If you want to achieve great results with your online marketing, I believe you need to become a really good observer. This means developing the ability to see what other people miss; to observe what someone is doing in order to get a result.
For example, I received an email recently from someone who made the links on his blog ‘do-follow‘. He said he did this, after seeing me offer these ‘special links‘ here and the huge response it got. He wanted to know why it hadn’t generated any extra traffic or comments to his blog when he added it there.
The bigger picture
A good observer would have seen the bigger picture. For example, he would have checked jimsmarketingblog.com out on alexa.com or compete.com and seen that it already had a large readership. The readership of my blog did not just grow magically overnight, after that single post.
Secondly, a good observer would have seen that I have a great online network of people around me; via my newsletter subscribers, readers of my website and the 14,000 people I network with on twitter. This means there was an existing marketplace for these special do-follow links before I decided to add them to jimsmarketingblog.com.
The point?
You can learn a lot more about how to market your blog or website, by observing what marketing professionals do; as well as reading what we write. If you just read the posts, you are missing half the picture!
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I love your point about seeing what others are not.
Case in point, I was driving, with my brother who is from Montreal, through Ft. Myers, FL and I pointed to him Edison and Henry Ford’s house. They are big and beutiful and on the river, quite a site! But he observed what most people would not “There’s a lot of pickets in the fence surrounding the properties, must be a lot of work to paint those”.
I mention to him that this was an unsual comment to which he replied “You have to look for what others don’t see”.
Just amazing Jim, how you bring it back home.
It’s so simple that it’s complex, huh? Many people can’t see the picture because they are in the frame
When you can’t figure out what goes in the blanks, try inserting YOU! I learned to see what works by being registered on top social media guru sites and looking for patterns across their style presentation as well as differences. Another thing I did was read business books from 30+ years ago. If techniques worked 30 years ago and they are still used today in some for, indeed they are proven. Thanks for your straightforward but valuable advice. Happy New Year to you. Wishing you continued success in 2009.
Great point, Jim…
I’ve read many posts on several different blogs regarding how to build backlinks, creating good content, etc. I’ve learned more, however, by actually examining the contents of the blog posts for “clues”, and also by seeing what these particular bloggers are doing “in the field” to boost their sites up the SERP’s.
As always, actions speak MUCH louder than words…
To put it bluntly the content on the site has to be worth commenting on. I’ve been reading many of these marketing blogs for 6 months now as I prepare to launch the new website for my company in the 1st quarter.
It helps to get all the insight as before and during the buidling phases.
I think helping people is the key. If you can go into groups, chat boards and help people succeed by answering questions, they will become loyal to you. They will want to help you succeed. There is this guy Zach Hurst who I met in FB groups. he never sent me any links, or spammed me, all he did was answer questions for me. So I added him as an FB friend, I looked at his profile and he does web design. Anytime someone comes along or is in a group looking for help in web stuff I tell them about Zach. He doesn’t need to market because has people like me using the most powerful resource in the world, call word of mouth…
Spot on, Jim. Never underestimate the power of word of mouse. Also remember that the quickest way to become a success at anything is to copy someone who’s already a success. People don’t just build up enviable marketing networks by sitting and doing nothing. You have to work at it and create the opportunities.
So much valuable information – it’s all out there for the taking. I estimate I spend about 2-3 hours a days just reading newsletters, blogs, forums to build my knowledge, and the rest of the time implementing what I’ve learned. Works for me!
Great content. Always interested in discussions with like minded people!! Interested in Technology, Trends, Web Metrics, Gaming, Social Media, PC Industry, Consumer Electronics!
(Disclosure: I am an employee of AMD)
Cheers,
Ian
Here is a question for you all? I argued to my boss that you could market your whole company in Facebook by telling your employees to spend 15 minutes 4 times a day helping people in groups, uploading fun videos, and making fun of your company…(link in twitter). That you never have to post links, you just have to be interesting, nice, friendly, helpful and fun. Add lots of friends and let them come to you. The status feed would get updated in teh friends profile. using the status feed through twitter you could have your employees talk a little bit a day about work…
Thoughts??
Gebadia,
I would love to make that recommendation. I’ve been building up info on the value of social networks, but if you add 1hr a day per person in a 20 person company thats worth 2x full time employees. At all the variable salary rates. Wouldn’t it more cost effective and potentially more effective in general to hire someone(s) to do that all day? A domain expert if you will?
Chris,
Yes and no. It all depends on how broad your market is and how unique the individual is. It takes a special person to be able to gab in relevant ways in multiple genres. It takes a special person to be able to start multi threaded conversations and be subtle enough not to be spam.
The reason why I said multiple employees is simply that often a company serves a large demographic of people. Within a company you have this broad spectrum of people who have different interests, likes and dislikes. A engineer might be a World of Warcraft junkie..so get that person to participate and make friends in a group might be useful.
Maybe you have a young pretty, out going secretary..well then have her do a weekly Youtube office gossip talk show and run your company group.
Google lets its employees spend 20% of there time a week on personal projects, hence froogle and google news. I kind of see this as the same thing.
Plus one person is only going to have 500 friends on Facebook. Facebook has rules on how many friends you can add each day. 20 employees x 500 is 10 000 friends. Not to mention friends of friends.
You would have to mold it around your market. You would need to match users to the genre of your market. Have some strict rules about not posting links or spamming, about how to do things in a very subtle way. Look at which media and apps can enhance that..
Ping.fm would allow you to update multiple areas. Maybe every 30 minutes everyone has to send a ping..
It would be fun to try..someday if I ever get off the ground…or work for a better boss:)
Above is just brainstorming out loud.