The bad back and the Referral Engine

May 6, 2012
referral engine

Is your engine working?

“I’m crippled with my back at the moment, would you know of a good chiropractor?” my client asks.

We automatically find ourselves wanting to solve their problem, be helpful and resourceful …. Who do we know? Thinking cap on … Yep, a name of one came up in conversation recently or maybe we spotted a blog post or a tweet, maybe we spotted an advert or a piece of editorial.

In any case we want to be helpful and even if we haven’t had a personal experience with a bad back and scientifically been in a position to carefully assess the attributes and success rate of all the chiropractors in the local area we offer up a suggestion ” Norman Wesson is supposed to be really good“.

..job done and hopefully Norman was able to solve the client’s back trouble.

Every day we are asked for recommendations and mostly we offer them without truthfully knowing scientifically that who we are recommending is the best option available.

80% is the statistic that is always quoted as the source of business that we get from referrals and word of mouth – we find ourselves that a lot of business comes this way but often it comes via surprising sources, frequently from people that we have never actually done business with.

John Jantsch in his clever book The Referral Engine makes the point that if we accept the 80% principle about the power of referrals then we need to make sure that we make it easy for people to recommend us, that our “engine” is in good working order.

So how about looking after your engine….

– Do Great Work!
– Send Regular Newsletters
– Attend Networking Events
– Advertise
– Optimise your Website
– Get Editorial about what you do
– Host an Event
– Write Blog Posts about your area of expertise
– Boost your Visibility on Social Media platforms
– Ask for happy clients to Recommend you (LinkedIn is a great place for this)

Whatever you do, make sure that the next time someone is looking for someone in your area of expertise that your name springs to mind!

That Fuzion crowd are supposed to be a brilliant PR firm by the way …!

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion

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Posted in Advertising, Customer Care, Marketing, Web Marketing | 7 Comments »

The Social Media Salesman

April 29, 2012
Birth of a Social Media Salesman

Birth of a Social Media Salesman

“This social media is a total waste of time, we’ve been at it now for over a month and it’s brought us no business” …. It’s not the first time I’ve heard that!

The prospective client that was in with us had a wine wholesaling business and had decided to take it online and had set up an e-commerce website and had also joined the world of social media with Facebook and Twitter pages and even a wine blog.

He was really frustrated as the orders weren’t rolling in and he was about to totally abandon his online efforts.

OK, I started having a peep over their activities and how they had approached their whole online efforts.

They had completed one blog post, they had just made a handful of social media posts in the month and they hadn’t interacted with anyone else on line. They had very few followers on twitter and even less fans on their Facebook page.

The guy who was responsible for the posting was too busy with his day job and was squeezing in his social media activity whenever he had some spare time if he remembered.

“Fair enough ….. now tell me how your main business works?” I asked.

The company had three sales reps who reported into a sales manager. Each of the reps headed out each day in their company cars with their order book and called into their list of customers and also popped into some prospective customers. It took a good few years, a lot of hard work and determination to build up the business to the level it was now.

On each call the reps chat about their range of wines, the special offers, the new products and exciting things happening in the industry. They obviously chat about other things with their customers – everything from how their business is going to general chit chat. It’s really important to build a relationship with the customer and to understand them if you want to do business with them. “That’s what the good salesman will do” my prospect explained to me.

Why do we expect the same results from our efforts on social media without the same effort?

With all of our clients when we provide social media consultancy we look for a “Social Media Champion” from within the organisation who knows the business really well, who is willing to learn about each of the platforms, who understands how to communicate comfortably on them and who is prepared to put in the necessary time and effort to connect with users and to achieve results.

Mostly this is not a full time job but the “champion” must be given the time as part of their role to do this properly – think of this person as a Social Media Salesman.

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion

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Posted in Business Planning, Marketing, Social Media | 13 Comments »

Are examples of Good Customer Service harder to remember than Bad Ones?

April 21, 2012
Bad customer service

Can you think of a good example?

“What’s your example of good customer service?” ….. Silence

“I can’t think of any” our PR course participant replied …

“Ok, I’ll come back to you later, you’ll surely think of one example”

As part of our PR courses for small business we always emphasise that PR is about “managing your reputation“.

Your PR firm can play a valuable part in that process but any efforts here are totally worthless if a business can’t create the right reputation building blocks by providing good customer service. We make this point on our courses and conduct a small exercise by asking the participants if they can give us examples of good customer service.

This exercise always surprises me as we often see some repetition with names of businesses that are mentioned – for example at two recent courses Apple were mentioned for their “no quibble” approach to problems. Nash19  always get a mention in courses that we run in Cork. The examples given are always intriguing and often they relate to how a problem or an issue was dealt with.

At a recent class we conducted this “good customer service” exercise and the first person to respond launched into a bad experience she had with a mobile broadband provider. I stopped her in her tracks and emphasised that it was examples of “good” customer service that we were actually looking for. She nodded politely as if she had grasped my point …. She then continued to tell the group in detail, blow by blow how lousy the service was! The whole group broke into laughter as we witnessed first hand how enthusiastic we are about sharing “bad” experiences.

In our most recent course I continued asking the other participants for their examples of good service and I was surprised to come to another person who again could not give me an example of good customer service … Not one!

“You’ll think of one in a minute, I’ll come back to you” I said , giving them an extra few moments to think of an example.

Once again I continued asking the others for their examples.

My own example that I shared with the group happened quite recently in West Cork.

At the Celtic Ross Hotel recently I was running a Social Media course early in the morning. As I arrived a hotel staff member looked after me, took me to the well equipped and very comfortable conference room and then asked me if I wanted a coffee ….godsend!

On this gorgeous morning I found myself with a few minutes to spare so I vey briefly walked outside to take in the fabulous view. When I came back , Michal from the hotel brought me a cup of coffee but there was one already on my presentation table. Confused I pointed out that he had already brought me a cup ..”Oh yeah, I spotted that you had gone outside and I guessed your coffee would have been cold!”

Wow ….that’s great service – I shared my story with the group.

To finish the customer service session I went back to the two ladies who earlier could not think of an example.

“Sorry, I can’t think of anything” said the first. I turned to the other – “I’m really sorry” she said apologetically “I can’t think of an example either”

This just amazed me ..

Is customer service so bad that some of us never have a good experience or is it that we just remember the bad?

PR starts with good customer service.

Can you think of an example?

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion

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Posted in Customer Care, Hospitality, Marketing, PR | 7 Comments »

Why do we Subtract when we could be Adding?

April 13, 2012
add or subtract

Do I subtract or can I add?

On a gorgeous sunny day recently I sent out a tweet – “Make hay when the sun shines – it’s a great time to close those deals #Positivity”

Well, that’s what I meant to say …. With the predictive typing on my iPhone the intended message went out as “May hay when the sun shines ….” Oopps!

I didn’t realise my error until I received a message on LinkedIn by a connection letting me know in no uncertain terms “the expression is make hay….“.

I was really annoyed to see the comment – ok it was a mistake, but surely anyone who read it would have seen the positive intent behind the post instead of being pedantic and motivated to just point out my error.

As annoyed as I was feeling I reflected on this criticism and realised that at times I do exactly the same myself. Recently I was at an event where we spotted a few grave “errors“.

We read through the event brochure and spotted a poem as part of the literature – initially I thought this was a novel idea and when I read it I spotted a “typo“. Surely a crime worth at least 1,000 lashes!

They had used the word “there” when they should have used the word “their” …. Tut tut! Of course I enjoyed my discovery and shared the error with the person sitting next to me.

At the same event we spotted the careless use of logos on the large screens – low resolution, poor placement and white border that could easily have been removed ….. Tut tut! Once again it was worthy of a little conversation and maybe another 1,000 lashes?

Did these errors reduce our enjoyment of the evening .. Of course not!

Why do we take pleasure at spotting mistakes? In this scenario we were in effect criticising a voluntary committee who clearly had gone to a lot of work for the night and instead of acknowledging the positives we were busy taking a little pleasure in how sharp we were in spotting someone’s errors.

Just like my critic that felt obliged to comment on my error instead of complimenting me on the sentiment …

Why do we subtract when we could be adding ?

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion

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Posted in Customer Care, Marketing, Personal development, Positivity | 12 Comments »

This is my “Colleague”

April 6, 2012

Fuzion gang

At what point did we end up being work “colleagues“?

I must admit that it never sits well with me when I hear the word “colleague” being used during introductions of co-workers at meetings or functions.

Is it just me or am I the only one who thinks it is the worst, dispassionate, unfeeling way to introduce someone you work with?

When I the hear the words being used I automatically think that we just “work together” and that’s about as far as any bond goes – maybe I am over analysing it but I feel it lacks emotion, depth and personally it leaves me cold.

In some organisations maybe that is the reality (I’ve worked in places like that!) but at best the “introduction” words used should convey something positive that reflects the spirit of the organisation.

So … What is the right language to describe someone you work with?

Fuzion team

The one that works best for me when I really think about it is the description “team-mate” – after all, we are on the same team, fighting for the same cause, we don’t have to particularly like each other (it obviously helps that you do like and respect who you work with) but we do wear the same jersey and the word does have a strong positive association to it.

It still feels strange to use the description as it seems to be reserved for a sporting context but even on websites and on credentials documents we often see the words “our team” being used and you see people say things like “our dedicated team will look after you” ..

… we don’t normally see a section describing the personnel as “colleagues“, but I guess you will often see in emails “one of my colleagues will contact you” … awful, maybe I am wrong?

If you use the right words it can be a powerful way in describing what kind of organisation you are.

Is it just me? .. how do you describe the people you work with?

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion

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Posted in Personal development, Recruitment, Teamwork, Uncategorized | 16 Comments »

Keeping your feet on the ground

April 3, 2012
Greg Canty & Kevin O'Shea, Fuzion at the DMA's 2012

Boys looking sharp at the DMA's

It was a big night for me and the Fuzion crew.

We just received our new business cards with our new brand revealed as we headed out the door to the Nokia Digital Marketing Awards in Dublin at the National Convention Centre where I was a judge and we were sponsors.

We put on the glad rags for this very glamourous and prestigious affair and I made an extra effort taking out the white dickie bow …. very dapper (very Downton Abbey as someone said to me)!

Over we marched to the event and arrived early so we could liaise with the event crew about the workings of the Fuzion twitter quiz, which was to run between courses during the night. We were greeted by the event signage where our new branding was on display alongside household names such as Nokia. Dee kindly jumped in and photographed me and our fab creative director Kevin O’Shea in front of the branding …. all done quickly before people arrived!

The night was a huge success and a very proud one for us and for me personally. Our brand was on display constantly as the quiz ran during the evening and then came the moment when I had to go on stage and present Blue Cube with an award for the Best Social Media campaign – this was the “real deal“, opening the envelope, cameras everywhere and posing for photos ..

When I was walking from the stage Barry Murphy, the MC from Aprez Match fame made a comment that I should win a smart dressed award … this night was getting better and better!

We had a cool crew at our table including the “boys about town” from B Scene, Brendan Scully and Sean Montague who whisked us off to Lillies Bordello – do you think we had to queue? No chance …. our boys were so well known that our crew were whisked quickly in past the queue and marched straight upstairs to the VIP room.

We sat around, ordered our Mojitos  and chit chatted as the fab hostess looked after her bunch of VIPs!

Unable to contain myself I was busy tweeting about my fabulous night of accomplishments and all of a sudden I misjudged my balance, the stool wobbled and I quickly tipped backwards and ended up with my two legs up in the air with the full VIP section of Lillies looking at me ….. “pathetic drunk” …. no one said that but I’m guessing that’s what some of them were thinking!

Red faced I finished my drink, put my twitter machine away and asked if anyone fancied a whopper in Burger King.

Guess I needed to get my feet back on the ground!

Thanks for reading ….. (it was a great night)

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion

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Posted in Marketing, Personal development, Positivity, PR, Social Media, Teamwork | 3 Comments »

The three very “different” Wise Men

March 27, 2012
Three Wise Men

I don't know which gift is best!

In we went all three of us, armed with our presentation slides, our printed copies to leave behind and mock-ups  of  possible adverts and a clear idea of who was going to cover each of the different sections. At this stage we had been through a detailed briefing meeting and spent days working to bring it to this point.

This was quite a complex pitch as there were a few different businesses all under the one operation and our proposal had to incorporate all of them. We felt really confident as we had a lot of unique experience in the different aspects of  their business, which we felt would be a huge asset in working with them.

Our presentation was very detailed, demonstrating an understanding of their proposition, an understanding of the communication challenges and objectives, and outlining clearly our approach including some clever initiatives that would drive media coverage and most importantly increase business.

We were pitching to the “Three Wise Men“, the key decision makers including our main point of contact, the Marketing Director. The presentation went well, there was a good level of engagement and discussion around some of the proposed initiatives. Our allocated time ran well over due to the level of interaction, which is always a good thing as long as it is constructive.

The presentation came to an end and as we left we could see one of our competitors waiting  outside ready to make their pitch. Apparently in total the Three Wise Men were taking proposals from three different agencies.

About a week later I received a call from the Marketing Director to pop down to have a “finalisation” chat – it looked like we were in!! I had been quietly confident but in this world nothing surprises me so I never get carried away with it.

I met with him and sure enough Fuzion were chosen and now it was all about getting the whole plan going. As we relaxed over lunch I asked the Marketing Director how he would have summarised each of the different pitches – I would never ask for copies but I must admit I was curious as to how each of us was different. We are never really in a position to find this out so I was bursting to get a fresh perspective on content, substance, style and delivery.

He opened up …. “Well, each of the presentations were quite different. One was very fancy, with bells and whistles and a little gimmicky, another was nod nod, wink wink, we know everyone, we will promise you great coverage and yours was somewhere in between!” …. what a summary!

He wasn’t finished, and this was the part that totally blew me away .. “Each of the three of us preferred a different presentation so in the end they left it up to me to decide and I chose Fuzion as for me you were clearly what we were looking for” … there wasn’t even a consensus!

There was a big lesson for me in all of this – we are all different and have different styles, likes and dislikes, we have different backgrounds and different collective experiences, we come from different places and carry different viewpoints and prejudices and even when you have broken your back on a proposal and think you are in prime position it often doesn’t matter – sometimes they just like the other guy!

A week later we got a call to say that the arrangement had to be cancelled as the place went into receivership..

Great win for Fuzion!

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion

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Posted in Hospitality, Positivity, PR | 4 Comments »

Facebook Business Page Changes – March 2012

March 23, 2012

We thought we should put out a blog post dedicated to Facebook seeing as it has been going through a few major changes that will affect everyone that has a Facebook business page.

If you haven’t embraced the changes they are due to be imposed on you on the  31st March.

With over 1.8 million people using Facebook in Ireland we would suggest that every business should be being proactive about the platform. In this article we will take you through some of the business page changes and the impact of these.

We will also discuss the running of competitions and how to generate more interest  in your page.

The biggest change of all will be the new Facebook philosophy – since  the Initial Public Offering in February 2012 Facebook will now be under pressure to deliver financially for its investors.

We will see the platform becoming more and more monetised and we predict that many of the tricks and gimmicks that we have all been using to boost our page fan numbers will be outlawed and in future if you want to do this you will have to advertise – pure and simple.

Facebook need to start delivering for their investors and will have to manage the balance between maintaining a credible and enjoyable social platform and a place where advertising will be pushed more on all of us.

This change of dynamic will affect how we use Facebook and the March changes are the first big hint of this.

Business Page Changes

The whole look and feel of your Facebook business page (personal profile pages have already changed) will change totally on the 31st March and some of your previous features will not work any longer.

You will need to do a few things to maximise the opportunities here. Besides some new visual changes a timeline has also been introduced where at a glance you can view a chronological history of posts on the page.

Our view is that these changes if embraced properly will deliver an even more impactful page for your business.

(For those of you operating your business from a personal page we would advise changing over immediately as this is not allowed – it is possible to convert from one to the other with friends coming across as fans).

Visual

Your own key visual identity will be delivered by two key visuals.

A (see image above) – Thumbnail

Your thumbnail will more than likely be your company logo and this appears on the bottom left of the main image that a viewer will see on your page. This should be 180 x 180 pixels in size.

Every time the page owner makes a post this thumbnail will appear alongside the post.

B (see image above) – Cover

The main banner image is a new feature introduced by Facebook. It is referred to as a “cover” and it stretches above the thumbnail across the page. This image can be a maximum of 851 pixels wide by 315 pixels high.

Facebook have very specific rules about the content of the “cover page”.

It should be an image that captures the business as best as possible but must not include offers, contact details, web address or any “like” us text. The basic logic here is that this information is available elsewhere on the Facebook page.

Starbucks on Facebook

It is clear that the new rules prevent the business from advertising or encouraging the user to “like” the page on this cover page.

Our design team are currently preparing new cover pages for a number of clients.

This is a really good opportunity to make your page stand out from competitor pages – grab it!

Landing Page

Before it was possible to specify a “landing page” (see example below) that a new user on your business page was directed to when they first visited.

This was often a customised and highly visual promotional landing page, which encouraged likes, promoted the business or offered the user the opportunity to enter competitions.

Facebook landing pages

This is not possible now using the new layouts and these customised landing pages will be redundant. It is still possible to have a tab that will host competitions and promotions but you can no longer dictate that a user of the page will “land” on this page.

Menu tabs

The menu tabs that were available on the old format on the left hand side of the page are now displayed as tabs in the main display just below (see Starbucks example above) the new cover visual.

It is only possible to display four tabs across the page. The other tabs/applications are available from the right of these displayed tabs by selecting the “down arrow”.

At any time it is only possible to display a maximum of 12 tabs/applications. It is possible to select your own choice of tabs to display on the main page except for photos, which will always display first.

You can do this by clicking on the “down arrow” which will display all the tabs. From here you can swap between tabs that you wish are displayed in the main view.

Posting

You can post as normal but there are a few new features.


Pinning a post – It is now possible to pin a post, which effectively means it will be featured and stay at the top of the page for 7 days.

Other subsequent posts will appear below this post in the stream. This is done by selecting the “pin to top” option (see visual above) that is available to you at the top right corner of each post. You would use this to position your most important post at the top of a page for each new visitor to see first.

Star post – when you “star” a post it will stretch across the full display instead of appearing on the left as a normal post. This will give that post more prominence on the page and it is very useful if you have posts with a lot of content.

Hide/delete post – it is now possible to hide a post (& unhide after if required). When you hide a post it will still display in the  “activity log” as a post. As before it is also possible to permanently delete a post.

Change date of post – it is possible to alter the date of a post so that it will appear in a different position on your timeline.

Milestone – it is now possible to create a “milestone” post, which is a way of marking special events in the life of the business such as a product launch or key event. This feature allows you to upload a photo and specific the milestone date.

Personal User view

The display of your business page is totally customised for each user.

MadMen on facebook
When a user visits a business page their own friend’s activity with that page will appear on the right hand side (see Mad Men visual above) making their experience with the page more informed and personal.

Display View

A user can view different aspects of the business page by choosing from the menu that appears at the top of the page once you start (see image below) scrolling down.


From here the user can choose from the menu of Apps/tabs, choose from the timeline or select different types of highlights.

The timeline can also be accessed directly from the time bar on the right hand side of the page.

Messages

The messages facility is new to Facebook business pages and is a very significant development. Fans of the page can now send a “message” to the page directly if they want to communicate as an alternative to posting directly on the page (which would be visible to all users).

These messages can be viewed and responded to in/from theadmin panel (top of your page). It is possible to shut off this feature preventing fans of the page to send messages.

It is really important that messages are responded to promptly.

Other Features

There are a few new features worth mentioning.

Approval of Posts – it is possible that you can change the settings so that all posts require approval before appearing as posts on the page (this feature can be accessed by going to the  Admin Panel, choosing Manage Page tab, Edit Page, Manage Permissions menu)

Activity Log – from the admin panel it is possible to access a log of all posts by type

Insights – there is now more data available to track the success of your activities

Competitions

This is now a very tricky area for every business who has been building numbers of fans on their page by offering prizes.

The facebook guidelines are quite strict and the new format, which cuts out landing pages where businesses have typically hosted competitions will make it even more difficult.

If you want to run a compeition you will need to:

  • Host it on an app/separate canvas page
  • State clearly that it is not endorsed by Facebook
  • Ensure that the entry criteria does not involve a Facebook activity such as “liking”,”sharing” or “commenting” – for example it could involve answering a question
  • Ask each entrant to give seperate contact details
  • Inform the winner independently of Facebook (by email or phone)
  • Only announce the winner on Facebook once they have been informed and have given their permission

Rozanne Stevens Cookery School
The competition can be mentioned on the wall of the page but cannot be featured on the page.

It would be an idea to mention the competition in a post and then to pin the post to the top of the page, keeping it there above other posts for at least 7 days.

Winning on Facebook

So – with all of these restrictions how can you build your numbers on your Facebook business page and really start engaging with fans?

Facebook Like Button
Content, content, content is the answer…

Without any big fancy tricks or gimmicks you need to give fans good reasons for coming onto your page.

Maybe it will be ..

Because they like you and like what you say

Because they are the first to learn about new products, events and sales?

Because you ask for their opinion and they enjoy giving it

Because you say really interesting things that they enjoy

Because they learn things from your page

Because you give good advice, provide useful tips and information

Because you are really funny and cheer them up

Because you run good competitions and promotions

Because you operate a really great business and they want to express their thanks – a live testimonial!

Because there are really useful Apps on the page

Because they want to feel part of something special

Its important that you achieve all of this through regular posts that are varied, visually interesting and not at all “spam like”.

Over 29.2 million people “like” the Starbucks business page – that’s a lot of coffee drinkers!

“Like” – If you want to boost your page numbers think of this simple word!

While we are having this conversation why not Like the Fuzion Facebook page – we need to catch up with Starbucks!

Social Media Training

If you require assistance with your Facebook activity or any other aspect of your Social Media presence including your overall strategy, blogging, Twitter or LinkedIn use please give us a call.

Fuzion provide Social Media Consultancy, one to one training and run courses for various organisations incuding the Enterprise Boards and the Digital Marketing Institute.

Your 31st March to-do list

We have mentioned a lot of issues and changes but the main things that you need to concern yourself with for the 31st March are:

  • Maximise your visual opportunity through a customised cover age (851 x 315 pixels)
  • Decide on the tabs that you wish are displayed on the main page
  • Review your settings that allow visitors to post
  • Decide if you wish to allow fans to leave messages

Until next time.. keep liking !!

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion

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Posted in Facebook, Social Media, Training | 19 Comments »

Happy Birthday Twitter! .. Valuable or Waste of time?

March 20, 2012

Jack Dorsey - Twitter

Happy Birthday Twitter

Happy Birthday Twitter..

On the 21st March 2006 founder Jack Dorsey sent the very first tweet and six years on while it is growing in popularity it is probably still the most misunderstood of the popular social media platforms.

When we run our Social Media courses the results are nearly all the same , pretty much everyone is using Facebook at some level and just a very few are using twitter. I would safely guess that a maximum of  20% of social media users are actively using twitter.

Is this failure, is this most people deciding that it is irrelevant, is this most people not understanding how to use twitter or is it an absolute gem that is yet to be discovered by the mainstream?

At Fuzion we take it really seriously because we see the value of it for us and for our clients but we do understand the difficulty that people have with it. By it’s nature it is looser than the other platforms with pretty much anyone being able to follow anyone, your messages are more public capable of being picked up by anyone searching and then there is the business of hash tags, re-tweeting and #FF, that’s Follow Friday, by the way!

Added to that everything is quite limited, how many characters (you have 15 characters in your twitter “handle”) in your unique identity, how many characters you are allowed in a post, how much information (literally describe yourself in 160 characters) you can include in your bio – it’s just different, different enough to scare users off initially before they get to experience the real magic.

The whole experience is very different and in many ways it is attracting quite a different type of user – often a curious individual who loves getting involved in discussions and who loves giving an opinion! Many of these users seem to leave Facebook behind as they find the twitter experience more enriching.

In the last year we have seen the interface and some of the functionality improve and the numbers using the platform have continued to increase.

Most recently Twitter was in the news for how it played such a starring (and deceptive) role during the Presidential elections in Ireland – while this highlights a risk around how people process information without source verification it also shows the instant and incredible power that it has today.

I won’t start giving a lesson on how to use twitter but I will share with you my Top 10 reasons why we think you should consider embracing it for you and your business –

1. Branded Chit Chat – on twitter you can choose an identity for yourself and every time you post, your “identity” carries with you, it’s like advertising in a subliminal way @prguru. Guess what service that person provides? Even if you are chatting about the latest Liverpool game your identity travels with you.

2. Viral “ability” – of all the social media platforms twitter is the very best for passing on information. The retweet facility makes this possible. I pass the message to my followers, them to theirs and so on. Uninteresting posts will not be retweeted but interesting ones will be, remember Simon Coveney’s, famous Brian Cowen post? Simon Coveney did not have many followers when he tweeted that information, it didn’t matter.

3. Innovators and Early Adoptors – Seth Godin in his famous book the Purple Cow talks about a typical product cycle and he stresses the importance of targeting people who love new things. These are the people who love to try new things out and then tell their friends, they are generally naturally curious and are often the ones who are vital for spreading the word – before you know it when enough people have heard about “that” new product it enters the mainstream, where volume starts kicking in.

If you have a new product or service you will find many of these innovators and early adoptors are already using twitter- makes sense if you think about it?

4. Avoiding the Crowd – Facebook has the advantage of so many users and it is really powerful as a result. However it is a pretty crowded space with more businesses joining it the whole time competing for people’s attention. The chances are that your competitors are already up and running and competing with you in this space. Twitter on the other hand has not been explored to the same degree so you can steal a competitive advantage over your competitors and have more of those prospects to yourself.

5. Search – the search facility on twitter is incredible. You can use it to follow topics, to search on people discussing your business and your industry. We find it invaluable in our work with clients and in a “crisis” situation it is really useful. You can literally measure the temperature of a situation on twitter, which can be really useful if you are dealing with a tricky situation. In the last 12 months alone we have used it many times to assist us in our work with clients.

6. Read all about it! – the problem is that it is now impossible to “Read all about it” . With so many newspapers, magazines, radio and tv channels how is it possible? With twitter by following the correct media profiles on twitter you can create your own customised news feed. Everything from your favourite team (have I mentioned this is Liverpool!) to breaking news.

7. Journalists – for some reason many journalists have flocked to twitter, which probably tells it’s own story as to how they value it. If you start using it you can quite easily follow journalists who may be interested in your sector and if used correctly you will be able to learn what they are interested in and what they are writing about. Use the platform to try to build a relationship with them and then pitch your stories – make sure you build trust before you start pitching!

8. Audience – if you use twitter proactively we believe you have a good chance of building “followers” or an audience for your message very quickly, even quicker than Facebook. However, it’s up to you how you use these relationships once you gather them.

9. Relationships – we have found that the nature of the conversations is quite different and at times they are more of a “community” type – the conversations can happen between groups of people. As a result you can have quite different relationships with people. Once you are capable of holding your own on an issue or topic you will build a good reputation and also quality relationships with relevant people.

10. Fun – there can be quite a good sense of humour around using Twitter and even though your topics might be heavy you can build good relationships around lighter issues, which can ultimately lead to a listening for your key messages. My key message is don’t take yourself too seriously on twitter, have fun, build trust and build relationships – after that spread your message.

I heard a great quote by someone who attended one of our social media for business courses in Dublin recently, when comparing Facebook and Twitter – “Facebook is for interacting with people you were in school with, Twitter is for interacting with people you wish you were in school with!”  – This is a big generalisation but it does capture a little bit of the unique spirit that exists on twitter.

“Twitter is a load of rubbish, the stuff people tweet is totally useless.. who cares what people have for breakfast”

I often hear this type of argument about using twitter so I will leave you with my closing thoughts ..

Twitter is like a radio station, you tune it in by following who you want – find the channels that you like. If someone is annoying you, don’t follow them, block them, change the channel – you are the controller!

So Jack, thank you for Twitter .. I’d miss you if you weren’t there, Happy Birthday!

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion Communications

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Posted in Facebook, Marketing, Social Media, Uncategorized, Web Marketing | 12 Comments »

No, not yet and nothing at all

March 15, 2012
American Idol Judges

"Not Yet"

Another young hopeful prepares for their huge moment in front of the judges … will they get to Hollywood?

Of course the scene is set with their touching interviews ..this is what they have always dreamt of and if this doesn’t come through for them, their life will be over!

The big performance happens and then they wait for the judges verdict… The scene is set as the music plays in the background to heighten the drama and tension of this make or break moment.

This is American Idol…one by one, Randy Jackson, Jennifer Lopez and Steven Tyler give their verdicts.

Expecting to hear a simple “yes” or “no” as we have come to expect from these shows I am surprised to hear Steven Tyler, the Aerosmith legend say “not yet” to the young hopeful.

“Not yet” …I hadn’t heard that language used before on the show and it struck me that it was a really great way of rejecting the young singer in a positive manner, dealing them that dreaded news but in a way that left them feeling encouraged and that the world hadn’t ended.

I guess in the show someone had reflected on the whole Yes/No scenario and decided that there was an option and some sense of responsibility around the cold delivery of rejection – why not do it differently so that it might actually leave people feel ok about themselves and willing to possibly try again next time?

With young vulnerable people there is a particular responsibility to show encouragement even in a negative situation.

In business we all face rejection and at times we also have to do the rejecting …

“No”

“I’m not interested”

“No, it’s not for me”

“Thank you for all your efforts but unfortunately not at this time”

“Sorry, it’s not exactly what we are looking for”

“Unfortunately our budget won’t stretch that far”

– there are so many ways to say no and while it is always tough hearing it ,”not yet” or some sign of appreciation or encouragement always softens the blow.

Worse than “no” has to be the Nothing ..

Feel Good LostMy son, Brendan Canty who is new to the business world and doing really well with his music and film production company, Feel Good Lost shared some of his recent frustrations with me.

He spoke about a recent situation where he had put a fortune of work into a pitch, mocked up sample footage, presented and received encouraging feedback and then hears “nothing” back from the prospect.

He waits, he emails, he texts, he calls and despite his considerable efforts ….nothing. Then you tread a line between being pushy and just wanting some feedback. It drives him nuts, not receiving any feedback. As he says himself, he would prefer to get a clearcut “no” rather than the dreaded “nothing” treatment.

This experience bothered him so he came to me looking for some inspiration or advice … “Brendan, welcome to my world!“.

This happens in business and unfortunately it is just something that you have to live with as some people are either being rude or they just have a huge problem with saying “no”.

Is “No” better than nothing ?

Greg Canty is partner of Fuzion

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Posted in Customer Care, Marketing, Personal development, Positivity, PR, Uncategorized | 6 Comments »

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