“Three Rules of Work: Out of clutter find simplicity; From discord find harmony; In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.” (Albert Einstein)
When I work with clients on Web visibility, I define exactly what we want their social media Economy of Effort plan to engender. I define Economy of Effort in this way – taking the best content and brainshare you can provide and using it in the most efficient and economical way possible to reach your communities through online channels.
In the hype, over-hype, more hype and master hype that the social media “experts” are urging you to buy into about social media profiles, they forget to pass on the real truth that if you can’t keep up with them all, then not one of these tools serve you well.
If you’re diluting your message across hundreds or frankly even five or more social media platforms, fan pages, blogs, twitterIDs – then you’re not utilizing economy of effort in social media. And your return on investment in doing all this work will be very small.
You can’t conquer all communities, you can’t be the answer for every single question on the Web, and you can’t be active on every social media platform. And trust me, you don’t want to be either.
It’s not about the masses, it’s not about how many people are following you on Twitter, it’s about the quality, the congruency and the resources they require from you uniquely to help them.
It’s not about how many comments your blog posts are getting – it’s about setting up a structure for you to blog effectively, even if it’s just once weekly, with valuable and integrity-based content. It’s about using content to its best purpose through all your online profiles and not spending hours generating tweets, blog posts, status updates or weeping over your keyboard because you can’t possibly think of one other “tweet-worthy” thing to say.
Instead, it is about using your efforts wisely. Pick three goals and focus your online efforts toward those.
(HINT: Make it a goal to attract journalists, media and peer publications to your blog or your profiles, so you become a valued expert for them, without the need for PR gatekeepers, agencies and pitches full of pablum to mass media lists.)
Keep in mind all your goals should focus on supporting your community with grace and respect for their time as well as yours. Your community is always more important than you. Your community, by this point, is most likely sick of being interrupted by your Flickr, YouTube, blog posts and incessant tweeting.
We would all be served better if we decided to incorporate what Einstein said, “Out of clutter find simplicity; From discord find harmony; In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.”
How to do that?
1. Out of clutter find simplicity – Start slow with your social media efforts. I suspect many of you are already suffering from what I’ve termed “Post-Traumatic Social Media Disorder” and so for you, I would advise you “socialdown” immediately. I know it sounds hard, but you can do it. If you’ve got twenty places you’re juggling online, reduce them to five. Message them so they know where you’ll be and why you’re doing it, and believe me, the ones who really value you will “socialdown” right along with you. In fact, you’ll inspire them to take this step themselves.
Think of it in terms of downsizing, social media belt tightening so to speak. There’s not enough time in the day to do everything well, and keep our work life balance where it should be, so choose to no longer be trapped by ”tiny shiny social media” tools.
2. From discord find harmony – Incorporate a strategic and congruent plan for your brand and your online conversations. Not just superficial junk, make sure that every single thing you’re doing counts for something. Not only counts, but brings you harmony with your community. And most importantly, brings you harmony in your life. Stop being in front of the computer 24/7. Get off the Blackberries, iPhones, laptops, YouTube and walk outside.
3. In the middle of difficulty, lies opportunity – I feel your pain. I feel your panic about what you might be missing out there if you’re not online all the time and you’re not on all these platforms. That difficulty – that pain- will pass. Give yourself six months and you’ll recognize that it’s nice to see the sun again, it’s nice to not be in constant social media panic mode, it’s nice to have a plan and follow it. Congruently, abundantly and with boundaries.
Sieze the opportunities, I promise you’ll find, if you’ll choose to set yourself free from being everywhere online.
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5 Ways to Kiss Your Publicist Goodbye And Pitch Your Book Online:
1. You’ve compiled your list of bloggers to reach out to. You’ve read their blogs, followed their blogs or websites and know the kind of books they like to highlight or review.
2. You demand coverage or review of your blog in an ALLCAPS email to them. (Ok…no you don’t.) What you do instead is send them a brief email pitch like this one below:
DEAR (NAME) (real name!):
I’ve been reading your blog and know that you review business books on networking and I wanted to see if you might consider a review copy of my new book, “Accidental Networking.” (PUBLISHER, 2010)
BRIEF PARAGRAPH ABOUT THE BOOK HERE – this paragraph would answer WHY, WHAT and HOW.
a. Why the book is important and different than other books out there
b. What the book details very briefly and its target audience
c. How their blog readership will benefit from the book and the blogger sharing it with them.
Here is a link to the book and my site for more information.
Thank you and please let me know if you’re interested in seeing the book.
END
3. You wait patiently for their response. You give them time to consider the book before you followup with another email. You don’t email every hour, you don’t send them chocolates, wine or fervent pleas about how they must cover your book on their blog. You don’t comment on their blog about how they must cover your book. You just wait. Wait, wait, wait.
4. If you’ve not heard back from them within 2 weeks of your first pitch, you make one more pitch to them. It looks like this.
Dear NAME,
Just wanted to reach out once more and see if you’ve had time to consider the possibility of reviewing my book, “Accidental Networking,” , it was most recently reviewed here – LINK TO REALLY GOOD UNBIASED REVIEW (not one your mom wrote) – and I hope you might take a look at it too.
I know you’re probably inundated with pitches, so I appreciate your time in considering it.
Thank you.
Your NAME
END
4. They respond to you and say they’d love to read the book and you SEND it! You also note in the email that you would be happy to provide them a ready-made Q&A or a book for giveaway to their readership if they feel that would be appropriate.
5. You go back to your target Excel sheet (where I know you’re keeping all your outreach lists organized) and you mark that blogger as IN PROCESS and you go to the next blogger. Also keep in mind that you’re always compiling a new list of 20 bloggers, tweeters or websites that you can reach out to.
Bonus: The blogger reviews your book and you link to that review in your blog, thank the blogger via the comments on their blog and feel grateful that you’ve garnered another review.
Bonus: You start all over again. You don’t give up. You keep pitching, researching and of course thanking anyone who takes time to cover your book!
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7 Ways to Kiss Your Publicist Goodbye
1. Make your site a mini-magazine issue of thought-leadership. Look at your site as though it’s a real publication for both your peers and the media to source for news. Build an editorial calendar for all your online tools including Twitter, Linkedin.com (status updates), Facebook and make sure you’re congruent in your content and your expertise.
2. Make sure you’re linking outside your blog to other news sources and stories by journalists. As a recovering technology journalist (1996-2004) I can tell you that all journalists love to have their names or links to stories, surface in Google alerts and they really love to show those to their editor as well. You’re also giving them new sources of experts to look at when you write about stories they’ve covered and what your take is on the story.
3. Build a set of Google alerts on topics you’re most interested in and let those Google alerts give you ideas for new pieces of content on your blog, your Twitter and your Facebook pages. Don’t just stop at posting those story links, go and comment on the stories at the sites they’re on and that will help you with building link-love to your site.
4. Don’t purposely be contrarian to the news. Be the person who lends a new angle or insight to a story.
5. Make sure you’re reading the online and offline magazines in your vertical and studying how their stories are created, who they source and where you can contribute bylines.
6. Have a website that encompasses a Web 2.0 press ready page. This includes your TwitterID, Facebook, Linkedin.com, YouTube channel and one pager about your expertise.
7. Put Google alerts on journalists’ names so you can build a clip file of what they’re covering and who they write for. More and more the online media is made up of freelance writers so don’t leave them out of the mix.
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1. Journalists are curious and under very tight deadlines. You can write all the content you want on your blog, Twitter account, Facebook but if you don’t work at making it interesting, enticing and engaging they won’t source it.
2. Who the top reviewers Amazon are for your genre. Get them yourself by doing a search on Amazon or actually just hit this link where you’ll find the list.
3. What journalists to follow on Twitter. You can find them on your own by hitting sites like Muckrack.com and using Google search to search Twitter IDs.
4. How to engage your fans on Facebook – the secret is post often, post thoughtful content, post responses to comments and just when you think you’ve done enough – post even more.
5. What the names of producers are at major television shows. Ok, here’s the thing, the PR firm won’t tell you even if you do pay them, so one thing you can do is join a site like MediaBistro.com and watch the comings and goings in news staff and compile your list from there. You can also use google search and search on terms like, “Producer Anderson Cooper show” or “NPR Morning Edition producer.”
6. Who the top bloggers or online book reviewers are in your book’s genre. For this one use Google, Technorati and do searches like “book blog reviews” or “cookbook reviews” or “business book review”. You can also apply this to Twitter searches as well.
7. That you matter. Too often we forget that our ideas, our expertise can contribute something greater to the discussion and sometimes our PR firm can forget that as well. Make your ideas actionable, news-peg worthy, future focused and you will find media that is interested in it.
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One of the things an author must avoid no matter how famous or unknown is the disease of “Don’ttheyknowwhoiamitis“.
Flickr photo courtesy of Via Mio
The symptoms of this deadly and narcissistic disease include the following:
1. Author does not believe they need to continue doing outreach after their book has been out for six months, because everyone should already know who they are and desperately want the book.
2. Author does not think it’s necessary to register their profile on new niche sites that might elevate their visibility and help them reach out to a new community of folks.
3. Author says their online guru “manages all that web 2.0 stuff and they don’t need to keep track of it or know what is being posted.”
4. Author believes the term “online guru” really means something.
5. Author is too busy to thank any bloggers for covering their book.
6. Author doesn’t want to send out hand-signed copies for book giveaways because book give-aways are only for lessor authors.
7. Author spends time blogging snarky posts on their blog about how they are the smarter than everyone else.
8. Author never responds to comments on their own blog or even bothers to link to outside bloggers.
9. Author thinks the media, the blogosphere and the twitter denizens will follow them JUST BECAUSE.
10. Author believes book marketers who tell him/her it’s all about impressions, click-throughs and long copy – not about valuable content, elevating the discussion and empowering the vertical.
If you are felled by any of these symptoms, please make certain to address them immediately so they do not become a full-fledged online affliction.
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