WEB BUSINESS SOLUTIONS

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Took the family up to Port Macquarie on the NSW North Coast recently so my daughter could play in an annual soccer tournament. Last year we stayed at Beaches Holiday Apartments, a top facility if you’re looking for Flynns Beach accommodation. Unfortunately, this year we left our booking too late and they were booked out. So an alternative was found, a resort known as Flynns on Surf.

First impressions weren’t great…cockroaches in the kitchen as soon as we walked in, more in the bathrooms, and the second bathroom had practically no water pressure. Still, we overlooked this as everything else was generally good and we were close to Flynns Beach where the team were meeting.

At the end of the tournament the coach - who was also staying at this resort along with several other families from our team - decided to have a team get-together at the resort’s recreation area. But, apparently it was against the rules for non-guests to use the facilities. This is understandable, and the owner was well within his rights to make an issue of it. We should have at least sought his permission beforehand. Our mistake.

But what left us totally stunned was the way Basil…he even had a similar stature to John Cleese…decided to handle the situation. Instead of quietly taking aside one of the guests and saying “If there are people here you have invited who are not guests you’ll have to ask them to leave” he proceeded to shout at the whole group… in true Basil Fawlty tradition…and demand that any non-guests, who he humiliated by making them raise their hand, vacate the premises immediately.

That was bad enough, but he then started yelling at the kids in the pool, saying if they weren’t guests they must get out of the pool immediately. Now, if you want to piss off a parent big time, just yell at their kids.

Basil then left and returned half an hour later, when most of the group had left but a few were still cleaning up, to ensure his demands had been met. More angst. More confrontation.

Now, what Basil seemed to forget was that many of the people in that group were his PAYING CUSTOMERS, attending an ANNUAL EVENT. The rest of the group were POTENTIAL PAYING CUSTOMERS also attending an ANNUAL EVENT. A smart “customer service professional” would have seen the opportunty and said to the non-guests “I’m glad you’re enjoying our facilities, although we don’t really allow non-guests to use them. Maybe you’ll consider staying here next time.” He could also have said to the coach “Why don’t we see if we can do a special deal and book the whole team in for next year?”

As it was, it’s highly unlikely any of our team will return to Fawlty Towers. 

So, how does this relate to the online world?

Your website is not the only way your potential customers find you online. In days gone by, people would relate their experiences to their friends. Bad enough, if the experience was bad. But now they express their feelings online. They make comments in forums. They blog about you (just like this). The effects are far-reaching and permanent. Try Googling “Dell Hell” and you’ll find references to a bad customer service story that happened 4 years ago. And even a company the size of Dell are powerless to stop it.

Social media effects companies large and small. Customer service affects every business.

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Received some great comments and questions recently from Scott Sheperd who had found me via my profile on BlogCatalog. Scott says:

“I started blogging a couple of years ago and then dropped it basically because I just don’t understand the RSS and the networking system and the affiliate stuff. I started up the blogging again and am determined to figure this out.”

I can understand your frustration Scott. Getting a handle on the technical side of things can be a challenge and there is so much mis-information about social marketing floating around that it’s scary. There is definately a right way and a wrong to do this, and many web marketers/SEOs are not only doing it the wrong way, but teaching people how to do it the wrong way.

How do I know there is a wrong way? Because I’ve been there. I’ve made stupid mistakes, followed some bad advice and had my butt kicked as a result. But, I’ve learnt from those mistakes and I’m now getting some good instruction and guidance from people who really know this stuff, and it’s paying dividends.

Social media sites do not exist for marketers and SEOs to game them for their own advantage. Yes, they are a great way to build links and thus improve your rankings in the search engines. But, as long as you approach social marketing with the right mindset you can use it to raise your profile -  to be seen as the “go-to” guy in your niche. Rather than “marketing” to your audience, who aren’t there to be marketed to, you’ll find potential clients will come to you simply because they trust you. It’s called relationship marketing and it’s been around for years. Simply put, people do business with people they know and trust.

Scott’s enquiry to me is the perfect case in point.

Scott asks:

“Where do I go to get a grip on the technical part of blogging like the RSS stuff and placing ads on my blogs and websites. Is it you? Or is this too basic for you. Do you charge? How do I get a little more personalized service at first to get me going?

Scott approached me because he saw me as an expert in blogging, RSS, affiliate marketing etc. Scott’s an expert in stress management and motivational speaking so his objective is to build his online profile and be seen as the go-to guy in his area of expertise.

OK, where to start? There are two people from whom I’ve learnt a lot about social marketing - Rich Schefren and Jack Humpfrey. So, to get started on the right track:

Download Rich’s Attention Age Doctrine Pt 2. This is one of the best free (unbelievably) books you’ll find anywhere on Web 2.0 marketing. It doesn’t get into nitty-gritty, fine-detail tactics and resources but it’s an excellent overview of where Web 2.0 marketing is heading. It will put you in the right mindset for your social marketing endeavours. Rich has recently followed this up with the Maven Matrix Manifesto, also free. Download them both, print them out, pour your beverage of choice, arm yourself with a pen and paper for notetaking and read these books.

Next, download Jack’s Authority Black Book. This is an excellent resourse on social marketing and covers the basic tactics and strategies. It includes a huge list of Web 2.0 resources. Also free. Keep a copy on your desktop for easy access.

Jack has also created Social Marketing Central where you can network with other social marketers and get advice. You’ll feel at home here. Also free.

OK, that takes care of the best free resources. The next ones aren’t free but will move your social marketing efforts to the next level.

Jack’s Social Power Linking is a membership site which gives you access to training books, videos, webinars, podcasts etc which will teach you everything about social marketing. I’ve written a full review here. Every month new resources are added. The latest is a 107 page report aimed at newcommers to social marketing. It includes:

• The Social Marketing Gold Rush - is it a Flash in the Pan?
• What is Social Marketing?
• The Two-Part Social Marketing Power Strategy
• Your Blog as a Social Marketing Tool

I’m a member of SPL and I intend to stay a member. The quality of the books released each month alone you would easily pay $50 to $100 for. SPL is currently around $30 per month.

The last non-free resource I’m going to mention is another creation of Jack’s called Authority Site Center. It’s basically a Content Management System which uses WordPress as it’s core but adds proprietary software and site building technology to take WP to another level. If the technical aspects of blogging, RSS feeds, site building and marketing with Web 2.0 leave you totally confused then this is the right resource for you, because all that is taken care of while you simply build a great “authority” site.

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Received this from the Stompernet guys recently:

“Pure Evil: 10 More Devious Ranking Tips for Video + Social Marketing”

I’ve learn’t a lot from Andy Jenkins and Brad Fallon. Their original “Stomping the Search Engines” course was a good guide to the fundamentals of SEO and despite being very successful at their own online businesses they maintained an ethical standard which I respected. I never joined their Stompernet membership site because of the high cost but as a subscriber I have taken in a lot of their tips and free videos. Up until now, it’s all been good.

But, I was very disappointed to read this latest mailing, which is all about getting links from social bookmarking sites. Actually, the article is to promote a coaching program from a guy called Jeff Johnson, who Stompernet are now apparently affiliated with.

Now, creating links via social bookmarking sites is quite legitimate as long you do it the right way. But here’s what Stompernet say:

“Register multiple accounts for each of the Social Bookmarking sites listed at SocialMarker.com. We suggest starting out with at least 10 unique accounts for each Social Bookmarking (SB) site.”

Wrong, wrong, WRONG! Creating multiple accounts is abuse, pure and simple.

They go on…

“For example, you should have made 10 propeller.com accounts in the last step.  For any given item you are bookmarking, randomly choose 3 of those accounts to submit your item to. The next time you bookmark an item, randomly choose 3 more”

For starters, this is not social marketing as the title of this mailing suggests. It’s black-hat link building. It also shows a complete misunderstanding of what a “bookmarking” site is. Propeller is not a bookmarking site in the same manner as del.iciou.us or Furl. It is a social media site where users submit stories such as blog posts (not just bookmarks) which are then voted on by the community.

Users of sites like Propeller are very sensitive to spam and they can spot it a mile off. If you create an account at Propeller for no other reason than to promote your own content the users will sooner or later sniff you out and mark you as a spammer. To avoid that you HAVE to become a trusted member of the community by active participation - submitting, voting and commenting on other user’s submissions. Done correctly, i.e. not trying to game them but rather use them in the manner they were intended, you will be flat out maintaining one account.

And the Stompernet guys want you to create 10 accounts or more?

It’s abuse, it’s spam, and it’s why social media sites HATE marketers and SEOs. It puts their defences up and makes it harder for legitimate social marketers who do the right thing and play by the rules. Creating multiple accounts is AGAINST the rules and if you take the trouble to learn how social media sites work, and work WITH them and not against them, you can still reap the benefits.

And this…

“If you’re promoting a page/post/video about Jessica Alba (for example) - you should ALSO Social Bookmark items you find about her from various other sites as well (YouTube, MySpace, Digg, etc.) that are NOT the pages you’re promoting. This will help create that “natural” appearance we are striving for.”

Instead of creating a phoney “natural appearance”, why not just BE natural? Create a great blog post about Jessica Alba. Make it controversial or confronting and people will want to link to it. You won’t need multiple accounts.

And this…

“If you are not natural when you do this, it’s going to look like spam - because, it IS spam if you abuse it. Please understand that there is a fine line between power techniques like this and outright abuse - don’t abuse this tip! Do it the right way.”

Sorry Andy, these aren’t “power techniques”. They’re abuse. They’re deception. And that’s never a good long term strategy. You crossed that “fine line” ages ago. You mightn’t see it that way, or other marketers mightn’t see it that way, but just ask the creators and users of the social media sites you’ve party-crashed into. And once you’ve been banned it’s extremely hard to get back in, unless you go skulking around with proxy IPs and the like. Who wants to be bothered with that? When you’re banned it isn’t just your throw away email address that gets banned, it’s your IP address.

Andy Jenkins is a smart guy. I’ve watched his videos and learnt a lot. If you believe his claims, and I have no reason not to, he runs multi-million dollar online business. But if you’re a Stompernet subscriber, please, don’t follow this advice. It’s yet another example of what happens when big-time Internet Marketers/SEOs discover social media/bookmarking. They just screw it up for the rest of us!

If you want to learn how to do it the right way, Jack Humphrey’s Social Power Linking is where you’ll find the answers.

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A recent post on LED Digest raised the issue of organised voting up of content on social media sites. One subscriber had suggested that LED readers might be able to devise a system where each subscriber could submit and vote on other subscriber’s content. So in response to that, another subscriber designed and put up a page which he named SICoop (The Slightly Inappropriate Co-op for Shilling Social Media Sites.)

This concept of organised voting up of social content isn’t new but you need to be very cautious about how you execute it and participate in it. Most social media sites track your participation. The sites you submit and vote on, comments you make, groups you join and friends you make, are clearly visible to the entire community.

The first site listed to be “shilled” was the SICoop page itself. So, if you were to submit this “Shilling Social Media Sites” page to social media sites, what would that say about you as a member of that community? Once you’re marked as a spammer the damage is done and there’s no turning back. Take the second URL I saw listed on SICoop. What is that? Seems to be nothing more than a copyright notice and legal mumbo-jumbo. Trust me, NO genuine social media user is going to submit that to StumbleUpon, Propeller or any other social site. Submit it to Digg and you’ll likely get banned. Or worse, your domain will be banned and no one else will be able to submit any of your content.

There’s no shortcut to success on social media sites. You have to gain an understanding of how they work and become a trusted member of the community. These guys aren’t stupid. They can spot spammers and attempts to manipulate them a mile off. If you vote up a page which exists for no other reason than to game their system then you’re just asking for trouble. A StumbleUpon “I like it” click is very powerful. It truly is a personal recommendation, unlike a link in the eyes of search engine. When a SU user checks out your recommendation, and they like it, they’ll check out other stuff you’ve voted for. If they like what they see they’ll check out your profile (with links to your site) and become your “fan”. They’ll start to trust you. But submit a site for “shilling social media sites” or a copyright notice, that trust will evaporate. They’ll start clicking the thumbs-down button and before you know it you’ll be shown the door.

It’s quite OK to network with other members of a community such as LED Digest. LED is one of the best old-style email discussion lists out there and I read every issue. But I’m not going to risk my reputation on SU by voting on a page just because it was written by another LEDer, and I wouldn’t expect anyone else to do the same for me. However if that member were to post a good article on their blog – whether it be about web hosting, SEO, marketing or any aspect of doing business online (which is what LED is all about) and I’ll gladly vote for it. The concept of LED users helping each other is fine, but you have to be smart about how you go about it. Simply putting up a page where you add your URL to the voting list isn’t the best way to achieve the desired results and could do more harm than good.

I recently joined a membership site called Social Power Linking where I’ve learned an awful lot about social marketing. Part of that membership is a “buzz” group where they are setting out to achieve the same thing as SICoop. I haven’t actually participated in it yet (not sure if I really want to yet), but there are very strict rules on how it operates and ethical standards are maintained for the good of the community. The guys who run it have been doing this for years, successfully, and really understand social marketing. One thing I have learned from SPL is you do NOT want to shill social media sites.

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Blogger is no more. After creating several new blogs with WordPress I realised just how much better a blogging platform it is than Blogger. Easier to manage. Easier to configure. Easier to customise. And most importantly, WP outperforms Blogger in the search engines by a country mile. So it’s out with Blogger and in with WordPress.

Using WP’s “widgets” it was a simple matter to add links to my previous Blogger posts (under Web Development and Marketing Strategies in the right panel) by using an RSS Feed widget. I’ve also added a feed for my Affiliate Sales Programs blog, created with WP as well.

Web Business Solutions - the Blog, is an extension of my Web Business Solutions website. I’ll be blogging about site building, web design software, SEO, web marketing, link building, web 2.0 and social marketing.

Come along for the ride. Should be fun!

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