Insights for Running Better Business

Most of us are familiar with hashtags on Twitter. Maybe there's a chance you found this blog post from the #scrm hashtag I used in my Tweet about it. On Twitter hashtags are a way of creating ad-hoc communities or discussions organized around a certain topic, like social CRM. Or the NHL. Or some political movement. Need a quick and dirty idea how sentiments are trending on a certain topic? Follow the hashtag.

The biggest mistake people make about trying to sell online is reasoning "people who want to buy X can be found in social groups devoted to X." Yes, you and 2,000 other merchants have thought about that. And you're all in that social group waiting for some potential customer to join. And then everyone pounces on the poor guy with their pitch.

You want people to follow you. The best way to get someone to follow you is to follow them first. Or re-tweet or favorite something they've tweeted. Or do all three. I've said it before here in the Roo blog but let me repeat: sometimes the best way for people to think you're interesting is if you find them interesting first. Following, re-tweeting, and favoriting tweets is one way to signal such interest. But that's only step one. People do not spend much time deciding who to follow back. There's a considerable body of research in both traditional marketing and online marketing about the very, very small window of opportunity you have to get someone's attention.

Many small businesses lend themselves to the informal, personal touch. People understand Instagram is not the product of a big media campaign. It's street level. It's a merchant's on-the-spot snapshot of the here and now. You are proud of your office, your building, your warehouse. These things don't really lend themselves to web sites or marketing materials. But Instagram lets you get out these slice-of-business-life snapshots in a way that doesn't seem crass. Keep the photo caption verbiage to a minimum and raw/authentic.

Following a person or following a person back is a first step. But replying to their tweets actually raises your influence with them. Raising influence is about building personal relationships and the perception of a personal relationship. It takes time. Using a robot to follow/unfollow people to build numbers is a complete waste of time.

The most powerful trend these days in communicating information is the "infographic". As the name implies, it's communicating information using images. Anyone who has ever witnessed a political race knows how powerful a pie chart or bar chart can be ("Number babies my opponent eats per month"). Good infographics take it to the next level, presenting complex information in ways that are easy to digest and scales/relationships can be quickly grasped.

Don't despair if you're looking to leverage wiki to increase your business's exposure. The first thing to remember is Wikipedia is the big show. Having a bat and ball doesn't mean you can join the Yankees. Or even the Blue Jays. Businesses that get their own page tend to be notable. Notable means a lot of "dead tree" press coverage, usually of the national sort. Until you're being covered by your local daily paper, CNET, and a few blogs or news websites that Wikipedia considers notable enough, don't even try to get your company written up in Wikipedia.

In BlueCamroo, Leads are what I like to call "the big slush pile". The Leads section is where you enter your first contacts. Got a business card at a trade show? Saw someone on Twitter? Someone filled out a Send Me Information form on your web site? Got an inquiry to your info@mycompany.com email? These are all leads. And they can all be captured easily and in the later two cases automatically by BlueCamroo.

I'm glad you asked. Not many of us have in-house talent or resources to create the next Angry Birds (it cost Rovia about $200,000 to develop the game). That doesn't mean, however, you can't think creatively about producing free digital content that can have spin off benefits.