Tag: social media

What Does Social Media Mean to Me?

Social media has become a big part of my life. And here is how that all went down.

The truth is, I started going online in early September of 1997. It was my 35th birthday, and Princess Diana had just died. I was not a big fan of hers.

This does not mean I was actively hostile or even uninterested. It was more that I was not a royals watcher. And I am still not much of one.

Whatever Harry, Meghan, Will, and Kate are doing is not much more fascinating to me than what the Kardashians are doing.

That is, not much at all. But I digress.

I was shocked to find people (this was on MIRC) who had whatnot to talk about. Now, this was not a great swath of highly intellectual jargon. And I was not making deep, long-lasting friendships.

But I was finding out that there were people out there with something to say. And, I was learning that I, too, had what to say.

Then Came the Early Years

I switched over to the New York Times’s forum, Abuzz, in maybe 1999. There, I found more intellectual discussion but also a lot of silliness and a lot of heart. The friendships were deeper.

In fact, I am still friends with some of the people from that time.

When Abuzz finally folded, Able2know.org was born. This continued the smart talk but it also opened up less intellectual talk.

Facebook

I joined Facebook on October 5, 2008.

And when I first got there, it, too, was a more geeky and almost intellectual place. But that changed.

At some point, Facebook converted to a more egalitarian site much like it is today.

And through it all, social media has been my BFF.

Swag for Independent Writers

Swag for Independent Writers

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on September 17, 2020

Ah, Swag

Do you like swag?

So, swag is necessary when you go on the road. Work a convention at a dealer’s table, or get your book into a library, and you may need a little extra something to give away. Hence here are a few choices.

Bookmarks, a Very Common Form of Swag

Maybe the best and closest kind of giveaway item is the humble bookmark. In one sense, it’s perfect because it relates directly to books and reading. And you can spend as much or as little as you like. Plus maybe you only want something straightforward, perhaps a section of your cover, often printed on one side on heavy cardboard stock. And that’s great!

Because you’ve got some real estate, consider some additions, such as your website or even a QR code for a discount off one of your books. However, I suggest leaving one side blank for notes. While that’s not strictly necessarily, it may end up cheaper for you, not to mention it having an actual purpose.

Bookmarks are particularly useful because not only can you put them in your own books, you can put them in library or bookstore books. Yes, they might be removed and discarded. However, you need to consider that these are loss leaders; you need to be ready to lose some cash on these.

Business Cards

These seem hit or miss. If you go to conventions and run a table or booth, you will need cards. And again, try to keep the back blank. Pro tip: use matte. Shiny card stock costs more and it makes it harder to write on the card. Because you want people writing on your cards. Oh, and don’t be stingy with them. Give them away. Meet someone? Give them a card. Someone stops by your table? Give them a card. Like bookmarks, these will be discarded by a lot of people. Accept that as a cost of doing business.

Tee Shirts

These can work really well if you have a fantastic and memorable cover design, or a great catch phrase. Imagine a tee shirt which has your cover on the front and your catch phrase on the back. You can make people into walking billboards this way. Be ready to give a lot of these away, and maybe even use them as contest prizes. Most people will not purchase these unless you become really famous. Again, this is a cost of doing business.

Toys and Action Figures

Funko Pops lets you design your own male and female characters. But volume is an issue here. And so is the startup cost. The blank figures in that link are almost $10 apiece. Hence a large run of these may not be in the cards – so take advantage of their rareness and play on the scarcity aspect when giving these away or selling them.

For other types of action figures, look at prices and consider what you want to settle with. If the figure doesn’t end up looking a lot like you, how will that make you feel? If the answer is ‘terrible, of course’, then you might want to do something else with your swag budget.

Swag: Some Takeaways

Giving away swag may seem counterintuitive. After all, you want to make money, rather than spend it. But if you are new on the scene, it can be a great way to get noticed and show how you’re different from all the rest.

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Community Management – Collection of Users to True Community

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Community Management – Collection of Users to True Community

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on September 10, 2020

Going From a Collection of Users to a True Community

What is a True Community?

I’ve written at least seven obituaries.

That is, perhaps, an odd thing to confess. But when Jill, Kevin, Paul, Joanne, Olen, Joan, and Mary all passed on, it was up to me to write something, to not only commemorate their lives, but to try to help comfort a grieving community.

I am not saying you will write as many, or even if you will ever write even one. And I certainly hope you will never have to, as they can be gut-wrenching. But it was with the first one – Mary’s – that it became manifest (if it was not already self-evident) that, to paraphrase the old Brady Bunch theme, this group had somehow formed a family.

How Can This Happen to Your True Community (Without the Tragic Part)?

But no one has to cross over to the other side in order for your collection of users to coalesce into a Community with a capital C. The secret is very simple, although many companies don’t want to hear it: it’s going off-topic.

Let us assume, for example, that your community is a corporate-run one. And the product is a soft drink. Corporate tells you to stay on topic, on message. However, your users are saying something very different.

For it is easy, as you’re talking about the soft drink, to slide into discussing foods eaten with it (frankly, for such a community you’d almost have to go off-topic. Nobody but a truly dedicated corporate marketer can talk about a soft drink 24/7). Food slides into a discussion of recipes. Recipes turn into a talk about entertaining. And then suddenly you’re off to the races and talking about family relationships.

Corporate tries to pull you back on topic. Yet your users pull the true community ever further away. And they pinball from family relationships to dating, raising children, and elder care, if you let them.

The Community Manager’s Role

Here is where you, as the Community Manager, can talk to Corporate and forge a compromise. Corporate needs for people to talk about the product, tout it, and virally promote it. And they need people to make well-ranked (on Google) topics about it. Corporate may also realize that they need to hear the bad news about the product as well. The users need to talk.

So make a compromise. Create an off-topic area and move all off-message topics there. And be fairly loose with your definition of what’s on topic. In our soft drink example, the recipes topics, even if they don’t use the product as an ingredient, are still close enough so you can consider them on topic.

Also, don’t be surprised if the corollary is true. Hence topics that begin on message veer off it, even by the time of the first responsive post. That’s okay. Those topics should still be considered to be on message. Because Google is far more concerned with a forum topic’s title and initial post than with its tenth response.

The Benefits of the Off-Topic Section

Don’t be shocked if your off-topic section becomes a large one. And recognize that you and your Moderating staff (if you have one) may need to make on message topics in order to continue creating germane content. But your true community will be talking and the site will be a lively one.

It’s a party that’s going nonstop, your users will stick around and from this you can build a marketing database. And that is one of the standard corporate aims behind creating a community in the first place.

So when your users start talking about life events, such as births, school, divorce, moving, jobs, marriage, children and, yes, deaths, it matters. And when they start supporting each other through each of these phases, it marks a bright line distinction between a haphazard agglomeration of users and a true team of like-minded individuals.

Finally, that team, that family, that army, is what being in a true community is really all about.

Want More About Community Management?

If my experiences with community management resonate with you, then check out my other blog posts about how online communities work.

Community Management Tidbits

Here are some posts about my years in community management, and what I’ve learned.

• A Day in the Life of a Community Manager
† Analytics
• Going From a Collection of Users to a True Community
† Risks of a Community Without Management
• Are Off Topic Posts Ever Okay?

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The Best Lengths for Social Media Posts and More

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The Best Lengths for Social Media Posts and More

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on September 1, 2020

What Are The Best Lengths for Social Media Posts?

Best Lengths for social posts can seem elusive. What’s right? Does it ever change?

The fine folks at Buffer and, in particular, Kevan Lee, have done it again and have everything you always wanted to know about social post lengths but were afraid to ask.

In my travels online, I have seen blog posts that were under 50 words long. I have seen blog posts that were a good 10,000 words long. Tweets, of course, are limited. But there have been plenty of Pinterest pins with just an image and nothing else. Or they’ve got enough verbiage behind them to seemingly rival War and Peace. So, what’s ideal? Is there any science behind it?

Blogs

How long should blog posts be? Buffer likes blog post titles to be six words long (oops, this blog post’s title is too long). Interestingly enough, the blog post where I got the inspiration for this blog post from also has a title that is too long.

Sometimes, six words is just not long enough.

Thanks to Buffer for this graphic.

Interestingly enough, Buffer said blog posts are best at 1,600 words in length.

However, Yoast (the fine makers of an SEO plugin I use for my own blog posting–as do many other people!) provides good SEO credit for blog posts that are at least 300 words in length.

The two are not necessarily mutually exclusive, but one thing is for sure – those fifty-word blog posts just plain are not long enough.

Facebook

How big should a Facebook post be? Buffer said forty characters.

Keep it short, snappy, and to the point. According to Lee, Facebook posts that exceed forty characters degrade in engagement as they get longer.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but that 700-word screed you wrote? Better make that a blog post instead and just link to it. But if you put the whole thing on Facebook, people will scroll right on by. Yes, even if you add an image.

Here’s a trick to get around the forty-character wall – links show the title and some text, and you can always change these.

Or add an image with some text. But don’t go nuts! It is very, very easy to hit and exceed critical mass.

Best Lengths for LinkedIn Posts

How long should a LinkedIn post be? Buffer clocks in at twenty-five words, based upon clickthrough data.

How large should a Pinterest image be?

Buffer’s got you covered – 735px x 1102px. These taller pins seem to stand out more, and are therefore shared more often.

Best Lengths for Twitter Posts

How long should an effective Tweet be? Buffer said to limit it to 71 – 100 characters, in order to provide some space for people to comment before sending out a modified tweet (MT).

So keep hashtags at six characters for maximal impact. Yes, we all know that people sometimes use hashtags as a bit of wry commentary.

Tumblr in particular seems to inspire hashtags like #DudeLooksLikeALady (and not just for fans of Aerosmith). Excessive hashtagging is one of the characteristics of Instagram. However, the best length hashtag on Twitter has six characters.

Best Lengths for Posts: Takeaways

TL; DR – Check out the chart, and the cited article, for more information. The research on best lengths for posts is sound, and fascinating, and the article was a hell of a find.

Is it still relevant, years later? Eh, kind of. You make the call, sports fans.

The best lengths for social media posts keep changing. But there’s one constant in life—cut to the chase!

Want More About Social Media?

If my experiences with non-platform-specific social media resonate with you, then check out my other articles about navigating our social media obsessed world.

Conquer Your Fears and Get Together

Yes, you can—and should — get together! Life online is all well and good. Many of us spend large chunks of our time connected, whether that is via a desktop PC, a smartphone, a laptop, or a tablet. Newer technologies will, undoubtedly, make it even easier to get and stay connected.

But sometimes you’ve just got to say: Stop the Internet, I want to get off!

Of course you go offline every night for bed (er, you do, don’t you?), at the absolute minimum. But there’s more to it than that.

When your community has been around for a significant period of time (say, a year), your users are going to, naturally, be curious about meeting one another. In person. With no screens dividing them.

And this is excellent. It is a sign of the community jelling. You should encourage this. Or, if you like, you can even suggest a meeting yourself.

I mean, why the hell not?

Informal Gatherings

For informal gatherings, there is little, if anything, that you need to do. If you can attend, great! And if you can’t, ask people to take pictures. However, remind your users they should get permission before they take any photographs and post them online.

Furthermore, if there will be minors present, emphasize that photographs of them really should not appear online. Be prepared, if the child’s parents ask, to remove such photographs if they end up on your site. But that’s about it.

Formal Gatherings

Formal gatherings allow for a lot more dazzle. A get together can be as expensive or cheap as you like. Your attendees might wish to reserve a block of hotel rooms, or even a hall. Or you might just need to make reservations at a restaurant.

Or you could think outside the restaurant, and consider a visit to a museum, historical attraction or nature preserve. Your group might enjoy attending, say, a minor league baseball game (it’s often a nominal fee to get your site or company mentioned on the scoreboard or over the public address system. Usually this takes the form of a charitable donation).

Or your users might even enjoy a potluck, or a cruise, or a bowling tournament for fun. They might like to run a 5K race (or just watch) or even attend lectures or form a book group. And they might even enjoy helping to build a house for charity or volunteer at a soup kitchen for the day. The only limits are your imagination and the focus of your community.

Because a forum devoted to young mothers, for example, might enjoy a gathering where they can bring their children. Whereas a board focusing on a hip hop artist might prefer attending a concert.

Get Together Swag

For a gathering (in particular, for one specifically planned and sanctioned by you), it’s nice to bring swag. That is, forum- or company-specific merchandise. Make it free for the taking! Hats, tee shirts, frisbees, key chains, whatever you like.

The young mothers’ forum might like diaper bags or onesies. That hip hop forum might like licensed mix CDs, or special music that they can download.

Just give them the URL and a key or password, so they can get it exclusively, at least to start. And, it’s not a problem if people begin to share the URL and the password. Because you want them to do this.

Gatherings are fun. It’s enjoyable to finally see and get together with people you only know from online. Once you’ve heard their voices and seen their mannerisms in the flesh, you’ll never read their posts the same way again.

Want More About Community Management?

If my experiences with community management resonate with you, then check out my other blog posts about how online communities work.

Community Management Tidbits

Here are some posts about my years in community management, and what I’ve learned.

• A Day in the Life of a Community Manager
† Analytics
• Going From a Collection of Users to a True Community
† Risks of a Community Without Management
• Are Off Topic Posts Ever Okay?

Next blog post

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… And Facebook for All – Your Home Page

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on July 16, 2020

Life, Liberty … And Facebook for All – Your Home Page

Your home page is vital. Log into Facebook, and it’s the first thing you see. It’s your Home Page. So here’s what’s in it. You can divide it into what look like columns.

NOTE: Facebook constantly A/B tests. Features move around, change, are renamed and resized, or disappear all the time. These are rolled out in stages; your neighbor may have a different-looking Home Page from yours. And this is 100% normal.

Home Page Links

So first of all, column one (left side, top):

• News Feed
† Messenger
• Watch
† Marketplace

Then shortcuts; this is a section you add to or subtract from.

Then …

• Explore
† Pages
• Groups
† Events
• Fundraisers
† Games etc.

Your Feed

Then column two (center):

• Status messages on friends’ pages
† Other friend activities
• Anything your friends or the pages you follow are sharing

Column Three

Then column three (right, top):

† Events
• Friends’ Birthdays
† Marketplace
• Groups You Might Like
† People You May Know
• Targeted Advertisements
† A list of friends available on chat (at the bottom)

Let’s start with Column One:

Groups

So this is a list of the groups you have joined.

Pages

These are pages you are following.

Friends

So pretty obviously, this is a way to access your entire list of friends.

Create Group

So you can create groups for any reason. And this includes to support a beloved entertainment figure, promote your business or just complain about people wearing Crocs. So I’ll get into the specifics later.

Games

These will rotate as you access more games, depending upon recency.

Status Messages on Friends’ Pages

So this is the actual News Feed itself. And you can comment on others’ statuses (statii?) or posted links.

Your Home Page Still Shows Other Friend Activities

First of all, you are served everyone’s activities. Facebook can be a tsunami of data. However, a lot is aggregated; you are usually shown that six people joined a group, rather than separate messages on all half-dozen.

Events

So if you’ve got upcoming events and you haven’t RSVP’d, they’ll show up here, but you can jettison them by clicking the x on the right side. Note that you’ll be invited to all sorts of stuff, including sponsored activities and openings by commercial ventures. And RSVP’ing is not strictly necessary. However, as an event organizer, I have to say it’s appreciated so as to at least get a handle on headcount (and know who not to expect).

You need not RSVP for commercial store openings or whatnot.

Friends’ Birthdays

Whether they’ve made the year apparent is their own business. But if they’ve got the month and day up on Facebook, birthdays will show up here. And of course you’re under no obligation to wish people a Happy Birthday, but it is kind of nice.

People You May Know

So this is based upon some sort of an algorithm whereby Facebook looks at things like your current friends list, their friends, your location and possibly also your school(s) and workplace(s). However, I don’t believe the latter are included at this time. So if you have any mutual friends, Facebook lists them as well.

Facebook does not always get this right, or it gets it wrong in interesting ways, e. g. Facebook says I “may know” the spouse of someone I attended High School with. Well, unless I went to High School with the spouse (over 30 years ago), then there isn’t much of a likelihood there.

Hence there are times when this list is bewildering. Hey, Facebook is doing the best it can.

Targeted Advertisements on Your Home Page

Well, they’re as targeted as Facebook can make them. This apparently has a basis in your click activity, your likes, your friends’ likes and whenever you click on an ad to get rid of it. Again, sometimes Facebook can get this wrong in rather spectacular ways; for example, when I wrote this post originally, it showed me an ad for Toyota. And I have neither owned nor contemplated owning one, ever.

Your Home Page has a List of Friends Available on Chat

It should go without saying that you should never click on links from chatters you don’t know well. And you’re under no obligation whatsoever to answer anyone’s instigated chat.

So a big part of the Facebook experience is not only playing games but also sharing them with others, or sharing status or links. The way you see and can participate in this sharing is via your Home Page. It is, essentially, a bulletin board between you and your pals. But keep your own wall the way you want it. If you don’t want people to swear or argue politics, etc., that is 100% within your rights.

Want More About Facebook?

If my experiences with Facebook resonate with you, then please be sure to check out my other blog posts about the largest social network on the planet, by far.

… And Facebook for All

• Creating a Facebook page
† Working with a Facebook Page
• … Your Profile Page
† Home Page
• Offsite Sharing
† All Your Account Settings
• All the Rest of It
† Facebook versus Forums

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Advertising on Facebook

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on October 15, 2019

Let’s Look at Advertising on Facebook

Have you tried advertising on Facebook? It’s easier and more affordable than you might think.

Keep in mind that Facebook is constantly A/B testing (e. g. checking to see if any new layouts or color schemes, etc. will make you click more), so these instructions might be a little out of date after a while. This has worked in the past. It might not any more. Caveat emptor.

Getting Started

About half the time, Facebook will just come to you and suggest you start advertising. I can’t say what their algorithm is for selecting a post to promote, although they usually suggest a popular one.

If they are not suggesting a post you want to promote (e. g. you would prefer to promote another one), or you are new to promotions and there are no suggestions, or you just want to see how to start one from scratch, go to your Author Page and go to Publishing Tools.

Then, on the right, pull down on Help and click Advertiser Support. This will get you to the Facebook for Business page. In the upper right corner, click Create Ad.

For the purposes of this tutorial, we’ll choose Boost Your Posts as our campaign.

Selecting an audience for a post

Audience is important; you do not want to just send to everyone, as even failed clicks are going to cost you money. You will do a lot better with targeting as that will help assure a greater percentage of your clicks are meaningful and helpful. Click Set Audience and Budget.

You can choose an audience from demographics, or from preferences or from lookalikes, who are people similar to those who like your page.

If you are just getting started, and a greater percentage than normal of your likes come from friends and family trying to help you out, do not use this option!

Select a location by navigating around the map and dropping a pin in your preferred location. The age ranges are also pretty self-explanatory. You can even exclude some people.

Setting an Advertising Budget

Start small. You can always add. The minimum is generally $1/day. I prefer what Facebook calls a Lifetime budget, which sets a total. It’s a lot easier to rein in than a Daily budget, I believe.

Scheduling

Go to your analytics and take a look at when more people are on than usual. Select those days and times for your ads! Next click Select Ad Creative. I recommend allowing everything unless you absolutely know your targeted audience is not in a particular area.

Choosing Which Post to Promote for Advertising on Facebook

Choosing a post to promote (if Facebook has not done so for you) is easy. So, select a popular one, representative of your brand. If you have a limited time offer, that could be perfect. Just make sure your ads don’t run after the offer has expired.

And finally, check out advertising on other platforms. FB isn’t the only fish in the sea. And in particular, with Facebook’s continuing problem of organic reach decline, you may do better elsewhere.

Good luck!

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Want More About Facebook?

If my experiences with Facebook resonate with you, then please be sure to check out my other blog posts about the largest social network on the planet, by far.

… And Facebook for All

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The New Rules of Marketing & PR by David Meerman Scott, A Book Review

Book Reviews, Killer UX Design, Content Nation by John Blossom, SEO Made Simple, Lee Odden, Dave Kerpen, Liana Evans, dummies, cluetrain manifesto, shama hyder kabadi, Numerati, Guerilla Marketing, White Space, Clay Shirky, Trust Agents, Kristina Halvorson, Stephen King, Zen, William Zinsser, Drupal for Dummies, Executive, XHTML, Communicating Design, Joshua Porter, Strategic Planning, Google Advertising Tools, Web Analytics, Right Hook, David Meerman Scott, web analytics, Revved Up, robot building, Charlene Li, Josh Bernoff, style guide, elements,

The New Rules of Marketing & PR by David Meerman Scott, A Book Review

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on September 12, 2019

A Look at The New Rules of Marketing & PR by David Meerman Scott

The New Rules of Marketing & PR by David Meerman Scott was a fascinating book that I had as required reading for Quinnipiac University’s Social Media Platforms course (ICM522).

The Premise

First of all, the premise is, like a lot of other books about the Internet and social media marketing, that marketing has become less of a one-size-fits-all/push system. Instead, it has instead evolved into a far more balanced bilateral conversation.

And perhaps the most interesting part of the book consists of the rules themselves, which are in Chapter 2, on page 31 and are as follows –

David Meerman Scott and The New Rules

The New Rules of Marketing and PR

• First of all, marketing is more than just advertising
† In addition, public relations is for more than just a mainstream media audience
• You are what you publish
† And people want authenticity, not spin
• People want participation, not propaganda
† Instead of causing one-way interruption, marketing is about delivering content at just the precise moment your audience needs it
• Furthermore, marketers must shift their thinking from mainstream marketing to the masses to a strategy of reaching vast numbers of underserved audiences via the web
† In addition, public relations is not about your boss seeing your company on TV. It’s about your buyers seeing your company on the web
• Marketing is not about your agency winning awards. Instead, it’s about your organization winning business

And the internet has made public relations public again, after years of almost exclusive focus on media

• Furthermore, companies must drive people into the purchasing process with great online content
† In addition, blogs, online video, e-books, news releases, and other forms of online content let organizations communicate directly with buyers in a form they appreciate
• And social networks like Twitter (X), Facebook, and LinkedIn allow people all over the world to share content and connect with the people and companies they do business with
† Finally, on the web, the lines between marketing and public relations have blurred

Because customers are talking back. And companies and their marketing departments had better start listening.

Rating

Review: 5/5 stars.

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The Zen of Social Media Marketing by Shama Hyder Kabani, a Book Review

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on August 27, 2019

A Look at The Zen of Social Media Marketing by Shama Hyder Kabani

The Zen of Social Media Marketing by Shama Hyder Kabani is a fascinating little work on how to get ahead with online social media marketing.

Shama Hyder Kabani’s prose style is engaging and direct. Furthermore, if you go to her own website, the way she writes represents an obvious reflection of the way she really speaks. Major points for authenticity.

Three Main Sites

Shama says that the three main social media areas/sites you should focus on are LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Forget most others.

However, this part has changed and is out of date, for I would argue to swap out Instagram or even Snapchat (depends on demographics) for LinkedIn. That is, unless your audience is mainly business people.

Or maybe TikTok.

In addition, your should present your company (and, by extension, yourself) on all three with a kind of what I like to call professional intimacy.

That might sound like an oxymoron. However, the idea is, be genuine and sincere but also hang back in terms of too much sharing and togetherness.

Your customers want to know about your company and your product, to be sure, but a little personalization works (and, in fact, can help to build trust). But too much personalization does not work.

Your prospects and customers really do not wish to hear that you’re going in to have a root canal.

ACT

So Shama’s three points come under the ACT acronym:

• Attract – bring the prospects and customers in with good, lively (and up to date) content
† Convert – turn your prospects into customers (and this may take several visits by them before this happens) and
• Transform – turn successes into magnetic forces of attraction

Attraction is your brand, your outcomes, your differentiators. And Social Media marketing is extremely good for this. Clarity of communications is key.

However, Social Media remains a less optimal tool for converting strangers (prospects) into clients (paying customers).

However, it is good for converting strangers into information consumers, which can often be a major step in moving them along the path from prospect to client.

Transformation

Transformation involves social proof, e. g. we’re more inclined to do something if we see others doing it.

Therefore, you have to do a good job, and use your success in order to attract more successes. That is, ask your clients if you can retell their success stories.

Make it easy to buy and pick your tactics (means of marketing) last – you need to get the essentials (such as theory) in place first.

Strategy is the big picture. Tactics are the when, the where and the how.

Blogging is also key. The idea behind blogging is three things:

† Educate – use your blog to add value by giving away good information.
• Market – make it attractive to buy and
† Sell – make it possible to buy.

Shama Hyder Kabadi is Walking the Walk

The book is a brisk read. Of particular interest are the testimonials in the back. As you go along, you realize that Shama practices what she preaches on every page of the book. And, it worked, didn’t it?

Because if she got you to buy her book and check out her website, then she’s already converted you to a client. And all she needs to do is sell you her services and she hits 100% of her target.

Finally, the most amazing thing is, even after you realize how much you are being marketed to, you just don’t seem to mind any more.

Rating

5/5

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Book Review – Likeable Social Media by Dave Kerpen

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on July 25, 2019

Let’s Review Likeable Social Media by Dave Kerpen

Dave Kerpen has a rather interesting book here.

Likeable Social Media

This book was required reading, as a part of my Community Management class at Quinnipiac University.

And it made for an excellent read.

For Kerpen, a lot of social media success comes from listening to, and then surprising and delighting customers and potential customers. Are your posts what they are interested in? If you received this post, would you bother clicking on it?

Case in point for surprise and delight

In May of 2015, my husband, parents, and I went to a Mexican restaurant in my parents’ town. We had eaten there before, but not so much that they knew our names or our usual orders or the like.

My husband and I don’t visit my parents too often. And he visits them even less than I do. To the restaurant, even if my parents were repeat customers, my husband and I surely didn’t look like repeats.

There was a short wait until we got our food. Without prompting, we received a little appetizer, which mainly consisted of little breaded and fried mashed potatoes, configured a bit like sticks. There were three bits of sauce in different colors.

The potatoes and sauce, most likely, were leftover odds and ends. It may have taken the chef all of ten minutes to make the dish. I didn’t see anyone else getting the appetizer. We thanked the server. The appetizer tasted good.

We were served our food, and you’d think that would be the end of it. But it wasn’t. We didn’t order dessert. But we received a plate of flan and four spoons anyway. No one asked us; we just got the flan (it tasted really good). We weren’t charged for either little extra.

These twin activities impressed us, so much so that I’ve even linked back to the restaurant. Win-win!

Surprise and delight your customers. Or, as I’d like to say, where’s their flan?

Being Likeable

By no coincidence, Kerpen named his company Likeable Media. From its positive name to its obvious association with Facebook, the book and the company are all about creating positive and meaningful experiences for customers and potential customers.

Kerpen begins with listening and with careful, accurate, and specific targeting. E. g. not all women in their 50s have the same interests. He strongly urges marketers to dig deeper.

He also encourages them to have empathy for their customers. Is a post interesting? Would it be welcome to the customer base?

The first fans should be preexisting customers, with perks for the really rabid fans. Another skill to master: engaging in a true dialog.

This means not just accepting praise, but also effectively and expeditiously responding to complaints. It also means owning up to your mistakes when you make them.

Honesty

Kerpen advocates authenticity, honesty and transparency in dealings, and promoting an exchange by asking questions, which goes right back to listening. From listening, comes the surprise and delight.

Did the restaurant hear us complaining about slower than normal service? Possibly. The appetizer and the flan certainly helped to quell those complaints and win us over.

Because he’s talking about social media (and not restaurant service), Kerpen’s flan moment doesn’t just cover coupons and offers. It’s also the sharing of stories as social capital.

Some of this includes stories of the company (e. g. how a product was invented that spawned an industry). But it also encompasses the stories of the customers themselves.

Imagine being a soft drink company and asking customers who drank your soft drink during their first date to share their love stories? Attach this promotion to Valentines’ Day and maybe even ask about a couple’s future plans….

Finally, rather than hard selling, Kerpen exhorts marketers to simply make it easy to buy. Good products and services will always have customers. Generally, you don’t need to massage demand. But you do need to make it easier for customers to open their wallets.

A terrific, breezy read, well worth your time.

Rating for the Book and for Dave Kerpen Himself

5/5 stars

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Book Review: Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook by Gary Vaynerchuk

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on July 16, 2019

Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook by Gary Vaynerchuk

Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook is a bit too cleverly named, but the premise is an interesting one.

Essentially, what Gary Vaynerchuk is saying is, little bits of content and engagement which reach your potential customers are the setup for the big finish (which is not really a finish, actually) of a call to action and an attempt to make a sale.

The other major premise of the book is that all platforms have their own native quirks and idiosyncrasies. Therefore what is reliable on Pinterest, might fall flat on Facebook.

What is killer on Tumblr might get a shrug on Instagram. And what is awesome on Twitter might bring the meh elsewhere.

But that all makes sense, as these are somewhat different platforms. Their demographics are different. They have differing user bases and numbers of people online at any given time.

Breaking Down What Went Wrong, and What Went Right

So, the most powerful part of this work was in the analysis and dissection of various real-life pieces of content on the various platforms. Why did something not work?

Maybe the image was too generic or too small or too blurry. Or maybe the call to action was too generic and wishy-washy, or the link did not take the user directly to the page with the sales information or coupon.

Or maybe there was no link or no logo, so the user was confused or annoyed.

While this book was an assignment for my Community Management class, the truth is, I can also see it as applying to the User-Centered Design course at Quinnipiac.

After all, a big part of good user-centric design is to not confuse or annoy the user. Vaynerchuk is looking to take that a step further, and surprise and delight the consumer.

Give people value. So, give them what they want and need, or that at least makes them smile or informs them. In the meantime, show your humanity and your concern.

And then work your tail off.

A terrific read. Everyone in this field should read this book.

Ten Years Later, What Do I Think?

Well, I think that the points Gary V makes are exceptionally valuable for the purposes of marketing. If the user has no idea what you want them to do, then they’ll just do nothing.

So, what do you want them to do? Download an app? Leave a review? Click on a link? Make a purchase? Share a post?

This is why virtually the best buttons you see on any website are the only that just say Click or Buy Now. Nobody writes War and Peace on those. Hell, you just plain can’t! The same should be true for any place where you’re putting a call to action.

This is vital for writers as well, and not just for the marketing of their wares. If you want to evoke sadness in the reader, then you had better make it clear that the characters have experienced, or they are experiencing a sad event.

Show the first with crying or depression or the like. And then show the second with a truly sad event: a death, a divorce, losing a job, failing a class—you get the idea.

This book and its contents have never been more relevant. My review and rating still stand.

Rating for a Right Hook…

5/5 Stars

Want More Book Reviews?

If my experiences with book reviews for social media and writing resonate with you, then please be sure to check out my other book review blog posts.

Check Out Book Reviews on Social Media, SEO, Analytics, Design, and Strategy

• Avinash Kaushik’s Web Analytics 2.0, a Book Review
† The Cluetrain Manifesto: 10th Anniversary Edition, a Book Review
• Content Strategy for the Web by Kristina Halvorson, a Book Review
† Groundswell by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff, An Updated Book Review
• Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook by Gary Vaynerchuk
† Likeable Social Media by Dave Kerpen
• The New Rules of Marketing & PR by David Meerman Scott, A Book Review
† The Numerati by Stephen Baker, a Book Review
• Social Media Marketing by Liana Evans, A Book Review
† Trust Agents by Chris Brogan and Julien Smith, a Book Review
• White Space is not your Enemy by Kim Golombisky and Rebecca Hagen, a Book Review
† The Zen of Social Media Marketing by Shama Hyder Kabani, a Book Review

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Tag: social media

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Social Media for Writers

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