by Scott Howard | Jun 7, 2012 | ScLoHo's Web World
I was asked by at least a dozen people to consider submitting a presentation for this years Blog Indiana Conference.
I declined.
Simply because I cannot commit myself to being available those 2 days in August.
Perhaps next year.
In 2010 I watched from afar as some of my friends were presenting, and then last year I was there for the first day but had to bow out of the second day due to my stepdaughter getting married.
Several folks from Fort Wayne made the trip in 2011 and more will attend this year.
One of the topics I would have submitted would be under the working title, Creating Your Niche.
I have stumbled along for several years in this internet world of websites and blogs along with Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Tumblr and a few others.
I have no absolute reason why over 3000 people have signed up to follow me on Twitter.
I am also surprised at the following I have gathered due to my updates on my website/blogs over the years.
(By the way, it’s time to stop distinguishing between a blog and a website as if a website is more legit than a blog. Often the opposite is true according to Google which is always looking for the best current content which is what a blog format excels at.)
I began with a couple of blogs using Google’s blogger platform, one was personal stuff and the other was focused on marketing, media, advertising and sales stuff.
That second one was the first Niche I created because I created a focus and limited the content to fit that focus. Eventually I started other blogs, each with their own focus and Niche.
Then came the process of tying them together and that was via renaming each of them to include the ScLoHo identity, such as ScLoHo’s Collective Wisdom and provide links from each blog site to the others.
Eventually I followed the advice of my friend and former co-worker, Kevin Mullett and bought domains for each of those blog sites, which lead to the next incarnation which took a couple months of planning and preparation.
That was to move from the Google Blogger platform to my own hosted site and another domain, ScottHoward.me. The dot com and dot net versions of my name were taken and so the dot me domain was selected.
This new website (which is what you are on right now) started as a central site to post and host 5 former blogs. For the first 6 months I was adding between 20 and 35 updates every week. I did redirects on all of the domains I owned to point to this website. And it worked.
The readers of Collective Wisdom became exposed to the other content I was writing every week. Those who were reading about the personal, funny or silly stuff were now also seeing the other passions I had in my life that were work related.
But this was a process. There was no master plan when I started. It evolved.
In April of this year I made another drastic change both online and offline as I switched careers back to the radio world after a year off working for a website development company.
This change required me to spend more face to face time with people every day and limit my online activity. I decided to design my website one more time and change the updates from 3 or 4 per day, to 1 a day.
I know very few people who post 365 updates on their website every year by themselves. But that is part of my niche. And the other part is simply being myself.
See, you are your own niche. You are your own personal brand as I sometimes call it.
If you have the heart and desire to take the time to write a little something on a regular basis, you can create a niche for your blog too.
Your comments are always welcome and I’ll continue this tomorrow.
by Scott Howard | May 30, 2012 | ScLoHo's Web World
I’ve worked in traditional media and social media. The Radio Business and The Web Business.
One fallacy that continues to be spread is that in the web world you can measure the response with accuracy and the precision.
No, you can’t.
There are plenty of ways to measure things like, clicks and likes and fans and followers.
But what you cannot measure is the real impact that motivates people to action.
And we’re not really measuring action accurately either.
Time and time again I see businesses failing to connect the dots. The waiter who has no idea what to do with a reward earned by a FourSquare checkin for example.
This is true with all forms of media and marketing, but some want to measure success with these false, incomplete numbers.
General Motors announced they were no longer going to use Facebook as an advertising medium because it wasn’t doing the job.
Let me tell you something.
The G.M. execs who pulled the plug are idiots.
Well payed idiots, but still they are measuring stuff that doesn’t matter.
We crave relationships, ones that make us feel good. The heart of social media is based on building relationships.
I have learned that through conversations after the fact, that something I may have said, shared, or done had a tremendous impact on changing a persons life in little ways and sometimes major ways.
These are anecdotes. You need to gather anecdotes to see the real impact of your social media, or any of your marketing for that matter.
Your comments and anecdotes are always welcome.
BTW: Every once in awhile I screw up a word or grammar or something silly that spell check doesn’t catch. Thanks to my friend Kit who pointed me in the right direction 11 hours after I posted this using the word Antidote instead of Anecdote.
My writing usually doesn’t need an antidote, just friends who catch my errors.
by Scott Howard | May 25, 2012 | ScLoHo's Web World
It’s been a week since Facebook had their IPO.
Billions of bucks.
Millions of people talking about what went wrong.
Thousands of people wondering if Facebook will go belly-up.
If you want the latest news, just Google it.
I see the big lesson is none of the “brilliant minds” have figured out the true value of Social Media and how to capitalize on these giant networks such as Twitter, LinkedIn, MySpace, Pinterest and yes, Facebook.
YouTube, (owned by Google) has figured some of it out.
The value is not really measured in Billions, Millions or even Thousands.
Maybe hundreds.
The value is in the relationships and most people have less than 1000 connections on their social media networks. Those of us that have more than 1000 are not having meaningful two-way relationships with all of those 1000+.
The reason people are using Social Media is not to be sold stuff. It is to converse, share, learn, and explore.
We do buy and sell stuff do to social media, but 90% of the time, it’s not the advertisements, it’s the relationships.
I bought my lunch from a hot dog vendor Wednesday due to the recommendations of friends on Twitter. This is word of mouth communication utilizing social media as a conversation agent.
I’ve seen countless similar activities that resulted in buying and selling using real dollars due to social media.
The “brilliant minds” haven’t pick up on this yet. They want to put a price tag on a share of stock in Facebook in the same manner they put a price tag on a share of stock in any other business. The problem is this whole social media stuff isn’t just any other business.
I don’t know the answer.
But I do recognize that those who are trying to place a value on Social Media are not using the right measuring sticks yet.
by Scott Howard | May 18, 2012 | ScLoHo's Web World
A couple weeks ago my daily update to this website was titled, What’s the Purpose of All this Social Media Crap?
It gathered some attention, including a new Twitter follower that had me puzzled for a couple moments.
Take a look:
When I received the notification in my email, my first thought was, why in the world did BathroomDotCom want to follow me on Twitter?
Then I remembered I used the word Crap in my latest update and sent a promotional tweet at noon. 19 minutes later, the autofollow program that BathroomDotCom decided that I was worth following.
That, I believe demonstrates the problem with AutoFollowing on Social Media based on keywords without a little human intervention. Otherwise, it’s just a bunch of crap…
by Scott Howard | May 14, 2012 | ScLoHo's Web World
Last week my name was mentioned as a resource (again) by someone on Facebook for Twitter advice.
A third party asked:
Anyone have any tips to increase the number of one’s twitter followers?
Humbly, I’m going to address the original question with a disclaimer. There are lots of people who are making a living, or at least supplementing their income by offering and charging for social media advice and guidance.
I’m not one of them. I do all of this online stuff as a communication tool. I started several years ago writing a couple of blogs which grew into 5 or 6, then recently scaled back one update per day, on one website, instead of the 40+ weekly updates I was doing previously. I did work for about a year with digital marketing agency Cirrus ABS and was recruited due to my media, marketing, sales, and social media credentials. However I decided to return to the radio advertising business this year to earn a living.
The person who asked the question on Twitter about adding more followers is also in the mass media business. I did some research on him and the company he works for.
They are both on Facebook and with respectable numbers of Likes and Friends. The company had 2716 and he personally had 2301 when I checked a couple days ago.
(In comparison, one of my radio stations has over 8,000 likes, the other has around 1,400.) My own Facebook page has 850 Friends, my wife has under 100 and so on…
But back to Twitter. This person’s company has 142 followers and follows 208. He has 61 followers and follows 49. I understand why he wants to increase his numbers, but I’m not sure he understands why.
Last week I wrote about the primary reason I use Twitter. I said it is my preferred conversational social media platform. Click here to read why I used those words.
But conversation is not the only reason I Tweet. I also listed 6 additional reasons the next day. You can read them here.
The main reason I am on Twitter is to engage back and forth with others on Twitter. I joined Twitter around 4 years ago. I have Tweeted over 36,000 times. That averages out to around 25 times a day.
You don’t need to Tweet that much. But as they say “results may vary”.
Here’s why I believe you probably want more Twitter Followers:
You want to connect with more people and have them connect with you.
So, this sounds silly, but it’s also obvious. Follow more people.
When I had less than 500 followers I always followed more people than I had followers. Eventually the numbers flipped. I have more followers than I follow.
Every time I get a new follower, I check their Twitter profile to see if they are real or just spammy, and usually follow back.
Two other things to do to increase the number of followers that I’ve mentioned:
Tweet more and converse more. 10 times a day isn’t all that difficult if you are building relationships.
And finally you need to keep at it. This whole twitter thing, in my book, is about building relationships with other people. If you disappear for a few days or weeks, you are weakening those relationships.
When I started most of my online activity, I was just as green and new to this as anyone else. I sought out advice, and I applied relationship principles.
Anyone else have some advice?
by Scott Howard | May 9, 2012 | ScLoHo's Web World
Yesterday I wrote about why I like Twitter as my preferred conversational social media platform.
But there are other reasons I like Twitter.
I like to share information.
I like to share silly stuff.
I like to promote others.
I like to provoke others.
I like to toss stuff out there and see what the reaction is.
But I also listen.
I listen a lot.
When you are following several hundred (or more) Tweeple, you have to listen.
Well, maybe you don’t have to, if you are a spammer or just trying to sell stuff, but I find that listening is key.
So, I tweet to share, and converse. And Listen too.
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