Start the New Year off right with The 2011 Marketing Forecast on Jan 12th. Register now... http://ping.fm/EtaNn

Learn to survive and thrive in the new year at the 2011 Marketing Forecast on January 12th http://tinyurl.com/l6gef3

CAMA's luncheon tomorrow Dec 7th at 11:30 am has been CANCELED. We will be sending refunds to those that pre-registered.

CAMA Public Speaking Tune-up 12/7/10, 11:30am at Dilworth Neighborhood Grille. More info at http://tinyurl.com/l6gef3

Meet us at La Paz tonight at 5:30pm for CAMA's holiday social. Details here http://tinyurl.com/3akluo7

Holiday Social at LaPaz

12/1/10, 5:30 pm at LaPaz Restaurant, 1910 South Blvd # 100, Charlotte.

It’s time to mark the holiday season! Join us for our Holiday Social on Wednesday, December 1 at 5:30 pm at LaPaz Restaurant on 1910 South Boulevard. You’ll have the chance to enjoy refreshments, including a complimentary beverage, and mix and mingle with the Charlotte AMA board and other local marketers. This festive evening event is free to attendees who bring $10 worth of food items to support our Holiday Food drive (more details below) or who make a donation of $10 for Second Harvest Food Bank. No RSVP. Registration on-site. Hope to see you there.

Charlotte American Marketing Association's Food Drive:

Help families enjoy their holidays by donating food! Please bring non-perishable food items with you to our December 1 Social at LaPaz Restaurant. All food donations will be given to Second Harvest Food Bank, which provides food and grocery items to charitable agencies that assist people in need. For ideas on what to bring, please see the list below of the most needed items. Your donations make a difference - every pound supplied is the equivalent of 1.25 meals for a hungry neighbor!

Below is a list of most needed items at a food drive.
Canned Meats: Chicken, Turkey, Ham, Beef Stew
Canned Fish: Tuna, Mackerel, Salmon
Canned Vegetables: Beans, Corn, Potatoes
Canned Fruits: Pears, Apples, Peaches
Other Items: Peanut Butter, Pasta, Rice, Deluxe Macaroni & Cheese, Soup
Non-food Items: Laundry & Dish Detergent, Shampoo, Deodorant, Toilet Paper, Diapers

"LGA Stays up All Night" by Lauren Sammerson now posted on CAMABlog. http://tinyurl.com/2983qkf

CAMA holiday social tomorrow 5:30pm at La Paz. Bring $10 worth of canned goods to get in free. http://tinyurl.com/l6gef3

Free CAMA Podcast interview with David Meerman Scott now posted http://tinyurl.com/24svs4z

LGA Stays Up All Night to Help Six Area Nonprofits During Second Annual Goodstock

The Charlotte AMA encourages marketers to give back to this great community. Charlotte is well known for a giving spirit. Marketers are no exception. How are you and your firm making a difference in our community through volunteerism and giving? Let us know. We would like to applaud you. Email your volunteer success stories to lauren.sammerson@charlotteama.com.

Charlotte’s 24-Hour Advertising, PR and Marketing Fulfills Wishes of Charitable Organizations

Luquire George Andrews (LGA), one of the Southeast Region’s leading advertising, marketing and public relations agencies, donated nearly 1,000 hours and more than $235,000 worth of services to six area nonprofits – American Red Cross / Greater Carolinas Chapter, Carolina Thread Trail, Girl Talk Foundation, Residential & Support Services, Right Moves for Youth and Teach for America/Charlotte Region – during its second annual Goodstock™, a 24-hour marketing and public relations marathon that took place from 11:30 a.m. Thursday, Oct. 7 through 11:30, Friday, Oct. 8. The agencies were selected from among nearly 25 that responded to LGA’s RFP to receive Goodstock services

LGA employees worked around the clock – brainstorming, writing copy, designing creative materials, developing strategies – and did not rest until all the work was done. In the end, the agency presented multiple pieces of work to the six agencies on Friday morning, including ads, billboards, new names, logos, taglines, press materials, key messages, fundraising event ideas and social media strategies.

For more information, please visit www.lgaadv.com.

Join us tonight for The Customer Experience: Future Trends & Insights at Dilworth 5:30pm http://tinyurl.com/l6gef3

7 Tips To Get New Facebook Fans For Your B2B Business

Having a solid B2B social media strategy is key in attracting and converting qualified leads. With over 500 million active users, Facebook is a formidable platform to establish a social presence and more than likely a part of that strategy. Becoming proficient in Facebook marketing is an essential ingredient for modern marketing success.

One of the most effective ways to utilize Facebook marketing for your B2B business is to create a fan page. Attracting new fans to your page takes a mix of careful planning and proper execution. To understand some key ways to attract more fans and boost lead generation, consider the following 7 tips to get new Facebook fans to increase your share of voice in the network:

1. Create An Active Wall

Showing an active wall displays current interaction and interest on the Facebook page. This is also a valuable way to provide social proof to potential fans of the page.

2. Use Photos

Adding photos adds a visual enhancement when combined with text-based updates. Add photos of any physical products or offline events such as conferences and staff at work to promote faces with the products and services. Also encourage customers to post photos of their successes and how they use the company products.

3. Use Videos

If a photo is worth 1,000 words, a video is worth 10,000. By adding video, you add a new dynamic of how and who visitors to your page experience the company. Adding video from internal and external sources such as existing customers on how products work, customer testimonials, case studies and even from off-line events such as conferences and press conferences.

4. Find Fresh Content To Share

Adding content to the Facebook page is as important as adding content to B2B blogs and other content marketing tools. Share a mix of content that’s updated from internal sources including blogs, articles, white papers and newsletters. Also include external sources of relevant content on the Facebook page to share resources that not only include company resources.

5. Nurture Interaction

As part of any optimal B2B social media strategy, interaction with prospects and customers is essential. Between sharing content and media, interact with questions, comments on other’s posted content or even add something non-business related as a way to connect with people.

6. Promote Your Page Across Platforms

Just building a Facebook page won’t let potential fans know it’s there – promotion is a requirement. Be sure to add links to the page from current content including: B2B blogs, web sites, marketing materials and newsletters. Also, encourage current connections on such B2B social media networks as LinkedIn to visit the page. One other way to promote the page is to ensure optimization of page content and structure for optimal search engine results.

7. Create Facebook Only Exclusives

Look to add Facebook exclusive contests, discounts and content to those who become fans of the page. This gives fans the sense of uniqueness by becoming a fan. This also allows better tracking of leads from unique resources from the company Facebook page.

This was originally posted by Maria Pergolinosable

Reinvent your marketing plan for 2010. Susan Larkin, VP of Marketing for Allen Tate, shares secrets tonight. http://tinyurl.com/l6gef3

CAMA social in SouthPark: Village Tavern, 4201 Congress St, Charlotte.10/6/10 Chapter Volunteers free all others $10

17 Compelling And Highly Usable B2B Marketing Statistics

Knowing what’s happening in the B2B marketing industry is key to understanding current and future trends. One of the best sources of information is industry statistics.

For your use in PowerPoints, to share with associates or just to get up to date, below are 17 usable and compelling B2B Marketing stats collected from various sources around the B2B industry:

B2B Social Spending

B2B advertising spend on social media and lead generation sites is forecasted to grow at an annualized rate of 21% and 17% respectively to 2013
Online accounted for 7% of the B2B marketing mix in 2008. This is set to reach 12% by 2013
Source: AMR International B2B Online Marketing Assessment and Forecast to 2013

US business-to-business (B2B) advertising and marketing spending will increase by 0.8% this year, to $129 billion
Interactive spending will climb 9.2%, to $51.5 billion this year
Source: eMarketer

B2B interactive marketing spending will climb to nearly $4.8 billion in 2014
Source: Forrester Research

B2B Social Participation

86% of B2B firms are using social media, compared to 82% of B2C outfits
Only 32% of B2B firms engage in social media on a daily basis compared with 52% of B2C firms
36% of B2B executives have “low interest in social media” compared with just 12% for B2C executives
Source: BizReport

34% of B2B marketers are not measuring social success at all, versus just 10% of B2C marketers
46% of B2B marketers said social media was perceived as irrelevant to their company, versus 12% of B2C marketers
Source: eMarketer

54% of CIOs prohibit the use of social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook while at work
Source: Robert Half

B2B Customer Perspective and Buying Process

93% of business buyers believe all companies should have a social media presence
85% of business buyers believe companies shouldn’t just present information via social media – they should also interact and engage with them
Source: Buzz Marketing

Bloggers on Brands

71% of all respondents who maintain blogs for a business – their own or one they work for – report that they have increased their visibility within their industries through their blogs
70% of bloggers are talking about brands on their blog organically
46% of respondents post about the brands they love (or hate)
38% post brand or product reviews
Source: Technorati

This was originally posted by Maria Pergolinosable

The Trifecta: Making Email, Facebook and Twitter Work Together

You may think that email, Twitter and Facebook are all slight variations on the same tune, but the ExactTarget Research Series, Subscribers, Fans and Followers has shown that each venue has its own X-Factor which makes it special. The trick, which is summarized in their newly published final report, is figuring out how to make them all work as a team.

The study begins by breaking down the numbers and there was a surprise here. 93% of online consumers say they receive at least one permission-based email a day. These are the subscribers. 38% said they are a Facebook fan of at least one brand. These are the fans. The surprise is in the followers, those U.S. online consumers who say they follow at least one brand on Twitter. That number is 5%. That’s it.

I probably spend more time on Twitter than the average person, so my idea of the usage is likely skewed by that, but I would have guessed the number at 10-15%. The upside is that of that 5%, 37% said that following a brand it made it more likely that they would purchase something from them. 27% of subscribers agreed as did 17% of the Facebook fans.

I’m not great with math, but I’m pretty sure that means that a larger number of people are getting emails and are getting influenced by them as compared to Facebook and Twitter. But all three venues have their success rate, which is why it’s so important to make them work together.

Many of the people surveyed said they were confused by where to look for information because the branding across the venues wasn’t consistent. For example, if I want a company’s monthly coupon offer, will I get it if I sign up for the email, or only if I become a fan on Facebook? Consumers didn’t like being told they had to subscribe to any one particular method in order to receive information.

Ideally, you want consumers to follow all three channels. To do this, you must cross-promote one channel with another. Announce Facebook winners in the email newsletter, Tweet about content that’s exclusive to Facebook, create a special email newsletter for Twitter followers. All of that takes time and that’s money – two items most businesses don’t have in abundance. That means you have to pick your battles. Try mixing and matching and monitor the results. If a campaign isn’t getting results, try something else. Social media is so new, there isn’t a proven pattern for success.

There are a few tips you should keep in mind and these come right from the consumers you’re trying to reach.

• Make it worth their time.
• Show gratitude for their business.
• Deliver quality products.
• Honor their individual preferences.
• Provide excellent customer service.
• Be honest.

I’ll bet you already knew those things, but are those points coming across in your email, Twitter and Facebook campaigns? That’s what is important.

You’ll find a lot more detail in the ExactTarget Subscribers, Fans and Followers report. If you haven’t downloaded this six part series, do it. It’s free and there’s a wealth of information in each report. As a bonus, the reports are light on text and big on graphics, perfect for those of you who want to be informed but don’t have the time to plow through a twenty page report.

Finally, let me leave you with this thought. If your audience is on the go, they may prefer Twitter over email so that’s where you should be concentrating your efforts. More of a social audience? Hook them in with fun games and community events on Facebook. The point is, the only statistics that really matter, are yours after you run a social media marketing campaign.

This blog was originally posted by Marketing Pilgrim at http://www.marketingpilgrim.com/2010/09/the-trifecta-making-email-facebook-and-twitter-work-together.html

Creativity: The Missing, Yet Critical Element For B2B Marketers

What’s the missing, yet critical element for successful B2B marketers? – Creativity.

It is a common fact that many B2B marketers stay the path of the traditional and in the box techniques. To create a competitive edge to your business marketing, add some creative thinking and opportunities to attract and engage prospects and customers.

Typical B2B marketing can be dry –Marketing business technologies or services typically don’t have much room for emotional interaction or social engagement. It’s not anyone’s fault, this is just how it’s always been.

Today, most B2B marketers still don’t embrace social engagement or online B2B marketing tools – they still stick with what they have always known and used. These marketers tend to stay in the box and not look outside of how they market their products and services.

Those willing to look outside of the box begin to understand how innovative thinking helps create new and expand existing opportunities with their customers.

Stand out with creativity – For B2B marketers that want to increase opportunities that will lead to sales, looking outside of the box is not enough – they need to stand outside of the box. Combining traditional B2B marketing and using new and creative options, business marketing becomes more than just dry marketing of the same old technologies and services.

Let’s look at a few areas it pays to be creative:

Business Blogs – To traditional marketers, a business blog is not worth the time and effort. To others, this is a perfect way to not only attract new prospects, but also engage and convert them into paying customers. With a blog, you provide information that educates prospects. When they have the information they need, they are ready to engage and ask for more information about what you offer – this will lead to better sales leads.

Social Engagement – It’s not enough to just wait for prospects to find you, you have to go to them. Look at social networks where your products and services would benefit those community members; engage prospects and give them places to look for more resources such as your blog or website.

Content Creation and Sharing – Creating content doesn’t just mean writing; it could be text, audio, video or other types of content. When you create your content, you can put it on and off of your own sites. Examples could be posting a video to your blog, adding a podcast to a podcast directory or sharing content on your social networking channels.

Sharing content is a great way not only for you, but also your customers to spread the word about your product and services. When you post something on your blog, include ways for others to share it on their social networks. Encourage others to share the content you post to your Facebook page or on your YouTube channel.

Use creativity to improve metrics – Now that you understand some ways to add creativity to your B2B marketing, what does it do for your metrics and overall revenue? By engaging with prospects and current customers on multiple networks, you get the word out; increase search engine rankings to you through back links and also get others to spread your information on their networks for you.

Now look at your digital marketing metrics; what do you see? All of the creative ways you have marketed out are bringing back in targeted traffic, conversions and are helping you build lasting relationships with your customers.

To get more prospects, more conversions and more sales, look at adding some creativity to your B2B marketing.

This was originally posted by Maria Pergolino

Getting to scale: direct marketing vs. mass market thinking

A mass marketer needs to reach the masses, and to do it in many ways, simultaneously. The mass marketer needs retail outlets and fliers and a website and public relations and tv ads and more more more and then... bam... critical mass is reached and success occurs.

Best Buy is a mass marketer, but so are Microsoft and the Red Cross. Ubiquity, once achieved, brings them revenue, which advances the cycle and they reach scale.

The direct marketer, on the other hand, must get it right in the small. That pitch letter can be tested on 100 houses and if it gets a 2% response rate, then it can be mailed to 100,000 houses with confidence. That business-to-business sales pitch can be honed on one or two or three prospects, and then when it works, can be taught to dozens or hundreds of other salespeople.

The key distinction is when you know it's going to work. The mass marketer doesn't know until the end. The direct marketer knows in the beginning.

The mass marketer is betting on thousands of tiny cues, little clues, and unrecorded (but vital) conversations. The direct marketer is measuring conversion rates from the first day.

That's the reason we often default to acting like mass marketers. We're putting off the day of reckoning, betting on the miracle around the corner, spending our time and energy on the early steps without the downside of admitting failure to the boss.

Of course, just because it's our default doesn't mean it's right. Business to business marketing is almost always better if you treat it like direct marketing. Most websites that do conversion as well. Same with non-profit fundraising. As well as marketing goods and services to the bottom of the pyramid, people who live in villages where mass media and mass distribution are difficult and have little impact.

Get it right for ten people before you rush around scaling up to a thousand. It's far less romantic than spending money at the start, but it's the reliable, proven way to get to scale if you care enough to do the work.

This blog was originally posted on Seth Godin's Blog at http://sethgodin.typepad.com/

B2B Social Media – 10 Tips From The Definitive Guide To Social Media

As B2B marketers, we know the growing importance of B2B social media. We know it’s a necessary tool for seed nurturing and demand generation, but in many cases, B2B marketers are still not sure where to begin. The following 10 tips from the Definitive Guide to Social Media will help you understand what components are essential to grasp, use and focus on.

1. Develop a plan – Ask yourself these three questions:

WHO – Who is your target audience? Do you have a buyer persona?
HOW – How can you deploy social media tactics for measurable success? What KPIs are important to your brand?
WHAT – What goals or objectives do you want to accomplish? Increase brand awareness? Improve engagement?

2. Blog – This plays a key role in lead nurturing and educating prospects. Therefore, its pertinent that you:

Update often
Create thought leadership content
Add a human touch
Provide insight into company & products/services
Develop linkbait & use anchor text links

3. Twitter 101

Create a full account – Always create your account with a full profile: picture, bio, link to company website and customized background.
Follow with relevance – Connect to significant people, thought leaders, industry experts and encourage others to follow you.
Tweet daily, multiple times daily – Include links, RT followers, be interesting.

4. Facebook 101

DON’T friend people you don’t know. DO ask people if you can friend them, particularly if you’ve only spoken to them on the phone.
DO take advantage of privacy settings to manage personal and business content separately
DO use Facebook status updates to include powerful tidbits of information, similar to Tweets. DON’T update what you had for breakfast unless it’s somehow relevant to your audience.
DO add a picture.
DO create a Facebook page for your business, especially if you aren’t comfortable with a personal profile.
DO post events and create groups. This will help develop your following.

5. LinkedIn 101

Connections – Connect only to those who are relevant. You can actually be banned for trying to connect with people you don’t know. However, it’s fine to connect with those whom you do know but only in a professional capacity without a personal connection.
Timeliness – Send connections shortly after meeting with someone so he/she remembers you.
Complete profile – Provide as much detail as possible, what you’re looking for out of the site and include a picture to ‘humanize’ the profile.
Recommendations – Request from individuals that can leave positive feedback and comments about your company.

6. Online Video Sites – These are great B2B marketing tools.

These sites include mainly YouTube but also Vimeo and Viddler. This provides a great opportunity to build awareness, demonstrate thought leadership and drive business. It also offers the chance to improve SEO, creating a greater likelihood your company will appear in search engines. Sites to test for your marketing include:

YouTube
Vimeo
Viddler

7. Bookmarking Sites – These allow users to share websites and content they find interesting. Sites like Delicious, Digg and StumbleUpon house lists of websites, blog and articles categorized by tags and topics. Use these sites to:

Gain referrals
Build a community
Increase brand awareness

8. Leverage widgets – Widgets are stand-alone tools or applications that provide dynamic content.

It’s very important widgets are relevant and useful, as it’s easy to get lost amongst the masses. Widgets make great viral marketing for companies by offering unique, easy-to-use content that’s visually appealing.

9. Share – The age old lesson of giving to others.

But in this instance we aren’t referring to cookies in the lunch room, instead we’re referencing document or presentation sharing. Encouraging sharing from those researching your content by providing presentations and documents via sites like SlideShare and Scribd. This increases the propensity that visitors re-share this information on their own blogs.

10. Photos – Pictures are great tools to give your company personality and life.

Prospects researching company events, conferences and offices love visual elements, as well. Tell a story through photos deliver dynamic content.

These 10 tips make a great start to help you ease into B2B social media. By downloading The Definitive Guide to Social Media from Marketo, you can learn even more about implementation and analysis. Discover the ROI of social media and how to implement tactics throughout each stage of the revenue cycle.

This content was originally posted by Maria Pergolino on http://blog.marketo.com/

Facebook Marketing: Ultimate Guide


It is an overused practice to start from some "shocking" stats and dissertate on how Facebook is powerful and important for business. So, I will just consider you all know what is Facebook and how cool it is.

What you're about to read is a step-by-step SMM strategy for promoting your business on Facebook. I've gathered all the best practices and tips that I have used myself, together with some advice that I haven't tried but am confident will work well. Ok. That's enough for the intro, let's go!

Where To Start?

1. Brand Ambassador.

First of all, don't use your personal account to promote your business, unless you want your customers to see your childhood pictures and lulz from the recent party. You can create another (purely business oriented) instance of yourself or hire someone to become your brand ambassador. This will be the person who represents your business online and handles all communications, so the info on the profile should be brief and clear and all the pictures neat and professional. Remember that users will associate your business with this guy.

Power Tip: Create a separate e-mail account in Gmail and import all the e-mail addresses of your clients there. Now when you use this account to create a new Facebook profile - the system will automatically find all of your clients in your address book and suggest to add them as your friends on Facebook! What a great start!


2. Creating a Facebook page.

Promotion on Facebook is all about having a page for your business. To create one, go to http://www.facebook.com/pages/ and click the "+ Create a Page" button.

Power Tip: "Page Name" is one of the the strongest ranking factors on Facebook search. Don't miss the opportunity to add some keywords you wish to rank for as you are not allowed to change your page name later.


Configuring Your Facebook Page

1. Profile picture & avatar.

Profile picture is one of the few things in the design of your page that you can actually customize, so be sure to make the most of it. Here are two great articles that will help you: "5 Creative Ways to Hack Your Profile Photo"; "Making the Most of Your Facebook Profile Picture".

2. Page info.

The next important thing to do is fill your Facebook page with information about your business. Most of it is stored under the "Info" tab, which you cannot remove or hide. Lots of people visit it, so work hard to make your info as brief and engaging as you can. "Think SEO" and use your keywords, as each of the tabs is indexable by the search engines.

Power Tip: if you type a URL starting from http:// in the info box under your profile picture, Facebook will turn it into a clickable link. So you can easily refer your visitors to your website, blog or twitter account.

3. Applications.

* Static FBML (Facebook Markup Language) - allows you to create 10 additional tabs, which can contain HTML/CSS, Flash, FBML, iframes and FBJS;
* NetworkedBlogs - allows you to post your RSS and Atom feeds directly to your wall;
* Twitter Tab - posts your twitter updates to a separate tab;
* Extended Info - adds an additional box which supports html/fbml, images, video and music to the left sidebar of your page;
* Fan Appz & Promotions - helps you handle all kinds of contests, sweepstakes & give aways.

Tip: you'll probably end up with lots of tabs by adding various applications. However you can easily drag them around if you think that some of them are more important.

4. Vanity URL.

To be able to convert your ugly "326727833086?ref=sgm&ajaxpipe=1&__a=7" URL into something fancy-looking, like "http://facebook.com/mybusinesspage" you need to have at least 25 fans. Once you do - go to http://www.facebook.com/username/ and click the "Set a username for your Pages" link at the bottom.

5. Custom landing page.

You need an attractive landing page, which will convert your visitors into fans. Here is when the FBML application comes into play. Using HTML, CSS, FBJS and even flash you can create awesome landing pages that people will not only "like", but link to, and suggest to friends.

Tip: If you've got no development skills you can find some nice facebook FBML page templates that have just started to appear around the template stores.



What To Expect?

Before we start reviewing various Facebook promotion techniques, I'd like to clear things up a little bit. Essentially when someone "Likes" your Facebook page, they will be notified every time you update its status, it's almost the same as following someone on Twitter. To have your message spread on Twitter you need to have your followers retweet your post so that their followers could see it and retweet in turn. On Facebook, the principle is a bit more sophisticated: when someone likes or comments your status update, this fact is being reflected in his profile. And when your status update gets a decent amount of "likes" and comments it is promoted to the Top News section of a user's News Feed, so that more people could see it.

Now let's refer to a famous "90:9:1 Social Behaviors Rule" to understand what it takes for your message to become visible.

Let's consider that "Heavy Contributors" are those ready to comment on your update, "Intermittent" ones will probably "like" it, and "Lurkers" will read it or just scroll through. Say your page has 100 fans. Knowing the fact that only 12%-20% of all your "Fans" will see your status update in their Live Feed, we can see that:

I hope this delivers a clear understanding that Facebook promotion takes an enormous amount of effort to become successful.



Promoting Your Facebook Page Internally.

1. Using your Brand Ambassador.

* Add to friends any people that may be your potential customers or somehow relate to your business. Recently, Facebook has added Skype integration, which can suggest you some Facebook friends from the list of your Skype contacts. Once you have a decent amount of friends use the "Suggest to friends" and "Share" buttons to promote your Facebook page to them;
* Use Facebook Search to discover relevant pages, groups, events, people and even messages. With Search you can easily track any mentions of your brand and provide feedback - people really love that;
* Once you join pages, groups and events, you are able to participate in the conversation, which is a great way of direct promotion. Moreover you can see the list of the group members and easily add them to friends;
* Communicate. Once someone comments on your new status, a photo, or anything else - answer back. Moreover you need to make people love your brand and become active contributors and then brand ambassadors. 1/4 of search results on each big brand is UGC (User Generated Content).

Power Tip: When composing a message put the @ symbol and start typing the name of your business page to mention it, just like you mention someone on Twitter. This can be used as a signature to your updates.

2. Keep the page fresh and interesting.

People join your page hoping to receive some interesting stuff from you, so do not disappoint them. Facebookers usually prefer pictures, videos and links to plain text updates. Here is a comprehensive list of things that you should keep in mind to avoid losing your fans: don't post too many updates; don't automate your content; don't be a duplicate of your website and don't be boring. Your page wall is your social proof and a signal for people to get involved.

3. Cheat a bit.

Ask fellow staff & your team members to post "likes" and comments on each of your status updates to boost its rankings. Only status updates with 5 or more "likes" and comments show up in the Top News section. This will also make your wall look "alive", which will inspire your fans to be more active on your page and participate in the conversation.

4. Fill in your page with media content.

* Upload pictures of your products/services, your office and your team at work to make your company easier to relate to;
* Encourage your fans to post pictures of how they use your product;
* Upload pictures from each event you host and tag your fans there;
* Post videos of your team members talks;
* Show your products/services in action;
* Use video to respond to your fans (Bill Clinton frequently does video responses on his page).

5. Treat your fans.

You need to offer your fans something special and reward them. For instance 1-800-FLOWER Facebook page shows the discount code only when you click the "Like" button.

You can make some special offers, which are available to your Facebook fans only and are not announced outside of Facebook. It's dead easy to reward your loyal fans by promoting them to the admins of your page, which will most likely turn them into enthusiastic brand ambassadors. Anyway, if there is some prominent fan - he should be publicly rewarded.

6. Send an update to Fans.

Direct messaging is a very powerful tool, but do not misuse it. Think twice before sending a message to all of your fans - it should be really valuable if you don't want everyone to ignore it or get irritated.

Tip: Facebook allows you to send targeted updates. Think of a way you could use that feature for your business.

7. Ask your fans for help.

Now and then you can post a status update asking your fans to help build the community by suggesting your page to their friends. Just refer them to "Suggest to Friends" and "Share" links on your page and measure their response.

8. Build partnerships with other pages.

Notice that each page on Facebook has an "Add to my Page's Favorites" button. When you do this, the logo of this page appears in a special "Favorite Pages" box on your own page. People see it and they might click the link to find out more about this page.

Your aim here is to build partnerships within your niche and be "favourited" as much as possible. Add to favorites pages that you like or that your business is related to and inform their owners about it with a wall post or a private message. Most likely you will be "favorited" back.

9. Use the applications.

There are a lot of crazy apps that you can use to promote yourself. You can even develop one of your own if your budget allows that. But how do the viral applications work in common?

You need something that people would willingly launch. This might be a game or a quiz or any other kind of dynamic content that most people love. Once a person has his score, bagde, vitual gift or any other result - the application publishes it to his wall so that all his friends could see it. The application should have a clear call to action, so that new people could easily get engaged. If the application has some kind of a High Score - people will play it again and again till they outrank their friends. You can (should) use the apps for sweepstakes and giveaways - people love them a lot.

10. Spy!

Yes! Always keep an eye on your competitors, especially on those outranking you. Check what they do and if you consider it to be a successful strategy - do the same. When they fail - try to avoid their mistakes. Anyway, you should always be informed on what others are doing to promote themselves.

11. Ads?

Indeed the most common way to promote your page. But before you use it, check out these stats:


Promoting Your Facebook Page Externally.

1. Facebook for webites.

The Facebook team has come a long way toward making your website more personalized and social. There is a list of great social plugins that can be easily embedded into your website and drive lots of new visitors: "Like Button" plugin, which is almost everywhere now, "Like Box", which let's you become a fan of the website without leaving the page, "Live Stream" which is often used while broadcasting some event. Try them on your website and see what happens next.

2. "Like" and "Share" buttons.

These two are so powerful that they require a separate paragraph. Once you own an online store - those buttons are of exceptional value. Whenever you find something that appeals to you in an online store - you no longer need to copy the URL and send it to your friends to ask for their opinion. Just press the "Like" button. They will see that and comment on it. This applies to photos, videos, games, blog posts, reviews - literally anything that can be found on the web.

3. Put a link everywhere.

Once you have a website, you put its address everywhere - e-mail signatures, forum signatures, twitter info, author bio section, LinkedIn profile, links section of your blog. Do exactly the same with your Facebook page. Highlight your Facebook presence at offline events, print it on your business card, use every opportunity you have.

Power Tip: Take some twitter auto follow script that follows a person whenever he has specific keywords in his tweet. Some percent of the people you've followed will follow you back. Write an engaging request to join your Facebook page and set it as an automatic direct message to people, who have just followed you. Being launched, this system will drive some new fans to your Facebook page on a regular basis.

4. Using video.

Almost every video sharing service allows you to annotate your videos with links. This is a great way to drive some new fans onto your Facebook page. You can make viral videos, funny videos, tutorials, explanations, presentations etc. and include a link to your Facebook page with a request to join. Works perfectly!

5. Other services.

There are a lot of websites where you can get some targeted audience. For instance, upon writing this guide I've gone though dozens of presentations at SlideShare and Scribd. There I've seen many referrals to join Facebook pages specialized on marketing, and I did join some of them truthfully as I enjoyed their presentations. Examine carefully all the websites where you post information or showcase your services and think of the way you could refer people to your Facebook page.

Power Tip: In case you have some kind of a digital product - create a torrent with some demos, name it with trending keywords and upload to all torrent trackers you can find. In the info or in the comments section add a link to your Facebook page. Then go to your analytics and watch your numbers grow.

Wheew... That's the end of my guide. Sure there's a lot more to add, but I tried to keep my tactics brief, to leave some space for your imagination. I'm sure each of you can invent lots of fantastic ways to use Facebook for SMM. I am open for any questions, shoot!

The blog was originally posted on SEOmoz: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/facebook-marketing-ultimate-guide

Attend our CAMA meeting this Wednesday and be entered in to a raffle for a free OMS ticket $369 value http://tinyurl.com/l6gef3

CAMA Members: Get 20% off the Online Marketing Summit this Friday the 16th in Charlotte http://tinyurl.com/l6gef3

Twitter Power Author Joel Comm chats with CAMA's Ingrid Travis James. Go to www.charlotteama.libsyn.com or look us up on iTunes.

Social CRM: The Latest Evolution for Managing Customer Relationships

The days are long gone when sales representatives could rely on their ability to “read” prospects to make the sale, thanks to buyers researching their purchases online.

The need to better understand online behaviors to convert leads jump-started the evolution of customer relationship management (CRM). With CRM, organizations benefit from increased operational effectiveness, easier access to data and improved collaboration.

Now, as the CRM evolution continues, the notion of social CRM has empowered organizations – especially sales adn support departments within these organizations –to connect with customers and prospects on an even greater level.

Integrating social media with traditional CRM has enabled organizations to:

1. Focus more on conversations than strictly on automated processes.
2. Progress beyond tracking and reporting on prospect information, and instead become integral parts of communities.
3. Attract prospects online who are searching for answers to business challenges by providing relevant content and information.
4. Activate the intersection of marketing, customer services and sales to attract hotter sales leads.

“Social CRM isn’t just about bolting on a new plug-in to your system like a new air foil on your minivan, but instead a new way of doing business,” Jeremiah Owyang wrote in a recent blog post on his Web Strategy blog. “The promise of social CRM says that companies are truly listening to their customers wherever they are, responding, anticipating and making the commitment to improve products and services.”
One very vital element of social CRM is social selling, which leverages Web 2.0 technologies to provide sophisticated sales insight. That insight enables sales to act as experts in the product selection process instead of negotiators.

True social selling tools enable sales to better understand, prioritize and interact with the hottest leads and opportunities to quickly close more business by:

• Receiving updates about lead activity via email or mobile device
• Using Outlook to reach prospects and sending data to their CRM
• Providing the option to pass back leads to marketing for further nurturing
• Using RSS to send different types of prospect information into one system
• Accessing sites like Demandbase, LinkedIn and Jigsaw from the tools already in use
• Sorting leads in their CRM by priority, allowing sales to contact leads when they need the most attention
• Monitoring key moments and behaviors that matter to sales, and notifying them of such behavior

When engaging with customers socially, they have a high propensity to share that experience with their networks. And the efficacy of this is strong – according to Marketing Sherpa, 87% of consumers trust a friend’s recommendation over a critic’s.
With a predicted 34% compound annual growth rate of social media spending through 2014 according to data from Forrester, our prediction for 2010 is the growth of social CRM will be strong.

This article was reposted from Marketo. Link: http://blog.marketo.com/blog/2010/06/social-crm-the-latest-evolution-for-managing-customer-relationships.html

Interactions, Engagement & Ecosystems

A "media" model composed of paid, owned and earned efforts is nothing new—however it’s useful to think about this landscape in tandem with the different ways we interact and engage which are enabled through technology. There are essentially three forms of digital engagement which can often overlap (engagement in a single initiative can include all three types) but each form can tend to dominate the experience. It’s important to remember that the type of engagement is contextual to what a participant wants to accomplish.

Types of engagement:

Interactive
This type of engagement is, as its name suggests highly interactive by nature, though what’s worth noting is that there is no social component to it. The primary interaction exists between a person and technology or human to computer. Examples of interactive engagement could be an ATM, or an e-commerce experience or microsites. It can also be a game, video, or any other experience where users engage a system or interact with content. The key distinction is that interactive excludes social interactions between participants.

Social
Social engagement requires the interactions between live human beings (not machines) and/or groups with each other. Most common forms of social engagement can occur on off domain networks such as Facebook and Twitter but can also occur on domain such as corporate blogs or by using the integration of off domain services. The key differentiator for social engagement is that it goes beyond human to computer interaction as described in interactive engagement and usually involves social behavior such as “friending” or human to human direct engagement.

Mobile
Mobile engagement happens exclusively on mobile device as opposed non-mobile device such as a desktop computer. It also takes into context the user behavior of individual(s) who are in mobile situations such as traveling or moving from point A to B. Context in mobile behavior is critical as user activity is influenced by the actual state of being mobile. It’s also worth noting that “mobile” itself may gradually be re-defined over time with devices such at the iPad which blend stationary and mobile behaviors as well as geolocation platforms such as Foursquare which makes mobile activity hyper-local.


Where engagement happens:

Engagement can happen either on domain or off domain and initiatives which include any form of media or content can fall into the following categories:

Paid
Paid efforts always require some type of monetary exchange in order to have initiatives placed on properties whether they be traditional outlets such as display advertising or non traditional outlets such as blogs or advertising within off domain such as Facebook. Paid placement in search initiatives also falls into the category of paid as long as results are tied to non organic or paid searches.

Owned
Owned media typically does not require monetary compensation and can occur on both on and off domain properties that the organization has control over (Facebook pages are off domain, where Websites are on domain but both are owned). Owned properties offer organizations the most control as they can decide what media to promote although off domain properties must be monitored closely as they often support social engagement which cannot be controlled but moderated.

Earned
Earned media nearly always takes place on off domain properties such as forums, blogs, social networks and also mainstream publications. Media is typically earned through word of mouth or unpaid but highly visible results in both search engines and social media referrals. Earned media can also be amplified through outreach initiatives. The core distinction for media which is earned is the absence of overt payment to the property owner for the results.

What This All Means
As stated in the beginning of this piece—much of this should not be new, however it does present new opportunities and challenges for organizations looking to stay in lock step with their customers, consumers and employees. The media ecosystem must be purposefully orchestrated and appear seamless to the individual and groups you are hoping to reach. From a technological perspective, this means potentially adding systems equipped with workflows such as Social Talk or Awareness which allow you to better manage your entire social ecosystem. From a people process, this could mean training and staffing differently. But from the perspective of the people who you want to activate—it simply means that you are relevant to their digital lifestyle. This translates to the the following: we must better understand how people want to engage (IE their motivations and behaviors). For example, the context behind when they want to act "socially" or be left alone and when they are “on the move” vs. stationary. Also, each form of media is its own micro ecosystem within a broader macro media ecosystem—Facebook’s latest addition of community pages could potentially create micro-ecosystems within the broader Facebook environment.

Having intimate knowledge of how these ecosystems thrive (or not) will help us figure out how they can work best together. In other words, get ready to go both wide and deep as you plan digital initiatives. The future of communications will require organizations to be effective both in engaging participants via micro formats while taking a step back and managing media and interactions across the macro (all social, interactive and mobile touch points)—and that’s just on the digital front. The bigger picture? Integration between the digital and real world because this is where it all comes together.

This article was originally posted by Logic + Emotion: http://darmano.typepad.com/logic_emotion/2010/04/engagement.html

5 Ways B2B Blogs Can Fast-Track Marketing Efforts

These days, virtually all marketers – B2B and B2C – at least recognize the potential impact of blogging when integrated into the marketing mix.

But for many B2B marketers, the decision to put a B2B blog strategy in motion may not come as easily. In 2008, Forrester Research found that more than half of B2B marketers either did not have a blog or were still figuring out their blogging strategy.

Successfully integrating a B2B blog into the marketing mix can provide organizations a wide range of benefits, from increased leads to improved brand awareness. Below we’ve identified the top 5 reasons why blogging fast-tracks your B2B marketing efforts.

1. B2B blogs provide an avenue for thought leadership content.
As part of the lead nurturing process, B2B organizations have to prove to prospects that they truly understand their unique business challenges. Offering thought leadership blog content – rather than simply pushing product information – is an effective way to do so.

By offering insight on trends and interviews with industry thought leaders, blog content can help B2B marketers prove to customers they’re an integral and involved industry player.

2. B2B blog posts can provide additional in-links to products and services pages on websites.
One of the most critical elements on B2B websites are products and services pages. The importance of building links to these vital pages is two-fold. First, the more links to products pages, the more traffic that’s directly driven there. Secondly, a major component of search engine rankings involves the number of in-links from reputable and relevant sources.

When blog content is relevant to a product or service page, keyword-optimized hyperlinks can be used within posts to provide readers with additional information.

3. Consistently updated blog content can keep customers returning to the website.
For many B2B organizations, typical website content is relatively static. New products may be added from time to time, and copy might be refreshed every so often. But by and large, new content isn’t added on a regular basis.

With B2B blogs, marketers can add new content weekly or even several times a week. By consistently posting interesting, informative information, organizations will encourage prospects to regularly visit the blog in search of fresh content. Plus, frequently updated, optimized content can help improve a website’s visibility in the search engines.

4. B2B blog content can be repurposed in other channels.
By integrating blogs with other marketing efforts (i.e., social media, lead nurturing), B2B marketers repurpose content to extend their reach and do more with less.

For example, images in blog posts can be optimized to be found in the search queries, as well as posted to sites like Flickr. Interesting pieces of information from blog posts can be used to create social media messages for sites like Twitter. If an industry thought leader is interviewed for a blog post, that exclusive interview can be leveraged in an email campaign or press release.

On the converse, marketing assets like whitepapers or webinars can be leveraged as blog posts. B2B marketers aren’t always tasked with creating completely original content for blog posts.

5. B2B blogs enable organizations to engage with customers.
Social media marketing is quickly becoming one of the most impactful elements in the B2B marketing mix. By allowing prospects to comment on blog posts, B2B marketers can gain valuable information about their interests and intent to buy. Moreover, by responding to prospects’ comments, B2B marketers can interact with and nurture those leads.

If you haven’t already implemented a B2B blogging strategy, now is the perfect time. From the ability to interact with prospects to increased search engine visibility, the potential benefits of integrating a blog into the marketing mix are endless.

This content was originally posted by Maria Pergolino on http://blog.marketo.com/

Do you have a media channel strategy? (You should.)

Twenty years ago, only big companies and TV stars worried about media channels.

Oprah was on TV, then she added radio. Two channels. Then a magazine.

Pepsi set out to dominate TV with their message, and billboards and vending machines. Newspapers, not so much. The media you chose to spread your message mattered. In fact, it could change what you made and how you made it. [Stop for a second and consider that... the media channel often drove the product and pricing and distribution].

Today, of course, everyone has access to a media channel. You can create a series of YouTube videos, or have a blog. You can be a big-time tweeter, or lead a significant tribe on Facebook.

Harder to grapple with is the idea that the media channel you choose changes who you are and what you do. Tom Peters gives a hundred or more speeches a year, around the world, for good money (and well earned). But this channel, this place where he can spread his message, determines what he does all day, impacts the pace of the work he does, informs all of his decisions.

Oprah lives a life that revolves around a daily TV show. Of course it would be difficult for her to write a book... that's a life dictated by a different channel. And she's a lapsed twitter user because it demands a different staffing and mindset than she has now.

This applies to non-celebs, to people with jobs, to entrepreneurs, to job seekers. We all spread our ideas, at least a little, and the medium you choose will change your ideas. If you only pay attention to the world when you need a new job (your channel is stamps and your message is your resume) you'll spend your day differently than if you are leading a tribe, participating in organizations or giving local speeches all the time.

We've come a long way from a worker having just two channels (a resume and a few references) to having the choice of a dozen or more significant ways to spread her ideas. Choose or lose.

This content was reposted from http://sethgodin.typepad.com/

Giving away a magician's secrets

Steve Cohen makes more than a million dollars a year doing magic tricks.

I will now tell you the secrets of this magic:

1. He sells to a very specific group of people, people who are both willing to hear what he has to say and able to pay what he wants to charge them.
2. He tells a story to this group, a story that matches their worldview. He doesn't try to teach non-customers a lesson or persuade them that they are wrong or don't know enough about his art. Instead, he makes it easy for his happy customers to bring his art to others.
3. He intentionally creates an experience that is remarkable and likely to spread. "What did you do last night?" is a great question when it's asked of someone you entertained the night before, particularly if you can give the audience an answer they can give. That's how the word spreads.
4. He's extremely generous in who he works with, how promiscuous he is about sharing and in his attitude.
5. He's very good at his craft. Don't overlook this one.

I guess it comes down to this: if you're having trouble persuading people to buy what you sell, perhaps you should sell something else. Failing that, perhaps you could talk about what you sell in a different way.

Important clarification: I'm not telling you to sell out or to pander or to dumb down your art. Great marketers lead people, stretching the boundaries and bringing new messages to people who want to hear them. The core of my argument is that someone's worldview, how they feel about risk or other factors, is beyond your ability to change in the short run. Sell people something they're interesting in buying. If you can't leverage the worldview they already have, you are essentially invisible. Which is a whole other sort of magic, one that's not so profitable.

This content was reposted from http://sethgodin.typepad.com/

Do You REALLY Understand Consumers?

If you can confidently answer this question in the affirmative, then you probably already know what your customers want and need.

Or do you?

Have you gathered and analyzed quantitative and qualitative data that indicates not only what consumers tell you they want and need, but also how consumers actually behave?

Consumer insight simply means having a good grasp on what consumers want, need, think, and say about the products and services they are willing to spend their money on. Of course, the trick is to figure out the most authentic way to access this information, and then the best way to use it.

Some companies have mastered the art of achieving great consumer insight, and then incorporating their findings into wildly successful marketing and advertising campaigns. For example, Nabisco discovered that their customers loved to dunk Oreo cookies in milk, and this became the cornerstone of many of their most memorable television commercials. And Unilever identified a unique way to connect with their target market by celebrating the beauty of women of all sizes and ages with the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty, and the twenty city Dove Self-Esteem workshop tour.

Many organizations dedicate considerable resources to this business of understanding consumers. So how do you find out what consumers really think and say about your business? Join us on April 14th to learn more about this topic. Click here for more information.

Keri Glover

Social Media Pays: People More Likely to Buy from Brands they Follow

A new study from market research firm Chadwick Martin Bailey and iModerate Research Technologies shows that social media might actually pay off—in real dollars in addition to the traditional branding and influence lift. The survey of over 1500 consumers showed that they were more likely to buy from and recommend brands they follow on Twitter and Facebook.

51% of those surveyed said they were more likely to buy from a brand after following them on Facebook; 67% said they were more likely to buy after following on Twitter. Brands also got a boost in recommendations: 60% of Facebook fans and 79% of Twitter followers were more likely to recommend a brand to their friends.

This is only natural, says eConsultancy:

The most popular reason people follow brands in social media is to receive discounts. But there were also many people who responded that they follow as a customer of the brand and to show their support of it. On Twitter, that reason was less popular. Only 2% of respondents followed a brand to show their support. More often, they are looking for discounts, new information and exclusive content.

That makes a lot of sense, as Facebook’s fan ability is more geared toward letting users express their appreciation for something.

And here’s our grain of salt: this is a survey. This only shows what people think they’re doing. It may be that people don’t want to admit they’re only following Nike to look cool. However, with questions like these, I’d assume there’s at least a little boost for the brands in terms of dollars and recommendations.

What do you think? Are these people accurately reporting their spending and recommendations?

This blog was reposted from http://www.marketingpilgrim.com, and originally posted by Jordan McCollum

CAMA Board Members Attend Regional Retreat

Two Charlotte AMA board members attended the recent two-day AMA Regional Summit, held in Richmond, VA, in early March. Sarah Burkhart, incoming Secretary for 2010-2011 and Randy Mintken, incoming President for 2010-2011, met with 30 other AMA Professional Chapters from around the mid-Atlantic region to share best practices and discuss successful strategies for member outreach and retention.

Photo caption: AMA Professional Chapter Board members attend the AMA Regional Summit in Richmond, VA.

Pennies and dollars

"Watch the pennies and the dollars will take care of themselves."

I'm not sure this is true. In fact, I'm pretty sure that if you watch the dollars, you don't have to worry so much about pennies.

Big brands don't sweat the small expenses. They don't hassle about a return, or a little coupon fraud or the last penny per square foot on the rent in a prime location. In fact, they understand that there's a powerful honest signal sent when you don't worry about the tiny expenses. It shows confidence.

My first business was running a ski club from my high school to a nearby ski area. Most of the other clubs rented expensive coach buses. I rented school buses. That one shift saved thousands of dollars. As a result, I had plenty of money to spend on snacks for the bus, no hassles about refunds if you broke your leg... it was easy to be generous because I'd saved so much on the bus.

So many small businesspeople are crippled by their relationship with money. I know... I used to window shop at restaurants and then go home and eat Spaghetti-Os. The thing is, if you run out of money you lose the game. That's a given. But what's the best strategy for not running out of money?

I don't think the answer is to worry insanely about little expenses (saving $20 on your blogging expenses in exchange for distracting ads, for example.) In fact, too much worrying about cash is the work of the lizard brain, it's a symptom of someone self-sabotaging the work.

The thing to do is invest in scary innovations, large leaps, significant savings. Instead of renting a skimpy booth at the big trade show and scrimping on all the extras, why not rent a limo and drive the key buyers around town, or sponsor the awards luncheon? When you skimp all the time, you signal that you're struggling.

This content was reposted from Seth Godin's blog, http://sethgodin.typepad.com/

Marketing Through the Recession to Recovery: The Charlotte AMA Focuses on Strategies for Business Growth March 10th

In 2008, John Doerr, one of America's most famous venture capitalists, called the current recession "the greatest economic opportunity of our lifetime." In today's economic environment, it's even more critical to demonstrate marketing's impact on organizational growth and the bottom line. To do so, marketers must learn how to reframe their conversations and build a business case that resonates with top executives.

Join the Charlotte AMA at our March meeting as a panel of CEOs discuss how the worst of times for the economy as a whole can often be the best of times for individual firms to create value by offering products or services that allow customers to cut costs and retain their profitability.

Learn how you and your company can benefit from the opportunities your competitors are leaving on the table as they pull back in the current economy.

To learn more and to register, please visit: http://tiny.cc/eZ5qn

Introducing Seed Nurturing

One thing you'll notice about most lead nurturing campaigns is the fact that they usually take place after prospects land on your site and enter your database. However, what happens when qualified prospects visit your site or social media sites anonymously where you don't necessarily have their names or e-mails?

This is where seed nurturing comes into play. Seed nurturing is the process of building relationships with qualified prospects before you have their contact information.

It comes down to this: prospects are educating themselves long before you actually identify them by landing on your corporate web site as anonymous visitors, and researching your products and services through third-party resources, word-of-mouth recommendations, and social media sites. Just because you can't identify these individuals doesn't mean they aren't qualified prospects — and because of this, you must nurture them just as you would the known contacts in your database.

If you succeed at this, you will stay top of mind with your prospects as they educate themselves and move through the early stages of their buying process. As a result, they will come to you when they are ready to engage with a sales rep, and you will create a steady flow of highly qualified inbound leads. If you ignore the requirement to build relationships with these very early stage prospects, you're yielding this opportunity to more agile competitors who will scoop these savvy prospects out from under you.

Seed nurturing best practices

Personalize interactions with anonymous visitors

When prospects visit your website anonymously, you can and should still take advantage of the visit to deepen the relationship with them with relevant and personalized content. You may not know their name and email address, but you certainly can know a great deal about their interests and behaviors. First time visitors can see different offers than repeat visitors. Visitors that use specific search terms can see different promotions that generic visitors. Visitors who visit specific pages and show specific interests can see even more specialized content and offers. Using these techniques, you can design “drip marketing” campaigns that help buyers educate themselves before they ever share their contact information with you. For more on this, see the on-demand webinar Supercharge your Demand Generation with Personalization (an oldie but a goodie).

Make valuable content freely available on your site and over social media.

By eliminating the need for registration in order to obtain your whitepapers, eBooks, and other valuable content, you are making the effort to build relationships with people before you have them in your database. You may be thinking to yourself, “If I do this, I'll be wasting valuable offers on people I'll never be able to identify.” On the contrary, you will strengthen your readership, and these dedicated yet anonymous leads will likely come to you as inbound leads once their levels of interest are high enough. Moreover, whether you like it or not, in most cases the information is already out there on social sites, so you may as well embrace the trend rather than fight it. David Merman Scott writes more on this topic in Say NO to squeezing your buyers.

Use social media to build a rock-solid reputation that builds credibility and trust with prospects.

One of the biggest obstacles in the B2B purchasing process is the feeling of risk that overcomes B2B buyers, causing them to behave irrationally during the decision-making process. Seed nurturing plays a key role in diminishing this risk by acting as a vehicle for you to build your reputation as a thought leader and gain the trust of early stage prospects. For example, you can use Twitter to inform people of your views on developments in your industry or show your ability to solve specific business pains by becoming an “Expert” on LinkedIn. B2B buyers trust thought leaders who can demonstrate they understand buyer problems and how to solve them. While a reputation of thought leadership will never be as “risk-reducing” as a personal referral, it is a great way to build awareness and increase your chances that the prospect will respond to future demand generation efforts.

Conclusion

While these ideas represent a departure from what you may consider traditional lead generation techniques, they will help you plant the seeds for highly qualified prospects to reach out to you when they are ready, and once this happens, you can rest easy knowing that you've nurtured them appropriately and gained their trust as you would through a traditional drip marketing campaign.

How have you incorporating seed nurturing into your marketing mix?

This blog was reposted from Modern B2B Sales on http://blog.marketo.com/blog/, and originally posted by Patrick Donnelly

Make the Connection: Attend the Charlotte AMA's orientation and connection event February 3rd

Whether you've recently joined the Charlotte AMA, or have been a member for awhile and want to get the most out of your membership, please plan to join us at our February 3rd orientation and connection event. It’ll take place from 6 – 7:30 p. m., at the offices of Luquire George Andrews (4201 Congress Street, Charlotte, NC 28209).
Following the orientation, get to know other Charlotte AMA members by joining us downstairs at the Village Tavern Restaurant for some social networking time.
Take a moment now to RSVP: http://tinyurl.com/yak9ppn
Questions? Please contact Christine Eubanks and eubanks@lgaadv.com

Show Me the Money: Learn to Turn Tweets into Dollars at Social Media Marketing Event February 10

Proctor and Gamble’s Facebook experiment with its Tide product in 2008 proved that advertisers can compel internet users to “friend” them on social media sites. But how does a company turn a friend into a paying customer? Join the Charlotte AMA at their February event as attendes explore strategies companies can use to generate revenue via a presence on social media sites such as LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter.

Attendees will leave this event with a clear set of strategies of succeeding in a marketplace where users are much more interested in friends and socializing than they are in advertising. At this program, marketers will:

1. Hear case studies of companies who have earned revenue from a social media presence.
2. Learn how to convert friends into paying customers.
3. Learn strategies for safely associating your company’s brand with user-generated content.

The expert panelists at the event will include:

• Chris Harrington
  Technology Director
  Luquire George Andrews
• Look for additional panelists to be added soon.

The event will take place from 5:30 p.m. – 8 p.m. at the Dilworth Neighborhood Grille. Those attending in person will enjoy pre-meeting networking opportunities and food beginning at 5:30 p.m. Admissions costs are $20 for current CAMA members and students; and $35 for non-members and all walk-ins. Individuals may register online for the event now through February 8th by visiting http://www.charlotteama.com/register.html