Facebook Events is an application that lets you schedule your business events from a Fan Page and invite friends and fans to attend. Events can be “Public” in which case anyone can RSVP and attend or “Private”, which only allows invited guests to RSVP. Either way this app is a great way to help get the word out about your next event! Thanks to Becky O’Brien of Optimal Wellness for helping me test the process!
Add an event from your Fan Page
Sign in to Facebook and go to your Fan Page. One of the tabs should be “Events”. If you don’t see an Events tab click on the “>>” tab or the “+” to see more options, “Events” may be there if you have other tabs. Your Events tab will show and at the top right is a button to “Create Event”. This will bring up a page to enter your event information.
After you fill in the event information it’s time to invite people. Realize that the people that you are able to invite are “Friends” from your Personal Profile, not Fans. You might want to filter and select from that list or choose not to invite people at this point if it is a business event. You can always post and share from your Fan Page after creating the event. Don’t forget to add an image to your event so that you don’t get the standard event picture! When you create the event it builds and event page that allows people to post comments and see who else has been invited and who has accepted, if you click on the boxes to allow those things.
When you are done entering the event information, click the button to “Create Event”. This will bring up your new event page. From here you can invite more Friends (once again from your Personal Profile) using the link on the left under the picture. At the top there is a link to edit the page if you need to make changes and…..
Update Your Fans!
Clicking the link to update your fans will bring up an update box for your event that lets you invite your friends to the event. You have the capability to do some filtering on your list by region, gender and age. Add a subject and message then click send. Your friends will see the invitation in their news feed and have the opportunity to comment, share and RSVP directly from the post.
You can send additional updates as your event approaches. You might want to consider planning this out and using additional updates to announce speakers, VIP guests that have accepted the invitation, door prizes that have been contributed or other special news relative to the event.
Sharing Events
The best thing about social media is the ability to quickly share information. This is true of Facebook Events as well. When you see events posting to your News Feed from your network, click on the share button to send to your friends if you think they may benefit. When posting and updating your events, encourage your fans to share with their friends!
Please comment with any additional tips or lessons learned while using the Facebook Events Application.
A couple weeks ago, I finally purchased my new Droid phone. This led to an increased frequency in my Foursquare posts – the posts you see on Facebook and Twitter stating that someone has just “checked-in”. Now that my friends and followers are seeing these posts I’m getting more questions about Foursquare, so I decided to shed some light for those that are in the dark on this unique social media application.
It’s Good for Businesses
Quite frankly, if it didn’t show some value for my small business customers, I wouldn’t be so enthusiastic about Foursquare. It’s good for business because it has the potential to send out your brand from a trusted source to hundreds of people every time a customer enters with a cell phone!
Here’s How it Works
Let’s say I am sitting at the Sigma College of Small Business offices in Haymarket, VA and decide that I need a cup of coffee and something sweet. I walk across the parking lot to Cupcake Heaven. While I wait for my tall decaf coffee and afternoon treat, I turn on my Droid, open the Foursquare app, select Cupcake Heaven from the list of nearby venues, add a note about how great the service is and “check-in”. This automatically sends a post to my Facebook and Twitter accounts and all my friends and followers see my comment and that I am at Cupcake Heaven.
So, do the math. If 5 customers like me walk into the store and each of us has 200 friends and followers, the name of that store is promoted to 1,000 people that day. Cost and effort to the store – ZERO!
Why Would a Customer Check In?
Just read your Facebook posts. I get posts from people when they wake-up, go to bed, eat, stub their toe, etc… So people will check-in just to be social. However, Foursquare offers tools for businesses to encourage customers to check-in. As the manager of Sigma College of Small Business I “claimed” my venue and can now offer specific promotions to people who check-in. Promotions can be based on number of check-ins or given to those who check-in the most – The Mayor. That’s right, if you are the person who has checked in to an establishment the most, you are given the title of Mayor, which is announced to all your friends and followers. People will definitely check-in for free stuff and a title!
There’s More!
As the registered owner of your venue, you have the capability to see who is checking in at your place and how often they are checking in – a great way to keep tabs on some of your most loyal and vocal customers. If you are a retailer or restaurant and not using this free tool, you need to put it on your list of things to check out. I’m still researching all the benefits, but this one seems to be a no-brainer, just set it up and let your customers promote your business! Did I mention FREE?
This weekend I traded emails with Becky O’Brien of Optimal Wellness about my Subscribe! blog posts that described the importance and steps to subscribing to a blog. As part of the discussion I went to her blog, checked out the subscription setup and left a comment – nothing serious.
Here’s where it gets interesting…
I walked into Sigma College of Small Business yesterday afternoon and there on the desk was a little pink box with a great thank-you note from Becky. The little pink box contained a Southern Red Velvet cupcake from one of my business neighbors in Haymarket, VA, Cupcake Heaven. Now, 5 years ago I would have e-mailed or called Becky to thank her and probably told my wife and a few others what she had done and how wonderful the cupcake tasted. In the end maybe 5 or 10 people would have known how thoughtful Becky had been, what a wonderful cupcake they have over at Cupcake Heaven and the fact that I took some time to help Becky out with her blog.
The Difference with Social Media
Instead of just e-mailing or calling, I posted my thank you on Becky’s Fan page and on my personal profile in Facebook, tagging her fan page. I also mentioned Cupcake Heaven and the quality of their product. The difference with social media is that the same message that went to 5 or 10 people a few years ago can now reach hundreds of people between my friends, my fans and Becky’s fans. And it took no more effort on my part than if I had just sent an email. If I could have quickly found the Cupcake Heaven Fan Page, (I have since found them on FB) the message would have been received by all their fans as well! So the advantage is that in the simplest of transactions and communication, all three of us are promoted from trusted sources (people choose to fan, follow and like those that they trust) to a few hundred people.
And By the Way…
You may be asking the question “Why would Becky choose Cupcake Heaven, with its pink box and swirly frosting for a male business associate?” Well, it is right next door and I look like I enjoy a good cupcake, but that’s not the case. The fact is that I have been posting my visits to Cupcake Heaven for coffee through Foursquare, and commenting on how tempting the cupcakes (and ice cream) look, for several weeks! In fact I’m the Mayor! So Becky knew going in that this would the perfect thank-you gift, and it absolutely was! I was wiping frosting off my face as I walked into my next meeting.
A Lot of Hype
There is certainly a lot of hype around social media. And there are some who can fit the technology so well with their business and personality that it becomes a huge business driver. But like any other marketing tool it takes time and consistency to build success. Don’t get scared by the hype because even a simple presence and effort can become beneficial. In fact, in many cases, like the one I described above, you just need to set up the presence and let your customers and network do the work for you through their social media channels!
Subscribe! Part 1 covered the importance of getting interesting blog content brought to you in a convenient, efficient manner. Part 2 is a bit more hand’s on in showing you how to actually subscribe.
Decide where you want to see blog content
A great thing about RSS is that there are multiple ways to manage content. You can set it up in your web browser, through email or even feed it to your personal or business home page. I actually have some feeds that come up in my iGoogle home page, some that feed to a tab in Internet Explorer and some that go to an email folder in Outlook.
To determine which tool to use for feeding content you should ask yourself, “Do I want to see this post immediately, or have as a reference for later” The posts I want to see immediately, the timely information I want to comment on, are fed to my iGoogle personal page through Google Reader. Those I use for reference to search later feed to my browser or an email folder, and some feed to multiple places.
Don’t forget that following and commenting on other people’s blogs is an important part of social networking. It is how you listen and interact in the discussion, building trust and credibility with each thought and comment.
For step-by-step on three basic RSS feed techniques, click the links below. If you have any questions, suggestions or run into problems, drop me a comment. Although the directions are specific to an application, most similar apps have the same functionality.
Google Reader is a great little tool that helps aggregate the blogs you are tracking to your Google account. The reason I like it is that I have an iGoogle “portal” page (a page that I can personalize with info I want to see) and there is a “Gadget” that puts my feeds right onto my personal home page, the one that I see first every time I open Internet Explorer. This is what I use for those blogs I want to see and review quickly and then comment, especially on blogs related to educating small business owners.
1. Sign into your Google Account. If you don’t have a Google account:
Click “Create an Account Now” under the Sign in box
Follow instructions for setting up an account
Click on Settings in the upper right to add new Google apps
2. In the upper right of your Google page click on the “Settings” drop-down and select “Google Account Settings”. You can do a lot here to personalize your page and account.
3. If “Reader” isn’t listed under “My Products”, go to the “Try Something New” section and click on “More”
4. Under the “Communicate, show & share” section, click on “Reader”. This will place Reader into the “My Products” section where you can open and start using.
Open Google Reader by clicking the link
5. Open Reader by clicking on the link and you should see your Google Reader Page
Now it’s time to add a subscription.
Go to www.SigmaBizBlog.com or another blog you want to feed
1. Go to www.SigmaBizBlog.com or another blog that you would like to track. Select and copy the web address, or url for the blog. (you can also just type this in to the subscription box when the time comes if you know it)
Click on the "Add Subscription" Button
2. In Google Reader click on the “Add a subscription” button at the upper left, paste or type the url into the box that drops down and click “Add”.
3. You should now see your new subscription in the subscription box on the left and the latest blog post in the reader box.
Click on the Subscription to see the latest posts from that source.
Add the Google Reader Gadget to Your iGoogle Home Page
Click on "iGoogle" at the top right to open your iGoogle page
1. Go to www.Google.com and sign in if you aren’t already. This should open your iGoogle page (if it doesn’t, click on the “iGoogle” link in the upper right) and you should see something like this. Each of the little blocks is called a gadget and you can customize which gadgets you want on you page.
Click on the "Add Stuff" link in the upper right to get new gadgets!
2. In the upper right click on the link for “Add stuff”. In the search area type in “reader” and search. This will show you the Google Reader gadget and clicking “Add It Now” will put it on your iGoogle home page.
Search for "Reader" to find the Reader Gadget and "Add it Now"
3. Now, when you go to Google.com, your subscriptions will show up for a quick review. If you click on the title a preview window pops up so you can take a quick look without even leaving the page.
Although I walked through the Google method for putting subscriptions on your home page, most other portal sites that let you customize a home page will have similar functionality.
In Subscribe! Part 1 I talked about the importance of tracking and commenting on relevant blogs and news feeds to building your online presence. Internet Explorer and other browsers have the capability to help you manage your RSS feeds and this post will walk through how to send news and current blog posts to the “Feeds” tab in Internet Explorer 8. Other browsers should have similar functionality.
If you are someone who routinely uses the “favorites” functionality in IE to manage the web sites you visit frequently, then this may be the best place to track important RSS Feeds that you want to comment on immediately. I don’t routinely use the favorites part of IE so I use this method for sites that don’t update often, or for sites that I want to track for reference when I’m developing business curriculum. Remember, in social networking it is important to follow and comment, so keep your “high interest” content where you will see it often through your normal work routine.
1. Go to SigmaBizBlog.com or another blog or news site that you want to subscribe to.
Click on the RSS Icon in the upper right of the IE window
2. In the upper right of the window, in the menu area is the little orange RSS icon. If the icon isn’t orange, either you are already subscribed or the site doesn’t have RSS capability. Click on the RSS button and a “feed” page will load.
3. Click on “Subscribe to this feed” and then “Subscribe” in the window that pops up. The subscription will be placed in the “Feed” Tab in Favorites.
Access your saved RSS feed through the Favorite window on the Feeds Tab
4. To see your feeds, click the “Favorites” button in the upper left of the window and then the “Feeds” Tab.
5. Click on the subscription to see the latest post!
Remember that a big part of building credible online relationships is to listen and comment on the thoughts of others. Subscribing to interesting blogs with RSS, reading them and consistently commenting is a great way to be part of the discussion!
Another great week of weather and business. If you are willing to listen and reflect there are always oppotunities to learn.
Who Cares?
A great tip came from Asha Sedalia Bruot of ASHA Public Relations during a MAPS committee meeting this week. When preparing to write your next press release, ask yourself “Who Cares?”. Her point was that choosing the right audience is a must in deciding what to write, how to write and which media channels might be interested. The upcoming MAPS (Marketing, Advertising and Public Relations Strategies) Conference on September 22nd will be focused on developing a good public relations strategy – more to come!
“Customer Service” should always be top of mind
Kris Johnson of the PWCGM Chamber shared a story at Friday’s MB3 breakfast that we can all probably relate to. She was calling a relatively new member to offer a sponsorship opportunity and was deep into her explanation of the benefits of this particular sponsorship. The member gently interrupted and jokingly said, “Oh, you’re calling to sell a sponsorship, I thought you were calling to thank me for membership and see if all is well”. Knowing Kris and her record of customer service, she surely recovered and impressed by the end of the call. Her point was that we can all learn much more about customer service Wednesday at the Insight Series Luncheon “Customer Service” , with guest speaker Bobbie Walker, Partnership Marketing Education Director for Virginia Tourism Corporation, but this was a quick reminder for me. Everyone says that repeat business is the most profitable, but make sure you have successfully delivered on the previous sale before launching into the next!
Gas Mileage, Gravity and Centrifugal Force
I learned this week that a late model Toyota Avalon can go from Warrenton, VA to the PWCGM office in Manassas, then to the Western Chamber Office in Gainesville and finally to the Sheetz in Haymarket with the orange gas light on. In further news, on that same day I learned that a well placed gas cap wedged between the rear windshield and the trunk will last against wind and centrifugal force from the Sheetz in Haymarket to Warrenton and that 2 of 5 people on the road will take the time to slow down and try to point that out to a motorist on a cell phone. And for those kind people – Ok, ok, I know now what you were trying to tell me! Thank-you!
Happy Birthday and Happy Anniversary to my little sis Kristy MacIntyre and her husband Jamie at MacIntyre Engineering! Congratulations to the “Rev Man”, Scot Small of RevBuilders who hosted a wonderful Grand Opening at his new office in Gainesville this week. I heard that Chow Now was featured in an article in an upcoming Flavor Magazine – looking forward to reading that. My daughter Jessica Gorman finished a summer semester of classes in France this week, with flying colors I’m sure. Way to go Jess! And finally, a big Sigma Shout Out to all the recent graduates of Leadership Prince William “Third is Superb” class. I hear nothing but great things about this program and they are currently recruiting for the next session. Congratulations!
In our Network@Noon at the Western Office of PWC-GM Chamber discussion this week the topic was “RSS”. For those who don’t know, RSS or “Really Simple Syndication” is an easy way for anyone to syndicate their online content. Just like syndicating a radio show, syndicating a blog or other online content means that many others can subscribe to the content. So it really is just a method for distributing, receiving and managing online content.
When a web page is designed there is code that allows the page to be syndicated so that others can subscribe to the page or site. As a subscriber they can now receive updates in a number of ways – email, browser, social media and through special “reader” apps. There is nothing else required really, any time the site is updated it automatically “feeds” to you so you can read it, and then comment. There is of course a few technical details I’m leaving out, but you probably don’t really care about them.
Here’s why RSS is important
Let’s say I’m interested in 5 different news sites and 10 blogs for my industry. The news sites post daily and the blogs post new content twice a week on average. Without a subscription service I would have to go to all 15 sites independently to see the latest posts, and most of the blog visits will be a waste of time because they only post twice a week. Now, let’s say I subscribe to all 15 sites and have them feed new content to my web browser. Each time there is an update to one of these sites it will show up in the “RSS Feeds” area of my browser. Instead of going to 15 sites, most of which have no updates, I can now see and read all the updates in one place without actually visiting the independent sites. More importantly, you’re audience can subscribe and be notified every time you update!
Every expert in social media will tell you that it is important to interact with your online network. One critical part of this is to comment on the blogs of those people in your network. Using a subscription service let’s you track a large number of blogs and easily monitor topics that you want to comment on. In fact, even if you just have a web site and haven’t done anything else with social media, commenting on blogs is an easy entry point. Pick a few blogs in your industry, among your friends, vendors that you use, and even your personal interests. Subscribe to these blogs and then set aside a little time each week to monitor and comment. The “bloggers” will be encouraged and you will start to build trust and credibility with your online network, before you even get into your own blogging, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn efforts.
To summarize Twitter Power by Joel Comm (@joelcomm) in one word, I’d have to pick “relationship”. And, the more I read and learn about this new magic marketing fairy dust called social networking, the more I see that these are just new tools for good networkers to be great networkers. Joel does a great job of laying out how we can specifically use Twitter to help build relationships and our networks.
Building Relationships
Building relationships is a theme throughout the book and most of the techniques and tips are focused on improving your capability to build relationships. Here are a few of the techniques I thought were especially helpful and unique:
Reply and Retweet – this is how you use Twitter to have discussions with your Twitter network and how to gently refer and recommend their thoughts to your followers. Joel stresses the importance of the reply and re-tweet throughout the book in much the same way I stress listening and referring in my business networking classes
Build Your Profile, Then Your Followers – When you sign up for Twitter is quickly takes you to a screen where you can search your email accounts to find potential followers. Joel recommends skipping this step and coming back to it after you have built your profile and followed a few others to get a feel for Twitter. It’s the networking equivalent to establish a good message and listen first before speaking.
Add Value – by providing information, discussion and a personal touch along with your promotion. If all you provide is promotion, your followers will not see the value and will most likely drop you. Joel offers some great techniques for mixing the types of tweets and setting up a schedule that adds value.
Twitter Power was a pretty good and easy read, and in addition to these and other techniques for use, Joel provides directions on how to customize your Twitter site, build applications around Twitter and more. He closes the book with some good reference chapters, including third party tools to leverage your Twitter presence and a 30-day calendar that reinforces the techniques throughout the book.
Thanks Joel for sharing your knowledge and experience in a way that was both understandable and enjoyable. I recommend this book for anyone who wants to make Twitter part of their marketing strategy.
This post is dedicated to my good friend Tom Schultz, CEO of Acuity Audiovisual. He gave it to me so he wouldn’t have to be on Twitter, but I’ll get him there eventually! thanks Tom
Since 2008 I have been trying to figure out how my small business customers can more easily create and use online video as a marketing tool. However, the ability for novices to develop good videos for business and the cost for a professional have been obstacles.
The Wait is Over!
Over the last couple weeks I’ve spent some time with Abe Erickson at Ugly Chair Productions, learning from an expert about what’s really happening with online video. Last week he explained how video content is going to have a huge impact on search engine indexing (see “What I Learned 4/17“), and told me about his newest product, INTRO|vid.
This week Abe was gracious enough to let me be a part of the new product launch and get my own INTRO|vid, which you can check out. For less than $300 you can have a 2-3 minute introduction video filmed in a professional studio and produced by an expert staff.
My Experience
I went over to the Ugly Chair Production Studio in Manassas, VA on Wednesday morning. The only preparation was to pick something to wear that wasn’t green, well within my onscreen talent. They set me up in the studio and asked a series of great questions to get me talking naturally about Sigma College of Small Business while the camera rolled. The questions they asked generated all the key points that I would have scripted. The whole video shoot took less than 30 minutes and they posted my INTRO|vid within 48 hours. AND, DID I MENTION THEY DO THIS STARTING AT LESS THAN $300 DOLLARS!
Wows
You can see for yourself – that’s what is great about video
Quality of the video, especially considering my lack of talent
Ability to nail the key points about my business
The price and more importantly the short time to shoot and produce
Pows
The only thing I would improve in this is me. As they move forward, I’m sure Abe will do a little coaching to us amateurs about being on camera.
While I was shooting the video I learned that Abe and his lovely production assistant Anna both have a business education. I’m convinced that is why they were able to come up with such great questions and then focus the video down to the best message for my business. I think this is a big differentiator when you’re looking for professional video for your online marketing!
August 23, 2010 | Posted by Jamie Gorman 
Categories: Business Networking, Business Topics, Marketing and Sales, Online Marketing, Social Media | 
Tags: advertise, education, facebook, gainesville, haymarket, learn, management, manassas, networking, online, seo, small, social, Social Media, VA, Virginia, warrenton, web | 
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A couple weeks ago, I finally purchased my new Droid phone. This led to an increased frequency in my 
