Category: Networking

By Posted on Posted in Branding, Marketing Techniques and Philosophies, Networking, Shel's Personal Life Tagged with , , , , ,
Shel made friends with these three Australians while traveling in Turkey
Shel made friends with these three Australians while traveling in Turkey

Pretty much every networking guru agrees: sending handwritten notes, especially thank-you notes, is one of the best ways to grow your importance in the minds of the people who receive them.

And I know that the hand-written thank-you notes I’ve received stay in my own mind for years, even decades.

But maybe, like me, you have terrible handwriting. And maybe you also get very bad writers cramp. So I hereby give you permission to build your network through other tools. Here are a few of the ways I do that:

  • If I don’t recognize the caller ID: “Good morning/afternoon/evening, this is Shel. How may I make your day special? This starts a lot of great conversations.
  • On the discussion lists I participate in, I do my best to answer people’s questions with friendly, helpful, useful advice—and to answer a lot more questions than I ask. For about ten years, this was the biggest source of new clients in my business, and all it cost was my time.
  • Of course, I add value when possible. On social media, this is so easy: retweet, Like, and share good posts, sometimes engaging in dialog or bringing others directly into the conversation (tagging them). But outside of social media, you can add lots more value without a whole lot of work. Make e-mail introductions to people who could benefit from knowing each other, even if you have nothing to gain from their connection. Send an article or video link you think will interest your contact. Be of service as a volunteer. Interview movers and shakers for your blog, your telesummit, or the book you’re writing.
  • Each year, I select a cool oddball birthday greeting (this year, it’s space aliens singing Happy Birthday). Whenever a Facebook connection’s birthday comes up, my assistant sends them the greeting. When they thank me, I often ask how they’re doing,w hat they’re up to, and when they respond to that, I fill them in on my own very exciting work turning hunger and poverty into sufficiency, war into peace, and catastrophic climate change into planetary balance. NOTE: since many of my FB friends know each other, I typically do these as private messages rather than wall posts.
  • I’m always ready to start or join conversations with strangers—such as the three young Australian women in the picture, whom I met while hiking in Turkey. I’ve actually formed lasting relationships on public transit, at conferences, and yes, even at business networking events.
  • Thank people publicly. When you make people look good in front of others, they remember.

 

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By Posted on Posted in Business-general, Customer Service as Marketing, General Commentary, localism/locavore, Networking, People Helping People, Shel's Personal Life Tagged with , , ,

Thursday was full of extremes, with both positive and negative encounters.

On the positive side, I had two amazing one-to-one meetings: with the former mayor of a nearby town who just took a job with a green energy company, and then a few minutes later, with a life coach friend of mine. With both, we each brainstormed marketing ideas and helpful contacts for the other.

Then, a brief call with my own coach, Oshana Himot, who continues to amaze me with her sheer brilliance. My business is engaged in a major shift toward much deeper work, and she can take much of the credit. And finally, a Chamber mixer where I managed to have several substantive conversations. I was introduced to a gentleman I didn’t know who’s partnering with an organic farmer friend of mine to make tortillas using local corn. As a local food advocate, marketer, and foodie, I’m eager to help him succeed. Then was my friend who runs the local TV station, on his capital campaign and new building they’re going to construct. I offered him a resource about building deeply green, and he, out of the blue, offered to shoot a promo for me. And finally, a woman in my own town who will bring a much-needed progressive and articulate voice to the Selectboard.

But on the same day, I had three encounters with enormous stupidity.

1. We’d been contacted by a charity some time back to see if we had any goods to donate. We did indeed, and in the intervening two weeks, we’ve filled three large boxes with books and a huge trash bag of clothes. Originally, we were going to put all this in front of the garage for pickup, so we wouldn’t have to wait around. They’re not allowed to actually open the door. But since that was set up, it’s snowed several times and our garage is completely blocked off. So I called to explain that the crew would have to ring our bell, since we couldn’t put things out by the garage and we didn’t want to ruin it all by putting it right in the snow. And then I asked for a two-hour window for the pickup, so we could be sure to be here. No can do, she told me; they’ll be there any time between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. I told her that I wasn’t going to be stuck in my house all Saturday waiting for them. Finally, after about ten minutes of back and forth, she gave me a phone number to call Saturday morning where they’d be able to narrow it down at least a little. Not exactly customer service heroism—especially considering WE’re doing THEM a favor by donating goods.

2. Between my two morning meetings, I had to walk in a busy, narrow street in the central business district of a nearby village, because one gas station owner hadn’t shoveled his side walk. I poked my head in the office and mentioned the problem. The owner growled, “It hasn’t been 24 hours.” Yet every other property owner had managed to clear the sidewalk, Guess where I’m never buying gas again as long as I live (and yes, I have been a customer there, in the past).

3. My wife and I were the only customers in a restaurant except for one person picking up a takeout order, for about 40 minutes. Just as we were about to leave, a woman showed up prepared to make a large takeout order. It was 10 minutes to 8 and they sent her away, saying they were closed. It probably would have delayed their 8 pm closing by 10 or 15 minutes and more than doubled their take for the hour. (The owner was not present). And it would have kept that customer coming back.

In all three cases, all I could do was scratch my head in amazement. I will not beat you over the head with the obvious customer service lessons from these three encounters with stupidity. Unlike the three perpetrators, you’re smart enough to figure it out.

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By Posted on Posted in Advertising, Energy & Sustainability, Green Marketing, Innovation, Marketing Techniques and Philosophies, Marketing Trends/News, Networking, People Helping People, Technology, Web 2.0/Social Media Tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Sunday, I asked for your comments on three inspirations for innovation and creativity. If you missed the original, please take a moment to go back and read it first. If you didn’t, be aware that I give away the ending to the Caine film below.

I’m writing this on Sunday, immediately after posing my question to you, and posting it on Tuesday, as promised. Hopefully a few of you have added your wisdom. And here’s what I think:

1. Chris Brogan is spot on when he says you don’t achieve greatness by following the existing paradigm. You conceive the ultimate goal—hopefully something big and bold—and then engineer a path from today’s world to that goal.

Examples:

2. A number of lessons to be learned from “Caine’s Arcade”:

  • Caine’s parents were wise enough not to interfere, not to assault their son with messages that what he was trying t do was impossible, useless, or even misdirected. They gave him room to follow his dream.
  • For Caine, it was enough to build it even when people didn’t come—just as for me, I’m driven to write my blog, my monthly column, and my books even though my audiences are small. Because I know that a few people do passionately pay attention to my ideas, it gives me a lot of juice to keep going. Of course, if I had the fame of a Chris Brogan or Seth Godin, I’d reach a lot more people. And that would harmonize with my own goals to change the world. But just knowing that I have changed the lives of a few people and the course of a few communities helps me keep going. I’m not sure I’m as brave as Caine, though. I’m not sure I could do it anymore if I didn’t think anyone at all was listening.
  • The missing ingredient in both Emerson’s “build a better mousetrap and people will beat a path to your door” and director Phil Alden Robinson and writer W. P. Kinsella’s “if you build it, they will come” is marketing. While Caine says he doesn’t care if anyone comes to play, he tells us of feeling excluded and teased when he tried to share his accomplishment at school. And his reaction when his lone customer brings a crowd to play shows that while just the achievement had been enough for Caine, sharing it with others is so much more. Nirvan, that solitary customer, did the marketing for him, and did a fabulous job. The happy ending is as much a testament to Nirvan’s social media prowess as to Caine’s creativity and ingenuity—just as the rise of Apple needed both Jobs’ vision and marketing skills and Steve Wozniak’s engineering genius. The lesson for entrepreneurs is that if you don’t have all three elements—vision, engineering, and marketing—you need to partner with someone who has the pieces you lack.

3. The actual ad featured in the going green video is a brilliant example of using big-picture thinking to convey a message. Take a walk—and find your true love. Yes, it’s absurd. But it’s also very compelling. and it talks most elegantly to the way people can change behavior and become greener—achieving both a planetary and a personal good.

Much traditional advertising of for-profit products and nonprofit causes focuses on one or the other: buy this car or smoke this cigarette and you’ll feel sexy, that sort of thing—or “only you can prevent forest fires,” give money to cancer research, etc.—helping-others messaging without a clear direct benefit.

As a green marketer, I constantly say that marketers need to hit both the self-interst and the planetary interest, especially if they want to reach beyond the deep greens. In fact, I wrote my last Green And Profitable column on this very theme. The ad is a nice example, and the opening slides give us some very good framing about the power of art to influence thought, in many contexts.

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By Posted on Posted in General Commentary, Networking, Shel's Personal Life Tagged with , ,

Last night, I opened an e-mail about the Occupy Wall Street protests from one of the people who send me progressive political mail.

To my amazement, it was forwarded from an old boss of mine (1979 and 1980)—someone I’d wanted to stay in touch with and had searched for online. And suddenly, there he was. I wrote to him last night, but he hasn’t written back yet.

I still remember the first time something like this happened: I was still on AOL, so this was 1994 or 1995—and in came an e-mail from an old high school buddy. We’ve been in contact ever since.

We all leave footprints all over Cyberspace. And those of us with somewhat uncommon names can connect again. I’ve done it dozens of times now.  Facebook makes it particularly easy for connections like old classmates, because you can actually search the alumni of your school. But Facebook is not the only game in town. Last year, I tracked down two high school friends through their own websites.

Who would you like to have back in your life again? Maybe they’re out there, waiting for you to reach out.

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By Posted on Posted in Advertising, Demographics/Psychographics, Marketing Trends/News, Networking, Shel's Personal Life, Web 2.0/Social Media Tagged with , , ,

Memo to Mark Zuberberg: You are not invincible. Facebook did not get to be the top social media network because it was terrific, but only because it’s so much better than MySpace. There’s always been lots of room for improvement, and yet, in the 4 years I’ve been a Facebooker, at least half the changes make it harder to use and/or more intrusive.

And now, with Google+ waiting in the wings, your position is precarious. Just as it did with search, Google provides a qualitatively better user experience; all it needs now is an active and vibrant user base. Meanwhile, Facebook’s user experience just took a serious turn for the worse. Again.

Some of these bone-headed things I just don’t understand, especially when you think about how much of Facebook’s income stream is generated by professional marketers—marketers who have, in many cases, invested significant time and money into their fanpages and their ad campaigns.

  • All of a sudden, the default is NOT to get mail from Facebook. Facebook’s fastest growing demographic segments are 40 and over, and (unlike our children) we, for the most part, don’t spend our entire waking lives on social media. For those accustomed (as I am) to going on Facebook by following an e-mail link, you’ve just cut out much of their viewing time, unless they notice and switch the setting from the default (which I did).
  • Used to be, when you added a friend, you got access to your friend category lists and could add someone to multiple lists with a couple of clicks. Now, it shows just a few. Even clicking “Show All Lists” results in only the first nine choices. I have about 40 categories, in part because of the (idiotic and now finally abandoned, I think) 20-name limit on how many people you could send a notice to at once within a friend category. So for categories where I know a lot of people, like high school buddies, residents of my area, and marketers, I have multiple lists. Now I have no way to put people in the right category unless it’s one of the first nine in my selection. UGH! Google+ got this one right from the very beginning, noting that we have different types of people in our lives, and message/interact with them differently. Mark, do you really think paying my VA to do this simple thing for me is going to add value to my perception of Facebook?
  • Links from e-mails go to unexpected places. Several times, I’ve tried to click on a discussion and end up in my main page. then I have to hunt for the person I’m talking to, figure out where the message history is that day, and waste time. When that happens, the temptation is great to simply not continue the conversation.

Mind you, I’m not criticizing the changes just because they’re new and different (though it does seem that just as we learn how to navigate the latest interface, it shifts again). Some of them improve the experience. I like getting an e-mail with a whole thread worth of posts. I like the ticker. And I like that Facebook quietly introduced the long-sought feature a couple of months ago that allows owners of a fanpage to e-mail their fans (those who’ve clicked Like).

But really, you have to wonder if they’ve ever heard of beta-testing or focus groups over there. In the words of one well-known marketer who posted a comment on my annoyed post, “Google+ here we go!”

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By Posted on Posted in Blog Tour, Marketing Techniques and Philosophies, Networking, People Helping People, Web 2.0/Social Media Tagged with , ,

I’ve just signed up for the Ultimate Blog Challenge (Twitter hashtag #blogboost), which means a commitment to add ten posts between now and the end of the month. Especially nuts because I’m speaking in Boston tomorrow and probably won’t even get on the computer. Fortunately, I happen to have one post already scheduled.

I’ll be honest. Despite the many benefits of participation (increased visibility, exposure to other people’s networks, and of course a nice boost in the search engines, etc.)—the main reason I’m doing this is because Michelle Shaeffer, a/k/a SmallBizMuse is one of the organizers (along with Michele Scism, who I hadn’t known before, but who seems to offer a lot of useful resources for solopreneurs). She’s been my Virtual Assistant for something like eleven years, and I’ve taken a sort of nachas (Yiddish word meaning pride in the accomplishments of one’s family) in watching her develop some marketing chops of her own, and a dedicated fan base, over the last year or two. She has 4989 followers on Twitter! All organically acquired, as far as I know; I only have 3395.

So my joining her blog challenge is as much a public thank-you for all she’s done for me these last 11 years as anything else. You, of course, will have different reasons for signing up.

Of course, when she’s rich and famous, I’ll probably have to go out and find a new Virtual Assistant. So it goes.

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By Posted on Posted in Energy & Sustainability, International Association of Green Marketers, Networking, Shel's Personal Life Tagged with , , , , ,

For decades, going back to the 1970s, I’ve had two major passions in my life: making the world better (with a particular focus on environmental activism, land-use planning, and the safe energy movement) and marketing/writing. In fact, my earliest published articles were the coverage of peace and environment demonstrations that I wrote for a high school underground newspaper back in 1972, when I was a 15-year-old student. And one of the first articles I sold as a freelancer, in 1977, was coverage of the Seabrook nuclear power station site occupation and the arrest/incarceration of 1414 protesters—including me.

For most of my career, these two passions were both active, but separate. Starting in late 1999, when I formed a group called Save the Mountain to protect the Mount Holyoke Range (near my home in Western Massachusetts) from the desecration of a large housing development, they began to come together. That campaign, running from the housing project’s announcement in November 1999 to our victory in December 2000, harnessed together everything I knew about organizing for social change AND everything I knew about marketing. And also taught me how much I still needed to learn, as we had people in our large group who knew far more than I did about such tactics as lobbying government officials, working with lawyers, and successful visibility marketing.

I wrote about that campaign in my 2003 book, Principled Profit, and I also included sections on various Green visionaries and the kind of world I want to live in. And I began to discover that there were plenty of other people like me who shared those two passions of Green and marketing. This really accelerated in 2010, with the publication by a mainstream house of my eighth book, Guerrilla Marketing Goes Green: Winning Strategies to Improve Your Profits and Your Planet (co-authored with Jay Conrad Levinson). All of a sudden, I’m finding Green marketers everywhere—and most of them feel very alone.

As carbon footprint, global warming (what an innocuous name for such a dreadful phenomenon) and similar issues have finally reached a critical mass to come into mainstream consciousness, the time seems ripe to move our threatened planet forward. And marketers have to be there, leading the charge, marshaling public opinion, and moving from consciousness that we need to save the planet to actually doing it. I envisioned an organization that would not only provide support to each other, but stake out advocacy positions that would enable governments, businesses, nonprofits, and the public to go more Green and do it faster.

Getting this right will take some thinking and planning, and I hope you’ll weigh in with your ideas. Tomorrow, I’ll tell you more. Meanwhile, if you’d like to be on the notification list, you can leave your e-mail address on the “coming soon” website I’ve set up.

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By Posted on Posted in Democracy, Networking, Politics, Web 2.0/Social Media Tagged with , , , ,

The convergence of social media and progressive causes is very exciting to me; I see enormous potential to leverage social media for social change. Even as far back as 2000, I used social media as an essential building block of a successful local activist campaign (in fact, I discuss this in my latest book, Guerrilla Marketing Goes Green: Winning Strategies to Improve Your Profits and Your Planet,co-authored with Jay Conrad Levinson).

I think one of the huge mistakes Obama made was to let go of the massive organizing via social media during the campaign—a piece of the campaign that may well have given him the edge both in the primaries and in the general election, and certainly a big part of mobilizing the youth vote. Actively using those tools in two-way communication would have helped energize his base, counterweighted the Tea Baggers, and provided momentum to implement the deep change he was elected to provide. In the months between the election and inauguration, Obama put out a groundbreaking initiative to get input from us. But that fizzled quickly, and I for one never got a sense that anyone was actually reading the feedback.

Yet it’s so clear that social media can be a force for social change! We’ve seen it in so many parts of the public discourse!

  • The metamorphosis of MoveOn from a narrow group created out of President Clinton’s impeachment to a major organization channeling progressive votes and dollars
  • Howard Dean’s early power in the 2004 primaries
  • wide condemnation of Iran’s repression last summer
  • Creating sustainability for economic change agents such as Kiva.org

    • Although they are brilliant organizers, Obama, Axelrod, and the rest of his team missed this opportunity. They saw social media as a very effective way to reach new audiences, but not a way to build organizations focused on real change…and not as a method of communication from the people to the honchos.

    Not too late to change this! If they build out their own networks, really listen to feedback, and piggyback on people with large viral followings (such as Rachel Maddow), this could still be a major influencing factor in maintaining Democratic control in the 2010 elections.

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    By Posted on Posted in Entrepreneurship, Marketing Techniques and Philosophies, Networking Tagged with , , ,

    I read a lot of business books, and too many of them are so dry you could use them for sawdust.

    Last year, I happened to meet Kevin Daum at a dinner party Sam Horn threw in Washington, DC (where neither of us live) and we connected quickly and personally. Kevin is a sales and marketing guy who has a similar approach to mine, and he’s also someone who can write. He’s even working on a book about Green business!

    Kevin’s latest book, Roar! Get Heard in The Sales and Marketing Jungle, is a classic business parable of the sort popularized by Ken Blanchard. I’ve read a lot of these. What’s especially interesting about this one, in addition to the quality of the writing is what he calls the “3500-year-old sales process,” rooted in, of all things, the metaphor of the Four Sons from the Passover Seder.

    And it’s impossible NOT to get the message that every company employee needs to know how to highlight the company’s strengths and points of differentiation, both in general and to specific types of buyers with specific concerns.

    As a marketer, you can learn a lot just by watching this book launch. Kevin is doing something very smart: he’s building his preorder list months in advance. And he’s built in lots of try-before-you-buy (something else I recommend). He’s even managed to find a bcouple of independent bookshops to do discount coupons. So you can go visit https://www.awesomeroar.com/index.htmand see a brief video, grab a couple of sample chapters, and read dozens of blurbs (including one from me). and of course order your advance copy, if you’re so moved. You can also read Kevin’s wonderfully transparent blog about his “Quest for the Jewish Super Bowl Ring”: to launch as a New York Times bestseller (where he’s not afraid to discuss failures in the campaign as well as successes).

    Not a big surprise either that Kevin is a master networker who’s asked a lot of important people to help out. I’m glad to be in that category, and happy to alert you to what he’s doing.

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