting pool to work though your sales cycle as you would any sales prospect.
Next and here is where most people mess up, contact people in the way that they want to be contacted. That’s right if you really want to connect you will contact them as they wish not as you wish. IN this kind of contact (which takes work) you start to stand out from the crowd and become a valued connection. The more value you are the closer you become to being on the “short” list. Why not be so bold as to actually ask how someone who you have exchanged a few threads with would really like to be contacted. Talk about finding a way to get noticed!
As in all sales you need to know when and how to ask for the sale. Don’t fool yourself into thinking that just because you have online interaction you have a done deal. You wouldn’t think that if they were in your office of store so why do you think that if they are in your online office or store? If you do, shame on you! Like any kind of sale you need to know when and how to close it. Use your sales skills.
If all this seems like a lot of work, your right, it is. Success does not and has never come easy for a sales person. We are not selling snake oil here where everyone with a slick tongue and a golden throat and sell anything to anybody. So as you march down the online marketing social media path, you might just want to remember that behind all those names are real people.
Larson Notes & Satire: I started with the request for you to sit down and have a cup of coffee. Now the fun starts. Stop collecting all those names and followers for a day or two and digest what you already have. Find those nuggets you have already laying on the ground. Now go on and read “Acres of Diamonds” it’s a good book.
Remember our 3 new programs for 2011.
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3d our Virtual Business Consulting Program
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
So you want to be a Social Media Business success? Follow these steps to get the necessary information to nurture your relationships and find customers
First thing is to just relax. Take it slow. I really don’t care what kind of business you are in. There is no real rush. Believe me. If you are in business to stay in business for a long long time, just relax. If you want to establish long term customers you need to do things one step at a time. Do them completely and thoroughly and if you’re like me, you can’t do this fast and on the fly. So again sit down have a cup of coffee.
Let’s look at it this way, you need to act online as you would as if you were meeting people F2F. If you exchange an online business card, if you email back and forth a few times, your LinkedIn connections, you need to treat them as if they are real people because guess what? They are real people. Each one is an individual who could and can become a customer.
The next step could be to invite these new prospects to receive your email or join your Facebook fan club. The idea is to get them involved with you.
Side note here is that if your sales cycle is 1 month or 18 months don’t think that just because this is online that it will shirk to half the time and go down to 15 days or 9 months. As in all your sales your cycle was created over time and the channel you are choosing to work in for your marketing is not going to change that.
Second thing is to use the information you are collecting wisely and keep it clean. Housecleaning might seem like a never ending task (and it is) but if you want to have data you can use keeping it clean and up to date is a primary task. What you are achieving here is making your database a prospecting pool to work though your sales cycle as you would any sales prospect.
Next and here is where most people mess up, contact people in the way that they want to be contacted. That’s right if you really want to connect you will contact them as they wish not as you wish. IN this kind of contact (which takes work) you start to stand out from the crowd and become a valued connection. The more value you are the closer you become to being on the “short” list. Why not be so bold as to actually ask how someone who you have exchanged a few threads with would really like to be contacted. Talk about finding a way to get noticed!
As in all sales you need to know when and how to ask for the sale. Don’t fool yourself into thinking that just because you have online interaction you have a done deal. You wouldn’t think that if they were in your office of store so why do you think that if they are in your online office or store? If you do, shame on you! Like any kind of sale you need to know when and how to close it. Use your sales skills.
If all this seems like a lot of work, your right, it is. Success does not and has never come easy for a sales person. We are not selling snake oil here where everyone with a slick tongue and a golden throat and sell anything to anybody. So as you march down the online marketing social media path, you might just want to remember that behind all those names are real people.
Larson Notes & Satire: I started with the request for you to sit down and have a cup of coffee. Now the fun starts. Stop collecting all those names and followers for a day or two and digest what you already have. Find those nuggets you have already laying on the ground. Now go on and read “Acres of Diamonds” it’s a good book.
Remember our 3 new programs for 2011.
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3d our Virtual Business Consulting Program
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
Monday, February 7, 2011
Is Your Social Media A Boost Or A Bust
Social Media is fun. Going out there doing all this marketing stuff. Getting your name out there. Collecting all sorts of friends and fans. Oh how we get all excited when we pick up someone new on our followers. So how many paying customers do you have or have gotten though your SM efforts?
Larson Social Media Score Card
Merchants Circle (1066 followers) – 3 customers gained
Linked-in (516 connections) – 2 customers gained
Facebook (129 fans) – 0 customers gained
Twitter (3012 followers) – 1 customers gained
All others – 0
So you’re wondering if Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter or any other sites are where you should invest your precious time?
I have started focusing more time on Facebook, but still my main focus is MerchantCircle and LinkedIn. For me right now Facebook and Twitter are filler sites. But with the mass power of those two I cannot afford to avoid them.
So as always when I do one of these little social media pieces the main question is always how should you approach it? Now don’t think I know what I am doing because I am totally blind, as all experts are. Sorry all you experts but we all have ideas and approaches and anyone who wants to be called an expert is a bit too egotistical for me. I have had too many experts telling me how to do what I am doing and wanting to pick my pocket. Sure they all have good ideas. Ideas and action items you could be doing for yourself if you want to and have the time. If you don’t, maybe you need to hire and expert. We here at Larson write blogs for 2 other companies that don’t have the time to do it themselves. We also monitor social media sites for 3 companies to keep them in constant touch with their fans and friends.
So what could you be doing? I can only tell you what I do then do what you need to do for yourself and your company.
I start with a posting to get my day started. I get it placed on Facebook, twitter and LinkedIn. Then I sit down and write my blog, usually daily but sometimes it goes to every other day or so due to time. My bong is the bedrock of my Social Media attack. Each blog take an hour or so of actual writing, but that does not count the research and development of the piece which might be another hour. I usually have about 4 or 5 ideas going through my mind at any given time.
After posting my blog on a few sites. 8 right now, I usually scan though some of the LinkIn Groups I am in to see if there are any pertant discussions I would get involved in. Most are just meaningless chest puffing and I stay out of those. If I am being mean cruel and harsh so be it, but most online chatter is just that, with 95% meaningless to my or any businesses real grown or personal development. If I offending anyone, I am sorry, but this is after all how I see things as I sit on the ebony thrown up in the ivory tower.
Though out the day I will put out some of the successes that I or my team has had in securing appointment or leads for our clients on twitter which feeds into my LinkedIn account.
I will go back and post another Facebook thought about noon. Right now the theme is phone skills.
The most important thing you can do is to just get involved. The key is as in all marketing, be consistent with your time and your message. When you post something pertant to you and your company, 1st it appears (with Facebook) on their front page and if they just happen to “like it” all their friends can then see what you have said as it then appears on their walls and they might become a fan of your company. (The power of social media Word of Mouth). That is about as automatic as you can get in sharing your message as you can get right now.
One brief note on e-blastings your friends on any Social Media site. Make it good if not your just another spammer and you will have just gone down 10 pints in my book. What is important to you might not be important to me. Your caucuses are not important to me Keep that in mind next time you want to send out a blast.
Larson Notes & Satire: If you want me to help you. Sure I will, for a fee. I am about as expert as you are going to find out here in Web World. I don’t know all the fancy programming. But I know people who do. The key is and if I lose a customer so be it. You can do all this social media stuff yourself. It takes time to bring it all together and make it work and keeping it working but if you are consistent it can and does bring results.
Now remember I am a B2B company not a B2C company so where I am and what I do is geared for that kind of customer and sale. If you are B2C you are going to need to do things a little different. Either way the key is constancy
Remember our 3 new programs for 2011.
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3d our Virtual Business Consulting Program
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
Larson Social Media Score Card
Merchants Circle (1066 followers) – 3 customers gained
Linked-in (516 connections) – 2 customers gained
Facebook (129 fans) – 0 customers gained
Twitter (3012 followers) – 1 customers gained
All others – 0
So you’re wondering if Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter or any other sites are where you should invest your precious time?
I have started focusing more time on Facebook, but still my main focus is MerchantCircle and LinkedIn. For me right now Facebook and Twitter are filler sites. But with the mass power of those two I cannot afford to avoid them.
So as always when I do one of these little social media pieces the main question is always how should you approach it? Now don’t think I know what I am doing because I am totally blind, as all experts are. Sorry all you experts but we all have ideas and approaches and anyone who wants to be called an expert is a bit too egotistical for me. I have had too many experts telling me how to do what I am doing and wanting to pick my pocket. Sure they all have good ideas. Ideas and action items you could be doing for yourself if you want to and have the time. If you don’t, maybe you need to hire and expert. We here at Larson write blogs for 2 other companies that don’t have the time to do it themselves. We also monitor social media sites for 3 companies to keep them in constant touch with their fans and friends.
So what could you be doing? I can only tell you what I do then do what you need to do for yourself and your company.
I start with a posting to get my day started. I get it placed on Facebook, twitter and LinkedIn. Then I sit down and write my blog, usually daily but sometimes it goes to every other day or so due to time. My bong is the bedrock of my Social Media attack. Each blog take an hour or so of actual writing, but that does not count the research and development of the piece which might be another hour. I usually have about 4 or 5 ideas going through my mind at any given time.
After posting my blog on a few sites. 8 right now, I usually scan though some of the LinkIn Groups I am in to see if there are any pertant discussions I would get involved in. Most are just meaningless chest puffing and I stay out of those. If I am being mean cruel and harsh so be it, but most online chatter is just that, with 95% meaningless to my or any businesses real grown or personal development. If I offending anyone, I am sorry, but this is after all how I see things as I sit on the ebony thrown up in the ivory tower.
Though out the day I will put out some of the successes that I or my team has had in securing appointment or leads for our clients on twitter which feeds into my LinkedIn account.
I will go back and post another Facebook thought about noon. Right now the theme is phone skills.
The most important thing you can do is to just get involved. The key is as in all marketing, be consistent with your time and your message. When you post something pertant to you and your company, 1st it appears (with Facebook) on their front page and if they just happen to “like it” all their friends can then see what you have said as it then appears on their walls and they might become a fan of your company. (The power of social media Word of Mouth). That is about as automatic as you can get in sharing your message as you can get right now.
One brief note on e-blastings your friends on any Social Media site. Make it good if not your just another spammer and you will have just gone down 10 pints in my book. What is important to you might not be important to me. Your caucuses are not important to me Keep that in mind next time you want to send out a blast.
Larson Notes & Satire: If you want me to help you. Sure I will, for a fee. I am about as expert as you are going to find out here in Web World. I don’t know all the fancy programming. But I know people who do. The key is and if I lose a customer so be it. You can do all this social media stuff yourself. It takes time to bring it all together and make it work and keeping it working but if you are consistent it can and does bring results.
Now remember I am a B2B company not a B2C company so where I am and what I do is geared for that kind of customer and sale. If you are B2C you are going to need to do things a little different. Either way the key is constancy
Remember our 3 new programs for 2011.
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3d our Virtual Business Consulting Program
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
Friday, February 4, 2011
Experience Use It Or Waste It
Experience is the best teacher. I have been told that since I don’t remember when. Then in the 80’s I learned the law of learning from other peoples experience. Nice but possible?
So let’s look at experience. Experience can be good if:
1. It has prepared you for today’s challenges.
2. It has made you comfortable with needed changes.
3. It has opened you up to welcoming new changes.
4. It has opened your eyes up to be able to look for new competitive advantages you can make.
5. You change wrong or bad habits before they become habits.
6. You keep learning how to simplify things and not complicate your life.
7. You can apply your experience to current events in a positive way
8. You can use experience to lift you up to new and greater heights.
Experiences are the building blocks that allow use to create our own future. If you can lean and discern the different experiences you have the good and get bad, you can lay a solid foundation to build your life and business upon. With good initiative and intuition you can be your own person not waiting for someone else to show you the way. Those of us who learn to make calibrated steady disciplined use of our experiences seem to move forward.
Yet there is a bad side of experience. Experience can be bad if:
1. Your skills are out of date. (Get cracking, life does not stand still for anyone)
2. You have locked yourself into bad habits. (Don’t be concerned about your appearance. It is all about substance)
3. You are resistant to change of any kind. (Don’t get trapped into what has not worked before. Change happens. Go with it)
4. You keep reliving the “Go old days”. (These are the good old days. Live in the now.)
5. You are afraid of making a mistake. (That is what experience is a compounding of action, both good and bad.)
6. You are applying old worn out solutions to new problems. (That is not using experience that is reliving the past.)
7. You are wasting time and energy on regrets of life. (The past is over, down, Period)
8. You dwell on past accomplishments. (I have a wall of awards; it hangs up on my wall and looks all pretty. I have a wall of medals and trophies but I want more. Is that bad?)
9. You follow the wrong people. (You need to be the lead dog, the front runner.)
Now I am not saying we don’t have bad experiences or that all bad experiences are to be considered bad. When you are having one or two, stop take a deep breath, suck it up, learn the lesson and go baby go! Deal with it. Don’t blame anyone for it. Make some solid choices. As you do consider:
1. If I continue to do this what will the consequences be?
2. What am I leaning that I can apply to right myself?
Minimizing bad experiences and Maximizing good ones. Experiences are the foundation to build yourself up. Each experience can serve as a building block to the next. What you do with it is the mortar between.
Larson Notes & Satire: Everyone once in a while it happens. Someone wants me to mentor them. Why? How should I know? I can tell them of life and life’s experiences from my perspective, which I do. I can have them go through various excursuses that might reveal their answers but what I cannot do is make that choice and make those actions for them.
I have always believed that each of us has all the tools we need for each challenge life thoughts at us. It is already in us to make the right decision. Look into yourself for the answers don’t look at me. I am me, unique and sometimes obnoxious. You’re you. If you want my help you might not like the answer(s). Why? Because I will make you think.
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
So let’s look at experience. Experience can be good if:
1. It has prepared you for today’s challenges.
2. It has made you comfortable with needed changes.
3. It has opened you up to welcoming new changes.
4. It has opened your eyes up to be able to look for new competitive advantages you can make.
5. You change wrong or bad habits before they become habits.
6. You keep learning how to simplify things and not complicate your life.
7. You can apply your experience to current events in a positive way
8. You can use experience to lift you up to new and greater heights.
Experiences are the building blocks that allow use to create our own future. If you can lean and discern the different experiences you have the good and get bad, you can lay a solid foundation to build your life and business upon. With good initiative and intuition you can be your own person not waiting for someone else to show you the way. Those of us who learn to make calibrated steady disciplined use of our experiences seem to move forward.
Yet there is a bad side of experience. Experience can be bad if:
1. Your skills are out of date. (Get cracking, life does not stand still for anyone)
2. You have locked yourself into bad habits. (Don’t be concerned about your appearance. It is all about substance)
3. You are resistant to change of any kind. (Don’t get trapped into what has not worked before. Change happens. Go with it)
4. You keep reliving the “Go old days”. (These are the good old days. Live in the now.)
5. You are afraid of making a mistake. (That is what experience is a compounding of action, both good and bad.)
6. You are applying old worn out solutions to new problems. (That is not using experience that is reliving the past.)
7. You are wasting time and energy on regrets of life. (The past is over, down, Period)
8. You dwell on past accomplishments. (I have a wall of awards; it hangs up on my wall and looks all pretty. I have a wall of medals and trophies but I want more. Is that bad?)
9. You follow the wrong people. (You need to be the lead dog, the front runner.)
Now I am not saying we don’t have bad experiences or that all bad experiences are to be considered bad. When you are having one or two, stop take a deep breath, suck it up, learn the lesson and go baby go! Deal with it. Don’t blame anyone for it. Make some solid choices. As you do consider:
1. If I continue to do this what will the consequences be?
2. What am I leaning that I can apply to right myself?
Minimizing bad experiences and Maximizing good ones. Experiences are the foundation to build yourself up. Each experience can serve as a building block to the next. What you do with it is the mortar between.
Larson Notes & Satire: Everyone once in a while it happens. Someone wants me to mentor them. Why? How should I know? I can tell them of life and life’s experiences from my perspective, which I do. I can have them go through various excursuses that might reveal their answers but what I cannot do is make that choice and make those actions for them.
I have always believed that each of us has all the tools we need for each challenge life thoughts at us. It is already in us to make the right decision. Look into yourself for the answers don’t look at me. I am me, unique and sometimes obnoxious. You’re you. If you want my help you might not like the answer(s). Why? Because I will make you think.
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
Thursday, February 3, 2011
Direct Mail Keeps Getting Better With Age
I’ve been kicking around advertising a long time. I have seen technology become obsolete with the new and better, although sometimes I wonder if new is really better. I have seen things start to happen faster, and site back up here in the ivory tower and wonder if faster is better.
Sometimes a walk to the coffee shop rather than driving can get my head working on overtime then a sip of a delightful cup of “Joe” then the walk back and I have more ideas than I can handle. I can’t do that driving in the city. Give me a good 200 mile ride and it will have the same effect on my mind but local, no way.
But don’t let my longevity fool you into thinking I am clinging to the old ways of making things happen. Sure my company uses a lot of old technology and old ideas and old marketing tools. But ask yourself if you know too many other advertising or marketing companies that are working the Social Media world harder. Ask yourself if you know too many other advertising and marketing companies that work the web harder.
So why direct mail? In the early days of web marketing (rolling on the floor with laughter as I think, ya the early days what, 10 years ago? 5 years?) there was the promise of this new channel pushing out all the old marketing ideas and tools as people flooded to only online marketing , online newspapers and catalogs.
So as everyone moved into the wide world of the web good old Larson’s moved more and more into telemarketing and direct mail while setting ourselves up in Social Media Marketing with our first entry on MerchantCircle in September of 2006 http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates . Why because that is where the action was and still is. We did not make a big splash back then we moved in, sort of like a gun fighter rides into town in an old Clint Eastwood movie. Head straight but eyes always moving.
So as everyone rushed or rushes into Social Media and the web we sort of slowly road in and sauntered up to the bar, ordered a drink (of telemarketing) then downing that another (of direct mail) looking over the room a third of shot (blogging). Slowing calculating as we lean against the bar our head straight, our eyes always moving. Looking. Watching.
As email and email blasts and email marketing rose up my mail box got emptier and emptier, but my email address got so full I did not read it all. As this happened I found that I, and those of my clients that were sticking with (good old) direct mail were seeing higher rations, better results and a stronger ROI. As each of our mailing pieces competed with fewer and fewer other items in the box, they were seen and read more and more resulting in more and more action.
One client of ours using direct mail has seen their performance in this channel go up 250% over the last 2 years. From 2% upwards of 5% return. In working the account we are finding that direct mail is becoming a stronger more viable channel to funnel valuable marketing dollars to. With variable data we can improve the levels of personalization and relevance to increase response rates even higher. I have been pushing direct mail hard over the last year not because my company is involved in it, but because it works.
Learn how to use direct mail while in harmony with your digital, web and social media marketing. Mix it up with the speed of light and you might surprise yourself.
Larson Notes & Satire: Am I old? You bet ya. Just ask my kids. I guess that is one of the reasons I still run races. I still place in the top 10% in the open race category. That is with all those 20 and 30 year olds the high school and college runners. 9 times out of 10 times I will be in the top 3 in my age group in any given race. The longer the race, the less their speed and my knowledge becomes important. Therein lies the difference between a 1 mile run and a full marathon.
Age has its benefits and one of those is the knowledge of seeing the past as we move into the future. My company has a 1 month, 3 month, 6 month, 1 year and 5 year goal on where I want it to be. The last year was not nice to most of use and I did need to revise things slightly but after revision I still hit my numbers.
It is sort of funny the requests I get from people that really have no idea on who I am. They are clues about what I want my company to be doing or where I want it go. They tell me how they can do this and that for me. How my web site stinks, which it does, but don’t know that in one of my targeted markers I place 1st page in Google, Yahoo and Bing, how I post too many links with my twitter messages which I do, but I get responses they have no knowledge of. How I do everything wrong and they do everything right and how they could fix my business. They know what THEY want but are totally clueless about me. (big sigh)
Don’t let my old graying blond hair fool you. When you want to do something for me shoot straight. Know me and my company, because guess what, I think I should be helping you and not the other way around.
And oh ya, don’t every take yourself too seriously, I know I don’t.
We have 3 programs that you might be interested in.
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3d our Virtual Business Consulting Program,
All designed to help small to medium size business thrive and prosper without picking your pocket.
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
Sometimes a walk to the coffee shop rather than driving can get my head working on overtime then a sip of a delightful cup of “Joe” then the walk back and I have more ideas than I can handle. I can’t do that driving in the city. Give me a good 200 mile ride and it will have the same effect on my mind but local, no way.
But don’t let my longevity fool you into thinking I am clinging to the old ways of making things happen. Sure my company uses a lot of old technology and old ideas and old marketing tools. But ask yourself if you know too many other advertising or marketing companies that are working the Social Media world harder. Ask yourself if you know too many other advertising and marketing companies that work the web harder.
So why direct mail? In the early days of web marketing (rolling on the floor with laughter as I think, ya the early days what, 10 years ago? 5 years?) there was the promise of this new channel pushing out all the old marketing ideas and tools as people flooded to only online marketing , online newspapers and catalogs.
So as everyone moved into the wide world of the web good old Larson’s moved more and more into telemarketing and direct mail while setting ourselves up in Social Media Marketing with our first entry on MerchantCircle in September of 2006 http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates . Why because that is where the action was and still is. We did not make a big splash back then we moved in, sort of like a gun fighter rides into town in an old Clint Eastwood movie. Head straight but eyes always moving.
So as everyone rushed or rushes into Social Media and the web we sort of slowly road in and sauntered up to the bar, ordered a drink (of telemarketing) then downing that another (of direct mail) looking over the room a third of shot (blogging). Slowing calculating as we lean against the bar our head straight, our eyes always moving. Looking. Watching.
As email and email blasts and email marketing rose up my mail box got emptier and emptier, but my email address got so full I did not read it all. As this happened I found that I, and those of my clients that were sticking with (good old) direct mail were seeing higher rations, better results and a stronger ROI. As each of our mailing pieces competed with fewer and fewer other items in the box, they were seen and read more and more resulting in more and more action.
One client of ours using direct mail has seen their performance in this channel go up 250% over the last 2 years. From 2% upwards of 5% return. In working the account we are finding that direct mail is becoming a stronger more viable channel to funnel valuable marketing dollars to. With variable data we can improve the levels of personalization and relevance to increase response rates even higher. I have been pushing direct mail hard over the last year not because my company is involved in it, but because it works.
Learn how to use direct mail while in harmony with your digital, web and social media marketing. Mix it up with the speed of light and you might surprise yourself.
Larson Notes & Satire: Am I old? You bet ya. Just ask my kids. I guess that is one of the reasons I still run races. I still place in the top 10% in the open race category. That is with all those 20 and 30 year olds the high school and college runners. 9 times out of 10 times I will be in the top 3 in my age group in any given race. The longer the race, the less their speed and my knowledge becomes important. Therein lies the difference between a 1 mile run and a full marathon.
Age has its benefits and one of those is the knowledge of seeing the past as we move into the future. My company has a 1 month, 3 month, 6 month, 1 year and 5 year goal on where I want it to be. The last year was not nice to most of use and I did need to revise things slightly but after revision I still hit my numbers.
It is sort of funny the requests I get from people that really have no idea on who I am. They are clues about what I want my company to be doing or where I want it go. They tell me how they can do this and that for me. How my web site stinks, which it does, but don’t know that in one of my targeted markers I place 1st page in Google, Yahoo and Bing, how I post too many links with my twitter messages which I do, but I get responses they have no knowledge of. How I do everything wrong and they do everything right and how they could fix my business. They know what THEY want but are totally clueless about me. (big sigh)
Don’t let my old graying blond hair fool you. When you want to do something for me shoot straight. Know me and my company, because guess what, I think I should be helping you and not the other way around.
And oh ya, don’t every take yourself too seriously, I know I don’t.
We have 3 programs that you might be interested in.
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3d our Virtual Business Consulting Program,
All designed to help small to medium size business thrive and prosper without picking your pocket.
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
So You Want A Facebook Ad?
Let’s not just pick on Facebook let’s add in any kind of Social Media site. Keep your checkbook closed and your credit cards tight in your wallet.
If your thinking of advertising in and though Facebook plan carefully not just in the add and the target but the back end follow up and service. As you do keep in mind that Facebook users are far more likely to click on ads for entertainment, media sites, and blogs than for other kinds of ads.
This chart from a recent Webtrends survey of more than 11,000 Facebook advertisements measures click through rates (red) and cost per click (blue) for different categories of ads. There's a huge jump in click through rates for the last two categories -- Media & Entertainment and Tabloids & Blogs. In other words, stuff that's fun to discuss with friends.
Health care ads are the least successful, followed -- somewhat surprisingly -- by ads for Internet and software products.
Maybe that fits you but not me. I’m putting together my Facebook Fan group http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans to go after a more B2B market but with only 126 fans it’s not there yet. Yet if your B2C and fit in the higher areas of media and entertainment you might not lose your shirt or if you have big enough pockets, go for it.
Keep in mind there are more social media sites aside from Facebook. If you’re B2C they might be your best bet right now but that could change in a month. Literally that fast. If you’re B2B you might want to look over sites like MerchantCircle http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates or LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/in/larsonassociates which are more business orientated. The key is to go where your customers are!
Larson Notes & Satire: No one picks Uncle Howie’s pocket. Yelp called me once and tried to get me to spend money on them, trying to show (show? No tell) me how successful they were with American Express. Well good for American Express but what do they have in common with Larson & Associates your premier Telesales Service for small business? It is funny how the delightful young lady could not answer that? Don’t worry I was nice to her.
But remember Cash is king. If you have it people will try to get you to spend it, on them.
If you need help with your business or marketing plan so you don’t get raked over the coals call us and we will set you up with a Larson planning expert or for long term we can put you on a consultant planning program.
We have 3 programs that you might be interested in.
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3d our Virtual Business Consulting Program,
All designed to help small to medium size business thrive and prosper without picking your pocket.
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
If your thinking of advertising in and though Facebook plan carefully not just in the add and the target but the back end follow up and service. As you do keep in mind that Facebook users are far more likely to click on ads for entertainment, media sites, and blogs than for other kinds of ads.
This chart from a recent Webtrends survey of more than 11,000 Facebook advertisements measures click through rates (red) and cost per click (blue) for different categories of ads. There's a huge jump in click through rates for the last two categories -- Media & Entertainment and Tabloids & Blogs. In other words, stuff that's fun to discuss with friends.
Health care ads are the least successful, followed -- somewhat surprisingly -- by ads for Internet and software products.
Keep in mind there are more social media sites aside from Facebook. If you’re B2C they might be your best bet right now but that could change in a month. Literally that fast. If you’re B2B you might want to look over sites like MerchantCircle http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates or LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/in/larsonassociates which are more business orientated. The key is to go where your customers are!
Larson Notes & Satire: No one picks Uncle Howie’s pocket. Yelp called me once and tried to get me to spend money on them, trying to show (show? No tell) me how successful they were with American Express. Well good for American Express but what do they have in common with Larson & Associates your premier Telesales Service for small business? It is funny how the delightful young lady could not answer that? Don’t worry I was nice to her.
But remember Cash is king. If you have it people will try to get you to spend it, on them.
If you need help with your business or marketing plan so you don’t get raked over the coals call us and we will set you up with a Larson planning expert or for long term we can put you on a consultant planning program.
We have 3 programs that you might be interested in.
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3d our Virtual Business Consulting Program,
All designed to help small to medium size business thrive and prosper without picking your pocket.
Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates
https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate
P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.
P.P.S. Take the Larson Challenge to double your sales this year and get listed on our web site @ http://www.larsonassociates.ws/Larson_Challenge . Email us your company name and web address to get listed. Make this year your best ever!
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